A heartwarming award

I received this wonderful award from Margie. I can't thank you enough Margie! It is an honor to receive this from you.

The rules of the award are to select 5 people that I think deserve this award. There are so many people who deserve this award that picking out just 5 is going to be extremely hard.

Here are the 5 wonderful ladies that I have chosen for this award:

Nic
Heather
Mylene
Stephanie
Kelly or here

I wanted to add everyone that I have listed in my blog list but there are wayyyyy too many of them. I'd still be typing this post in July LOL.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Goodness....three posts in one week!!!!!!!

SAL from Oakhaven Designs Group

Have I said lately how much I love this group?!?! Tonia is a wonderful person and her designs are just adorable. I plan on purchasing the mystery SAL that they did back in August as soon as I get some extra $$. Go on over and check it out, if you like purple you will LOVE that SAL.

I finished the January part for the SAL that I was talking about a post or two ago. I'm not too sure I like the silver filament that I paired with the white floss for the snowman but I do like how it turned out on the snowflakes. I just didn't think about the color of the fabric back in October/November when we first heard about it and I grabbed what I had in my stash and cut it to size the same day we heard about it! I had to come up with something to go with the white so it wouldn't get lost in the background. I think perhaps I should have gone with a lighter silver or perhaps a blue. I didn't have a blue so I went with the darkest silver I had in my stash. I think I need to go on a stash buying spree (sale items if possible) as soon as I get some extra cash in and get some more material and different types of floss.

I have received the pattern for the February part so I will be starting on that sometime today or tomorrow. Probably tomorrow as the kids will be home soon as it's only half a day of school today. They had Friday and Monday off, went to school yesterday and only had half day today. I think they should have pushed the half day to another week don't you?!?! Once I finish the February I will jump back on my Autumn (Four Season SAL) and try to get that done so I will have only one more season to do and that will be completed. Then I get to figure out how to finish it. Any suggestions??

Happy Wednesday everyone!

An Award

Thank you Kelly for the nomination!

I am to list 5 of my addictions and list 5 bloggers who I think are fabby. So here goes:

Addictions:

My family
Cross stitching
Reading
Chocolate
Coffee

Now it's your turn to do the same on your blog. Claim your awards ladies!

Sharon
Robin
Nic
Beatrice
Cindy

Update

Another Christmas finish; started in December but finished beginning of January.

Autumn of the Four Season SAL

As promised from about a month ago, here are the pictures of the stitching I had been doing. I finished the Christmas one and am still plugging along on the Four Season SAL from last year. I also have another SAL that just started on the Oakhaven Designs group. I'm chomping at the bit to get this one started as I got the fabric ready as soon as I heard about it back in October/November.

The kids are home again today but will be heading back to school tomorrow. Since the weather will be extremely cold again tonight; believe they said upper 20's here, I will be skipping the therapy for tomorrow morning. It seems my van doesn't like the cold. It has been having transmission issues every once in a while where it will go in reverse but when I put it in drive it has to wait a minute or two and then it will work. On Thursday I tried to take it to run errands but it really gave me major fits so I just parked it and had hubby do them. On Friday evening I tried to go get my hair cut but when I tried to start the mustang it was dead. It barely clicked when I tried to turn it on. Hopefully it's just the cold bothering the transmission and the battery cables on these cars because if not, it's going to be fun here for the next month or so while we wait for income tax money! We've been planning on using the money we get back to take care of any issues with both vehicles so I'm hoping they continue to behave until after that time.

Plans for this week are to get caught up with everything that got pushed back because the kids were home and then get caught up on some stitching. I hope to have the January part of the Oakhaven SAL done so I can post a picture. The SAL is closed but she will sell the pattern after it's completed. If anyone is interested in joining go here. I haven't been able to get much stitching done these past couple of weeks and I'd really like to get back to at least an hour a night. Any less than that and I feel like I'm having withdrawals. LOL

What a wonderful day!

Logan

Marie

Katie

Ryan

Christmas at our house was the best ever this year! Both boys really were aware of what was going on. This is the first time that Logan participated in opening presents on his own. Last year we had them in their respective areas and gave them gifts and allowed them to open at the same time and I just grabbed pics after it was done. This year, something told me we needed to do one present at a time. Of course, the old video recorder wasn't working as the battery was so dead, there was no resuscitating it. I had my handy little digital camera on from the time we started until the last gift was unwrapped and the battery died right after that! I didn't even have enough juice to take pictures when my Mom got here a few hours later. I took pictures as they were unwrapping so I probably ended up with five to six pictures per gift. LOL

Back to Logan, he surprised me by grabbing the very first gift and ripping the paper. He was what I'd call a "neat ripper". He'd pull a piece of paper off, throw it on the floor and move on to the next area until the entire gift was done. (Later he handed each piece to me or Marie so it wouldn't make a mess!) It was such a sight! Last year it was like pulling teeth to get him to unwrap. I had to help him the entire time and after a few presents I had Marie open them for him. What a difference a year makes!

Ryan was into unwrapping this year too and for a three year old, he did pretty good. You could tell he has sensory issues by the way he'd start flicking his fingers if the paper didn't come off quick enough. (Got stuck to his fingers, what a sight it was when the tape got stuck to him!!LOL) He loved all his Thomas the Train toys and all of Logan's too! He was really getting into it by the end and reached over the gate and grabbed a gift and started ripping it open. I was laughing so hard I almost dropped the camera. Logan didn't mind it at all, by that time, he was OVER the whole scene and just wanted to play with his Learn Through Music. Yeah, that toy was from three years ago and he had it in his lap or by his side the ENTIRE TIME. He serenaded us with different music for the entire time. He liked his new toys and had them neatly placed around his area but would always go back to playing with his old toy.

The girls had a blast opening gifts. Katie was loving all the Barbie's she received and Marie loved her new Video Now player with the mini DVD's that she got to play on it. Of course, she also loved Katie's Barbie guitar and had Katie playing with that as soon as it was out of the box. I think Marie was more concerned with Katie getting to open all her stuff then she was about her own things. What a great big sister she is; they may fight like little wildcats but they really love each other! Oh and what a treat we had!!! Logan was singing some Christmas carols; Jingle Bells, Santa Claus is Coming to Town and Feliz Navidad. Of course, you couldn't understand all the words but some came out clear as day and he had the tunes to each song down to a science. I've tried to get him on tape but you know how that goes! Every time I get near him with the camera he stops singing. What a little character he is, hamming it up UNTIL the camera is on him.

Merry Christmas!

I've been very lax with keeping my blog up-to-date lately but after the holidays I promise to get back to my weekly posts. (if not more!)

I just wanted to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and Happy, Healthy and Prosperous New Year! I hope that everyone gets to spend the holidays with family and friends and that you get to rest a little too. We are staying home and are going to have a wonderful time. Once the kids open up all the gifts from Santa (or bags of coal which ever they receive) we will relax in our jammies watching movies and playing with the new toys. Dinner will be chili and cornbread with some sandwiches, YUMMO! The hardest part of the meal will be the chopping of the onion then browning it and the meat.

Have a wonderful night tonight and day tomorrow!!

Oops!

Katie was helping me clean but decided she was too tired to finish!

It looks like Ryan is counting for Hide-and-Seek but he's asleep!

I had to get to get this picture; usually this little guy is almost naked when he hits the door after school. Shoes, socks and shirts come off as soon as the door is shut. I think he hates all clothes except for pants and I'm not too sure sometimes about them. LOL

I have been stitching just not a lot these past couple of weeks so I don't have any pictures to show. I'll take a quick shot later and post it soon. I didn't realize it had been so long since my last post. My how time flies when you're having fun! It also doesn't help that any time I try to sit down to do a post Ryan decides that he wants to snuggle with Mommy.

I still haven't put up the Christmas decorations yet. I know, very bad Mommy!! I was thinking about it yesterday when hubby was home but he decided to put up the light fixtures in the kids rooms. Since I'd been waiting on that for almost four years I wasn't about to say no! I did start today to go through all their current toys and weed out what they don't play with or have outgrown. I have quite a big bundle that will be offered up to a local freecycle group today after I finish going through everything. That's the first step in preparing for Christmas in this house; weed through to make room for new. I also need to clear out a space for the tree and redo the infant gates. Yes, even though my youngest will be three in February I still have infant gates in place and will continue to until they stop tearing up my books and everything else! I have to get back in that area and pull stuff (garage here we come!!) so I can vaccum in preparation for our tree which I'm bound and determined will go up tomorrow. I want to get as much as I can done before the older two get home so that we can start putting the ornaments up on the tree together. I always loved that part of decorating as a child; listening to carols, drinking hot cocoa and just having fun with the family.

I believe we are completely done with the shopping for the family so after the decorating comes the wrapping of presents. I so don't want to do what I did last year and sit on the floor for hours while I wrapped all the gifts. Who am I kidding, I got so tired by the third hour I picked items and just slapped some stickers with their names on them and had DH put them under the tree. The kids had a ball unwrapping gifts but also loved being able to see some so truly it didn't matter. Since hubby's family didn't wrap things from Santa we have compromised and wrap half so I can live with that.