Happy Thanksgiving

I have so much to be thankful for ... great family and friends. I hope you all have a wonderful turkey day!

and we have a winner of my 4th Blogiversary ... Congratulations Sharon (itsdaffycat). I'll be emailing you this weekend. Thanks everyone for all the lovely comments you left ... warms my heart *smile*

Hugs, Michele

Sunday Night ...

Hope everyone had a great weekend ... are you all ready for Thanksgiving? I can't believe it's only a few days away. I love Thanksgiving ... family, football and good food ... what's not to love! lol Last week Monica (my daughter-in-law) came over for a visit and brought me the cutest fabric pumpkins for Thanksgiving ... if you remember I shared some pictures of pumpkins she made for Halloween ... she's getting really good at making them ... they look so cute on my kitchen table.
Last week I finished BBD's Waiting For The Harvest ... I liked stitching this design until I got the my initials. My initials were too wide for the original design, so I stitched to keep the design square ... I really wish I'd left the initials off, for found a small alphabet ... funny how you can be in love with a design when you start on it, but my the end of it you are just kinda ho hum about it ...

Blackbird Design's Waiting For the Harvest

fabric - misc piece of linen

floss - GAST Dark Chocolate

I finished this cute design by Ladybug Lane Design ... it was in the 2010 JCS Ornament issue ... it was a really fun stitch ...

Joy ornament by Ladybug Designs

fabric - misc fabric

floss - Victorian Motto - Burgandy

I started this sweet design Friday and finished it on Saturday ... I just LOVE it! It's a freebie from Tanya, The Sampler Girl ... I can't wait to finish it and enjoy it for Christmas this year ... thanks Tanya for the freebie!

Christmas Eve freebie by The Sampler Girl

fabric - hand dyed by Staci

floss - dmc

Don't forget my 4th Blogiversary giveaway ... drawing is on the 24th ... just leave a comment on my blogiversary post ... Good Luck!

I hope you find your Joy in your stitches ...

I'm grateful for time with my stitching girlfriends ...

Guess Who's 4 Today??

That would be my blog is 4 years old today! And what a fun 4 years this has been. I have really really enjoyed blogging, even when I don't feel like I have very much to say. The stitching/blogging community is such a wonderful group of women. I've made some wonderful friends and I've been lucky enough to meet a lot of you in person ... it's been a great 4 years! And in honor of my blogiversary I'd like to do a little giveaway. This is my favorite time of year so I'm thinking my giveaway will have all kinds of fun Christmasy things in it ... I have the perfect Christmas basket picked out and I'll be stuffing it with all kinds of fun stuff ... maybe even some chocolate :) So all you have to do is leave a comment on this post, make sure your email address is available so I can let you know if you win. Thanks for making my first 4 years wonderful!

Edited 11/18 to add ... I forgot to put a date that I will be drawing the winner's name lol ... I'll do the drawing on the 24th ... leave a comment on this post if you want to be entered in the drawing.

Now a few Myrtle Beach pictures ... just to show you that we really do stitch at stitching retreats ... here's a couple of pictures of starts and finishes ... KarenAZ started and finished this cute Halloween design by Cherry Wood Design Studio. It's called Halloween Ribbon and is just adorable!

Diane started and finished Turkey Time by Lizzie*Kate and she's sooo excited to be done with it!

I started this design ... It's Blackbird Designs Waiting for the Harvest. I'm using GAST Dark Chocolate on a very yummy piece of linen ...

look at this messy messy work area!

and how can I leave out these great pictures of my stitching friends ... here's ChrisNC, Myra and Toni

I love this picture! Some of my oldest dearest stitching friends ... Laurie, me, Char, Theresa, Beth, Patti and Karen ... love you ladies!

more smiling faces ...

and some gifts from my dear friends ... Karen gave me this lovely chart of Christmas ornaments, complete with the board, floss and felt, some beads (red of course! lol) and a stitch charm that is hanging on my keyring ...

Chris gave both Karen and I this fun witch chart ... we drooled over it back in July when we all went to the stitching retreat in Tulsa ... and she remembered how much we loved it!
and from Sharon I got this hysterical bag! I will always remember who I got this from! Love ya Sharon *smile*

Thanks for letting me share with you my friends and our stitching retreat ... now I can't wait til next year!

I hope you find your Joy in your stitches ...

I'm grateful for time with my stitching girlfriends ...

I'm so spoiled ...

and so overwhelmed by the thoughtfulness of stitchers and bloggers ... my mailbox was full these last couple of days ... look what arrived ...

This lovely arrived from Lisa. She had my name for Round 6 on the Lizzie Kate Exchange blog. She stitched part of Lizzie*Kate's Thankful Sampler and finished it into this adorable pinkeep. Don't you just love the ribbon! I need to find some of that :) It now sits on my kitchen window ledge for all to see ...

Shelleen had messaged me the other day saying that a little gift was on it's way to me ... today arrived this wonderful coffee calendar! Yep Shelleen knows me all too well *smile* Here's the back of it so you can see all the different coffee and tea cups ... I just love it! and can't wait for 2011 to get here so I can use it ... I think it might go to work with me ...

This package really surprised me ... it's from Faye and Karen who I got to meet last month in Myrtle Beach ... we've been blogging and exchanging this last year and it was just a joy to meet them in person. The little card said this was a thank you from both of them for the little gifts KarenAZ and I brought to Myrtle Beach with us ... here's a picture of the wonderful fabric they sent ... I can't wait to stitch some Christmas designs to go with them, they are lovely!!

and here's a picture of the gifts we took to MB with us ... Karen made the pin cushions and pins for them, I made the scissor fobs ...

Jan had my name for the Seasonal Exchange blog Autumn Round. The design is from The Prairie Schooler "October" leaflet ... it's stitched so nice and finished beautifully into a tin scissor/needle holder ... I was so excited to see it because I don't have a tin like this ... how cute is this!

Thank you everyone for your wonderful gifts and exchanges ... you guys are the greatest!

Hope everyone has a great weekend! I'll be back with the last of my pictures from Myrtle Beach soon :)

I hope you find your Joy in your stitches ...

I'm grateful for time with my stitching girlfriends ...