Spring and Exchanges ...

Happy May to you all! Did anyone get flowers on their doorsteps on May Day? I remember making paper cones our of colored paper, picking flowers out of the back yard, putting them in the paper cones and hanging them on the door knobs of some of my favorite neighbors ... sometimes they were filled with grass and dandelions lol .. what fond memories I have of the 1st of May :)

Last week I didn't stitch on my rotation pieces ... instead I finished up an exchange and then stitched a couple of fun quick spring stitches ... now to get them finish finished! First one is Fresh Spring by Homespun Samplar. The bunny is stitched with GAST Maple Sugar and the rest of it is stitched with an unknown GAST color. Quite a while ago I bought some of GAST's special edition sets. Unfortunately I didn't know that the floss tags for each color, didn't have the color name on them, and I threw out the list before realizing it ... owell, they are still pretty colors and nice to stitch with ...

Next up is a freebie by The Stitcherhood ... the fabric looks purple'y in this picture, but it's just a nice neutral ... I do love the DMC purple and green for this one ...


I have two exchanges to show off to you too ... I received this lovely floss tag from KarenSC for the Lizzie Kate exchange I'm in ... I love this spring design! Sooo colorful and Karen did a great job on the floss tag ... this was her first one! I hope it isn't her last :)

here's the back fabric on the tag ...

and over on the Pals message board I participated on a Spring Stash Exchange ... here's what I received from Meg (I don't think she has a blog) ... didn't she send some great things! It was really fun to do an exchange that wasn't about stitching something, but about ending along new stash ... I hope we do another one like this soon ...

Friday afternoon I took off to the ocean for the weekend with my dear friends Yvonne and Lisa ... this was our 3rd annual trip and we had a blast as always ... walks on the beach, yummy hors d'oeuvres, pomegranate margaritas, lots of laughs, hot tubbing, an evening at the casino (we were all winners thanks to Yvonne ... she won big on the penny slots!) and of course great shopping ... good times with good friends ...

Here's the 3 of us in front of a sign of one the shops we visited ... had to get a picture! Yvonne is the one on the left, Lisa is the one on the right ... little old me in the middle ... definitely 3 wacky women! lol

I'm back to my stitching rotation this week ... Peppermint Twist is up for this evening ... can't wait!

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

I'm grateful for the ocean and good friends ...

I Love Exchanges!

I had a couple of great mail days this week. I received my exchange piece from the Lizzie Kate Exchange Blog. Angela sent this to me because the stitcher that had my name suddenly passed away. Mary Jo was the stitcher the passed away. I'm sorry I didn't get to know Mary Jo, from all the things I've read she was a nice warm person. It was very nice of Angela to send me this pinkeep, although when I heard about Mary Jo's passing and that she had my name, of course I never expected anything. Love the blue fabric she stitch this design on and her finishing is wonderful ...

and here's the back :)


I participated in an exchange on the Pals BB. We were to stitch a Christmas design, but no finishing. Yvonne (can't find her blog) had my name and stitched this cute PS design for me. It's from the 2007 JSC ornament issue ... I just love it! And can't wait to have it hanging on my tree this December ...


Over the weekend I stitched up my square for the Pals exchange, I'll post a picture of it after it arrives at it's new home. Since I was in the Christmas stitching mood I decided to do one for myself too ... this design is from Lizzie Kate's Three Blox ... I still need to add the buttons ... I think it turned out pretty darn cute. I decided to stitch these all as separate ornaments, two more to go, but they stitch up really really fast ...

and just to enable you a little more ... here's a picture of the scissors I was talking about in my last post ... a must for all of us Halloween lovers *grin*



I'm a little out of sync with my rotation. On Tuesday I stitched on AS and late in the evening realized I had miscounted and spent the rest of the evening frogging. So last night, instead of stitching on OZ, I decided to give another evening to AS ... and I'm so glad I did ... I made good progress and will post some pictures over the weekend.

Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment ... I really enjoy reading them *smile* Hope your week is going well!

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

I'm grateful for Thursdays ...