Saturday, September 22, 2012

Bailing Ship....

Hello readers! I don't get all caught up in the numbers, but I was sad to see that I went from 60 to 59 followers. Sorry you had to bail. Or it could just be Blogger messing with me again. I dont have a huge following, but I love the group of followers I have. I actually feel like I have gotten to know several of you fairly well via our blog exchanges. Sheesh I even talk about your postings like we've chatted on the phone. This has been such an exciting adventure, I have learned a lot from my followers, the bloggers I follow (for the record spell check changed bloggers to boogers, I FIXED it, Hehehe) and from using this program; good bad or indifferent. Improving my technical skills, yea that's it. :) Some bummer news on the stitching front, slow as I go on my HRH Christmas, my GF is kicking STITCH, I was off by two pickets on my fence line on the "Govenor's Palace", as I like to call block two. Boooo! I have successfully undone those teeny tiny over one stitches and hope to get some stitches placed this weekend. I am back into my stitching brain, so look forward to accomplishing some serious stitching on this project. I have some major ground to make up. :) I was just telling Annette of California stitcher that I am getting my snowman rug project all put together and plan to start working it when the first snow flies. Now it has snowed on Halloween since we've lived here, so it could be sooner than later. But in the mean time I will be on a HRH run. Thank you for continuing to follow Porcupine Needle. I do enjoy your comments and I understand some times it just enough to get through reading all the posts as they are rolling in, so comments are a wonderful gift. Going to put in a few stitches this morning before heading out to stack wood up at the house. We had our first fire of the season in the fire place last night. It was nice and cozy. Need to start prepping for the cooler season. Keep on Stitching! P.J. P.S. A blogger ghost keeps hitting the save button as I am typing this and it causes the page to get all fuzzy. Thanks blogger for the spooky experience. I guess it is the season for spooky....mooowhahahahaaaaa. **Edit** p.S.s. Screeeeeeeaaaaam! Come on blogger why are all my paragraphs squished together on my post?!? It Ain't that way in my draft. Give my readers a break, don't you know anything about visual breaks in print so that readers can absorb and stay interested. sheesh give us some "white" space WILL YA!

Monday, September 17, 2012

Bitten by the Rug Bug

So a while back, I believe When I returned from SA in May, I caught a nasty virus and was couch bound for 4-5 days. I was in no shape to work on my HRH Christmas over one ( the beginning of my stitching slump) so I remembered my mini rug project my GF got me started on when I first moved to Maine. Yes, over 7 yrs ago, it did not bite me then. I've posted about my finish of the blueberries. And I posted about picking up two new patterns and the ship I rescued and am currently hooking, little by little. That calls for a pic, doesn't it.

I moved the ship to a smaller frame, borrowed from my GF. Honey, Christmas idea. W*nk, w*nk.





Well I have been anxious to get some more wool for the moose and snowman projects, so after dropping off the in-laws ( after a terrific visit) at the jetport I asked hubby if we could stop at the Portland Goodwill. I wanted to check out the wool garments. I bought one man's jacket in tan herring bone and a woman's black and white houndstooth jacket. Holly cow that was a lot of work, lesson learned for a novice hooker, no more jackets. I will stick to pants and skirts. :)


Still itching to get some wool for these projects I bee bopped right back over to Wool & Ewe in Ellsworth to rummage through Chris's scrap bins. I found me some great pieces and even salvaged a pocket to use to hold my hooks. I added a Girl Scout button from my button jar and viola! I also picked up a couple if 1/4 yd pieces on sale.








I was getting in the Jeep to leave when I remembered that Chris had a cutter on sale, so I flitted back in to inquire about it, but it was gone. He recommended I check out eBay, I might be able to snag one on the cheap. So the challenge was on; eBay and Etsy here I come.

There is a cute little second had store on the way out from Ellsworth that I pop into every time I leave my GF after our S-n-B weekends. I riffled through the clothes and found two pair of pants (learned my lesson) that I could not wait to get home to wash so I could cut down for hooking. So I got ALLLLLL this wool and no way to cut them. Talk about feeling like a caged animal.

My GF and I talked about going halves-ies on a cutter, cuz day ain't cheap ya KNOW. Well by Saturday (I started Friday night) I had found the bargain of the year. A Fraser cutter with three cutter heads, plus shipping for just a smidge under $200. I was thrilled and hoped I was not going to be disappointed in the quality of the cutter. It was inside the door when we got home Friday night. I need to get some strip cutting under my belt, but it cuts well for a used one and I can't shake a stick at that price!




So like I have all this crafty time on my hands of late, I am now adding wool cutting to the mix. My GF tried to bargain with me to cut her wool for her... I said she could cut mine to work off the difference, she said she'll send a check. Hehehe. I feel so lucky to have a GF to do this kind of thing together. If she recalls this is all her fault to begin with. OOOXXX KB! let the cutting begin! I am sure there will be some cussing among the cutting I as get the hang of it.

I may need to see about these bugs....

Keep on stitching & hooking!
P.J.

Sunday, September 16, 2012

SQUIRREL!!



I have had the attention span of a nat lately.

I cannot believe that summer is coming to an end already, but I have to be quite honest.....FINALLY! It has been a very warm, sticky summer for northern New England, blah. I am feeling more like myself again with these cool, crisp days.

I did not realize how busy my summer was going to be this year. We went to San Antonio in May, I bounced down to Charlotte in August for scrap booking(just a leetle bit of stash); then a stash run to Massechuesettes ( a bit more stash) and then the in-laws landed in September. Whew! Oh wait our Navy Girl will be home for a week in October to see the animals and pick up her car. And then I head to Florida in November to a conference for work.

So as promised here are pictures of the stash from the mad dash. I will put together my next blog posting about my rug hooking expansion and pics of some purty wool.











Keep on stitching.
P.J.

P.S. since blogger is once again "Enhancing" their program, I have not added captions because my pics now come across on my drafts as the full url link vs the actual pic, so your guess would be as good as mine. Let the pictures speak a thousand words. Come on Blogger not all of us are computer geeks (meant as a good thing). Help a girl out!

Saturday, September 1, 2012

Blue Moon over the St Laurence River in Quebec

Bonjour!

I am enjoying my morning coffee sitting at the bay window table at the Choco-cafe at the Auberge Du Littoral. I love to have that first half hour alone to find my inner peace to make sure I start my day off on the right foot. Hard to do that on the work days; I'll keep working on that.

I have enjoyed listening to the French Canadians and working on my high school French. The people have been very hospitable. Ia little disappointing sitting next to a group of Americans talking about Walmart and eBay this early in the morning; now if they were parle vous francais it would be a more pleasant conversation. Seriously!

We visited la chute Montmorency yesterday and plan to explore the old city today. Did I mention that MADONNA!! is performing at the Plains of Abrahams tonight! No we are not going for several sensible reasons but mostly, even if I were a rich woman I would not pay over $200 for two of us to STAND on the ground at a general admission, outdoor concert. But I still think it is awesome that MADONNA!! is rocking out tonight in Quebec City, too cool!!

No stitching on this trip, but I did take pics of my stash before the family arrived; I will post those when I return. Au revoir.