Sharing my life and love of cross stitch. Thoughts about this and that.

Thursday, November 29, 2012

New Freebies listed

  • Stitchers Village  - available only until December 1st, 6 small Christmas Ornaments posted 1 per day.
  • Balades et Broderies - Noel Hearts, Christmas, Easter, seasonal and many other free small designs - 37 so far

Thursday, November 22, 2012

Happy Thanksgiving! (and a past freebie)

May we each be truly grateful for all the blessing bestowed on us this past year, and special prayers for and blessings to those who are no longer with us or are unable to be with us this year.

A freebie from 2009 (click on picture for link):



from LindaMc at Bits of Floss

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Unusal site for needlecraft freebies but

I enjoy reading cozy mystery series, something I discovered a couple of years ago. There are all sorts of cozies related to location, comfortable or off-beat characters, wine, foods & sugary goodies, dogs/cats, etc. I tend to read just 1 or 2 series at a time to the extent they are available at the Library, then must find another author. Which is what I was doing early this morning. I thought, there MUST be needlecraft mysteries, which is how I happened upon author Monica Ferris, whose heroine has taken over her murdered sister's needlework shop and becomes a sleuth in the process. This is already a 16-book series so I'm behind to start, but unfortunately only the most recent books are at my library. But beside the point of the FREEBIE reference. In reading about the author I discovered that in each book there is a needlecraft chart related to the story: cross stitch, needlepoint, a black work, a cut out, bookmarks, etc. A Christmas ornament, a Taun horse, a phoenix, and other delights. Even more important for this purpose, the author has made each of the patterns available online as a .pdf freebie!

Visit: http://monica-ferris.com/books  Click on the "Pattern" at the bottom of the description of each of her books and explore the possibilities! You may also decide to read one of her books in the process. They get good reviews, so I'm excited to start reading an author new to me.

Friday, November 16, 2012

New Freebies

at Artecy only until 11/30: Celtic Christmas Tree and a mini Grizzly Bear Salmon Fishing

Check out other new freebies on the Freebie Links page.

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Dads

We all tried to talk him out of it, but my 88-year-old Dad INSISTED he was driving ALONE to eastern Kansas to visit an old friend. After putting 1100 miles on the car,  he got home safely a while ago. WHEW and THANK YOU to the Kind and Watchful Gentleman upstairs!

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

I Love this time of year

Summer (it was hotter in September than in August this year) is OVER at last! Temps swing between freezing and the 80's. This year, because of an early cold snap, the oaks and gum trees and all the other deciduous trees have already started turning beautiful colors (it's been as late as mid-December in some years.) What's more, the gore and horror that passes as "entertainment" mostly ends after Halloween. I can sit and stitch as I watch (or just listen to) uplifting Christmas movies at last, all day and all night if I want. My only gripe about those is that except for one I recall with James Garner and Julie Andrews from several years ago, the women are young, beautiful, often needy - and so are the men. Really wish there were a lot more that feature much older adults, couples AND singles, and don't involve a Santa Claus and cute young, needy children as part of the story. [Confession: I've been watching/listening to Christmas movies, but I  haven't done all that much stitching recently.]
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