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.

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.

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!

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.]

WIP Progress, Reading Binge, New Freebie Links

After a long hiatus, I finally did some stitching earlier this month. But mostly I've been on a reading (and ice cream) binge. Since 9/5 I've read 19 books, six of them in the past week including 3 mysteries by Laura Levine, a TV sitcom writer turned novelist (her heroine, Jaine Austen, is owned by a cat named Prozac - it gets funnier), the latest MC Beaton Agatha Raisen mystery, the final Anne & Todd McCaffrey PERN novel (okay, I read some, became totally disenchanted and confused, read the ending which left me even more confused, put it aside while I read 2 other books and deciding whether I wanted to even go back to it, skimmed another couple of chapters then took it back to the library. Okay, I didn't read all of it, nor can I recommend it even to hardcore Anne and PERN fans.The last couple of days I've read Killing Lincoln, pausing in the middle to read one of the far more light-hearted and wholly inconsequential Jaine Austen mysteries. I've got a several hundred page, non-fiction Time Traveller's Guide to the Universe to probably read all of (I enjoy astronomy), a cozy mystery by a different writer, and put 2 more Jaine Austen mysteries on reserve at the Library. Now that my eyes are totally fried, I need to try to get back to stitching - something anyway. I really hadn't intended to finish "Bless This Nest," yet there I was stitching on it for hours at a time. I'm a fast reader but a very SLOW stitcher.

** Check out the new links on my Freebie List!

Good News - More Sad News

Alex April 2008

2004

April 2004

My son-in-law, Dan, called Tuesday to tell me he's been accepted into the M.Div. program at Brite Divinity School (TCU). I was unaware he had applied. However, I am very happy and excited as it is very meaningful to him. As he started to hang up he asked if I'd like to have the left over cat food from when they had a cat at the house.

Huh? WHAT??? I asked "Has something happened to ...." which is when I found out DD's 16-year-old Miss Chatty Cat (my name for her) had been missing for 3 or 4 weeks, since shortly after Brulet disappeared. I was disappointed they hadn't told me. Then last night at choir practice Dan told me that Alex, DD's almost 14-year-old Akita? mix had taken a turn for the worst, that they had put off the decision too long (they mentioned hard decisions in August when I last watched over DD's cat and dogs), and that they had asked a vet to come to their home. It turned out to be the same one that had done the emergency C-Section when Alex gave birth to her late-in-life, cruise-souvenir "Pups" in 2008.  Alex was gently released from her pain and the infirmaties of advanced age in her own back yard, with my DD holding her.

DD has never had to do this before and I know it was something she's been dreading for a long time. The decision was, as is usually for each of us pet owners, sadly inevitable. I've taken care of Alex and Miss CC off and on for the past 12 years (and more recently the Pups) when my DD was out-of-town - sometimes as often as twice a month for a week or more at a time. They have been as much part of my family and my heart as my own furbabies. I have been crying all morning. One of the reasons my DD kept 3 of the now 4-year-old Pups, was so that when Alex passed she would have something left of her. They are her solace. One looks so much like Alex we have all sometimes mistaken him for her. l can't find a picture of Miss Chatty Cat, a beautiful domestic long hair.

UPDATE: A night or so later, Heather got up in the middle of the night and was shocked to see Alex asleep in her dog bed. It was only when she reached down to see if she could pat her that she realized it was the look-alike Pup, who had never before slept in it. He continues to do so.

Sang in Quartet at Church This Morning

Northwest Christian Church - Arlington

 I'm the short one. (Can't believe I had to say that! I must already be getting shorter.) I'm standing next to my Son In Law. Yes, he's somewhat older than my DD. My DD and Dad also attend. Dad took the photo.

Webshots is Shutting Down - Permanently

As of December 1st. They've started a new "photo storage" site called Smile, which has a annual fee and is NOT a public photo share site like Webshots is. You MUST do something prior to December 1st, otherwise you'll lose access to your photos forever. You can tranfer your photos to Smile (though I understand from people who have that they end up all scrambled, NOT in the original albums, and are only available to view for invited guests - a real bummer for those who want to look at cross stitch projects), or you can d/l back to your computer. I have an old Flickr Account I rarely used, and tried out PhotoBucket, but preferred Webshots format at the time. This is the 3rd online photo storage/share site that has closed on me. Not sure what I will do.  Be aware that if you've linked to photos on Webshots, those links will no longer be valid. When my computer crashed and I lost everything between 2005 and early 2010 (my backups didn't work), I was able to replace SOME of them because I did have a Webshots and FlickR account. The link to one of my Webshots albums is apparently listed in a Galveston tour guide, and I have traffic because of that. I don't know who lists it, so I'm not sure what will become of those photos. I'm unsure what to do now. Anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks.