Happy Halloween 2007!

Happy Halloween! I have to spend it working at the nursing home, and I gotta be there an 1 1/2 hrs earlier. To help the residents pass out candy to the kiddos.

Of course, last week, Natalie requested Uncle Brian to draw her a picture of a pumpkin that she could hang at home.

Here was his results.. TOO cute!

Do you sell cross stitch kits?

Do you sell cross stitch kits? Was one of the many questions I received today while working my fun job at the quilt shop. Along with ... do you sell rubber snakes?! LOL

While I was working at the cutting table, putting together some kits. There was a lady that came into the quilting area of the store, and asked, "do you sell cross stitch kits?"

"No, sorry, but we do carry DMC floss, needles, and "some" aida, if you're interested in that."

"No, that's ok. I'm looking for some kits"

I waited till the customer walked away, and my coworker was close by.

I said to my coworker - "Do you think I should have said, well come to my house, I'm sure you are to find something to stitch." LOL

And there sitting on my little desk, a cross stitch book from a friend, for me to have.

Addicted, eh!?

You Make Me Smile Award goes too..

Kalu gave me the "You Make Me Smile Award" And now I must follow the rules. I have to send it to 10 people that make me smile!!!


Carolyn - Taking one stitch at a time
Cathey - Pumpkin Patch & Co
The Chicken Lady - The Chicken Coop
Elaine - Sharing My World
Irene - Cross Stitch Happy
Michele - Just Another Stitching Blog...
Rachel - SCRAP HAPPENS
Shari - Shari's Sharings
Teresa - Teresa's Stitching
Vickie - Reading and Stitching

And since Kalu said Missy, I want to include her with my award.


Thanks ladies, you truly make me smile!! You all are an inspiration to me! Love to you all!!

SBQ - Oct 24th

This week's SBQ is:

Do you railroad?

Nope, dont know how, and aint going to learn.. LOL

Vickie's SFE Received

Ive received word that Vickie received her SFE today.

Her theme was Winter/Christmas. I decided to go with Winter. Here was my result.

I used the Winter Welcome chart from Hinzeit, and made it into a little door hanger. :)

I love these exchanges. I love coming up with an idea and then running with it... and it shows. LOL

Think Pink - L*K FINISH

I stitched this cutie in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness month.

Think Pink, a limited edition design from Lizzie*Kate. I stitched this with DMC floss, and stitched it on 28ct Cheryl's Wild Rose from Sassy's Hand Painted Fabrics

You can find alot of other Breast Cancer themed finishes on Stitch Pink.

SBQ - Oct 17th

This week's SBQ was suggested by Jennifer and is:

What proportion of your stitching is for your own personal use versus gifts?

Well, I have done alot stitching for others, and I do have about 4 finishes hanging on the wall in the living room. I do have alot small finishes that are just laying in the finish drawer. I do stitch for others. I have stitched gifts for my Mom, Dad, sister, and brother. And I love to model stitch!

QSnap Huggers - Featured on Independent Needlework News

If you have found this blog as a cross stitcher, you may have visited Independent Needlework News recently.

Its a new blog devoted to cross stitching news, such as retreats, new goodies and just worthy stitching news. Well a couple months ago, Heather emailed me with a few questions about the QSnap Huggers, and she also placed an order for them. I think I sent her about 11 or 12 QH, an assortment for her, and also for prizes in the future for INN.

Well she informed me this morning about her post to INN, regarding QSnap Huggers! I love her write up about the Huggers. Thanks Heather!!

HOW COOL IS THIS! Please check out the post and comment away.. he he

For those that are proud owners of QSnap Huggers, THANK YOU. I really appreciate your support!

BIG Double GRRRRRRR

Yesterday, I noticed I was getting these weird messages from eBay.. stating that there was a question on a product. Well like most spam/junk mail, I just ignore and go "delete".

Well then I started to get replies back from eBay, and I thought.. what the heck!

Then I got an email from eBay -
Dear (insert my user name here)

It appears your account was accessed by an unauthorized third party and used to send unsolicited emails to other community members, including email offers to sell items outside of eBay. It does not appear that your account was used to list or bid on any items. Additionally, the email address on your account may have been tampered with, which is why you may not have received any emails about this activity. At this time we have taken several steps to secure your eBay account. Rest assured that your credit card and banking information is safe on the eBay site. This information is kept encrypted on a secure server and cannot be viewed by anyone.

Come to find out, my eBay account was hijacked and used to send out mass emails to people. So now, my eBay user password had to be changed. Crap!

To the hijackers.... Thank you my friends on eBay that decided to use my account for your enjoyment. Not funny!

I wanna be a Rockstar

I was watching CMT and this video came on.... gosh, how many celeberties can you spot. I saw Dale Jr, Gene Simmons, the guy from ZZ Top, Rich from Big & Rich, Kid Rock, Wayne Gretzky, Paul Sr, Paul Jr, and Mickey from American Chopper, and the list goes on.

Rockstar - Nickelback (edited version)

I wanna be a rockstar .....

Something Wrong With this Picture!?!

Ok.. can you figure what is wrong with this picture!?

Ok, story goes. Natalie asked if I could give her a bath Sunday.... got her all set, her in the tub. Left the bathroom to get Nat's pj's, began to talk to my sister. Heard - "Mom, the baby is in the bathtub." Turned around.. this is what I saw.. LOL

Yes - Kaylee is in the bathtub with her clothes on.. LMAO.

Look what I found in the yard!!!

Last night when I pulled in the driveway - something caught my eye. I thought, what the heck is that.

Over in the lawn between the two willow trees, there lay this big white looking ball. Brian then joined me outside.

I have never seen a mushroom this big before! But I have heard that they do get bigger than the one I found tonight. Just recently, my BIL found 3 of them down by the pond. It was one of those Puffball Mushrooms. We took it over to my in laws to show them, and while there, we washed it off. We brought it back to our house, and of course had to get out the camera.

So I took a picture of Brian with the giant puffball. And what the finished product looked like! How I prepared the mushroom was, we had to cut the mushroom open to find if it was edible. It was pure white, and smelled exactly like a mushroom! Peeled away the outer layer, and sliced it. Put it in a frying pan with some butter, and fried away. We did give half of the mushroom to my BIL who loves the mushroom!

So this was our dinner from tonight - chopped steaks, with fried onions, and puffball sauteed mushrooms, and broccoli and green beans mix.

Grrrr - I started to post this message last night, but then our internet went out.

Natalie's Trip to Build A Bear - Oct 15th

For Natalie's birthday - her birthday was on Monday (Oct 15th), I surprised her with a trip to Build A Bear in Appleton. She had no clue and never had been to such a store. It went very well! We had a blast. The only thing - is when we got inside the store, Natalie goes. "Mom - Kaylee can fit in this."... LOL. Umm no Nat, Kaylee is not quite the size of the bear.. LOL

Here are some photos of from Build A Bear. She picked out a Pink bear, of course. It has a white belly with a pink heart in the middle. And on the bottom of its foot there is another embordered heart.

I have to share a funny story. On Saturday night we were talking about doing something special for Nat's birthday. The plan was to go to school with her (which I did), and then go back and pick up Kaylee, Brian,(which is funny cause Brian had to pay the babysitter to watch Kaylee and himself..LOL)and my Mom. We went to Nat's favorite resturant, Fazoli's. After we would go to the mall, and go and do something special just for Natalie. Well we were talking in the truck, Nat and I were sitting in the back, and I said to Nat - you are going to have to pick out a special name for your something special that you are going to be getting. Her "special name" was Pineapple. LMAO. Fast forward to Monday.... it changed to Heart.

Random Pics from the weekend .....

This past weekend, Brian and I went down state to visit with my family, and to celebrate two birthdays. One for my niece, Katie, who turned 2 on the 10th, and for my oldest niece Natalie, who turned 4 on the 15th.

We went down on Saturday morning, arriving late to our destination, thanks to detours. My brother and his wife were having Katie's bday party at their house.

We got there, an hour late.. so everyone was eating. Shortly after Katie started opening her presents.

We visited with the family, and my brother's got out the 4 wheelers. We all had fun till someone got hurt. :( We had to have the ambulance come as one of my brother's friends was driving my brother's 4 wheeler, some how managed to flip the 4 wheeler, end over end. His gf was on the back - its one of those 4 wheelers that have the extra seat in the back. Well the bf landed on the gf, and then the 4 wheeler landed on the gf. My other brother's gf daughter watched the whole thing happen. She came up to the house to say that they had flipped the 4 wheeler - we were in a panic to figure out who it was. The gf was complaining of back pain. She is fine, she was transported to the hospital, but came home that same night.

When the accident happened, we were in the process of leaving to go shopping. So after the ambulance left, we went on our merry way. We had to go and pick up the stuff to make cupcakes for Nat's party. We went to Neenah and did our shopping. Got all we needed, and then it was on the way back to my parents house, where we picked up my Dad and went for dinner in Omro. The place were Brian loves to go when we are down there was packed!! We did get a table, and when our meal was over, they came out with a cake for Natalie.




Once we got home from going out to eat.. the process started of making cupcakes. As far as how many we made... I have no clue. I know it was more than 15 as that was the number I sent to Sunday School for Nat on Sunday. I was up till 2:30am frosting the cupcakes! Was up early on Sunday to take Nat to Sunday School. We even had a cupcake disaster! Someone accidentally put them in the wrong place, and Nat happen to sit on them.. Oh well, they still were edible. LOL

Sunday for lunch we went to the Viking in Winchester. What a great place to eat!! Its reopened supper club, and it was great to go there. Cant wait to go and again when we are down there again. After lunch we headed over to Fox Valley Lanes for Natalie's party. Yep, we went bowling for Nat's party. It was fun! Natalie opened up her presents and we had a great time!

Sunday night we went back to Amy's, and just relaxed. Had a pizza for dinner. Gave the girls a bath, and was off to bed.

Monday, I went to school with the birthday girl and my sister. It was neat getting back into the classroom again. I was even thinking about getting back into teaching again. But we will see.

After school, we went over to Amy's to pick up Kaylee and Brian. Then we were off to pick up my Mom and to Fazoli's to eat lunch. We went to a sewing place so I could get my needed foot for my new sewing machine. Then we went over to Archiver's for my sister Amy, as I treated her for her birthday (yes I know I was a month late). We then went to Build A Bear at the Fox River Mall in Appleton for Nat to get her bday gift from us. It was fun watching her in the experience!! We walked around the mall alittle, and needed to get going. But I had to stop at Hobby Lobby!! Nat and I went inside to do alittle shopping - I think I spent more time making her move than I shopped. LOL Monday night, my brother's gf invited us over for dinner, so Amy, Nat, Kaylee, Brian and I went. After we were done we went back to Winneconne, and my parents met up with us to visit again.

Tuesday morning, Amy had to take Nat to school and then run to an appointment. So I watched Kaylee and my niece Katie (whom my sister babysits for). We even managed to get a walk in between the rain showers. We walked about 6 blocks and back. My Mom called to ask if we would be interested in going for lunch before we left. So my Dad, Mom, Amy, Kaylee, Katie, Nat, Brian and I had lunch at the Arrowhead in Winneconne.

We got home about 5:30p on Tuesday and I was TIRED!!

Aunt Kim is home

Anyone miss me?! Didn't think so.. :)

Ive just returned from a weekend getaway to celebrate birthdays, and spend some time with my family. Off to catch up on emails! Will post pictures soon.

I really made Natalie upset today! Didnt want us leaving. Ahh, to live closer.

SBQ - Oct 10th

This week's SBQ was suggested by Ternezia and is:

What for you means to achieve mastery as a stitcher?

Humm for me... well I think it was when I began to model stitch for designers, and then being asked again. That right there is mastery for me! To see my name on a pattern, as the model stitcher, that was my all time goal. When I first seen it, I just cried. Its such an awesome feeling! And I have been blessed again to be doing model stitching again for a designer. :) Its great to have your passion for a hobby known.

Pimped My Sewing Machine already

The following optional accessories that were not included for the sewing machine that was listed for the new sewing machine were as follows:

~ Walking foot - bought and paid for with eBay
~ Quilting foot - bought and paid for with eBay
~ 1/4" Quilting Foot - was included with the machine - previous owner purchased this foot.
~ Quilting Guide - bought and paid for with eBay
~ Bobbins 7/16" size - gosh, took me the longest to figure out the bobbin size, but now I have 50 of them coming to the mailbox.. LOL Means now I gotta find more colors of threads to fill them!

Ahh, I love sitting at my home, and shop!! Now its time to sit and bite my nails till they arrive and scare myself silly figuring them out when they arrive. Oh joy!

Talk about motivation!

I got a new COMPUTER ....

Sewing machine!!!

A couple months ago - I think it was June, something in the bobbin area of the "old" (new title) sewing machine broke off. It was loud, and was driving me crazy. So I thought, ok, gotta put that on my list to buy in the future, when the money means arrive. So I have been saving up my pennies and nickels, so when I did find a machine, I could take the piggy bank to the store and put all the change all over the counter, and start counting. Ok, that was the day dreaming part of this venture.

It goes like this -- Remember when I killed posted about the rotary cutter incident, and someone suggested I go to JoAnn.com and look for a new rotary cutter there, as they were having a sale. Well, excuse me, did you forget to tell me that 'Sewing Machines' were on sale too!? Nope, but thanks for letting me find out!.. he he Well I browsed drooled over the machines, and one struck my interest. I saved the page for the machine. I thought, what the heck, WalMart sells them too. So off to WalMart.com I went. The sale price at JoAnn.com was $20 higher than WalMarts advertised price. I did a total with the tax, and it came up to the same price of the JoAnn.com price. I thought umm ok.. I do have a cheaper source that I can get the machine at.

I thought what the heck, let me try eBay. So one late Tuesday night, (the day after I took my truck to find out why the O/D Light on the dash kept blinking, and two weeks later (today), and a $225 bill - it still blinks! They did replace the part that it was coded for the blinking, but they are stumped, so my Explorer now has a piece of black electrical tape over the blinking O/D Light.... grr)

I typed in the machine I was looking for.. and I found an AWESOME deal! With shipping, it cost $22 something less than the one at WalMart (before taxes, and the drive over to the store, and food that would have to be included in the trip). LOL Well I took the laptop into bed.. Brian was already in bed. I beg and pleaded, and told him I would love him forever... well didn't really say that.. LOL We went over the auction, and in my heart and soul, I wanted it. The concern we both had, umm its used. But the seller explained the situation, and in an email, was kinda bummed that she had to let it go. So, that was on a Tuesday, was notified that it was mailed on Saturday, got it the following Saturday. It was in miles of bubble wrap, and I was in such a squeal to find the machine inside.

Here it is Tuesday night. I was actually scared to sit down at the sewing machine and figure it all out. TOTALLY different, but I was excited to "play" with it. I got it all threaded, bobbin all figured out (since the old one's bobbin was under the needle, this one is a drop in setting) Gotta figure out the needle threader yet. Played with the buttons, and the gadgets. It has a needle up/down feature which is sooo cool! It has a push button, for starting, stopping and reverse, and it can operate with or without foot control.

Ok, so you wanna see my new computerized sewing machine?!?!? You can go to WalMart.com, and see the info on the machine Brother 60-Stitch Computerized Sewing Machine, CS-6000i

Things I need now for this new machine is more bobbins, a walking foot, and a quilting foot :)

Too close to home...

If you havent heard about the tragedy that happen earlier this morning in Crandon, WI, such a sad day! It was to the point where I got a call at work about the news.

See we live 30 miles north of Crandon. Too close to home!!

Inspirations WIP 10/04/05

I started Inspirations on Monday, and this is my progress so far. Last night I was able to sit down for awhile and work on it. I hope to make weekly progress reports, but the way my life is.. will see.. LOL The frog did visit me twice, and was quickly taken care of :). I have finished sections 19, and 25.

I'm doing this as a SAL, and what really inspired me was looking at the WIP pic of Vickie's. GOSH, talk about being motivated to stitch! Thanks, Vickie!!

SBQ - Oct 3

Today's SBQ was suggested by Jennifer and is:

What are your favorite online stitching supply sources?

What are.. humm. Well I have shopped online @ Stitching Bits and Bobs, Down Sunshine Lane, 123 Stitch, and my "local" shop - The Stitching Bee in Green Bay. Waiting on an order from Handcrafts Online.

I cant say I have a favorite, but I have had great service from all of them. And I have had extra special service from The Stitching Bee. Its awesome to request something, get the item with an invoice, and then just have to send the payment back with additional of the shipping. Talk about having honest service!!

Special at QSnap Huggers!

Check out the QSnap Huggers site.

Any of the Pink fabrics listed, 20% of the cost of the QSnap Hugger will be donated to Breast Cancer Charities.

THANKS to all that have purchased a QSnap Hugger in the past, and I look forward to all the future and returning customers.!

SFE From Vickie

Today in the mail arrived a SFE (Small Finish Exchange) from Vickie. What a SFE is, you sign up with a theme you would like to have stitched for you. The others that sign up, also have a theme. Each person is assigned to a month where they will receive their SFEs. Each person then stitches a small finish with the theme, and then they have to finish it into something small. Hence, SFE.

My theme is Quaker, and I received my first SFE today! Of course my month isnt till November (November 20 - day after my bday.. hehe). Vickie stitched this adorable quaker theme, and attached it to a wooden box. One night while we were chatting, she asked me if I liked the color green. And I said, yes. She painted the box, and attached her design to the box. She said I can finish it off how I would like. Im going to take her suggestion of finishing it off as a needle case. :)

Thanks Vickie for doing this for me. I love it!!