Thursdays

Thursdays are such fun days.  On a scale of 1 to 7, I think Thursday is a total 10!

 

Why, you ask?

• There are very few meetings in my life that happen on Thursdays.
• Thanksgiving...   

• Tomorrow is Friday!!
• DH goes out to run errands and visit on Thursday so I have several hours of silence.
• Laundry and cleaning happen on other days.

There's just so little pressure to DO on Thursdays.  It's a day to relax and plan and figure out what's happening the rest of the week.  And these days when my brain is so fuzzy most of the time, that is such a blessing.  A day to plan to do nothing!  Wow!

  

Within the next two weeks we have a major family event or two, so today is kind of the respite before the big storm.

Miss E leaves for college shortly.  Dang!  The whole summer went by without me even thinking about this, and now it's upon us.  I am praying that things go smoothly and she settles in and loves it.  She's always been kind of an anxious little person, carrying the worries of the world in her backpack.  I will send minute by minute instructions to the angels to walk with her.  Only one person is allowed to go with her (what with Covid and all) so the rest of us will do our worrying at home.  😧

Also next week is DH's birthday.  My daughter and granddaughters consider this a National Holiday, well maybe just a family holiday.  Considering how little DH enjoys fuss made over him, I think he would think something's missing if we didn't.  There is likely to be cake enjoyed, in any case.

Hopefully chocolate.

Progress continues on the Harry Styles sweater.  I swear the panels are getting more boring over time.  Probably because I do not know anything about Harry, nor do I care... too old I guess!

Yesterday I pulled DMC Floss for the cross stitch kits I recently received in the mail.  I have a whole collection of floss wound on cards in plastic boxes.  This was a gift from my daughter, who got them from a lady at work whose mother maybe??  decided to get rid of them or passed away and she had to got rid of them.  They turned out to be almost all of the colors from number 150 to number 930.  

The charts I have included many numbers that were higher than that because there are now numbers that are 4 digits, beginning with 3s.  For some reason DMC skipped the 1 and 2 thousands.  Anyway, I pulled a color chart with chips of color to see if I could find substitutes for the ones I don't have.

Turns out it's easier just to order new skeins.

I found a site, Lovecraft dot com, that has them for 60 cents right now.  Even with $5 shipping, that to me is more comfortable than running out to JoAnns.  Although when I think about it, I should have gone up to Ben Franklin, which is closing in October, and shopped there.  Oh well, next time.

Funny, I've been watching a LOT of YouTube, mostly because it's summer and there is so litte on TV that is new/good/worth the time.  

I sometimes watch stuff that is in my list of SUGGESTED videos, and I ran across Brenda and the Serial Starter (or Serial Stitcher on some of their stuff).  I blame them for the resurgence in interest I have in cross stitching.  

They do very nice presentations, they're knowledgeable and friendly and just humorous enough to be entertaining without being silly and boring.  I'm thoroughly enjoying their whole series.   They are both prodigious stitchers, as you can probably guess from seeing the wall behind them.

Anyway, time to get up and walk around... all this sitting at the computer means I should probably NOT eat the cake!

Stitch on...

Let the Wild Rumpus Begin!

That's a quote from a children's book, one that my kids loved to have read to them, called Where The Wild Things Are.  It's so much fun to read aloud to kids, everyone should have a copy!

So what's the rumpus these days?  Not a lot of rumpusing going on in my world right now.  We stay close to home and church, although we have taken a few side trips.  We have some friends, former neighbors, with whom we sometimes go out to breakfast.

It's funny, when I worked I used to think to myself 'well, at least I'm not one of those old fogies, going out to breakfast at 9 o'clock in the morning'!!  

Ha!  I am that now...  <sigh>  

This week and last our big adventure has been a trip to the lawyer's office to finalize a will and set up a trust.  We now have a granddaughter who's over 18, and that changed the dynamic a bit.  NOT that we have a bunch of money or lots of property, but if you want to avoid probate in Wisconsin, there are some easy ways to do it.  I'm watching a friend take her mom's estate through the process and it take for-ev-er!

We have two kids and four grands.  We wanted to just leave everything each to our spouse, but after we're both gone then divided equally between the two kids/families.  But only one can be the executor so we arm wrestled, each on behalf of one kid.  I won.  ha ha!  I'm afraid the other might not be amused but oh well.

Now the fun part starts... we have to rename all of our assets so that they reflect the fact that they're owned by our trust.  There are just a few things that deserve the name of 'asset'... but that means some paperwork, which DH has determined is my job.  Well, I guess most of the assets ARE mine, he's been retired so long there is no more IRA in his name.  😝

What else?  I've gotten back into counted cross stitch for some reason.  It's feeling kind of zen to do that.  And since it's not printed, if someone's not looking at the pattern, if I change something, well who knows but me?  My daughter did a cross stitch of a tea cup years ago as a gift to me, and it's hanging on my kitchen wall.  I love it and want to do a couple of complimentary small items to hang in the same area, so I'm working on Little House Needleworks patterns.  

These are the ones I got recenty in an acquisition frenzy:

They're very small, but then of course the size depends on the size of fabric on which you stitch.  It goes anywhere from 10 to up to 40 stitches per inch, so if you choose a smaller number, say 18 count, it's smaller than a 40 count.  I don't do much on 40 count, my eyes are not that great without strong reading glasses.  I like more like 24 to 28 count.  The pattern for the Post Office says to use 30 count linen which finishes approximately 5x3.5 inches.  

Yea, small.  But by the time it's framed it could be a nice wall decoration.

So the oldest grand, Miss E, is going off to college in a few weeks.  I remember when she was born, and it doesn't seem that long ago.  She of course is champing to leave.  I have to get knitting... I'm making the Harry Styles patchwork sweater per her request.  We thought it was crochet until we pulled down the free pattern.  It's knit, in chunky yarn in bright colors.

All I can say is:  Thank goodness she didn't ask for this one!!  But I think that is a commercially knit sweater, so maybe you can just buy it??

That is all the rumpus for this week.  Have a good one, stay safe, wear a mask!

Stitch on...