Palin Rally

Cassie and I went to the Road to Victory with Sarah Palin rally in Richmond yesterday and had SO much fun! The gates opened at 11 and the program started at 2. We got there about 10:30. It took about an hour to get through security. The event was held at the Richmond International Raceway. Originally it had been planned that it would be at a much smaller venue but the ticket demand quadrupled what they thought it would be so they moved it. I'm glad we got there when we did! we had to wait for a really long time for the program to start but we got a really great seat. All of these people didn't. And why did we? Cause my daughter's mom rocks, that's why!


When we first got to the bleachers I asked a nice man working if we were to sit wherever we wanted. He said yes but whispered to us that if he were us he'd sit right next to this sectioned off area of the bleachers because that's where the important people were sitting. Turns out he was right! We also got to see the motorcade coming in which was super cool! We had the best time and I'm so glad we went. Afterwards we tried to get Sarah's autograph but there was a pack of crazy men pushing us out of the way. I'm not sure why. Surely they didn't think the Secret Service would let them get too terribly close to her. Cassie did manage to get Hank Williams Jr.'s autograph. Enjoy the pictures! The guy in the white shirt is her husband. Hank Williams JR. is wearing the Redskins jersey. I've found some press pictures that we're in but I can't post them on my blog.

Stinkin people and their stinkin signs....




















Hank Williams JR.

We'll take 2 please!

I'm really excited to announce that on Monday Cassie and I will be hopping over to Richmond and attending the Road to Victory Rally with Sarah Palin! We're both REALLY excited about that! I'm excited to see Palin but more excited that I have the opportunity to take Cassie to something like this. I picked our tickets up on Thursday. I've not ever been to anything like this before so am not sure how early we should get there. The doors open at 11 and the program starts at 2. I had a look at McCain's website a bit ago for rally info and am glad I did. I noticed that both the venue and the time were changed. If we would've showed up at the other place that would've been a bad thing. I would've been an unhappy puppy. Cassie's planned her outfit down to the earrings and the necklace. I'm hoping I can get some really good pictures. I'm really looking forward to doing this with her.

I finally finished up attaching those patches to Joshua's Cub Scout shirt just a few hours before he needed to wear it. I busted out with my sewing machine and got them on much quicker. Piece of cake. Well, not really but quicker than hand anyway. Much much quicker. He was really excited to put it on.

I finished stitching a small piece last night. It's that new cute little Christmas Purse from JBW Designs. How cute is that?! I stitched it in Cranberry Sampler Threads. It came with a charm but I didn't use it because I don't really like it. I take that back...the charm is fine, I just don't think I like it on the piece.

Speaking of stitching I'm pleased to report that a model I stitched a couple of weeks ago has just been released so I can show it to you. I bring you "All About Halloween" from HE. See the fun kitty pillow? I stitched him. He was a lot of fun to stitch. He's a nice sized cat stitched on 10 ct. fabric. I think some mini kitties stitched on a higher count would be really cute.

A Year Later

While folding clothes this morning and thinking about what all we've done this past year and what we hope to do in the next year, I realized it was exactly a year ago today that we moved from Texas to Virginia. I try not to think back on that day too often because my heart was in a million pieces. When we left town I had my handkerchief in hand and I pretty much held on to it for the 2.5 days we were driving. I remember feeling at that time and for some time after that the world was coming to an end. I couldn't imagine myself across the country and away from my friends and family. Separation and change are very hard things! I know now though that moving up here was the best thing for us. I also know that my parents and brother moving to WV was the best thing for them. We LOVE LOVE LOVE it up here and now that we've been here for a year it would be hard to imagine living there again. Sometimes I lay in bed at night and close my eyes and try to remember little things like what our backyard in TX looked like because sometimes I feel like I'm starting to forget. Change is always hard and that move was by far the hardest thing I've ever done but now that we're here and have been for about a year, I'm really glad we did. I can't believe the year flew by so quickly. On the other hand, it seems like we've been here forever.

I've started pulling the blankets and the long jammies back out. The nights have been cold! The mornings have been too. I've noticed the past couple of days that the leaves are starting to turn on the trees. I love it when they turn orange and red. I'll be looking forward to posting pics of them as soon as they turn. It's so beautiful up here in the fall. I'll also be looking forward to the deer coming around again. I've not seen any around here since last February.

Gimme a Break, Man

Besides God, my family, friends, and country, somewhere in the line of things I love would be my needle. I did love my needle but right now I despise the shiny little tool. Those patches are thick! I have to have the patches sewn on to Joshua's Cub Scout uniform by Thursday. I've never had any trouble with needle and thread until now, although I've never attempted to sew on patches. Maybe it's just me being particular but these things are a pain in the butt to sew on! I don't know if I'm using the wrong kind of needle or what but there has to be an easier way. I spent well over an hour sewing on one patch which is just unheard of. I still have 7 more to go *sigh*. I love his council patch btw, very cool. It has the Jefferson Memorial on it with Cherry Blossoms around the Tidal Basin. Super neat little patch. I'll take a picture of it if I ever get the bloody thing sewn on. If you're an accomplished patch sewer on-er I would greatly appreciate any suggestions you might have of a quicker and easier way to get these things on within the next 2 days.

I got word that the Halloween package that I sent for the Halloween exchange in one of my groups was received so I can post a pic of the stitched pieces now. I sent to Gaby in Germany. I stitched a really fun Jack-O-Lantern for her from the Prairie Schooler's Prairie Year Rounds book and made it in to a treat bag. I really liked stitching this piece. It was a nice change to stitch on the black fabric. I love that candy corn fabric. I also made a pinkeep for her using the witch from the Prairie Schooler's When Witches Go Riding chart. It's an obsession, I know. When I sign up for exchanges I just can't seem to get away from the Prairie Schooler charts.

I think I mentioned a couple of months back that Mike's Grandma has lung cancer. She was in the hospital for a little while recently. When she first went to an oncologist she told him she didn't want to know what her prognosis was. She also has heart problems so I worry about her a lot. Mike really wants to see her and I do too. It looks like he might be making a trip to Texas in a couple of weeks to do so and I might be going shortly after he gets back. That's the stinky thing about not having any family nearby. If the kids weren't in school it wouldn't be an issue, I could load them and the dogs up and take them to WV to my parents house. We're still thinking on what we're going to do. I know he's going but I'm not 100% sure I am just yet.

Houseguests and Creepy Things

No connection between the two :). Mike's dad and his wife came in on Thursday for a visit and left early early early this morning. We had a really nice visit and I know the kids wish they could have stayed longer. Friday we took them on a tour of the historic part of Fredericksburg. We didn't have enough time to see everything so will have to catch more of it next time. We had lunch had this really neat Irish Pub called The Blarney Stone and afterwards headed down to the Fudge Factory for dessert. Yummo. I love that candy shop. I know I've said this before, it reminds me of the candy store on Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. While walking downtown, I saw my first policeman on a horse. I've been downtown tons of times and this is the first time I've seen one on a horse. Pretty neat. After we picked the kids up from school we went back down town again to this really neat place that was all decked out for Halloween. They wanted to take the kids to pick out pumpkins. I saw this place from the street last year and then again the other day but had never stopped in until then. They had the neatest Halloween displays set up. I really liked the little graveyard!

I had a pretty busy week. I spent a lot of it getting ready for our visitors but did skip out on Wednesday for a last minute trip to Richmond with my friend, Juli. She wanted to go shopping and I was happy to tag along since I hadn't really seen anything in Richmond yet. We went to a big outdoor mall called the Short Pump Town Center. We ate lunch at the Cheesecake Factory YUM! I highly recommend the Grilled Chicken Avocado Club. Before we left the mall we went back again to get some cheesecake to go. Yum again. I highly recommend the Pecan Caramel Turtle cheesecake. At least I think that's what it was called. I would've felt bad about eating it except the nice man behind the counter assured us that he sucked the calories out of it :).

I didn't do much stitching the past week but I did manage to get an ornament stitched out of the new JCS Christmas ornament issue. I stitched the Norwegian Reindeer from Scandinavian Stitches. I stitched him in Raspberry Parfait Sampler threads. He was a really quick stitch. It took me 3 evenings but I only had a bit of time each sitting. I'm hoping to start on a birthday gift tonight.

Stitching, goblins, and other stuff

I'm feeling much better now than I was a week ago. Thanks so much to those of you who emailed! Your thinking of me was very much appreciated. I've realized the past week that while things aren't going as we planned it could be much much worse. Some times things don't go as planned. When things don't go as planned and you have to cancel all of what you thought were going to be your plans for the next year, really the only thing to do is make new plans. So onward I'm plugging to make new plans. It took me about a week to shake whatever crud I had too. I had a fever on and off for about 3 days which wasn't helping either. I'm just now feeling like myself again.

Mike was given some gift cards as an award for some work he did on an audit recently. One of them was to a movie theatre so we took the kids to see Igor yesterday. They really liked it and there were some pretty funny parts, but for the most part I was kind of bored. I'm glad they had fun though. They had the previews up for High School Musical 3 which Cassie was thrilled about. It starts around the end of Oct. and Cassie's b-day is Nov. 12th so I'm thinking we might gather up a couple of her friends and go see it for her b-day. I think she's thinking on a slumber party too.

On our way out the door to see the movie I was greeted by a nice big box on my front porch. I was trying to hurry everyone along until I saw the box was addressed to me. When I noticed that I decided we had a few minutes to spare after all :). The box was from Laura, my friend in Richmond. I had no idea what it was or could be because I wasn't expecting anything from her. When I opened it up, I discovered it was my Halloween package from an exchange we're in, in our yahoo group. I distinctly remember being at In Stitches with her in Alexandria last month and asking her who her Halloween exchange partner was and she told me someone else so it never occurred to me. She did a good job of keeping that a secret :). Everyone else was fascinated with the box too and were eager to help me open in. When we did they all found something they wanted. Cassie and Joshua's eyes lit up when they saw cute little goodie bags filled with candy. Joshua quickly snapped up a pumpkin pez dispenser and Cassie snagged the witch. Mike noticed a can of yummy chocolate covered cashews and was eager to help me dig in to them last night. Laura also sent along some fun Halloween baking cups, Halloween sprinkles, and cute Halloween napkins. Cassie loves baking with me and is looking forward to helping me make Halloween cupcakes :). She also sent along a spool of orange ribbon and a spool of black. That was perfect timing because it just so happens that I needed some black ribbon to finish a little project. She also sent me a really great chart from Erica Michaels called Toil & Trouble. I LOVE this chart! It looks like such a fun stitch and I'll be looking forward to stitching it. The best thing was at the bottom of the box! She stitched a piece for me from Shepherd's Bush called Be a Witch and made it in to a beautiful pillow! Laura, I LOVE it! It's fantastic! The fabrics she picked for the finishing are perfect! I love that she put our names on the back of the pillow. Isn't it wonderful?!

I finished stitching a model a few days ago and took it back to HE on Friday. I can't wait to post a link to that chart once it's published. It was such a fun piece. I think it will be this week. In the meantime the chart for the first model I stitched was released a couple of weeks ago. It's called Boo to You. Here it is. I stitched the smaller pumpkin on the left. If you choose to buy the chart you will find my name on the inside. Yay me! I'm in print :).

If I'm being honest

This is what I feel like:

OMG, this was the worst week ever! I should be in bed and not on the computer but a person can only sleep or lay down for so long. There were a couple of good things things going on this week but more bad than good, unfortunately. We signed Joshua up for Cub Scouts and he's super excited about that. That was pretty much the highlight of the entire week. I was sick last Sunday and Monday and then Joshua was sick on Tuesday. Friday Mike and I got some very unpleasant news. I don't care to share it right now....just thinking about it gets me all sorts of upset which is probably why I'm sick again. I woke up not feeling well yesterday morning and by the afternoon I had a fever of 103. I was in and out of sleep from 5 yesterday afternoon until just after noon today when I managed to drag myself upstairs to my chair. I've been planted there most of the day until I managed to bring myself back down the stairs. You know, stairs are hard to get up and down when you're really sick!

Another good thing is I got an email from the director of the local stitching guild a week or two ago saying they had gotten some new members. I tried it right after we moved here but several of the women were flat unpleasant so after about the 4th month I didn't go back. I did go this past Tuesday though and had a really nice time. All the meanies stayed home and there were some very nice ladies there. I made friends pretty quick when I over heard one of them saying they paid someone $80 last year to finish 2 Christmas ornaments for her. I told them I'd show them how to do the finishing on ornaments at the November meeting and they were very excited about that. They're going on a field trip for the meeting in Oct. but I'm not sure if I'm going yet. They're going some place that I've not heard of about an hour from here.

I also got a phone call from the shop telling me that the new Just Cross Stitch Christmas ornament issue I had anxiously been waiting for came in. I was super excited about that! I really look forward to this magazine every year. I picked it up Tuesday night while they were having an open stitching session at the shop. I had not been to one and used picking up my magazine as a good excuse to scout the people out and see how they were. They were very very nice and I'll definitely be popping in to stitch with them. I sat with them for a while and flipped through the magazine while they stitched. Most of them looked over my shoulder while I was flipping through it. We all agreed that this issue is somewhat disappointing and doesn't compare to previous issues. There are a few pieces in there that look recycled from previous years and a few...well....a few that you just have to wonder what the heck they were thinking. There are a few that I really like and plan to stitch.

I'm in a birthday exchange in one of my groups. I sent to Nancy this year and her birthday was yesterday so I can post a pic now of what I stitched for her. I stitched 2 pieces from Blackbird Designs With Needle and Thread book. I finished one of the pieces in to a little stitching basket to put scissors and other little bits in, and I finished the other piece in to a matching pincushion just like in the book. I LOVE the pincushion.

I'm off....there's a bottle of gatorade and a box of nyquil calling my name. If only I didn't have to go back up those stairs.