I haven't posted since March????

It's been a very long time since I posted here but it hasn't been due to a lack of desire, but more due to a lack of time! Lots of things have been happening around here - with the usual mix of happy and sad that seems to occur in everyone's life...

Gitta's Getaway went really well. You can reall all about it here. Folks were very happy and seem to have enjoyed the weekend. I'm sure next year's Getaway will be even better!

After the Getaway, I celebrated another birthday. DH and the kids bought me an iPod touch which I'm having lots of fun playing with and loading up with all kinds of music and audiobooks and podcasts. I'm enjoying having a real electronic calendar too as it's allowing me to stay on top of things a little better than I was. Years ago I used to live by my Palm PDA and I have missed it over the years. I'm glad to have one again and this one will let me read or listen to a book or have some cool tunes to listen to while at the gym!
May continued to be busy with Scientist work and spring was popping out all over!

DS#2 was bridged from Cubs to Scouts at a very sweet ceremony:


DS#1 is a senior scout so he had the honour of bridging his little brother. DS#1 is holding a candle on the left (with his other hand in his pocket) and DS#2 is standing right next to him.

The long holiday weekend in May (Victoria Day for Canadians) brought us a mix of good and sad news.The good news - I became a Great Aunt for the 10th time. One of my nephews and his wife blessed us with little Felicity on May 23:

(try to ignore me and focus on the pretty little baby, 'K?)

The sad news came on May 24th when my FIL called to say that his mother had passed away. She was 94 but in exceptionally good health despite her age. She had fallen at the nursing home where she lived and broken her leg. She had surgery to repair her leg and was doing just fine until she had a sudden heart attack and passed away. It was such a surprising passing for us all. We'll miss her a lot, but I'm so glad that both my boys are old enough to remember her. It's not all that often that kids get to know and remember their great-grandparents.

June saw a wrap-up to most of my Scientist work and brought us another big family event. DS#1 had achieved one of the highest awards in Scouting - the Chief Scout's Award (if you're American, this award is equivalent to the Eagle Scout award). There was a special ceremony at a university about an hour's drive away from us where DS#1 received his award:


And no, his award doesn't have big black marks on it - I blocked out his name! :-)

Of course, in amongst all that, I have been stitching whenever there was a moment to spare! I just finished a model and I'm working busily on another one, so I can't show those....

But, once I finished up my last workshop for the year, I did get bitten by the finishing bug and I finished-finished a few things. One of them I can't show you because it's a gift for someone who reads this blog (you know who you are!), but here are a couple things I *can* show you!

First up is Lizzie*Kate's Seeds of Knowledge:

Stitched on 32-count cobblestone linen from my stash
with recommended DMC substitutions
(except I subbed 712 for 3042 - cut apples are NOT purple inside!)

This is a gift for DS#2's teacher. Here's what it's been turned into:


And a side view:


And if you're wondering, I like to use the tutorial from Vonna's blog - she has great pictures and instructions written for the craft-impaired like me. :-)

And the second thing is something that has been languishing in my finished pile for eons.... It's a design by Jeanette Douglas that she taught at the CreativFestival. I can't for the life of me remember what it's called and I can't seem to locate it on her website. I did change the wording on the piece to have the name of the lake where my parents have their cottage. I intended to make it into a bellpull for ages and just have never gotten it done. Here's the before picture (it's resting on the fabric I'm using to back the piece):


You'll have to wait for the after shot though - I still have to hand-sew the pockets that will hold the dowels and I need to make the hanging cording and tassel....

Hopefully I'll have some more time now to post more regularly. We're heading off on a big adventure this summer - we're going to drive all the way out to the west coast of Canada and back again. The Travelling Project will get a major workout this summer! I made DH promise that our trip will include a stop at Nordic Needle. I can't wait!