Slowly but surely ....

I am getting there ... I promise!  I've had no internet access at home since the beginning of September; long story but I will get it sorted at some point.  I bought a dongle thinking that would help, and yes it did up to a point.  It worked on the laptop I used for work (which unfortunately went back to my ex boss last weekend) but for some reason I couldn't get it to work on my own laptop (i.e. this one).  Tried everything I could think of and nothing, nada, zilch.  I took it up to the local coffee shop today as I was meeting a new pupil (more of that later) and thought I'd try using their free wifi access and - you guessed it - nothing!  Came back and contacted a techy friend on Facebook through my Blackberry and she was sending me ideas to try out and whilst all that was going on I thought I'd do a system restore which I did, back to the end of September, and it worked!!!!  Maybe I am more of a techy than I give myself credit for.

Anyway I thought, since Mouse is out living it up in Barnsley tonight and not on Facebook to give me grief about my lack of stitching progress, that I would do a blog update.  I'll do the cuppas tonight since she is out on the ran dan (*tuts*) So, I went to the bag I had taken up to the coffee shop this afternoon to get out the Crocus Cushion to do an update - and it wasn't there!  Panic set it!  Oh no - months of work and it's almost finished and now it's gone!  I even phoned the coffee shop to see if it had been handed in.  Then I went through everything I had taken out of the bag again just in case - and there it was - in amongst a load of finished projects I had taken up with me to show Hannah.  Phewwwwwww!



Crocus Cushion by Sue Page



And without further ado, here it is:  I thought that the gold metallic swirlies would take me no time at all; get them done in a weekend I thought.  Yeah right - that was back at the beginning of September and you can see how far I have got!  It is taking me about an hour just to do one.  Talk about soul destroying :(  Anyway it is almost done and I have high hopes of getting it finished and sent off to Mouse for getting it made up into a cushion.  I have got the most gorgeous fabric to back it with so fingers crossed and who knows maybe on my next blog post I will have a proper finish to show you all.

I have been stitching honest just haven't got a lot to show for it at the moment.  I am currently working on a Christmas ornament for an exchange on my Friendly Stitchers group and also doing some other ornaments for a craft fair taking place at one of the coffee shops where I meet up with fellow stitchers - and more on that later as well.

Well on the non-stitching front; I had a week-long visit from Mrs Mouse at the end of August/beginning of September and oh it was lovely to have her here!  She hadn't been here before and it was the first time she had met the Minster too but they took to each other straight away and to be honest I was beginning to feel a bit left out of it ROFL!  I showed Mouse around my wee home town - took her up to the gardens to show her around and she met some of our members up there; also took her up to the PDSA shop where I volunteer and she came along to the quiz night that Nyree and I go to every couple of weeks.  I think she enjoyed herself (well I hope she did lol) and Minnie and I really enjoyed having her here and I was so sad to see her go.  She did crack the whip a bit while she was here and brought her sewing machine and overlocker with her and made me practice on them.  She had a go on my antique Frister & Rosmann too and really liked it.  We had a wee trip down to the coast too to Largs to meet up with Maureen and Dee from my Scottish Stitchers group (and Dee's friend Lorna too) - and a lovely time was had.  We took Mouse to Nardini's for icecream - I think she was impressed lol!

Then it was my turn to pay a visit!  While Mouse was here her DD1 contacted me and told me she was arranging for me to go down to Barnsley for Halloween and not to tell Mouse cos it was to be a surprise!  Have you ever tried to keep a surprise from a nosy Mouse?  You'll know what we went through over the next month or so then.  DD1 organised the train tickets and got them sent up to me and even booked me into the local Travel Inn for the first night too.  On the night of my arrival DD1 and DD2 and DH (Mouse's not mine of course) made some excuse of going out for a McDonalds and of course when they came back they had a MacAlly instead!  The Barnsley stitching girls were at Mouse's that night too - and of course they were in on it, so I got to meet them too.  I loved the look on Mouse's face when I walked in behind the girls!

We had a lovely weekend - but no stitching because we were getting organised for the big Halloween party that Mouse's DD1 organises every year.  Unfortunately I came down with a chest infection and was feeling distinctly rubbish the whole time I was there but it didn't stop me getting stuck in to help where I could - I was right chuffed with the end result of the cupcakes DD2 baked them and I iced them and then DD1 sprinkled them with glitter.  They look reet good on the cupcake stand in fact they looked so good we had to persuade people to eat them - they didn't want to spoil the display!  I have to admit that I ate so much buttercream during the icing of the cakes that I didn't even try one when they were done.  Still can't face the idea of buttercream lol!

Karen came over with her DH and wee Freddie her gorgeous wee Yorkie on the Saturday and they stayed over at the local hotel until the Sunday.  I shared with Freddie - he's such a wee gentleman lol.

Mouse's craft room was the bar for the night of the party and then she was decorating it so I think we only actually sat in there a couple of times and not a single stitch was put in.  I didn't stitch on the journey down either due to lack of space and on the journey back I was just too tired.  Ah well there's always the next journey ...

As usual I left my camera at home so I didn't take a single photo that weekend but Mouse took loads and you can see them on her blog.

I have been keeping myself busy and have started running some stitching classes up here in the south side of Glasgow.  I do Saturday mornings and Saturday afternoons at the moment in the local coffee shops but we're hoping to be able to have the use of a fabric shop that has just opened up not far from here where I can have the classes and we can do some workshops too.  The ladies who have contacted me and come along are all so nice and I'm hoping that they'll be able to come along to the next get together of our Scottish Stitchers too which would be nice.  I am going to renew the ad on Gumtree over the next week or so and maybe get some more people interested pre-Christmas.  I need to do some more work to the website but once Christmas is over I can concentrate on that more.

I am hoping to have some more work done in the flat before Christmas with a view to hopefully getting it on the market some time in the New Year.  It seems to be a much better idea to sell up, move to Yorkshire and use the proceeds from the flat to set up the shop rather than try to get funding here and struggle along.  I can get on with the classes and the website for now and leave the big plans until I can move.  Wish me luck on that!

Oh before I forget - here is the lovely needlebook I received from Mouse in the Autumn Needlebook Exchange on Friendly Stitchers - and it was purely coincidental that we ended up being partners.  We drew the names while she was here and I had just said wouldn't it be funny if ... and the rest well you can figure it out lol! 

Here's the needlebook I sent to Mouse too.  I used a JBW Design and Fragant Cloves GAST hand dyed thread on Potato 28ct lugana.  I was really pleased with the way it turned out and it was a really nice stitch too.

Ok well I guess I ought to go now and finish off that Christmas ornie.  See what happens when Mouse goes out for a night lol!  Sorry it has taken me so long to do an update but I promise that I'll have another one for you very soon.  Oooh and thanks to the Canadian Oddball for yet another lovely letter. I need to get mine out to my secret penpal at the beginning of the week (should have gone already but life keeps getting in the way!)

Thanks for staying with me - hope you enjoyed the tea.  Might even do some scones for your next visit if you're lucky!

Bye for now!

Hugs,

Ally xxx