Totally Useless......

That's right....it is TUSAL time!  

My October-themed TUSAL jar:

Not too shabby if I say so myself!   I feel like I've been productive!


In other news.... I've been stressing out over my WIPs!   I keep starting new pieces and new SALs.....so my original rotation plans are shot.  A few of the new stitch-a-longs that I'm in run by time versus finishing a page (which I'm used to), so I've taken a shot at coming up with a plan that fits both timed stitching and finishing pages.  I think WIP planning is tougher than rocket science!!

I've also decided to put a few pieces on hold, which you'll see on my On Hold tab.   Once I get caught up on some other items, I'll put these back into rotation (I think!).
I've posted my updated plans in the right side bar (I left what I've finished so far this year and will delete those once 2012 is over). 


Now, I know I mentioned some new pieces I've started.....here's some pics!

QS Seasons 2 - I met a wonderful stitcher, Michelle, on the HAED FB Groups and she RAKd this chart to me a few months ago.  We decided it would be fun to stitch it together as a SAL, which we work on the first week of each month.   Here's my progress from our first week, in October:

Also, I purchased my first hand-dyed fabric from Silkweavers a bit ago, and once I recieved them I just had to get some floss in one of them!   I started QS Dream of Dahlia and here is my progress after 1 day:

I'll take a better picture for her next update...so you can see the gorgeous fabric better!


-lesli

"The board is set, the pieces are moving......

............. We come to it at last, the great battle of our time.” – Gandalf

It's a Lord of the Rings SAL (stitch a long) !!!

Kim of Scully's Cross Stitching spoiled me with a RAK of the hugely gorgeous chart, Middle Earth by Heaven and Earth Designs.  

This chart was re-released in a larger format, to show the details of the map clearer. 


And for an early HAED All Hallows Exchange, Samira from Facebook RAKd me the beautimous The Eternal Promise by Matt Stewart

This chart is also a re-release of the chart that was previously retired.  Michele updated it and it is a bit larger than the original.


The ever so fantastic, Ewa from Cross Stitch and other Musings had the brilliant idea of having a Lord of the Rings SAL!  

We plan to begin on October 25th, as this is the day that Frodo decided to begin his journey of taking the ring to Mordor. 

Anyone is welcome to join us!!  Any HAED LotR themed chart counts (Middle Earth, Eternal Promise, Burden, Gandalf at Bag End...etc...and I see that The Lady of the Mirror was JUST charted!)

No set rules!  I plan to stitch for 5 days, beginning on the 25th of each month.  You can stitch on just the 25th, rotate every week...whatever you like!  Post your updates on your blog site, and/or the HAED Facebook groups.


Now....to get everything ready to start!



-lesli

My Blogaversary Winner!

WOW!!!   I loved all the wonderful comments everyone left for my Blogaversary!  THANK YOU!!  You are all so generous and I appreciate your thoughtfulness :)    The online community of stitchers is amazing, isn't it!?


Here is a full list of everyone that was entered into the drawing:

And......the winner is....(via Random#Generator).....

CONGRATULATIONS TimRachel! 

Your $50 gift certificate to 1-2-3 Stitch is on it's way!

Rachel has a wondeful blog, full of gorgeous stitching!  Check it out here:   TimRachel's Blog



Thank you again to everyone for your kind comments!   Here's to another year!!



-lesli

September WIPocalypse

I'm a little late...but hey...that's the story of my life! :)


Thanks to everyone that wished me well during this darn cold....and yes...I still have it!   At this point I may be going for the World Record for longest cold, or possibly the most nose blowing!

Some quick pics of my WIPocalypse progress this past month  (I say quick, but after I loaded them all I was pleasantly surprised by how much progress I made these last 30 days!):


Lanterns Before:

and After:

Blue Moon Before:

and After:

Blue Butterly Before:

and After:

Moonlight Immersion Before:

and After:

Around the World Before:

and After:

Looking forward to checking out everyone's progress as well!



-lesli

September TUSAL and September IHSW

My September TUSAL:

My jar is actually more full than I had expected!  Mostly within the past few weeks, as I've been sick and haven't done much besides lay around in bed and stitch!  (no complaining on my end...I've been loving it!)

When I went to grab my ORT jar for the picture, my daughter's Lil' Pony was on the same table...she likes to put her own "pretties" in there then bring it to me to see her handi-work.   The fabric everything is sitting on is something I bought to work on a Christmas stitchy gift.  We'll see if I ever get around to it!

And my September IHSW:

I chose to work on my Lanterns piece.   My goal is to have all but the back stitching on this done before the end of this month! (yeah right, lesli!)

Before the weekend

After the weekend

As I shared earlier, I've been sick for the past couple of weeks.  I can't seem to shake this thing!  So it absolutely made my dreary day when I received an email from Kate letting me know I won a $25 gift certificate to 123stitch.com for her Blogaversary!   

Visit her adorable site here:   Momuboocrea Island  and if you scroll through her posts to the one on 09/11/2012 you can listen to her cute audio blog!

This also reminds me...don't forget to enter my Blogaversary contest as well...just click here!  

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend full of family, fun and stitching!  I'm off to check out all your updates!

-lesli

It's a Blog...blog....BLOGAVERSARY Partayyyy!

Seriously though...how do you spell the dang word...Blogeversary, Blogaversary....Blogiversary?  Surely someone must know .....even WIKIPEDIA didn't have it <gasp!>

Enough rambling....let's get to the good stuff!



October 2nd is the 1 year anniversary of my blog-adventure!  If you're bored and would like to check out my first post....wander on over here   (it's boring...not a single picture...what was I thinking?)


I thought long and hard and soft and short....... and at first I was going to go through my humongous stash of goodies...then I was going to do some shopping...but instead what I decided was to get someone what THEY'D like..... so for my 1 year celebration I'll be giving away a $50 gift certificate/card to anywhere that offers them! 

Winner receives a gift certificate/card of their choice!  Some ideas might be:

Basically.....as long as I can buy a gift card or certificate from a store (they have to accept US dollars...but they all do, don't they?).....you can choose it!

The usual rules....

• Be a follower
• Post a comment
• Please include your email
• Please include the store you choose, if you don't choose one...I'll choose one! :)

All entries will be given a number and the winner chosen by my good ole' number generator.

Drawing will end at midnight EST on Friday, October 5th (I know..my one year is on the 2nd, but that's the middle of the week...and this gives folks more time to enter!)

Winner will be announced sometime on Saturday!

Good luck...and thanks for hanging in there with me for the past year!

-lesli