A Little Nonsense Now And Then...

Look for my new blog here...

2008-03-23T13:49:34Z

http://marmiarmo.wordpress.com

I DO stitch!!! Honest...and here's proof!

2007-07-04T13:48:17Z

Here's the little guest towel I stitched for our tiny downstairs half bath, it's my first Paula Vaughan!

And this, although stitched some time ago, hangs in that bathroom as well...

And these two were recently mailed off to Becca and Sylvie...

Now,back to stitching, so I can hopefully show off something NEW!!

PIF...

2007-07-01T00:53:35Z

Well, I read so many lovely stitching blogs on a regular basis, and just today I signed up for a Pay It Forward (PIF) on one. The stipulation was that, if you wish to receive you should be willing to give. So here we go...

My talents can not match up to some others I have seen, but I would be more than willing to send off my own little stitchy PIFs to the first 5 people to post to the comments section of this blog entry. I can guarantee you that, although my PIFs won't be museum quality by any means, I do love to stitch and embellish and am certainly capable of finishing things off...if not professionally, at least in the manner of a slightly talented amateur. (Smile.)

So, who wants to receive a little PIF from me?

Shows You What I Know...

2007-06-20T23:04:48Z

So a Size Three is HUGE on the little daycare cutie...and I mean enormously, engulfingly HUGE!! So I tried again, and even the Size Two is going to be too big...this little girl is a petite little thing!

So now Sylvie has two new dresses, and they're pretty danged cute if I do say so myself. Becca has seen the Mermaid one and is supremely jealous, so I will be making one in her size, as well.

Here are the dresses...not perfect, but adorable just the same!

UGH!!! So Frustrating!!

2007-06-17T15:15:16Z

I thought I'd spend some time stitching yesterday, and I had a real yearning to work on Mirabilia's "Titania". I stitched her arm, and found out I was off by one. I ripped it out, restitched it, and got it right. Moved on to her hair. Got that without incident, and moved onto the other arm. And I can NOT get it right!! It's been stitched, ripped, restitched, ripped again, restitched...and it's STILL wrong!!! I want to throw her across the room at this point, but I have settled for just packing her away for another day. Sigh...I wanted to make some genuine progress on her, and it just isn't happening!

So I think I may sew today. I sewed last Sunday, making a scrub top for one of the parents at work. It was a new pattern to me, and a little tricky since I haven't sewed a garment in some time, but I persevered and it turned out really beautifully!! Pretty fabric, summery and bright. The pattern was adorable, not just an average scrub top but one with a cute neckline and elastic in the back, etc. Really, it was so sweet!

And it doesn't fit her. I forgot about sewing patterns not really matching up...size-wise...to plain old Wal-Mart clothing sizes. The damned thing is too small. It's too small for her, too small for me, and too large for anyone else I could give it to. *&%#*$(#!!!!! (Yes, that's me cussing!)

Hopefully I will have better luck today. Well, I can pretty much guarantee it. I am making a little sundress for my little preschool girl. I found some pretty "Little Mermaid" fabric and a very simple, sweet pattern for a sundress at Wal-Mart Friday night so I bought it. Now this time, I am making it a size three...the little girl at preschool is itsy-bitsy for her age, but I think a size three will work. The lucky advantage is, if it doesn't fit her, I can send it off to Sylvia and it WILL fit her!! Maybe this time, I am guaranteed a little success...I can use some 'round about now!

A picture of the girls for good measure...I think they look adorable!

Cinderella, Cinderella...

2007-06-03T06:02:15Z

Finally, finally, a FINISHED finish!!! I stitched Cinderella for Rebecca quite some time ago, but now it has been finally made into the little purse she wanted...a shoulder bag, no less, since the Princess Rebecca so commanded me. Here it is, all trimmed in frou-frou maribou-type trim, and with a fabric on the back that mirrors the front excellently. It isn't perfect, but I think it's fabulous, anyway!!

Slowly, slowly...

2007-05-27T15:10:54Z

Yes, I am still around...it may not seem like it, as I have become a very boring, bad blogger, but here I am. It has been three weeks since I blogged...homework, job, housework, stitching, and various other things have kept me from blogging nearly as much as I would like, and I haven't even scanned or photographed any of my stitching, either. Depression? Maybe...

I finished several small pieces from a Leisure Arts book. Four were made into flat folds as gifts for my teachers, one will be sent overseas as a gift. I am also currently stitching the name "Luke" in a cute little robot alphabet that is a royal pain in the behind...I have ripped the "U" out twice already, and am threatening to trash it if I have to rip it out one more time!

I'm feeling really frustrated this month. Despite a strong desire to get it done, we still haven't completely finished unpacking and putting everything away yet. My older daughter blew off Mother's Day as if it never existed, or maybe as if she didn't have a mother. I haven't heard from her all month. I'm cranky at work (just with my boss, not with the kiddos), and I know that isn't smart, but I can't seem to get into a good, steady mood.

So, here is my entry...fun, isn't it?

Deep dark depression, excessive misery...

2007-05-07T04:19:51Z

Did anybody ever watch "Hee Haw" as a kid? Remember that song, "Gloom, despair and agony on me, Deep dark depression, excessive misery, If it weren't for bad luck, I'd have no luck at all, Gloom, despair, and agony on me."? No? It's just me? Yeah, well...

It isn't actually as bad as all that, not really. We are having some problems with our new neighbors, who seem to have taken an instant dislike to us...either that, or they're just idiots. They park in our parking spaces, slam doors, cuss at each other in loud voices, and tonight when I got out of the cab coming home, someone was peeking out of the blinds of the front door at me. Not a quick, "who's out there?" peek, but a long, watch me walk from the street to the front door stare. Weird. They'll stand outside with their car stereo thumping, which I totally don't understand, and they beat on the porch railings while they're standing there. Why? I'm thinking it's to try and be obnoxious...they are pretty strange.

My blood sugar is higher than I'd like, but then again, I haven't exactly been being very careful about my diet since I've been stressed out with the move and the money situation and everything. And the arthritis is intensely painful. Not only that, but it has rained nearly every day for the past week, and is supposed to rain all this week, too. Anybody know a good ark builder???

No stitching pics yet, although I have two finishes...a cute little towel with a Paula Vaughan floral on it for the downstairs half bath, and LHN's "Cherries", which is finished but not "finished" finished. Hopefully there will be a bit of sun tomorrow and I can get pics...we're having scanner problems, too, did I mention that? And the CD driver isn't working on the computer, either.

It never rains but it pours. Literally!!

ETA: Oh, gosh!!! I completely forgot about this picture!! This is Becca at her very first T-Ball game (she just turned four). She got the game ball, now how cool is that??? Obviously she does NOT come by her athletic genes by way of her grandma, who came darned near to failing gym class! I'm about as graceless and uncoordinated as a three-legged, one-eyed elephant!!

And here are a couple of other pics from the game, too...including little Sylvie watching.

Stitching again...FINALLY!!

2007-04-15T18:06:12Z

Nothing to show yet, but after a couple of really heinously hectic weeks, I am finally able to get a little stitching done again, and I am so glad! I had to find my thumb stabilizer (without which stitching is pure agony), and the new townhouse is as yet not completely unpacked, but I am making progress on that, too.
Hope to be able to scan and post a progress pic or two tomorrow...til then, here are a couple pics of the girls hunting Easter eggs.

Hee hee hee...and Sylvia helped dye the eggs...looks like she enjoyed herself, eh??

Well, we're movin' on up....

2007-04-05T19:39:09Z

...I don't know my east from my west until the sun sets, though, so I don't know if we're moving on up to the east side or not...but we are definitely movin' on up!!

We came home from work one day last week to discover an ABUNDANCE of mouse droppings in the kitchen. (Um, yeah...needless to say, we hadn't been in the kitchen much in quite a while...it's small, musty, and not nice to cook in, so we don't!) Well, my daughter, who is pathologically afraid of mice (as if I'm much better!) started crying and trembling, and even though we set traps, cleaned like maniacs, and put out all manner of poison, we kept finding droppings the next couple of nights. We decided that was our last straw...we didn't much like a lot of things about that apartment...okay, all we DID like is the cheap rent and the nice landlord...so we decided to start looking for something new.

Saturday I was babysitting and looked in the newspaper to find a listing for a townhouse that was within our budget. We drove over to take a look at the outside and liekd what we saw...contacted the owner on Sunday to see the inside and filled out our applications the same day.
Processed Monday, approved Tuesday, lease signed Wednesday...and we are moving in this weekend!

Rush rush rush...wow. But we will finally , after three years, have a dishwasher and garbage disposal again. Heather has her own room again. And we finally will have enough closet space to get everything put away again. And the nice little bonus of an extra half bath...wonderful!!

So you won't see me for a while...no internet til next week, and then Tuesday is class night, so it'll be nearly a week before I'll be back online. Wish us luck...we are going to need it to get this all done!!!

Up For Grabs...

2007-04-01T03:18:31Z

Okay, so I jumped on the Quaker bandwagon and it was a definite mistake. I'm a shabby chic, cottage, cutesy, country primitive kind of girl, and the Quaker thing, while temporarily infatuating to me, is so NOT my style.

I had ordered With My Needle's "An Emblem Of Love" with income tax refund money, and even special ordered the two Olde Willow threads and the GAST for this. And a large piece of vintage country cream linen.

It's all up for grabs...for less than half of what I paid for it all. We are hoping to move soon, and my teeth need some work, and so on and on, so who needs something I will never stitch to drag around?

Leave me a comment with some contact info if you're interested...

Happy Happy Joy Joy!!!

2007-03-25T01:00:15Z

Ah, yes...remember Ren and Stimpy?? And their fabulous song and dance?

Anyway, I am happy today...here is why!

1) I finished "Easter Bird", and I think she is very sweet. She may be a little "too pink" for some, but since pink is my favorite color, I am not worried about that.

2) I just signed up for the auto ship of Country Cottage Needleworks from Down Sunshine Lane, and this is the newest pattern, just in today...I LOVE IT!!!

And...

3) I have soooo many more beautiful photos of the girls to sort through, like these...

What's to be unhappy about???

Happy Birthday, Sylvia!!

2007-03-24T14:20:14Z

Today is my younger granddaughter's second birthday. Isn't she lovely? I can't wait to get to see her...she looks like me, and also she just is so adorably cuddly looking.

Happy birthday, little Sylvie sweetie!! Your grandma adores you...

Happy Birthday, Becca Bear!!!!

2007-03-21T23:05:07Z

Today is Becca Bear's 4th birthday!! I can hardly believe that I have a four-year-old granddaughter, but there she is.

Happy, happy birthday, beautiful Becca. Your grandma thinks you're one of the best little girls in the whole wide world.

I had a bad day...

2007-03-16T12:18:25Z

Well, this is how I felt for a large part of my afternoon yesterday. (This is Sylvia, by the way.) The evening went much better, though, and now I am ready to face the day anew. Thankfully!!

(See? She is such a sweet little thing, really...she was just having a bad day like her Grandma.)

Summer Breeze, makes me feel fine...

2007-03-12T02:31:34Z

Remember that old song from Seals & Croft, or am I truly showing my age here?

Anyway, here is today's update on Prairie Schooler's "Summer Breeze", and I am pretty impressed with it, myself.

The dark brown color which I stitched in DMC#3371 rather than the DMC#898 called for, doesn't actually bother me. And the "mistake" in the skinny house windows is intentional...I like the look of windows with lots of little panes.

This is working up quickly and I really love it...the colors and all of it. My first Prairie Schooler, but it won't be my last!

**Edited to enlarge the image...gosh, I'm slow!

Ain't She Sweet?

2007-03-11T17:52:53Z

That's a song I remember my father singing when I was little...I don't remember much but those words, but I thought of them immediately when I saw this photo of the little girl I babysit for.

Recognize the dress? I loved it so much for my granddaughters that I bought one for my little "Bella", too. She sure looks like a little doll baby in it, doesn't she?

More cross stitch updates later, as I have been chugging along on "Summer Breeze" and it actually shows! But for now, I just had to put up this adorable picture...it reminds me that a)Spring IS on its way and b)Little girls are so much fun.

Have a great day! I'm off to LimeWire to find "Ain't She Sweet".

I have been stitching...honest!!

2007-03-08T00:51:48Z

I finally got my glasses back from Target in Springfield (where I lost them during my trip there with Shelley about a week and a half ago), so now I can actually SEE what I am doing...and I noticed that sloppy looking loose stitch along the bottom right away! I'll have to go to the back and pull that in a little, but here is my Prairie Schooler "Summer Breeze" thus far.

I am loving this!!! I only ever worked on one PS design before (didn't finish it), but this one is so great...I love the colors and the style is just too cute. I started on "Summer" because I have a high level of distractability (come on, it took me three months to finish "The Wizard of Oz"!), but I may actually finish this one before spring arrives...it's fun to work on and is going pretty fast.

That's all for now...I need to do some more housework, as our landlord is selling our building and I like it to look nicer than my usual clean-but-sloppy style when someone will be here.

marmiarmo @ 2007-03-04T07:58:00

2007-03-04T14:08:40Z

Yippee for me!!! My boatload of homework is done done done!!! Typed up, printed off, finished completed DONE!! Now maybe I can do some stitching...

Do the Snoopy dance with me!!

ETA: Go to Snoopy.com to get to a great website where you can download screensavers, wallpapers, gifs, etc. I LOVE Snoopy!!!

Oh, wow...

2007-02-28T00:25:57Z

Scary stuff going on here in Rolla today!!

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/02/27/missouri.standoff.ap/index.html

ETA: The "anthrax" was powdered sugar, there was no bomb, the man is in custody. Wow.

Aaaaaargh!!!

2007-02-25T16:35:03Z

Well, for all the fun I had yesterday, I paid a nice little price...seems I left my glasses behind somewhere. Nice, relatively new, absolutely essential bifocals...lost in Springfield, 2 hours away, and me with no way to go find them.

I called the bookstore, e-mailed the craft store, and called Target...and the guy at Target said, "Yep...we got 'em!"

Relief!!! I asked him if they could pleased send them to me, explaining the circumstances, and he said, "No, we can't do that. You'll have to come and pick them up."

Well, okay, I can understand that...what if they weren't really mine? But I live two hours away and have no car...and I am fortunate to make it to Springfield once a year. What the heck am I supposed to do now???

I talked to the store manager who said that he would check into it and to call him back tomorrow morning, so hopefully he can help. I would bet almost anything that they couldn't be anyone else's glasses...same scratched case with a buff-colored lining, same gunmetal-grey framed bifocals inside, turned in just late last night...c'mon, what are the odds of them being anyone else's???

Say a little prayer for me...I have substitute, back-up glasses that I can use, but they are coming apart at the seams, so to speak, and are not quite as strong as the newer ones, and I would hate to have to wait for a trip back to Springfield to get these back!!

Moral of the story...maybe I should get used to wearing my glasses all the time. They bother me for the computer and far away things, and at certain times I find myself scooting them up on top of my head because I can't focus well with them, but it's better than losing them altogether!!

A Bittersweet Day...

2007-02-25T07:16:48Z

Today was "Last Hurrah Day" with my best friend, Shelley. She and her family are going to be relocating to southeast Georgia in a few months, and who knows when we might see each other again after that. We usually go at least once a year on a road trip to Springfield and spend the day doing a little shopping in the city...we small town girls and our Wal-Mart existence just love to enjoy a trip into Barnes & Noble for a frappucino, a stop in each Hobby Lobby, etc. And don't get me started on the fun we had going to Leslie's Craft Carousel in Bolivar, or the trips to Kohl's and Target. It was a great day and we both got bunches and bunches of goodies.

I got this little dress for Sylvia...

...and one almost identical to it for Rebecca, which for some reason I couldn't get a picture of on the Kohl's website. Becca's has no white at the bottom, cap sleeves, and flowers rather than butterflies embroidered on it, but otherwise they are almost the same. And they are sooooo cute!! These are going to be the girls' birthday gifts, and I will tuck a little cute toy in the pocket of each dress.

I also got some great Valentine goodies for 10 cents on the dollar (how can you beat a gigantic windsock for 70 cents, I ask you??), some new Q-snaps, a breadcloth, some great charts and things, restocked my DMC, and got two cute Bent Creek kits on clearance for $9.95 apiece. All in all, a great shopping day!!

Oh, and I spoiled myself just a little...in Target, they had those hobnail glass-looking bunny-shaped candy dishes for $3.99. Unfortunately, they were only plastic, but they had one in pink, and it was so sweet, and Easter is coming...so I got one. I just love pink things, and shabby chic decor, and anything that reminds me of my childhood days. This satisfied all three, in its own way, so it was a must have.

Shel bought me lunch at Fazoli's (another thing I miss about Little Rock...there aren't too many, and they all involve food or shopping, I must confess) as a belated birthday treat, and that was delicious and the service outstanding.

But it was a bittersweet day, because as I said...it was our last hurrah. I'm really going to miss that girl...

I love my job...

2007-02-17T01:04:49Z

Sometimes I do dislike it...when the kids are all running around screeching, when there are 17 little snotty noses to wipe and nobody thinks to keep the kid with the 103 fever home, ANY time someone throws up.

But then there are the moments like Valentine's Day, when you get little Valentines with Nemo, Superman, or the Disney Princesses and little cherry heart-shaped lollipops from the kids, every day when I walk in the door and the kiddos scream out "Mary!!" and come running to hug me around the knees, the neck hugs and sloppy kisses goodbye I get every day, watching my little "adopted granddaughter"'s face light up when she sees me come into the room, etc. etc. etc.

And days like today, when we did a little art project with toilet tissue tubes, paper, stickers, etc. The object was to make a little robot of their own design, but I, being the Princess of Pink, decided to make my own little pretty (well, beauty IS in the eye of the beholder, after all), pink, frou-frou girly thing.

I present to you, my own creation...
...the precious pretty pink princessy "thing".

Go ahead...call me cuckoo. I am absurdly proud of this little thing, I think because I am a color-in-the-lines, think-inside-the-box kind of person. Give me charts, diagrams, and step-by-step instructions and I am just fine. But expect me to CREATE, and I am lost. I am a crafter, not an artist.

But today, I made my own little piece of art. Such as she is.

Ta Da!!!!!

2007-02-16T06:51:22Z

To paraphrase Dora the Explorer (hey, I'm a preschool teacher after all!), "I did it, I did it, I did it!!!"

I put the last backstitch in minutes ago, and scanned it before even washing or ironing it. It's so late I didn't have time for that...I'll do it at work tomorrow.

But it is DONE!!! Now I can move on to other stitching without the accompanying guilty conscience!

Updates on Ponch and "The Wizard of Oz"

2007-02-11T14:45:12Z

Okay, I know it's an unusual sounding combination...wasn't Ponch the cop Erik Estrada played on "CHiPs"?? And what has that got to do with "The Wizard of Oz"??

Ponch was the nickname chosen many moons ago by Mario, the dear cousin-in-law many times removed who passed away earlier this week. His father's name was (is) Mario, and young Mario didn't like being "young Mario" and greatly admired the character of Ponch on "CHiPs", so he chose that as his nickname. A fiercely loyal and dedicated man, he kept that as his nickname long after the character and show fell out of fashion.

Well, we now know that Ponch died from a massive heart attack. Shocking, to say the least. He was a healthy size and weight, and as far as we know, he didn't have any warning signs of trouble ahead...and at 42 years old, he was quite young for such a tragic end. It's really very sad...

That's Ponch on the right, with a friend he was helping after the friend suffered a stroke.

And then there is "The Wizard of Oz". Ugh.

I got the bright idea to stitch this for my boss for a combination Christmas/50th birthday gift. She is a HUGE fan of the movie and collects little things related to it...not obsessively, but she does have a cool little collection. she is also a HUGE fan of my needlework, and is always admiring what I stitch. So I thought what better gift, right?

Well, it will be...if I ever finish!! I stitched like a madwoman for the first three weeks, and almost the only thing done was the durned sky!!! That burned me out and I started stitching at a slower pace...too slow! Christmas and her birthday came and went, with no sign of a gift from me.

Cut to yesterday, when I decided that since I am going to be laid up for the weekend with this crummy cold, I may as well get as much time in on this piece as I can. And here it is as of midnight last night, when I finally quit and went to bed.

Just one more color (and very few stitches of that, thankfully!) in the Emerald City itself, one color to fill in on the grass, and the backstitching to do. I'm thinking a few days at most. Hooray!!! I want this over with...first of all, it is overdue. Secondly, it's a great finish and I really will like it again once I have finished it. Thirdly, the boss will be ecstatic!! And finally...I am absolutely ACHING to start something new!!!