Winter at Beacon House…

is finished. I started on Sept. 6, 2011 and finished on July 18, 2013.

Behold:

Beacon House Update!

Into the home stretch:

Still lots of snow to do, but at the moment, I’m tired of snow. We got about 16” yesterday. Today it’s close to 50 degrees, so it’s melting.

I also found my cribbage board from the old days, before Blogger:

This was handmade by an old friend almost 20 years ago who has since moved to Maine.

Water, water everywhere....

I finished the water portion of Beacon House:

Then the snow....I have to remember I want to add a lost mitten in the snow somewhere. It's not on the chart but I think I can wing it.

In other news, the Axe pony was the source of angst and lessening of the bank account today. The barn called to say she wasn't "acting right" and didn't finish breakfast. Not good- and made for upsetting flashbacks to the weekend Axe coliced over the summer and Bob died. Emily got there first & called to say "get the vet- her head is swollen". Which is kind of bizarre, but sure enough, when I get there, her muzzle is grossly swollen- close to twice its normal petite size. And very sore to the touch. The farrier came by too- he was supposed to do her shoes, but wanted to see what was up  with her face, and he said it felt very warm- like an infection. Long story short, after a sedation, a shot of pain killer, and a very painful oral exam, the vet thinks it's an allergic reaction to something she's ingested. She administered a steroid shot and gave me an Rx for steroid tablets. And a follow up visit mid-week.

Our guess was an infected tooth, but the vet said her mouth looked "awesome" - no cuts or foreign objects or broken teeth.

That's me: Mary "The strange, the bizarre, and the unexpected, day late and a dollar short, queen of procrastinators" Murphy. Also, very cold. Brrrrrr

I.O.U….

A progress picture of Beacon House:

Almost to the right side. But there’s still a ton of snow and water to infill, the numbers, 4 more pine trees, another dog and a person or two.

I also owe you a Christmas update: I’ve been reading a lot- Emily gave me a Kindle for Christmas:

(that’s the screen saver)

I bought a pretty pink cover for it:

She also gave me these 2 cross stitch books:

which contain some very cute projects. Dirty words, but cute!

She also gave me 2 pretty cardigans, plus some new horse ornaments for the tree, and LOTS of chocolate!

It’s Been a While….

Since you’ve seen Beacon House. I worked on it last week, but only in the snow bank so any progress seemed invisible. But this week we went in a different direction:

After some errands this morning, I grabbed some crackers & cheese for lunch. Chickie loves her cheese!

Beacon House Update

Day #2 of NaBloPoMo:

Yes, that’s a LOT of snowflakes. Smyrna crosses over 2, 4, and 6 threads. But a girl has to do what a girl has to do.

It’s Alive!!!

It has been a while since i posted a picture of Beacon House:

As you can see, we now have a boat, and more ocean.
I have other news: the owners of my barn have sold the property to move to Florida, and we had to move the pony to another barn. We've ended up at the barn we wanted to move to way back when, but they had no stalls, which is why we went to Jodi's. Alice has 2 of her own horses, plus one other boarder. She doesn't have the acreage/pastures like Jodi's, but I know she treats Ax like one of her own, I completely trust her and her care. Ax is settling in nicely; Alice is impressed with her manners and good sense. It's almost as good as a compliment about one's own child!
Emily has found close access to some nice riding trails, so that's been a plus. Alice does have an indoor arena, but it's much smaller than Jodi's. It's almost uncomfortably small considering Ax has such a long stride, but at least it's something.
Back to Jodi: her dog Jackson, who was not a very happy camper the last time I barn sat, ended up being diagnosed with a thyroid condition, as well as coincidentally being afflicted with sudden onset blindness. His sight seemed fine when i was there, but within about 2 weeks of them returning from vacation, he was almost totally blind. Now his sight is completely gone, and his thyroid treatnment seems to be working, so he's still not the same dog (perky, bouncing, wacky and off-the-wall). Now he's timid, cautious and subdued. He's going to have a difficult adjustment at their new house, learning where everything is.

It was heaven on earth at Jodi's. Beautiful property, and wonderful friends.

More Stitching and She Cooks…

Here’s where i stand on Beacon House:

I mostly filled in some water at Thursday stitching group. I had worked on it a little last weekend finishing up the deer ad the variegated snow.

This evening I’ve been invited to supper at my good friends Dianne & Jen’s house. I made a Flat Apple Pie for the grown-ups, and some Vanilla/Vanilla cupcakes for the kids.

I used this no-mess-frosting tip from Our Best Bites. It worked beautifully! Although I wish my frosting recipe made just a scooch more – I divided the white 4 ways to add the color and piping that 3rd cupcake involved me jamming my thumb all the way into the tip to squeeze enough out to cover the cake top. The 4 cupcakes on the bottom you can see are a bit wonky.

But I’m sure they’ll taste fine.

TTFN

Lather, Rinse, Repeat…..

Here’s my latest Beacon House update:

I had to unstitch about 3” of the top line of the water, back to where I stopped infilling, because I had mistakenly repeated the previous section of chart. This JCS version of the chart is horrible. The chart runs across 3-4 pages and breaks at very inconvenient places- it’s been difficult trying to keep my place. I finally taped all the sections together into one big chart.

Em got me a new purse for my birthday. It has smaller outside pockets than my previous bag, and a single large inner compartment. So I made some zippered organizers so I can find my all-important lottery cards: 

Here are the lining colors:

And this is for my Mom- the thread catcher:

Then Em got me this- a leftover from the Olympics:

Google “Steven Colbert” and “Dressage”. He’s made several hysterically funny videos in an attempt to skewer the Romneys, but the videos are too funny. Oh- here: From The Colbert Report and this. And dressage queens united to produce this at Gladstone (site of the Olympic Trials) 

Stitchy Update….

First of all, thank you for the kind words and electronic hugs- they are much appreciated and comforting. I am doing a little better each day, but then I am also trying to keep my activity level at 155 MPH to be distracted as much as possible. At night when I inevitably have to slow down, I watch a little TV, then go to bed early. Needless to say, I have a LOT of DVR hours to go thru.

Anyway- here as promised, are some stitchy pictures:

Beacon House- here’s where I left off last time:

I rolled the scrolls over and here’s where I am now:

And a zoom of Mr..Snowman:

Here’s Joy Sampler by Lizzie Kate:

I could finish this up this weekend if I sat down to it.

Here’s Jackson from the barn:

His 2 big sisters were put to sleep a couple of weeks ago, so this was his first time being all alone while I barn sat. He’s been vaguely “not right” since before that, and the vet(s) can’t figure out what’s wrong. He’s eating, pooping and peeing normally; he’s just not the bouncy wing-nut he’s always been. He got along good with Chicken, just a few growls, but no fights, so I was able to have her sleep over with us instead of leaving her alone at my house.

Off to do house work- my favorite! 

 

NOT!

And then…

Here’s this week’s progress on Beacon House:

More alphabet and lower border and snow ground cover…

As I was pulling into my driveway, Mommy turkey and her brood of 6-9 chick lets were crossing my street up into my yard. I ran & got the camera  but while Mommy and half the babies hid in the shrubs, these ones thought if they froze, I wouldn’t see them:

Chickie says: “I’m the ONLY Chicklet round here if you please!”

Shaved Chicken…

Poor puppy is getting up there- I’ve had her for going on 9 years, and she was an adult dog then, so my guess is she’s anywhere from 12-14 years old. She doesn’t tolerate the hot so much anymore and it doesn’t help that her coat is like a collie’s fur. Last fall I had her trimmed to clean clean her up some, and I like the results so much I vowed to have her done for summer. And vee-ola- here she is: (don’t laugh too hard)

Here’s what she used to look like:

I keep doing a double-take and laugh when i look at her- poor baby! She feels like a seal. And her little legs crack me up now that I can actually see them.

I’ve been busy doing stuff I’ve neglected around my house- scraping and re-painting exterior trim on my house, lots of cleaning. I have to mow the lawn at least once a week to keep up with it. I still am having trouble taking out my stitching except for Thursday stitch nights. Can’t figure out what that’s all about because i love Beacon House, even with it’s wall-to-wall stitching, and there’s very little on TV to watch these days.

Off to mow- rain coming tomorrow and Tuesday!

TTFN

Halfway….

Geesh! I’ve been very bad at posting and stitching. Don’t know where my mojo’s gone %^(   but we’re halfway thru June already!

Here’s 2 weeks’ worth of stitching on Beacon House. I yanked up my big girl panties and did the snowflakes on the left side of the chart. I can now scroll over to the right side. I think I’m about halfway done:

You may have seen on the national (and international)  news about  the town next-door to mine that has imposed a $20 fine for swearing? Yeah- except for the people who voted for it at Town meeting, we all think it’s pretty stupid too. It’s not like they don’t have other, more important problems to deal with…

Happy Memorial Day!

I hope your day is blessed with sunshine as we remember those who’ve given the ultimate sacrifice for our country.

This is the first Memorial Day weekend in 3 or 4 years  that I’ve had “off” off, because of my barn owner’s show horse having colic surgery. KoKo is recuperating well, with no problems (quick knock on wood). Next weekend she can be turned out into a small pen; she’s been out of her stall only for brief periods to  hand graze 3 or 4 times a day for the past month. She’ll have a month of “pen” rest, then another month of pasture rest, which will bring her to the beginning of August before she can go back to work.

Here’s my progress on Beacon House. This is 2 weeks worth of stitching and it really doesn’t look like much, but I’ve dipped into the water:

I’ve been procrastinating on doing all the snowflakes scattered in the sky areas. There are 3 different size Smyrna Crosses to do and I’m dreading them!

I made a Peanut Butter sheet cake for snack at stitching last week:

I thought it was excellent. Jeanne had the idea of Pioneer Woman’s Chocolate Sheet Cake with the Peanut Butter sheet cakes’s frosting.  A must-try for sure!

Have a nice quiet holiday tomorrow!

Good News & Bad News….

The good news: I barn sat this weekend, and stitched a bit on Beacon House and on the Lizzie Kate Joy Sampler.


The bad news is: I was supposed to stay over both Friday and Saturday nights, but at 6:00 pm Saturday, I got a call from the barn owner who was at a horse show in Topsfield. Her horse had coliced and was about to go into surgery. They were going to come home Saturday night around midnight.
Long story short, her horse came out of surgery fine. She’ll be at the vet’s until the end of the week, then back home for several months of recuperation. So basically my barn owner’s show season is over, which is sad because  she does so well. She was hoping to go to Nationals this year in July, but that won’t happen. And even if her horse is recovered in time for Worlds in October, I don’t think she’ll have the points to qualify. (I’m assuming one needs a minimum amount of points to qualify.)
Needless to say, no discounts on my board for a while. %^(

Strange Days…

I had to barn sit this past weekend and it was very odd not to be stitching on Garden Grew. So instead, I put lots of time into Beacon House. Here are some daily photos from Friday thru Sunday:

  

I also started Lizzie Kate’s Joy Sampler (because one cannot have too many ornament-of-the-month starts in any given year-even if we’re still on January’s ornament):

This is on  a piece of DMC 28 or 32-ct. linen with the called-for threads.

Ta-da!

Let’s Pretend….

shall we? That I haven’t posted in close to 4 weeks?

Here is 2 weeks’ worth of Beacon House:

I added the second little girl and the dog on a sled, plus continued with the alphabet. That was giving me fits 2 weeks  ago- I kept being off and had to unstitch the “n” & “m” 3 times. Then I got to the “p” and said out loud “WTF!”  Deb can verify that fact for you. Out of the entire alphabet, the “p” and the “s” are in blue, not red. It took a minute to realize it wasn’t for the designer’s initials, but for Praiseworthy Stitches. Since both my initials are the same, I went with the chart. The little red rectangle above the sled dog’s nose is the door to the lighthouse. I still have all the snowflakes in the sky to the left of the house to do to be done with the first page. This is a very fun piece to work on. I hope the newly released store chart corrected all the mistakes in the Just Cross Stitch magazine. I’ll be working more on this tomorrow night.

TTFN

Again With the Thursday Stitching Update…

Beacon House:

Not much different from last week, just some more snow. I also did the red bird at the lower left above the “a”.

Nothing doing on my February ornament  %^(