Back to Reality...

Ahh, Maui was magical, marvelous, mountainous, and any other descriptive word you can think of beginning with "M". After our initial shock at how different it was than Oahu, we quickly settled in to falling in love with the place. I never experienced that feeling on Oahu, tho I think the beaches and turquoise water at Oahu are much prettier. But Maui has captured me. We even bought a time share condo, fee simple, so we own it forever. Now we will always have an excuse to go back. As if I need an excuse!!! Pictures are posted on my picture page, see the link in the left column. I spent many hours on this beach in this picture. I hated to leave. I will go back!

I did not do any stitching at all. I never even felt the hankering to take it out of the bag. Pretty unusual for me. I found a small stitching shop in Lahaina, but they had mainly Hawaiian quilting and needlepoint supplies. I bought a small kit for a Hawaiian quilting design (potholder size) that will be pretty when done.

Hawaii here we come!

We are packing madly...and plan on leaving the house at 6:00 AM for our week on Maui. Boy, am I ever ready to have a vacation! It is really nice to have Chris and Alli staying here taking care of the cats and the house. We won't have to worry about anything. It didn't really hit me that we were leaving until this morning at work. I had a very hard time focusing on things I needed to do.
We had a baby shower for Amy last night. She received so many nice things. Here is a pic of my girls, my mom and my sister Nancy. With baby Alana, it is 4 generations pictured. My grandmothers both passed away before I had children, so these 4 generations are very special to me. We will have to have a very nice one done when the baby is born. Alana is the first daughter, of a first daughter (Amy), of a first daughter (Connie), of a first daughter (my mom, Marge). So this baby really is special. (Too bad my maternal grandmother was a second child!!)

I have been trying to decide for two weeks what stitching project to take with me to Hawaii. I didn't want anything big and bulky, so that ruled out my projects on stretcher bars. I had a hankering to some hardanger with variegated thread, probably my very favorite thing to stitch, so I pulled out an old pattern from Emie Bishop of one of her small Christmas hardanger angels. EXCEPT I am going to stitch her in Waterlilies "Parfait". Pink and lavendar and all sorts of lucious color. This will be a fun experiment to see how my parfait angel turns out! Last time we went to Hawaii I took along an angel pattern from Thea, so I am into angels when I travel I guess!!

Aloha, and talk to you in a week.

I wish I could think of a catchy title...

but my brain just won't come up with anything wonderful. It's been two weeks since my last post, but I feel like I really don't have much to talk about. Life has been very busy, but nothing very extraordinary has been going on. The ladies group at our church had a baby shower for Amy last Saturday, and she received some very sweet things. I am having a shower here for her at my house on Thursday...not very sure when I will have the time to get ready for it!!! Then Friday night I will be packing like mad as we are leaving very early Saturday morning for Maui. I can hardly wait to hit the beach with my sunscreen and book.

I haven't done any stitching in two weeks. I haven't felt like doing any stitching in two weeks!! I have been printing pictures off and on for the wedding scrapbook, and last Saturday I made a "Tag book" with an autumn theme. It turned out really cute, I'd like to make some more with other themes. I downloaded some pictures from the internet of fall leaves and trees and pumpkins, etc. and used those with lots of autumn stickers, sayings and papers. It was gratifying to get a whole project done in less than two hours! I need to decide on a project to take with me to Hawaii, but nothing seems to fit my fancy right now.

I have cross stitched Christmas stockings with names for my three girls in years past, and when Max joined the family I stitched one for him too. The last two years Christopher (Alli's new hubby) has had to make do with a blank stocking...I had told him I would stitch his name when they actually got married! So he is not letting me forget that this year he gets his name on his stocking!!! I guess I had better get busy if I am to be true to my word!!!! I wonder how many strange looks I would get if I did Christmas stitching on a hot day in Maui!! LOL!

Amy was back in the hospital today with contractions. She is at 33 1/2 weeks now, so they gave her 2 shots of terbutiline (Spelling?) to stop the contractions and ordered her to bed for the next two weeks. After that, they are going to let nature run it's course. The poor girl is getting quite uncomfortable now, so she is feeling ready to have the baby anytime. I hope that she waits until we get back from Hawaii!!

Sunday Evening

It is now Sunday evening, and I find myself feeling a bit better tonight. I have spent the last 3 hours going through wedding pictures, editing some of them, and started printing some for scrapbook pages. It still seems to be an overwhelming task with so many photos to go through. So I picked a few themes tonight to work on, i.e. their first dance, cutting the cake, formal pictures of the cake, working on wedding invitations, at the tux shop, etc. It's starting to come together.

I worked on Toccata for a few minutes Friday nite, but didn't get very far. One more square is all. I am also crocheting a sweater for the baby, so I have been concentrating on it. Our ladies group at church is having shower for Amy on the 15th, and then we are having one for her here at the house on the 19th. It won't be long now until I can kiss my granddaughter hello! I can hardly wait!

I have been enjoying going through the Just Cross Stitch ornament issue this week. There are a couple that I will do. I think, but I can't remember for sure, that I stitched the model for the Humour ornament by Victoria Sampler....it's been awhile. I know I stitched the large piece with three of the ornaments on it...maybe Thea can refresh my memory!!! LOL!

Well, it's back to the office tomorrow morning. The house is in fairly good order, lesson plans have been done, and the spiced cider on the stove is smelling very inviting! I think I'll go have some!!