Momentum lost

I was just starting to feel like I was getting my groove back when I found a monster of a counting error. I had been just living with all the others but this was a half a row mistake. And one I could not ignore. So frog, frog, frog. I don't know about you, but when this happens I tend to walk away for a while. Picked her up again yesterday and got past the frogged part.

Isabelle is starting to feel better and she is having her stitches removed today. Hopefully today I'll get some sort of estimate on how much longer she needs to be splinted. She also has an appointment with a physical therapist on Friday to start a treatment plan. Cross your fingers that we don't have to go the full six weeks. She is miserable in the crate.

long weekend

I didn't get much cross stitching done over the weekend - actually none. :-) Any progress I made was on the train this morning. I did sew some curtains for my front room bow window and I cut out some fabric for a valance that I'm making for the dining room. That was good progress given everything else I had going on.

It was a long weekend taking care of Isabelle. The poor baby is in pain and can't understand why I won't let her play anyway. I'm supposed to keep her on a leash when I let her outside but that proved impossible because she is so strong and determined and just pulls my arms off. The best I've managed is to keep her from launching herself off the deck. She still tries to run but usually stops short when she realizes just how much it hurts. It's going to be a long month.

Poor Isabelle or a tale of how stupid I can be

On Wednesday some time during the afternoon Isabelle got her paws (literally) on my brand new food processor blade. It had been sitting on a shelf in the kitchen and she somehow knocked it down. She proceeded to play with it (the vet and I could tell from all the tiny cuts on her paws) and eventually sliced open an artery in her left foot where the paw meets the leg - what I would call her wrist if she were human. I can only assume at some point she got tired of batting it around or it started to hurt and she left it alone but on it's side with the blades up in the air. Then she must have stepped on it hard and the blade cut across her paw, back over her wrist and back up her leg a couple of inches. She almost died from the blood loss. I got home from work a little after 6:00pm and I knew something was wrong before I even got out of my car - Iz didn't meet me at the gate. That was only the first clue - the rest of the night was a nightmare. There was blood on the deck as I walked into the house, in the kitchen it was everywhere and I called for her and she came staggering out of the living room barely conscience. By one of the happy circumstances in life my sister was in the driveway having brought me dinner and was waiting for me. I ran outside and got her and the three of us were off to the emergency vet seconds later. I live very close to an excellent emergency vet that is open 24/7/365 that also has a blood bank. She ended up with a blood transfusion and surgery to repair the artery, ligaments, tendons and muscles that were sliced - she has stitches three layers deep! Iz is splinted and the vet needs me to confine her to a crate for the time she is splinted, four to six weeks. My poor baby! I feel so awful. That blade should never have been sitting on a shelf. I've since gone through the entire house and didn't find any other hazards but of course the damage is done.

I really didn't notice just how much blood there was in the house but my sister did. She was on the phone in minutes calling people to come and start to clean - she told me later she didn't want me to come home to that if Iz died. I of course had to leave Isabelle - the transfusion took hours and they couldn't do the surgery until she was stable. I didn't even know if she would going to make it until the vet called me at 11;00pm. So I got home about a hour and a half after the cleaning had started. And was still shocked by the blood. It was everywhere. My sister wouldn't let me go into the bathroom - apparently she must have settled in there at some point for a long time. Throughout the house there was blood on the walls, of course furniture and the curtains. By the time I went to bed at midnight the worst of it was taken care of and I and I was to go to bed with the great news that Iz would make it.

I was able to pick Isabelle up from the vet at 10:00am yesterday. She's very uncomfortable and hates the cone and crate. I have a better cone coming early next week called a BiteNot and she is in the super sized crate that a friend gave me a month ago when she was cleaning out her house so Iz can turn around and get in and out without much trouble. The pugs are leaving her alone for the most part and I've been working from home. She gets potty breaks every couple of hours but no toys and no excitement. Hard to do with a 10 month old lab puppy. It's going to be a long six weeks. Once her splint comes off she will need to be evaluated for the possibility of more surgery but physical therapy will be a must.

The pugs rallying around Isabelle.

So all the bedroom plans are off for now. The fund is gone to pay to fix my baby. Money well spent and it's not like the bedroom is going anywhere.

a happy surprise

I've moved onto the tree portion of Birds of a Feather. My counting is all over the place! You can sure tell how distracted I was when I started it. But no big deal - I'll just work around the miscounting and no one will ever be the wiser.

Thanks so much for your kind remarks about my new house. I'm having a blast and all I want to do is stay home and work more. :-) And work on quilts, and pictures and painting....

On Monday I received in the mail a most unexpected bonus. Some how my mortgage company double payed my home owners insurance and I received a refund of almost $1,000! That's the drywall, insulation, new sub floor and paint for my bedroom! I can start the tear down this weekend! That is so much earlier than the January date I was hoping for. Of course I have to clean out the room now. I ended up putting everything that wouldn't fit into the other two bedrooms into the main bedroom the day I moved in (it was against my better judgement but I let it happen anyway). Not being able to move into the "real" bedroom put all my plans for the other two rooms into chaos. My bedroom is 13 x 18, what will be my sewing room is 12 x 8 and what will be the spare room is 8 x 9. You can see how not being able to set up my bedroom in the what is huge compared to the other two rooms set up a domino effect on storage. Everything extra that should have a home in the two spare rooms ended up in the main bedroom and my bed and dresser is totally taking up all the space in the sewing room. I call it the room of bed. :-) So really before I start to gut the bedroom I have to move everything that is currently there and move it to the garage. And I need to make space for that too! I have somehow filled up a two car garage that is totally full with all my extra stuff and holiday things and only one car. ;-) So it will take at least one weekend maybe two just to get ready to start the tear down. So some of the money will be used for floor to ceiling shelves in the gargage so I can stack things much more orderly. Right now to get to one box in the gargage I have to move ten. I hate that.

A long weekend ahead of me.... It needs to be empty before I start tearing out the ceiling - there is blown insulation in the attic above and it's all going to come down on my head and everything else the second I start. What a mess it's going to be! But I'm so glad it's going to happen sooner than later!

getting to the new normal

I'm finally finding my new normal. I've been in the house a month now and yesterday I actually got my sewing space together finally (new curtains and slip covers soon!) and I stitched when the day's work was done. Here is my progress on Birds of a Feather. Back to the border. I don't want that left when the guts of the piece are done. I'd never go back to the rest! :-)

I took a bunch of photos of the house yesterday complete with shots of the dogs throughout.

I have a long living room and this is what is looks like from the front door. I divided it into two sections - one the tv area and one what I'm calling a book reading area. I need to recover / slipcover the 1980's colored green chairs to the right still but they were a bargain at a garage sale two weekends ago - $22.00 for the pair and just what I was looking for in front of the bow window.

This was the main bathroom before I got my hands on it. It was a mess and I took it down to the studs. New everything. I'm actually still working on it - I still have to put down some trim and finish sealing the tile floor I put down. The bath is small. On the someday wish list is knocking out a wall to make the bathroom bigger.

Here it is now. Chocolate brown and white. I love it.

My dining room is right next to the living room and is open to the kitchen. In fact all the living room, dining room and kitchen are open to each other. It was one of the things I liked most about the house. Here is my china cabinet with some of my depression era glass.

One of my brothers made me a corner cabinet several years ago. I pulled down some cabinets in the kitchen that overlooked the dining space and I lost all my glassware storage. So I made a bar out of my cabinet! I'm so happy with how it turned out. It stores all my bar ware, wine and liquor.

The kitchen area is really low on storage so I put in a pantry in the laundry room. This is still a work in progress - I have another cabinet to buy and install on top of the one shown and I need to add a couple of shelves to the actual laundry space. But I found another space to show off my quilts! They are everywhere. I'm so happy that I finally have space to live with more than one or two at a time.

A shot looking into my kitchen from the dining room - one of two rooms that still needs a ton of work. But the money has dried up and I have much more pressing issues to deal with as I find more money. The kitchen works and I put in all new stainless appliances - there is an peninsula of cabinets and counter top on the other side. I'm planning on putting in a slate tile back splash in the coming weeks and as soon as I have finished doing the outside of the house, I will start to redo the kitchen - a couple of years down the road at least.

This was before looking into the kitchen island area and dining room.

Now after. :-)

The front hall before.

The front hall after (Isabelle is looking out the screen door hoping one of the neighborhood kids comes over to play with her - they come over almost everyday after I get home from work and several times during the weekends). I've haven't touched the front door yet accept to replace the screens on the screen door and Isabelle proof it. :-) I'm replacing the doors shortly and didn't want to waste the time or money to make it look better. If I can't get to it before Thanksgiving, I'll paint the door a nice bright white and get rid of the nasty flat grey color (which by the way is the same color of the siding outside - I can't wait to make it a nice light almond/yellow color with green shutters).

Looking into the house from the front door before.

After. One of my best garage sale finds of the summer. A cabinet made from old barn wood. It was being used as a tv cabinet and has the type of doors that slide into the unit to get out of the way. The plan is to remove those type of hinges and put on the type that just open wide - I'll add shelves and put quilts on the doors to display them and put them on the shelves.

No photos of the bedrooms yet. I ran out of money before I could do over my bedroom. There is a crawl space and there was standing water in it when I bought the place. I've put in a sump pump and drain tile so it's now all nice and dry. The bedroom however is where the crawl access is (in master closet). There was a ton of mold in the room and I had to rip up the floor and I need still to replace all the drywall - walls and ceiling and all the windows in both the bedroom and the adjoining bathroom. And as noted earlier I'm out of cash. So this means I'm sleeping in the larger of the two remaining bedrooms - one is going to be my sewing room and the smaller of the two, my spare room. I'm hoping to start on the bedroom in January or so.

Have a great week!

be it ever so humble

Last Friday was officially move in day and the truck and movers were at my parents house nice and early. They were gone from my house by 1:00pm and I spent the rest of the day settling in.

It's been several long days for the dogs and by Sunday they were all pooped out. Iz is enjoying a nap on the couch.

I now have a doggy door the all four of the dogs come and go as they please. Molly was enjoying the last bit of sun on the deck Saturday.

Clancy and Aoife were enjoying the early morning sun on Sunday.

Even Hunter got to come over and visit and play!

still here!

I can't believe it's been a month since I last posted. I hardy feels like a couple of weeks as gone by - days even - heck, hours even! I haven't had time at night to stitch and my train rides are for catching up on sleep. My daily schedule goes something like this: alarm goes off at 4:30am, feed and water dogs and get ready for work. Leave house at 5:50am to make 6:13am train downtown. 7:40am arrive at work. 3:55pm leave office for 4:13pm train. Walk in door of parents house at 5:30pm. Feed dogs and change clothes - 5:45pm leave for my house. Work, work, work - leave 9:00pmish for parents house. 9:30pm go to bed to do it all again the next day. The weekends only vary by a bit. Get up at 6:00am - leave by 7:00am for house to work, work, work. Leave around 6:oopm or so to pack more. 9:30pm - go to bed.

I'm still busy getting my house ready to move into. All the walls are painted with the notable exception of my bedroom and master bath. There was a leak in the roof (from a poorly installed satellite dish) and mold in the drywall as a result. That means the room needs to be re-drywalled and taped. Oh and I pulled up the moldy carpet also so I need a new floor. And that takes money and I'm out of money.

So I'll be moving into my sewing room for the time being. It's a smallish room but my bed just might fit. :-) I don't know what I'll do with my dresser and other things. So the plan right now is to move in next Friday! After almost two months of painting, pulling, replacing, fixing, fencing and generally being a slave to the house, I'll be moving in. I have two major tasks to finish before September 2nd - finish main bathroom - it was gutted to the studs three weeks ago and dog proof the deck. The pugs can get through the railing and the lab can jump over the railing. It's going to be a challenge because all my ideas cost somewhere around $300. And as mentioned before I'm pretty much out of cash and credit. And I so want it to at least look nice. I spend a lot of time on the deck and I'm not looking forward to seeing an eyesore every time I go outside.

My new fence is great and the dogs love being able to come and go at will. At least they can when I can keep an eye on them. All four dogs tested the deck withing hours of the fence going up. Clancy and Aoife can get through no problem and within minutes of the yard being dog proof I let Isabelle outside and she put her paws on the railing and turned around and looked at me as if to say, hey, I can go over! Na, na, na, na, na. It's a major problem still.

Once I finally move the fun will just be starting. I have a ton of sewing to do - curtains and pillows and such. I can't wait for that. I actually thought I was going to have time last weekend but some family help showed up and they helped me do some tasks that I couldn't manage on my own so I put the machine away. So look for photos in the coming weeks. Before and after - I can't believe the difference. I'm really proud of what I've accomplished.

Stitching for a change

Despite the fact that I haven't put a needle to thread in weeks, I still drag my stitching bag with me everyday on the train to and from work. The last couple of days, I've even stitched! I put down the border that is Part I of Birds of a Feather and got started on Part II. I enjoy stitching letters and they do fly so I'm hoping that feeling progress will compel me to continue to work on this piece. Especially now that I have some where to hang it.

Every night when I get home from work I load a couple of dogs into the car and drive to my new house to work on it. I have completed two rooms with paint, new switch plates and the like and scrubbed them within an inch of their lives. :-) I'm happy with how they turned out. For now they are starting to fill up with boxes as I bring over a couple every time I drive over and so does my dad. At the rate I'm going all I'll need to move on moving day will be the last couple of boxes of things that I couldn't live without and my furniture.

This week the center of house is having a couple of beams in the underside of the house jacked up and replaced. Over the decades the medal had deteriorated by water dripping on them from the bathroom and laundry room and the center of the house was sagging a bit. And of course I noticed. :-) Then I can start to gut the floors and drywall in the bathroom and laundry room. When I have a new bathroom in place and the laundry room straightened out I can move in all the way. I'll have to live with the kitchen the way it is for the time being because I have other things to replace/repair that are more urgent - like new bedroom windows. But I will give it fresh paint and new fixtures and lights.

I'll post photos soon of some of the before and after - after I move in furniture and hang pictures and the like.

It's mine!

I closed on my house Tuesday. I felt like the attorneys, closers and agents should have said "congratulations, we regret to inform you it's all yours." :-) It's been a stressful process and I haven't had much time to do anything but stuff that involved the close. The reality is the hard part starts now and that's fixing up my fixer upper. First on my list is get into the crawl space and fix the moisture problem and get my fence for the dogs installed. Then I can work on the bathrooms and kitchen with a goal on moving in before Labor Day.

House woes again

Sorry for the crappy photo - my camera ran out of juice and I had to use my phone. :-) I'm not making as much progress on my mystery as I would like. Duh, maybe I need to stitch to make progress? LOL! I spent three days in NY last week on business and I spent the rest of the week catching up on work and sleep. I should be getting the next installment in the mail any day and I was hoping to be done with part one before the part two came out.

I'm about 24 to 48 hours away from loosing the house - again. The seller has turned out to be uncooperative as can be. I needed to get in last weekend to start work on the FHA changes and they would not give me permission. So now I'm down to one weekend. And I still don't have "official" (written letter) from them for this coming weekend. The sellers agent says he can't contact him at all but what is funny about that is my sister drove by the house on Saturday and they were there and I drove by on Sunday to chat with a neighbor and they were there also. So much for that. But I did have one good piece of news, the sellers agent said he would take down the fence during the week so I won't have to do to take care of that piece of the FHA requirements. That little piece of help might turn out to be the difference in getting the house and not getting it.

Stay tuned - never a dull moment here. :-)

lovely colors

I managed to stitch on the train yesterday and this morning! Miracle of miracles. :-) My eyes are getting older - I am having a hard time seeing the 36 count with the motion of the train. I have to be really careful I don't skip or add a thread when counting. I guess it's time for glasses that aren't cheaters.

Bank of American has given me until June 30th to close on the house. We think the seller is moving this week and might actually be already gone. My agent is trying to confirm this. I plan on going into the house at some point Saturday or Sunday with my brother who is going to help me make the repairs. We thought it a good idea to look first so we are ready to go the weekend after with all the tools and suppies we need for the repairs in hand. I'd love to close around the 20th. That would give me several days to clean and paint before moving on the 25th and 26th. :-) This might really happen. :-)

new start

Here is my new start - the With Thy Needle and Thread mystery. I'm doing mine on Silkweavers 36 count French Vanilla. When I went to pull it out of the bag just now to take a photo I was startled on how little I had completed. It felt like I stitched all long weekend. But I the reality was closer to I picked it up a lot but didn't spend much time stitching. I got a lot of packing completed and that feels good. I have a lot more to go though.

Happy Birthday finis

Happy Birthday - design by Blackbird Designs

32 count Silkweaver's Purely Primitive

Recommended overdyed floss

I finished up Happy Birthday yesterday. Almost half way! Next up Swan Lake. I really like that one. It's a good thing I'm taking a little break however, I pulled my floss for it last night and was missing a couple. Need to call Drema. :-)

Those of you in the US enjoy your long weekend! I have no plans except to play with the dogs and a little lawn work here at my parents house. I'm hoping to get to the new house at some point on Sunday so I can get a time estimate from one of my brothers on how long the repairs will take. Then I can safely book how much time I need with my realtor as he needs to be there while I'm there.

so close!

I'll finish up Happy Birthday on my way home from work tonight. Yeah! They a new start for me.

I don't mean to sound so negative about the seller (and thanks for the nice supportive comments! you guys are great). But I do see things from such a different side. When the banks were giving away mortgages without proper checks at 110% percent of the hugely inflated property values I walked away. I didn't drink the coolaid. I waited and saved and waited more. And I finally can buy a home the right way. So while I really feel for this family who is loosing their home, where were the people they trusted telling them maybe this was not such a good idea? I'm not responsible for their bad choices. I'm actually part of the solution for them and for the market in general.

But I did hear some hopefully good news - the seller is planning on moving next week and I should be able to get in the house and make the changes I needed to make before the FHA Inspector comes back. Cross your fingers that the place doesn't get trash on the sellers way out. It's always something. :-(

where does the time go?

I'm almost finished with Happy Birthday. As soon as it's off my hoop and ironed, I'm going to put it away for a little bit and start on the three part mystery from With Thy Needle and Thread. I'm all ready to start. But I think it's smart to at least finish the block I'm working from Anniversaries from the Heart.

I'm still working my house in Gurnee and it's been so up and down I can't stand it. Late last week I received notice that Bank of America said my offer was the correct amount and miracle of miracles on Monday they approved my short sale! Not two hours after finishing my happy dance I received a call from my agent. The seller is despondent over losing his house (which by the way he has been living in for three years without making a mortgage payment) and has decided not to make the five fixes that FHA has required before they will approve my loan that he agreed to do five weeks ago (shame on my agent for not getting it in writing). So now I'm back to scrambling. I have asked if the seller will clear out for one weekend day so I can go in and make the fixes myself so I can get my loan. They are small - so small as to be ridiculous - but they must be made. I figure they will cost less than $100 for all five and take only a day. Mostly scraping some pealing paint and some repainting of the outside window trims and deck. One bathtub handle needs to be replaced and two electrical outlets need to be switched to GFI outlets. The fence in the backyard needs a few boards replaced. That is it! But FHA is holding all the cards and I don't have enough money for a down payment to go with a conventional loan. I haven't heard anything yet and once again I'm being held hostage and no idea what is going to happen. I just want a house! How hard can this be? And the reality is I'm helping the seller out by doing the short sale - he is avoiding a foreclosure which will be reflected on his credit for 10 years! The short sale falls off after 3 or 4 years. And he won't be evicted - he can move out in an orderly fashion. If you had small children like he has, what would you do? I just don't get it.

a good weekend

I started to work on Happy Birthday this week. I was totally going to put this aside and work on a WIP but when I went to pull out my stack of WIPs I discovered that I had packed them! And now since I'm not moving best case until mid-July, I think I need to find what box they are in and pull them out. I really need a change for a couple of weeks.

The pugs and I had a great agility trial. Once again our Q (qualifying) rate was low and it totally doesn't really represent how good Clancy and Aoife are doing. Clancy went 1 for 6 for the weekend and it was just really small things keeping us out of the money. His excellent jumpers runs are amazing and he is really into the game. Aoife has only been doing Jumpers for the past few trials because I still can't get her to focus on a standard course and there is no point in paying to have her run around and bark at me but she too is running great, super fast jumper courses.

Here is Aoife poising with her first place Open Jumpers ribbon which was also enough for her Open Jumpers title. She is now in Excellent A Jumpers and is running the same jumpers courses that Clancy is.

Clancy qualified in Excellent B Jumpers on Saturday with an 8th place finish. Good for a pug but not his best time of the weekend. He dropped the triple on Friday and Sunday and either finish would have placed him in at least 6th place which is amazing when it's all said and done for a pug.

Next weekend we have another trial and then I'm taking a bit of a break to save some money for the move. Or at least I'm still hoping I will have a move planned. It's all in the hands of Bank of America at this point. That's the sellers lender. I only gave them 60 days to decide whether or not to approve the short sale to me. My attorney advised 90 days but I didn't want to lose the entire summer in case they ultimately voted against me. The stress is getting to me. I so want to move now! :-) And then I can be really broke but it's a good broke as it's for my house and making it just the way I want it.

Farm House finis

Farm House - design by Blackbird Designs

36 count Silkweavers Purely Primitive

recommended overdyed cotton floss

Another one bites the dust! I so wanted to work on something else (I'm really bored with this color palette) but I didn't have time last night to pull something else together. I should have just grabbed one of my many WIPS but I didn't think of that either until just now. :-)

windows!

I have a door and windows! Yeah!

And what is the big deal you ask? For those of you who are newcomers to my blog, you might think this as very normal. But those of you who have been visiting for years, know that me not stitching on a regular basis is not the norm. But I'm making progress. :-) And I love to get back to my usual rate of finishes. Especially now that I might have a house to put them in.


I picked some spring flowers yesterday from my garden. Is there anything better than this?

sunny weekend!

Northern Illinois had a sunny warm weekend for a change and the pugs, lab and I enjoyed every second of it we could. So I didn't at much stitching in as I wanted to but I did get some in! All that is left on Farm House is the house and it's a big one. I'd love to have this puppy in the can by Friday but that's wishful thinking on my part. :-)

Have a great week!

making progress

I've made some progress the past couple of days on Farm House. I haven't managed to stay awake on the train ride into work but have managed to stitch on the way home. I'm hoping now that's is light (or almost so) when I leave the house in the morning, soon I'll be staying awake on the way in also. :-) It would be good to get back into the swing of things. I think when I finish this block I'm going to take a break for this piece and work on something else. Maybe a small finish will motivate me to work more on my stitching. And I have so many to choose from. :-) It will be fun just to look though my stash.

Not much news on the house front. The sellers now have a contract from me and I'm hoping for short sale approval from their bank within the next 60 days. That's pushing it but I don't want to be held hostage by them and I'm thinking more houses will come on the market starting in the summer. Cross your fingers for me. I originally didn't want to go the short sale route because not many are approved. But it was just too good of a house not to take the chance. Walking into a house with $30,000 of equity in this market is worth the try. :-)

snow?!?!

Spring snow is always so startling. Especially when I had no idea it was coming. We got about an inch and a half and the only one who seems to be enjoying it is Isabelle. :-) I did get some stitching in but not as much as I had planned. I found home improvement books to be far more interesting. I've been going to Home Depot and looking at the books and if I like them, buying a used copy on Amazon (some for just pennies). I had a ton show up on Saturday and spent hours looking at how to re-wire, trim and tile.

Isabelle is getting so big! Here she is with Aoife taking a nap. She is now double the size of the pugs. They just run under her when she is in the way. :-) Isabelle is five months old this week and I expect her to continue to grow for at least through the end of the year. At this point I'm hoping I end up with a 24 inch agility lab rather than a 20 inch one. There are far less dogs in the larger class and fewer border collies.

Have a great week!

house buying pain

Is buying a house ever hard! At least 20 times (or at least that is what it feels like) the deal felt like it was going to go bad and something happened and it was saved. But now I'm in a holding pattern again. The seller needs to make some repairs for my FHA Loan to happen but it's a short sale and the bottom line is they don't have to do anything if they don't want to. If they don't make the repairs I have to walk away. But in the meantime, I've had to pull my financing deal (I locked in 4.75% and had to let it go) and I won't be closing in April. At the rate I'm going not even in May. The stress is killing me. And I started to pack in anticipation of moving at the end of April so half my craft stuff is packed while the other half is not. I'm living in box land. So between the stress at work and at home I haven't been stitching. I'm starting to miss it. I have no plans for this coming weekend and I'm hoping to get some time into some of my projects.


The pugs are doing great with agility. Clancy has earned three Qs (one of them a third place in Excellent B Jumpers) in the last couple of trials and Aoife got a first place last weekend in Open Jumpers. A bit of a break until May and we go at it hard again.


Here is a photo I took yesterday of little Isabelle. She is huge! And she is living on my coffee table. No matter how many times I tell her no or off, she gets right back on. It's driving me crazy.