A Gift and an Update

Last week I had a lovely surprise gift arrive from Barb (no blog), a fellow member of JA/S&S Forum. I was amazed when I opened the box and found these three Barbara Erskine books inside:

If you're reading this: thank you again, Barb, for your wonderful generosity. My DH thanks you too - for the many peaceful hours he will get while I'll be busy reading them. LOL :0)

I completed making the card for the Stitched Christmas Card Exchange over on JA/S&S Forum and that is now winging it's way to my partner. Unfortunately I can't post a pic yet but will do so when I can. I also posted off my parcel to my No Stash For Christmas Exchange partner at the same time. Opening day isn't until Christmas Day, so I'll be living on tenter hooks until then, waiting to hear if I got things right for my partner. I didn't think to take a pic of that.

Apart from the stitched card and Sea Stars SAL night, the distinct lack of stitching has continued. I am, on the other hand, continuing to get quite a bit of reading done. I recently finished Chocolat by Joanne Harris - please see The Reading Corner blog for more on that. It's now registered with the Book Crossing site and is up for grabs, if anyone wants it, and I've also updated my book list on the Swap Blog. I'm now reading Picture Maker by Penina Spinka which takes the story through several Native American tribes and their cultures and is a fascinating read - any spare minute has me reaching for the book rather than my stitching. Oh well, at least I'm slowly whittling away at the mountain of books I've acquired recently. LOL
Lelia: There's a bit more about the Kate Morton book over on The Reading Corner blog here. I'm still working my way around to reading it. :0)

As for Sea Stars, here's where I got up to after last Thursday night's stitching session:

I just couldn't seem to get a decent flow going with the motif at all, so didn't get as much done as I'd have liked. I guess the sleep deprivation, whilst DH was in Italy, didn't help - I wasn't going to bed until around 2am each night, occasionally going on to read until 3am. At least when I eventually did go to sleep I got through the night reasonably well, only waking up a couple of times (usually it's about every hour). DH got home on Friday: they almost missed their flight, due to a bad crash on the Italian motorway which held them up for an hour and a half. Thankfully they didn't, as it would have entailed a much later flight to one of the London area airports and an overnight stay down there - the trip had already been a very tiring one, so none of them fancied that scenario.

My latest order from Sew & So arrived last week too but I can't show any of that as all the items are intended as gifts. I have to make a comment about the great customer sevice I received though: one of the Glass Treasures I ordered arrived broken, so I emailed them to let them know and asked for info on returning the damaged item and getting a replacement. I received a very quick response to say that there was no need to bother with returning it and that a replacement would be sent out the following day - it arrived safely the day after that. Top notch! :0)

The weekend has been a busy one again: Saturday we went to Uncle Henry's Farm Shop to get some shopping and managed to get a couple of small gifts and some nice nibbles for the festive season (a fruit and nuts mixed platter plus a savoury nibbles platter - a little healthier than the usual very high calorie stuff we used to get. See, I'm learning. LOL) As the cafe was very busy we opted to go back through Kirton to go and eat at the Garden Centre cafe instead. Good call, as we managed to get a couple more gifts there too. :0)

Sunday was the Food Fair at Lincolnshire Showground and DS came with us to that. It was quite busy but am pleased to say I coped fine with it and we had a very good day out. We also came away with some gifts too. I'll write more about it on my other blog. :0)

Today has been my usual Monday routine. Alex came for a visit and this time brought four of her latest embroidered patches with her - they're gorgeous and I can't wait to see how she finishes them. Unfortunately I forgot to take a pic, as we were busy nattering. :0)

I haven't made any stitching plans for this week....... will just go with the flow.

Christine: The Crystal Skull DVD was OK but both DS and I thought that it wasn't up to the previous films - though not bad for a couple of hours escapism, LOL. There's a bit of an element of Close Encounters meets Indiana Jones which is rather surreal and left us looking at one another and saying: What the?! What were they smoking when they wrote that? It also seems to be a bit of an intro for a younger model for future films....... but I can't say any more without spoiling it for you. Would be interested to know what you think, if you watch it. :0)

Thank you all for stopping by, especially as it's a busy time of year. Hope you all had a great weekend and a good start to the week. :0)