ILCS Sock- It To Me Santa Exchange et al.

Birthday

Here I am on my birthday, in very cold Colorado...last I heard our current wind chill was -13.  Expected actual low tonight is to be -17.  Brrrrr!  You can bet I have the fireplace going!  DH called me at work today to ask where I wanted to go for dinner for my birthday.  I told him home to have leftover chili and cinnamon rolls!  Guess I'm getting old.

I received a great birthday gift from one of my staff, Darya.  It's a wonderful glass cutting board with the exact same kitty design as one of the notepads I received yesterday from Nancy.  Guess they know what I like. 

It's about 9" x 10".  I'm actually considering displaying it at work in one of my bookshelves on an easel.  Don't you think it is way too pretty to slice tomatoes or potatoes on? 

ILCS Sock It To Me Santa Exchange

Today's mail brought me a wonderful exchange from Rene la Frog.  Look at all the great goodies she sent!

I've had one pair of toe-socks before and loved them.  Can't wait to wear these---you can bet they will be on my feet tomorrow.  They will be perfect with my blue Christmas sweater with white stitched snowflakes!  

She also sent a tiny 'Doodles' kit that is complete with a snowman button, my favorite John James tapestry petites, a skein of Threadworx (I've never had any of this brand before), and a cute Stitch A Card kit.  She totally spoiled me!

However, the most exciting item in this exchange was the absolutely awesome snowman scissor fob Rene made for me.  I've actually never owned a fob before.  This genius fob deserves it's own photo.  If you look carefully, you can see that the beads and black in between each make little snowmen!  Is that cute or what?!  I put this on my very best pair of embroidery scissors...my  cloisonné Gingher's.

'Ring Around The Rosie' (one more time!)

I posted the framed 'Ring Around The Rosie' Hummel I'll be giving Nancy at her retirement luncheon tomorrow, but I think the post got lost in all of the updates I did.  So, here it is once again for your viewing pleasure....

This is 18" x 18" framed.  I'm extremely proud of it; it's one my largest completed cross stitches so far. 

Our next door neighbor works for a framd shop and I gave her the cross stitch and told her to 'do what she felt was right' to mat and frame it.  I think she did a wonderful job! Here's a close-up of the frame.

That's it for now.  Happy Stitching!

Vicki in Cold and Snowy Colorado

"Ring Around The Rosie" Framed and "Elvis" Update

Finally got some photos taken of the Hummel design for Nancy,  This is her retirement gift.  A group of us are supposed to go to lunch on Wednesday to celebrate her retirement.  Sure hope the snow doesn't cuase us to postpone to a later date! 

I'm really excited to give this to her!  She collects Hummel figurines and I think she is going to love it. 

I think the framing turned out wonderful.  Our next door neighbor works at a framing store and she chose the mats and frame.  The size of the frame is 18" x 18".  DH got a specially made box from a packaging store so I can wrap it properly. 

Here's a close-up of the stitching.

And here's a close-up of the frame.

I worked on Elvis just a little bit in the past week.  I can see him coming to life; sure hope I can get this finished up and framed for DH by Christmas!

Lots more updates on other subjects, but I'll save them for another post.

Happy Stitching!

Vicki in CO

A Finish, WIP Update, New Start, and Health Update - Scheduled For Surgery

A FINISH

Lots of news today.  First of all, I finished 'Ring Around the Rosie' Hummel last weekend.  It's off to the framer at the moment.  But, I discovered this morning I forgot to take a photo of the finished design.  Duh!  So, you'll have to wait to see it until it comes back from the framer.  I need it before the 30th, because it is the retirement gift for one of my employees who last day is Nov. 30.  So, stay tuned for a photo.

WIP PROGRESS

Next, I have an update on the Snowman Welcome Banner I'm doing for our son for Christmas.

I need to be spending more time stitching and less time reading and replying to e-mails and blogs, if I have a prayer of getting everything stitched by Christmas!  Aaack!  HOW do some of you get so much stitching accomplished and still seem to be sending lots of e-mails, blog updates, etc?  Did you find more hours in the day somewhere and failed to give me the website link?!!

A NEW START

Next, I have started (just barely) on a new BAP.  It is the Mary Wigham sampler from 1790 and is actually available free from Needleprint's blog.  Check it out if you like this type of design.  This is what the finished project should look like:

This is my very small start....a row of about 15 stitches in the top left corner!  :)

This is a pretty large project (for me).  I'm doing it on 32 ct Permin Lambswool, stitched over 2 threads.  The design area is approximately 20" x 20".  So, This is on my 24" scroll rods.  I am using a conversion to WDW, CC and GAST that I found online. 

HEALTH UPDATE - SCHEDULED FOR SURGERY

Some of you know about my serious back injury almost two years ago.  I fell down our basement stairs and fractured six vertebrae in my upper back - T1-T6.  After a lot of misery and wearing a horrible 'turtle shell' hard plastic brace for many months, that injury i about as good as it willo ever get. 

I've had lower back issues for 30 years or so...degenerative disc disease, bulging discs, bad arthritis...you get the idea.  The past six months I have been suffering from awful back and leg pain.  I've seen numerous orthopedists/neurologists/spinal specialists in the past couple of years.  All have told me essentially the same thing.  I have so much wrong with my back that there is essentially nothing they can offer me to give me long-term relief from the pain.

When I saw my regular physician recently for a check-up, we discussed my continuing battle with back/leg pain.  It has become so severe in the past few months that I am taking as many as 8 Vicodin a day to try to cope.  It has also caused me to severely restrict my activities, to the point where I have to greatly limit my walking.  I just hurt all the time and really need some relief of some kind!  My doctor recommended I go to a spinal specialist here in town (not someone I'd seen before).

I got an appointment, went in on Wednesday this week for some X-Rays, saw him on Thursday for an initial appointment, had an MRI on Friday afternoon and saw him late on Friday to discuss the MRI results.  My DH accompanied me on all these visits,.  On Friday afternoon, he showed us the MRI results, and explained what we were looking at.  While he concurs with what the other specialists have said regarding a long-term 'fix' for my problems, he DID say that looking at one particular disc (L3), he believe a Lumbar Laminectomy (Open Decompression) of that disc will bring me relief of the leg pain, and with PT and long-term water therapy after the surgery, I may be able to manage my other issues much more easily than I'm doing at the moment.  You can clearly see in the MRI that disc is severely pinching the nerves at that spot, plus there is a bone spur and a cyst at that location.

So, I am scheduled for surgery on December 14.  He had an opening for the day before Thanksgiving, but we opted for the December date because our son is expecting us to come for Thanksgiving, plus December is a much better time for me to be away from work; it is after Fall Semester has ended, so most of the students will have left campus for the Christmas Break

I'm nervous about having back surgery, but I'm also SOO hopeful this will make me feel 'human' again!  Prayers would be MUCH appreciated! 

I was supposed to go to Denver today to the Sampler Guild meeting; my back/legs are hurting so much, it just wasn't meant to be.  So, I hope to get a bit of stitching done before the day is over today;

Until next time, Happy Stitching!

Vicki in CO