Puppy Love and Back to School

WOW!  I am back to school and it has been the roughest start I have had in my entire 17 years of teaching.  Our high school comfortably holds 3,700 students and we have enrolled so far this year, 4,200.  Quite a big difference let me tell you.  Not only are we extremely packed for space, we have almost 300 teachers on our campus and 65 of those poor teachers are homeless.  They do not have a classroom and have to float into other teachers classrooms. They get a rolly cart to hold all their supplies and push it from class to class. So, on my prep period, I have to leave my room so another teacher and their class can be in my room.  I have to pack up everything I might need to get taken care of during my 90 minute prep.  I can't go back if I forget something, I  just have to make it work!   Think of it like this,  you are in your office space and someone comes to you and says "Vickie, you have to leave your office space now and you cannot come back for the next 90 minutes.  Gather up everything you may need and then go find yourself a new workspace that is not being used by anyone else.  However, if someone needs the space you find, you have to relocate again to a different space."  Imagine that, and then realize I do this every day!  It really stinks.   We are praying the public votes YES for a new high school to be built.  

My stitching has really suffered.  I have come home these past 2 weeks of organizing my room and then the first week back just exhausted.  I come home, sit down and then promptly fall asleep.  Last week was really rough because Mark went out of town Mon- Wed and it was just me and the critters.  I came home the first day to a dead mouse and a lizard tail.  Which meant there was a live lizard somewhere in my house.  Luckily I found it hiding under my vacuum cleaner.  It is now hopefully surviving outside and growing a new tail.  Mark was really sweet when he came home,  because he fixed dinner for me while I slept.   I have been worn out.  

Bert, the mighty hunter brought a chipmunk in the house sometime on Friday, because Mark found him in my tablecloth drawer. He jumped out and the chase was on!!  All 5 critters and 2 adults was on the hunt looking for the little rodent.  I found him today, dead, under my chaise lounge.  He is now out of my house and I have a very angry cat who really wants his chipmunk toy!!!

On to Stitching...Here is my Puppy Love progress....I love it on the purple sparkly fabric

This is another Disney design that I am doing. I can't tell you anything because it is a secret Round Robin design.  

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There is a lot more to say, but it is time to go to bed because I have to get up early and do my weigh in on my Biggest Loser game.   I did not lose a single pound over the Summer.  However, I did lose several inches so I am proud of that!!!

Puppy Love and Sistine Chapel update

Even though it is summer, I feel like I haven't had time for much. It isn't like I have had a job to go to or any major projects going. I have just gotten lazy because I get sucked into Facebook, Pinterest and this slot machine game I play.  That is my whole excuse.   August just snuck up on me and now I have been spending a few hours a day in my classroom.  

I did pull Sistine Chapel out this past weekend.  I am still on the on the third page of the second panel.  It is moving very slowly.

Several people asked about my Disney Table Runner and where I found the pattern.  I bought this Italian magazine off Ebay a couple of years ago.  

I pulled out my Puppy Love to work on and I just love this design.  Mickey's butt looks so cute!  

I have been working out at home 4 days a week.  Here is my obstacle course that I have to go through when I workout.  They just want to encourage me I know.   I have not lost any weight this summer.  I am still the same weight I started at however, I have lost several inches so I am proud of that.

Disney Table Runner Finish!!!!

I cannot believe I have not posted since the middle of July.   WOW!!!  I have been spending my time stitching, and working on school work.  There have been many hours since my last post of cutting and gluing math problems onto math task cards. Then I had to make an answer sheet for each set.  Sigh.....I have to go back to work officially on the 13th.  However, unofficially, I have already spent hours in my classroom just getting things set up.  My classroom is just about as big as my living room. That has to hold 15 to 20 students desks, 2 teacher desks, book cases and all the other goodies we need to survive.   It is like playing tetris in my room to make it where we aren't squished like sardines.  I have to do like Tim Gunn says off Project Runway  " Make it Work!!"....

I had hoped to finish this by the end of July. However, I kept having to frog something on EVERY set of characters.  Donalds Butt wasn't stitched right, Daisy's globes where wrong...I started Pluto 5 lines BELOW where I should have and had to restart that too....sigh... But it is finished!!!!! LOVE IT!!  Now to find the perfect fabric to go around it so it can be a fabulous table runner!!  

Living Room gets a new look

I can't believe it has been 7 years since I painted my living room a beautiful chocolate brown.  I fell in love with that color and it went so well  with my cream furniture.   Then my DH got the brilliant idea to buy new furniture 4 years ago....it was beautiful CHOCOLATE leather furniture.  He wanted that color over all the others.....well...it made my living room very depressing with the  blackout curtains drawn during the day.

Here are the windows in my living room...as you can see the suns shines very brightly in this room and it gets to be like a furnace in the summer time.  It is horrible!  That is why I have blackout curtains, to keep the heat out and the coolness inside.  Don't you just LOVE the Tour de France that is on the TV right now???

Chocolate walls around the fireplace.  

Chocolate walls with Chocolate furniture.....very depressing......

My goal was to pain the living room a new bright color.  I looked at several shades of greens, but my eyes kept going to the lavenders....so I painted my living room lavender!!! LOVE IT!!!  MY DH came in and went...dang, we are going to need sunglasses to sit in here now!!!    I bought Valspar Signature paint with primer at Lowes and it took 1//2 a gallon of paint with only one coat!!!!!  It took me a total of 2 hours to paint my room.   I repeat...I LOVE my new living room!!!!

Since I painted it so bright, you can see I have to paint the fireplace mantle.  The smoke stains really stand out next to the lavender.   I went to Walmart to buy white paint....do you know how many shades of white there are out there????  I had to bring home 10 different sample cards and I finally found the one!  My next two projects are to paint the fireplace mantle along with putting new shades on the windows.  

When I finished, the tour was over but the Scottish Open was on.  Gotta love men and their sports!!!!

Disney Stitching and Framed Summer Ball

While I on vacation this year, I took my Disney ornaments with me to stitch while we were in the car.  I took 8 ornaments with me since we were going to be gone 8 days.  My goal was to stitch one ornament a day.  I almost made it! However, when we were driving from Minneapolis, MN to Sheboygan, WI, the road was so bumpy that I couldn't stitch!!!   So I read a trashy novel instead!  When I got home, I had to order black and red seed beads for the eyes and buttons.  I can't make a french knot so I use beads instead.

Summer Ball is framed!!!  I took it to Hobby Lobby with me to look at the framing section.  I decided to look in the pre-framed area and found the perfect frame!!!  It was on sale for 50% off  so the frame cost me $25 and I chose to get a blue mat for it.  LOVE IT!!! hanging in my hallway now!!!!!

Brigen brought in a new friend Sunday night.  He found a turtle in the yard.  Not sure how it got in because we closed in all the holes after Berts incident (see below).  He was chewing on it trying to get it open.  Poor turtle!!  I rescued it and placed it in the yard.  Doesn't he look proud of his find????

Doesn't Bert look so sweet and innocent here???  He has been trying to give me a heart attack this past week!!!!

Last Sunday, I was getting ready to leave for my cross stitching group and did a fur baby count to make sure all were ok before I left.  Bert wasn't in the house, so I went and looked in the yard.  He wasn't there!!  I had a heart attack!!  I keep calling and looking for him and found nothing.  I called my husband 7 times since he was on the golf course and couldn't reach him.  I just wanted to know if he had seen him that morning.  Bert likes to get up early and go outside to lay under the shed.  DH didn't answer his phone, so I called the club to have him call me.  He hadn't seen him.  I was panicked!!!  I walked up all the streets calling his name and still didn't find him.  Finally around 5:00 pm, I went outside and called his name again.  I heard this faint meow in the woods behind our house.  I ran outside and there he was, crawling out of the woods looking scared.  He didn't come to me at first and finally when he realized who I was, he came running.  I brought him in the house.  He went straight to his food and water.  Once he was full, he went to find Gibbs for a nap.  

Mark and I had to walk the fence line to see where he was getting out.  There was a small gap in the gate and concrete that he could fit so we covered it with rocks and fire logs.  After we plugged that up, went to lowes to buy some plywood so he couldn't jump OVER the fence near the lower part of our deck.  We let him out of the house again.  He went straight to that gate and was looking at me when he realized he couldn't get out.   

So for the past week, when he goes out and is our for more than an hour, I go look for him.  Yes, I am crazy!!!!

Summer Ball is finished!!!!

It is 2:50 am and I put the final stitches in Summerball tonight!

Here is it, Hot off the q-snaps!!!!  LOVE how it turned out!!!!!  I feel like I have been working on this forever!!!  I am off to bed now.  Just wanted to share my excitement!!!!!!

Vacation!!!

Mark and I left for vacation on last Saturday for our drive up north.  We went to Minneapolis, MN, Sheboygan, WI, and the to Chicago, IL.    It was a 10 hour drive to MN and the first 3 hours were spent in huge rainstorm.  It was terrible....we spent the night in Iowa and made it to Minneapolis Sunday morning.  We couldn't check into the hotel until 3:00 pm so we went to the Mall of America.  OMG!  It was so much fun!!  In this mall, we rode a roller-coaster, played Putt Putt, went to the aquarium, had lunch and walked through the mall.  It was awesome!!!  I did visit a stitching store on Sunday and stitched several ornaments over the week...that will be in the next post.

This roller coaster spun in circles as we went along the tracks.

 What they can do with Legos is just amazing!!!!!

So much fun!!!!

Above the sting ray tanks....

Playing putt putt.....

Sunday evening on the way to dinner..

Monday morning, I went back to the mall and made it through one and half floors.  I did walk in this store and found a fantastic pair of shoes that were 40% off....flipped the shoe over it was originially $385....I put the shoe down and backed slowly out of the store.    Every day of our vacation, Mark played golf in the mornings, while I did some exploring.  We would get back to together in the afternoons to spend the rest of the day together.  

Monday afternoon we went to the zoo.  

 Snow Monkeys were very rambunctious.  I just loved watching the two little babies.  I was able to get a picture of one.

 Bears were playing in the water...

This bear is king of the mountain!

Tuesday, I went back to the Mall of America to finish.  Tuesday afternoon we went to find the Mary Tyler Moore statue downtown. Tuesday night, it was off to the Twins Game!

                                            

Wednesday, we left for Sheboygan, WI.  Mark decided to check out how cold the water was in Lake Michigan.  It was cold!   Thursday, I met up with my friend Kim Ritchie.  We went to Joanns, Hobby Lobby, local Quilt store and a Victorian Candy store.  It was so great to see her!  I haven't seen her in a couple of years!!!  Thanks for diving up to meet with me!!!

Thursday - Saturday was spent in Chicago visiting with Marks sisters and her family.  It was so much fun!  My sister-in-law took my niece and I to the Art Institute to see the miniatures.  Now I want to make a dollhouse!  So disappointed, that we are not closer to Chicago because there is a Fashion Exhibit that starts on June 26th and runs until September 22!  I would LOVE to see it!!!!   Trying to convince Mark that we need to go back before the exhibit is over.....

Decided to drive all the way home in shot, we were greeted at the door with lots of wiggly butts and wagging tongues.