Stitching Blogger's Question of the Week

Designer dreams

Would you or have you designed your own cross stitch design? If you have can we see it?

Oh, heck no. I don't consider myself that creative. I've altered a few designs, most notably Celtic Spring, but I've never done anything of my own. I also highly doubt that I ever will.

Here's the Celtic Spring, I didn't like the way the original word placement left the "g" of spring on top of the right side motif, so I moved it around.
. Spring was dropped off at the framer and I can't wait to get her back, there's an empty space over the mantel next to Celtic Christmas just waiting to be filled.

Dave picked Elminster up on Saturday. Zedd and Morty are not at all sure they like this little intruder. Morty seems to be warming up, but Zedd is still hissing and growling. Abe on the other hand, is terrified. It's pretty easy to tell why he was retired before he ever raced, this poor dog has absolutely no prey drive whatsoever. We had him out at Dave's parents once, and tried to show him a bunny. He didn't see the bunny until we were standing almost on top of it, and when it ran away he didn't seem to be interested.

Pictures of Elmo later tonight when I bring the camera upstairs

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Shop Dreams

If you could design your dream needlework/cross stitch shop, what would it be like?"

I'm fairly satisfied with the shops I have available to me. There are at least three local ones, and another slightly more than a hour's drive that does all my framing. I really can't think of anything I'd do different. I know I'm pretty lucky, living in the middle of plenty, when there are so many that have just Hobby Lobby and Michael's to choose from.

Work has not let up yet. We are just about out of cages and crates and stalls at the hospital. Somebody needs to tell the animals that they need to space out their illnesses a little better! It is very hectic, we've racked up quite a few hours of overtime, so I guess the change came in handy. Except that the boss is trying to get them to change it back to comp time. I'd personally rather have the money, than get time that may or may not get taken (we get excessive amounts of vacation time, so comp time is just silly), but I'm just a peon and nobody cares what I want.

What I really want is a schedule change, which is not going to happen unless one of the other techs leaves and I don't see that happening any time soon. I'd love to have a weekend day off on a regular basis, so Dave and I could do stuff together, instead of having to beg for the time off. I've asked for October 9th, so we can take the dog to the Celtic Heritage Festival to be the poster boy for retired racing greyhounds, and she has yet to tell me yes or no. It's really annoying to have to wait until the very last minute to know if your time off is approved, and it makes it hard to make plans.

I've been sucked into the world of Tales of Symphonia so very little knitting or cross stitch has been done. I'm about halfway done, which means boredom will set in soon, I'll quit playing, go back to crafty pursuits and watch Dave finish the game for me.

Zedd has decided that the dog's crate belongs to him now. That's fine with Abe, who has taken over our new loveseat as his new bed.


Just Finished:

Stitching Blogger's Questions of the Week: "Do you stitch small projects one at a time that you can finish quickly, have numerous large projects going at once that you rotate, or both? How does your current system work for you and have you thought about changing it?"

Currently I have a ten hour rotation going. Last month I had a one hour rotation going. At the beginning of the year, I was working on one thing at a time until I finished it. So, I change my system all the time depending on my mood. I'm still trying to find the perfect system for me.

Right now, I've got five largish projects, and one smaller one going. Three of them are "mystery" projects where only a portion is released on a monthly basis. I'm very behind on Mystery 6, only sort of behind on Medallion Sampler (which I just started) and am all caught up on Mini Mystery F. I haven't worked on Common Ground in months, I really need to shoehorn it back into rotation.

For my ten hour rotation, I've been working through the whole lot and then adding one new project for anything I've finished. So far I've chosen a couple of Lizzie Kate Halloween designs that were easily finished within the ten hours. That way I have the satisfaction of finishing something, and each round of the rotation I get to add something new without increasing the total amount of projects I have going at a time.

So far this is working for me. But who knows how I'll feel next month. I might decide I can't stand to be several months behind on Mystery 6 and just stitch on that.

Still bitching about work...

To top it off, today when I tried to enter my hours on the stupid payroll server that is always down when I'm trying to access it, I found out that I'm no longer able to use the code I need to use. We were told that we had until Nov 18th to use up all our comp hours or lose them. I had taken a couple of days off last week, so I figured I'd just use up all my comp time, instead of wasting my vacation time. Nope. Can't do that, I'm not allowed to use the comp code anymore. Way to go, people! I'm sure they won't manage to figure out how to fix that until after the deadline expires.

I did finish another Halloween cross stitch. Also by Lizzie Kate this one is Halloween Sampler


I haven't really done too much knitting lately, just my usual socks. Hawaii is making me nuts, but I really don't want to set it aside, if I do I know I won't pick it back up again. So I have to work on it in very small doses.

Sometimes I just hate my job! The city in its infinite wisdom decided to change my job classification from salary with comp time to overtime. Sounds good, right? Wrong! The city makes it very difficult to get approval for overtime, and makes you jump thru hoops to pay for "unapproved" overtime.

Unapproved overtime, is the stuff we have all the time, because of emergencies. The animals don't know to get sick or have accidents only during the standard 7 to 4 workday.

So, it sounds like we're still going to get comp time, but now it's at the mercy of the hospital manager. The one who when I asked to leave a half hour early on Saturday to vote in our local election looked at me like I asked if I could kick her puppy. The one who always asks if we really need time off when we fill out our request sheets, and who doesn't approve time off requests until the very last second.

The one who when she told me about this new policy, which started on Aug 18, (I only just was informed about it Sept 11), and I responded "what about the hours that have accrued over the last week? I want my four hours." Said "You're not the only one who has overtime". Excuse me? I wasn't talking about anyone else, I was talking about my hours. I'm pretty sure the others can speak up for themselves and don't need me to be the spokesmodel.

Just Finished:

Stitching Blogger's Questions of the Week
How do you explain cross stitch to non-cross stitching people? Do they get it or do they say “Oh, right.. you do knitting then (or sewing, or needlepoint)"?

I don't have many chances to explain cross stitch to people, since I don't stitch in public. If I'm out I'm usually knitting, which people tend to call crochet. I do find that most non-craft oriented people really don't care that there are different names for the different crafts and just lump them all together.

Went to the in-laws to be this weekend. While there we picked out our new kitten. He's not old enough to be separated from his mother yet, so Dave will return in a couple of weeks to bring Elminster home. Dave's parents ended up with quite a few outdoor cats, all from one female who showed up and decided to stay because the food was plentiful. (Their property is a wildlife sanctuary, Dave's mom leaves out food for everything from deer to vultures. All of the neighborhood doves are congregating due to it being dove season in Texas.) Most of the kitties are bob-tailed, as far as we can figure out the first female had some Manx in her background. Elminster has a stubby little tail, and his coloring most closely resembles tabby point. I wish I had brought my camera to take pictures of the cats, and of the zillion hummingbirds fighting over the feeders.

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