Stitching Again!

I am so excited to report that I've finally been feeling well enough to pick up my stitching again, do some baking and snap some more nature photos.  I'm still not at 100% but I'm getting there.  Sinuses are still draining terribly.

My neighbors on both sides have bird feeders but we do not.  However, we do have a tree on each side of out deck out back and all those birds just love to come hang out in our trees - and there are many!  It does provide an abundance of opportunities to snap photos of many kinds of birds.  I loved the color on these two yesterday and thought I would share.

Friday night we did rent a movie to watch.  Hubby decided on Seven Psychopaths.  Well, let's just say it was a stupid movie.  I don't know why we watched it all the way to the end except it was so stupid you just had to see where they were going with it.  This after taking my hubby's truck out to be fixed as his power window quit working on the driver's side while at the car wash on his way home from work. Lucky for us they were able to get it in right away and we were able to pick it up the next day all fixed. I won't tell you how much it cost as you would probably faint dead away.  Bill almost did!

I enjoyed an evening of stitching on Saturday night and am pleased to show you my completion of this little freebie I got from Pinterest.  It really was a quick stitch once I felt well enough to stitch again.  I used DMC 310 for the Black, DMC 581 for the green tree stem, and DMC 740 for the pumpkin and candles.  It is stitched on an experimental over dye in 32 count that didn't work out for my friend.  

Sunday I managed a couple of hours of stitching on the 2013 Prairie Schooler bee that was a gift from a friend as she didn't want her copy.  I happened to have a scrap of 28 count black so was able to start stitching right away.  I will tell you I don't like stitching on black and this will be my one and only ever to be stitched on black.  I did change 2 of the colors as I stitched with the DMC colors I have in my stash.  

I also made a batch of brownies yesterday using an old family recipe that my mom always used.  You will see that my hubby was into them before the icing had time to set.  I'm glad he is enjoying them!  I've added a new tab in my header for recipes where you will find this recipe.  I will go back and add previous recipes when I have more time.

 Today has been a lovely sunny day and I've spent it cleaning and disinfecting my house.  I told you when I felt well enough I was going to tackle cleaning my house from top to bottom and I just couldn't stand it another day.  I feel just a bit better being in a clean house.  I thought today would be an order pizza night after cleaning all day but I managed to put pork chops in the crock pot so a home cooked meal will be enjoyed after all.

Book club is coming up this Friday when I must lead the discussion for Blackout by Connie Willis.  I've been rather nervous about leading this discussion.  I finally decided my approach for this discussion and it has helped considerably to reduce my fears.  I've decided to embrace the fact that this book is a work of Science Fiction and lead it like any other fiction book.  I'm not going to try and make it all about what really happened in WW II but about the characters and what is happening to them in the book.  I think I will be much more confident in my ability to lead the discussion this way.