Remember

A heartfelt thanks to all those who laid down their lives for this country. God bless you, and God bless the United States of America.

Quiet Memorial Day weekend

Yesterday we went to UniTown for a picnic at the parental units' place. My youngest brother and his son were in town for a short visit. I made Boston Cream pie totally from scratch, and if I must say so myself--it looked great and tasted even better. Yum.

Anyway, classes are finally over and the fifth grant proposal since January has been submitted. Youngest Daughter is home from visiting Son and seems to be coming down with a cold. I've been working on her pillowcase, trying to finish it before she goes to England at the end of June. Here's where it stands right now; one fan partially completed.

I get this week off, and then Monday the summer session starts. Lamentably, I have to teach a class and it's a really FULL class, and it's also one I've never done before. All that adds up to a massive time investment. Sigh. They don't pay enough to compensate me for the loss of much-needed brain rest time.

The things you find

I've been doing some cleaning here and there, and yesterday I went through the front closet. In a bag, way in the back of the closet, I found this baseball hat. It has been years--many years--since I turned this on, and it still has the same 9V battery, which, amazingly, WORKED.




In another bag, with some books and papers and a copy of the Dean's List announcement from 1992, I found this:




The verse says,

"Roses are red, violets are blue
Chocolate is heavenly, and so are you!
Roses are red, violets are blue
Chocolate might be heavenly but I don't love it more than you!"

Awwwwwwwwwwwww.

Second silver guilloche: first try!

Here's the second vein, which only took one try. I messed up a bunch of things on the first one, including not making the base structure long enough, and then not taking advantage of the big holes left by the queen stitch for the cross bars.


The gold and silver is so shiny in the sun that it makes it hard to see when stitching! But it is really pretty and sparkly.

Today I plan to clean out the front closet, right after I drop Spouse off at the corner to catch the subway, then print, sign, scan, and send a reference letter for a student applying to a UK MBA program.

The third time's the charm with guilloche stitch

Finally got one silver leaf vein in, after three tries. Goodness!


One class is completely graded; today I will finish the other two, and celebrate by cleaning something (I have so many somethings to choose from!). Then tomorrow, full bore on the grant proposal, although I am increasingly convinced we won't get this one in.

My lilacs are blooming, and it didn't rain yesterday so I brought some in the house. Ohh, do they smell wonderful! My mom and sister-in-law want to try to transplant a couple shoots. There are plenty of them, thankfully.

No Reno for me

I spent yesterday morning at the ear, nose and throat doc's office getting my left ear reamed out. Wow, that hurt like the dickens! So it's still a bit infected and sore and zings now and then, and I have to put drops in it twice a day for a week. Therefore, no flying and no trip to Reno.

Not that I was looking forward to Reno a whole lot.

So, that means I get to finish grading and do stuff around the house and work on the various embroidery projects I have going. I have eight papers and eight finals to grade, so my plan is to finish the papers today (which completes the grading for one class) and the finals tomorrow (which completes the grading for two other classes). Then I am free to work on the grant proposal that is due Monday. Not sure if that's going to fly--my co-PIs aren't exactly burning up the e-mail wires with revisions to the current document, and I can't write the whole doggone thing by myself.

Early this morning I finished the gold guilloche on the sampler. A couple of things--I didn't have as many loops as the reference piece (I had four, the piece has six). That's partly because I didn't make the base as long as the reference piece has, and since I was trying to keep things equally spaced, I ended up with fewer crossbars--which meant there was a big space between loops. In a way, that made it easier to keep the three loops nested more neatly. I also used tapestry needles to lift up the crossbars and make it easier to pull the gold thread through without piercing the underlying loops. I'll try that trick again when I do the silver guilloche leaf veins on the top right flower.

Here's the current state: Top pic is the detached buttonhole with return, which turned out pretty nicely. Next is the guilloche and last is the full piece. My phone takes rotten photos, and the camera isn't much better (can't get as close as the phone with the camera). Time for a better camera!

Stupid earache

I've had an ear ache on and off since mid-April, when I flew to see Son. When I was at the doctor's last week, I told her about it and she looked but didn't find anything. It doesn't hurt all the time, just on and off I get these sharp pains, and it's tender inside. She said to take Sudafed and Ibuprofen, and it would go away in time.

Today it's much better, thank goodness, because I have to fly to Reno Saturday morning (a trip I am NOT looking forward to) for a conference. I think I will get some Earplanes just in case. It's just on the edge of hurty today, so I think it should be okay by Saturday, I hope.

Its the end of the quarter, so I am in grading jail, too, until Monday at 11:55 or I finish, whichever comes first. Fun, wow.

But, I still try to get in my few minutes of embroidery. Here are the Month 5 stitches--reverse chain with double buttonhole edge (upper right) , and guilloche (middle left). I didn't finish the guilloche yet; I just got the foundation part in. The guilloche stitch starts off with a set of four long stitches. When I put those in, I saw right away that the reverse chain next to this motif wasn't straight--so I pulled that out. Tomorrow hopefully I will put the reverse chain back in, and finish the guilloche here and in the upper right flower's leaves. Guilloche is also used in the pincushion but I don't know that I will get that done tomorrow. Can't take the goldwork on the plane, darn it.


Oh well, time for more tea and more grading.

"It is in the DNA of our country to explore...WE MUST NOT STOP.."

--Mark Kelly, Commander.

Godspeed, Endeavour.

Rain, rain, go away

Wow, it was pouring here last night. Today it's still rainy and grey.

Today I need to work on the TUES grant, if I can manage to type around Kitty Mama, who has deposited her puffiness on my lap and is purring happily. Also need to comment on some draft term papers and get the assignment grading done for three classes. Ugh.

Yesterday we went through three boxes of miscellaneous stuff and threw out a bunch of things. It's time to start packing up the house in preparation for moving. When is the move? Darned if I know. I just know that packing takes forever, so it's never too early to start.

Got this far on the goldwork sampler and pincushion. I'm up to Month 4 in the class, only 9 months behind...

I have survived Week Ten

and Kitty Son has a blog! (mrbeowulf.tumblr.com).

Still have assignments to grade and finals to grade and a grant to write. But I don't have to be on campus except for the odd meeting here and there. What a relief!

I got some goldwork done on the sampler but spent more time tying off ends that I'd left from the last session I did on that piece. I wanted to do the silver heavy chain part but it got too dark. Tomorrow is another day!

Happy Birthday to my dad, who is the Best Dad in the Universe--he now has a Fisher Space Pen that says so.

I have survived Week Nine, and more gold!

Tired much? Wow, what a long slog this academic year has been. I still have a bunch of assignments to grade by tonight, then Week Nine is in the bag and we are on to Week Ten. One more set of lectures, one more set of homework assignments, then finals, term papers, and projects to grade by May 23. I'll get two weeks off, then the summer session starts.

Got some more of the goldwork done this morning, since I'd finished the green border yesterday. I need to be more careful not to snag the silk, arrgggh, as I'm doing the reverse chain stitch. It does look nice and shiny!

Youngest Daughter needs to get her allergy shot today, then we are running some errands in preparation for her trip to see Son next week.

I spoke too soon

about the silk being finished. I started putting in the reverse chain stitch in gold, then when I was looking at the directions, I realized that there was a green "frame" around the edges that sets off the composite gold stitch border.

Oh, poo.

So I've started working on the frame, and the rest of the gold will have to wait. Sigh.

Got him

God bless our troops, our intelligence community, and the United States of America. God bless George W. Bush, who never forgot who we were fighting, and who relentlessly pursued this monster. God bless Barack Obama, who continued the pursuit.

God comfort those who lost loved ones on 9/11, who were traumatized by the events of that day, and whose family members have fallen in this long war.

My husband jokes that instead of 72 virgins, terrorists are met by 72 Virginians, and that the first ones they see are George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Zachary Taylor, and Woodrow Wilson.

It was wonderful to see the spontaneous celebrations at the White House, Times Square, the military academies, and the NYC subway. What a great day this is.

Silk finished!

I finally finished the silk embroidery part on the Tudor pincushion (which I have decided to frame when it's done). Not loving the Soie d'Alger thread. It gets kind of fuzzy and matted looking; granted, that might be because I am constantly putting the embroidery in a ziplock bag and toting it back and forth to UniTown, but compared to Soie de Paris, which is what I used on the floral glove, and which went through the same traveling regimen--this thread isn't quite as nice.

Now that the silk part is done, I can start on the metal thread embroidery, and continue putting the gold and silver work on the sampler. The new "travel embroidery" will be the mate to YD's pillowcase, at least for the two weeks left in the academic year. Last class is the 12th, last meeting the 13th, and after that it's finals and grading. Yay!

Anyway, after a marathon day yesterday schlepping Youngest Daughter and her belongings back to Home City, we are all absolutely exhausted and the house is again full of boxes. We have been moving kids in and out of the house since 2001. Sigh.

And now something for Rachel--pics I took with my phone of a gold-encrusted wedding kimono. Can you imagine how long it took to do that?