And Now to Something Completely Different....

Do you ever feel like it is time to do something completely different - break the habit, take a refresher, work on something unexpected? Every now and again I do and the last week has been one of those periods. After three weeks of pretty intense stress (very rewarding, though, but more about that later), I have finally gotten back to stitching, catching up on blogs, and - finally - posting again!
Just a few minutes ago, I finished a couple of "different projects", just for fun and to see what I think about them once they are done, if that makes sense? Here they are: Black Horse and Brown Horse from a vintage Burda magazine.
I am not a horses person and have never been. I mean, they are beautiful, very useful and no doubt wonderful pet, but I have never longed to have one in the back-yard and even less to get up close and personal... This is abut as closely as I will get, I think - but after all, I do live in one of, if not The, Horse States of the World:

I like the style; it reminds me of Biedermeier wool work, even though these horses were stitched with DMC on an unknown piece of linen from the anonymous section of the stash. I stitched the wreaths with a single strand and the horses with two to get a contrast difference (which does not really show up... LOL).
They were both a couple of fun and quick stitches, about three evenings each, and the frames were cheap and on sale at Hobby Lobby - it feels good to start something and run all the way through to a complete finish!
While stitching, I have been watching Dexter seasons 3 and 4. I have a really bad habit of going to Wikipedia when I am in about the middle of a season to read about what will happen next... So, I have not finished season 4 yet, but I already know how it ends... :-b
As far as the horses go, still not sure what to think... do they fit in anywhere in the house... no, probably not. Oh well - I had fun! :-)

Other than that, not much stitching has been done, as mentioned earlier. I pretty much hit the ground running after coming back to Salty Yarns. I prepared and gave to presentations in a couple of societies; one on negative male gender patterns and the impact they have on the professional work-place and the other one abut the Swedish-American sculptor Carl Milles. Both were well received, so well worth every extra evening hour of work.
I also took the chance and joined an innovation challenge at work. Would you believe this: our team won - out of 10 competing groups!!! Among other things, we each get an iPad2 as a prize - I will finally get a "gadget" - wohoo. This says something, since I *still* don't have a cell-phone! (Well, "still" is not entirely true - I did have one in Sweden back in the early 90s. Ericsson is a Swedish company, so we had the highest cell-phone count per capita for years. I still recall painting mine with glitter nail-polish to personalize it and to make it more "glam"... Nowadays, I just don't have enough to say to invest in one... LOL)
What was the first thing I did after I found out what we had won? I hit Etsy to check out all the yummy iPad cases and stands, of course. Then I told myself that I really need to sew my own because 1) I have plenty of cute fabric at home 2) I do own a sewing machine and 3) I really should sew more of my own stuff. Sigh... ;-)

When all the craziness was finally over, I was so happy to take a breather and managed to catch a cold! Isn't it funny how that always seems to be the case? I was too tired to stitch much of anything, even though I managed to finish up a couple of the Salty Yarn class pieces.
This is Dames of the Needle's sweet and colorful needle book:

Here is the strawberry that Barbara Jackson taught:

As you may be able to tell, DH has done one of his once-every-half-year living-room rearrangements. The reason is less thrilling; the big and loud birds were moved back up from the basement, which will get too cold fro them in the winters, and into the aviary, erh, living-room with the rest of mad flocks. Sigh! The nice thing with all the moving around is that I finally got a really nice spot for our beautiful new spool-cabinet that FIL built for us.
I managed to fill this beauty up with no problem!

DH happened to break our floor-lamp in all the shuffling, so we did also invest in a new one plus a matching glass side-table. WalMart is not a bad place to get some cheap furniture! ;-)

Some unexpected goodies arrived in the mail last week too; the latest Loose Feathers from Blackbird designs... I forgot that I am subscribing to them through Silverneede. (I like the "bonus projects" a lot more than the main piece for this series, but there is still time to get dazzled.)

... and a new issue of SANQ (check out the gorgeous sampler with an urn full of flowers! That is definitely one that hit the ole' (and mostly ignored) to-stitch-very-soon list!!!

I did also happen to pick up a wonderful BH&G quilt magazine in the grocery store. Check out my favorite piece - love the fall colors, all the stars and the fact that is is designed to be a table topper (or maybe even an iPad case, yeah!?):

Since we are speaking fall, I can also report that the scraping of car windows and putting on an extra layer of clothing before leaving the house has started here. The garden looks like it is preparing itself to go to rest. It is beautiful, peaceful, yet somber.

Better to stay inside in the warmth of the house and the family, like DH, Bubba and Scrappy:

... or maybe take a hot bath like Henny?:

Well, it is time to hop to bed! Before signing off, please skip over to our Brightneedle blog if you get a chance. Gwen posted her tiny and fabulous Eek! finish there today!

Last, but not least, thanks a thousand times over for all your sweet comments - they truly mean a lot! I am trying to keep up with all of you and check out what you have been up to lately. If I haven't already stopped by to say hi, I hope to do so soon.
Until next time, take care and Happy Stitching,