Keebles World

This was a totally pitiful stitching week. I've got vacation coming up and my mind is on little else, so between it and work, my poor Cinderella Castle didn't stand a chance despite my best intentions of finishing it last week. I left off here last week: I got all the body stitching done and started on the backstitching, but after about four hours in one little location, I was done for the week. I questioned every single color on Sleeping Beauty Castle, especially in the backstitching area, but since there was a more definitive color variation on Cinderella Castle, I haven't been too worried (although, like Sleeping Beauty Castle, the colors are WAY off from the actual castles...that's what I get for doing a kit that is about 20 years old). The closer I got to finishing though, I started to question certain things. I decided to stitch the gold and silver with one thread instead of two so it didn't look clumpy like it did on Sleeping Beauty's (but now I f...

Measi's WIPocalypse Sorry I'm late guys...I'm bogged down with vacation planning right now and just forgot! This month's question is: "If you have any of your pieces on display in your home which attracts the most plaudits? (via Hazel)" All my pieces that I've done for myself are hanging on my walls, but unfortunately (or thankfully, depending on how you look at it), no one ever comes over to my house, so they are basically just there for my own enjoyment. Besides, I have a blog to show them off, so no one need come visit in person. For this month's WIPocalypse, I made considerable progress on some and none on others, so without further ado, let's see the progress! I worked the most on Maleficent. Last month she was here: And I managed to finish the third row making her total now here: She is on my usual HAED fabric of 28ct Monaco, 1x1 full stitches. She's going back to the bottom of the rotation pile for a while though...she...

As always, go over to Kate's and Tiff's blogs to see their Top 10's for the week and if you want to join in, just let Kate know. I love me some YouTube! I've been a faithful watcher of the channel since its early days. I use it for entertainment purposes, for work purposes, for learning purposes, for vacation purposes, and a half-dozen other reasons as well. My favorite channels change all the time, but I do have my go-to, never-let-me down favorites. I almost wish this was a top 20 list instead...I could literally ramble on about YouTube for hours! #1: CRASH COURSE (SPECIFICALLY ASTRONOMY) This series just finished up (there is talk that Physics is next), but there are also courses on history, literature, culture, philosophy, government, etc. They are short and sweet, but very perfunctory and certainly enjoyable enough to watch over and over. I've read Phil Plait's blog for years, so I was already a fan, but he's not the only Crash Course ho...

If there is one thing I've learned about my work environment it's that there are those that bully and those who get bullied. When one bully starts up, it stirs up the others into a feeding frenzy. Last week was one of the worst in my 20 years of being employed there. Although I wasn't the main target of the biggest explosion, I got caught up by the mongrels looking for leftover morsels. Apparently, some people have more free time than work. I'm one of the bullied, but I've always been OK with that because I I don't feel emotions like a normal person, so thanks to my Asperness, they are wasting their time...usually. But even I have weaknesses and there are those in the bully brigade who know some of them. Last week, they managed to hit the worst of my exposed nerves. I'm not a bully myself because it takes more social effort that I'm willing to put forward...it takes planning, conniving, a desire to make oneself more important, and an evil spirit ...

As always, go over to Kate's and Tiff's blogs to see their Top 10's for the week and if you want to join in, just let Kate know. I'm not really sure how to approach this week's topic. Heroes are very subjective and mine change with the tides other than a select few, but I'm going to give it my best shot. I don't know why I consider some of these guys heroes, but they are the characters that come to mind first, be they "real" or animated. I also tend to interchange "hero" with "superhero". I know there are varying degrees of hero, but I tend to go big or go home, so to speak. This will also be an male-dominated list for several reasons, the main one being because I'm old and I like male heroes. I've ranted numerous times about the shift in movies to give young girls someone to look up to by making the girls the heroes...I get the point of it, but don't necessarily think it's a good thing. If they ins...

I spent last week working on Snow White. She's definitely more complicated than she looks! I left off here last time: I did stop her on Friday night as planned, but she stayed on my mind all weekend because of where I left off. After a rather crappy weekend spent on Suteki, I picked Snow back up today to try to get the background finished. I didn't succeed, but I'm so close, I think I'll continue on her next week until I get the row finished. Here is where I stopped tonight: I figure it shouldn't take more than a day or two at most to finish the background, but it will leave me with a partial week for whatever project I pick. I'm pretty sure it won't be Night Wish because I want to give it a full week's worth of attention. I'm kind of thinking that maybe it's time to start Cinderella Castle back up, especially since I will be in Disney World in a few weeks. We'll see. Speaking of Suteki, I'm at a very hard place with her rig...

Despite my reluctance to get out in the world, on certain occasions I am dragged out for one reason or the other and last night was one of those nights. If I had it my way, I would never go to any other concert than Duran Duran, but there are specific instances when I'll make an exception. As a birthday present to my mother, my sister got us tickets to see my mother's "Duran Duran"...Barry Manilow. I'm not embarrassed to say that this isn't the first time I've seen Barry (for the sake of my mother) but, if I'm really honest, I really don't mind seeing him either because he does put on a good show and it really is the music of my childhood. There comes a time in everyone's life when they discover that, not only is their parents music not as sucky as they once thought, but that some of it is really good. I didn't take a camera, I just had my phone, so the pictures are crappy (because Barry does love his spotlights), but here are a few h...

As always, go over to Kate's and Tiff's blogs to see their Top 10's for the week and if you want to join in, just let Kate know! Kate put a cap on the amount (75 million pounds - about 110 million dollars) and I'm so glad she did! If I'm realistic about it (or as realistic as one can be about a lottery win), I'm going to assume that's the cash-out amount and, after taxes, both federal and state, I would be left with about 60 million, so that's what I'm going with. Thankfully, this is my go-to amount of win and the one that benefits me the most. Anything more and it's just way too much (and incredibly dangerous) and anything less means I'm not going to hit these targets and the plans are completely different. Because of my Asper-ness, my brain constantly runs at full speed, especially at night. The only way I can get to sleep is to start a scenario in motion and play it through until I drift off. My standard scenario is a lottery ...

Let's get this month's TUSAL over with first (and a day early, no less). For some reason, I was feeling a bit "ducky" this month: Looks like a meerkat we all know and love is peeking around the corner! I stuck to Maleficent like you guys suggested and, it took a ton of work, but I managed to finish the third row (finally). I left off here last week: And here is the row finish at 388.07 hrs: And here are all three rows together: For all the hell that this stupid dithering is giving me, I do have to admit that it does look really good. I wish I could say the same for Suteki (but that's a post for another blog at another time). My goal is to finish the fourth row of Maleficent by the end of the year, but I might just get into the fifth if I keep up at this pace. I debated on working on the wording for Rainy Wedding next week, but right now, at least until my Disney trip is over with, I think I'll put it off a while. I decided to complete the rota...

As always, go over to Kate's and Tiff's blogs to see their Top 10's for the week and if you want to join in, just let Kate know! Well, yet again, I've got to bend the topic just a bit. I may be a techie, but I'm also one of those people who think that a phone should just be used to call or text people. I rarely ever use apps on my phone and typically only out of necessity. My iPad, however, is a whole 'nother beast and I app the heck of it, so I'm going to make this week's Top 10 Tuesday a list of my top 10 favorite iPad apps (with maybe one or two iPhone apps thrown in for good measure). I'm also going to try to link to as many of these as I can. #1: HOURS TRACKER Ever wonder why I know exactly how much time I spend stitching on a project? Hours Tracker is the reason. I pretty much clock in and out as I stitch and have a "job" for each cross stitch project. #2: EZ PDF READER Although I still use paper copies of my patte...