Stitching-related exchanges and presents 2006

A very beautiful variegated Dinky Dyes floss from Debbie via the BAPXS Card exchange.

Just pictures of the wonderful stitching-related presents I am receiving Christmas 2006

A different sort of Christmas present ....

Had a long frustrating phone call with mum today - don't get me wrong I love my mum - but neither of us could think of a Christmas present for her that she really wants - thats not just me buying something for her simply so I can say I've done so. Some useless piece of junk she'll feel guilty about wanting to offload ....

Then I came home to the following in my mailbox http://www.abc.net.au/science/features/greenxmas/

So for Christmas this year mum is getting an adoption of an animal in the Victoria zoo. Here's their adopt an animal page, http://www.awhc.zoo.org.au/Get%20Involved/Adopt%20an%20Animal.aspx

and here's a list of the animals you can choose from ..... http://www.zoo.org.au/sponsorship/animaladoptlist.htm

Cute huh ??

Birthdays ?????????

Ok Guys and Gals - I'm getting ready for 2008 {grin}

So - when are your birthdays? I'll stick your birthdays in my events links and see if I can get it to send me reminders a week or so in advance .......


Let me know - you might actually get a card or something that year :)

What you expect me to be this organised for 2007 ????

Hey Claire, should we put something like this on BAPXS - or am I getting ahead of myself again ?

Hugs
Mel.

Meowy Christmas - Finished ready for framing

Finally - after many distractions and much tiredness - she's finished! She's even washed, ironed and ready for framing.


For those that can't see the pic here, its also in my KBK album and my finished album :)

I spent hours last night trying and trying to get the French knots to actually work - not to slide through the holes, not to be "weird lumpy things". Nothing worked - they looked horrible.

Tonight as soon as I got home from work, I removed them all (all four I had managed to make and hold) and I did the lot in beads instead. I'm tired so I kinda free-handed the bead placement and it shows {LOL}

The pattern has the French Knot placement on sides and in between stitches - and that's hard to do on Aida so I decided to wing it and make my piece unique :)

Hopefully by the time I get enough sleep that I'm not chronically tired and I can actually see how bad the bead placement is, I'll also have it framed and will then be too lazy to want to do them again :)

OK off to make dinner and continue with the house cleaning - actually seeing as I have the ironing board out - that might be tonight's chore ....

Teegs and DK

OK I have no idea how to PM more than one person at a time and I wanted to contact both of you and I don;t have both emails here at work - so sending a blog and allowing *only* you two to see it - seemed to be the best way.

Diane, Teegs has been reading a Mercedes Lackey alternate universe series set during the end of the reign of Henry VIII and she's been txting me, asking about the language used.

I suggest she talks to you - as you have as good a grasp on the language as I do (if not better) and you actually *do* read Lackey !!!!

Any chance you could email / PM / txt Teegs?  Its a conversation for you two I think ...

I don't know about your network but I'm with Vodaphone and international txt messages cost the same as local ones for me.

Hugs to you both.

 

All posted! (mostly)

To paraphrase Marvin:

"Post Office, don't talk to me about post office".

Weill I've now posted off all international and domestic cards, gifts and swaps. In the last two days between packaging materials and actual postal costs I've spent over $200 at the post office.

No - that does *not* include purchasing the actual cards and goodies that were posted!

Pity Ramen noodles contain gluten :) Looks like boiled rice for me until Wednesday :) Nah its not *quite* that bad but there's no more Christmas shopping being done now until next weekend (I need my pay on Wednesday before I can even consider food, decorations, a tree etc).

So its house cleaning for a couple of hours, braving the Post Office for one final parcel this afternoon (now I have the address - thank you!) and then a quiet shopping-free few days .... might even get some stitching done ?????

Look out Christmas - here comes Mel !!!!

Yes I am organised! I am ready! I can take on this holiday and win !!!!

{ahem}

What a day ......
* I have a list of everyone I'm buying gifts for.
* All items to be purchased via the net have been ordered.
* All international gifts and cards are selected bought wrapped boxed addressed with appropriate customs information and waiting to go to the post office in the morning ()except for one and I'm still waiting on someone here to supply me with her address HINT HINT)
* ALL Christmas cards to family and friends have been written, enveloped, addressed and stamped. Half have been posted, the rest will go out int he morning.
* All the soaps for both soap swaps have been tidied up, edged cleaned up, packaged, labelled wrapped and name carded (for the Christmas swap) boxed up and all forms correct to go in the post tomorrow.
* Half of the BAPXS card exchanges went int he mail today - the rest will posted out tomorrow morning.

Well all of that - including a trip to the post office to purchase appropriate packing materials and customs forms and a trip to the supermarket for last minute package additions and other Christmas gifts .... I guess I had a productive day :)

All I have left is to purchase the gifts that I need to walk into a local shop for. And these are for people I will be seeing either Xmas Day or Boxing Day. Oh and I still need to purchase some decorations and a tree and some food and do all the attendant bits like decorating cooking etc.

What else happened today?

The telecommunications technician came out this morning as I've still been having intermittent problems with my phone line. He ended up replacing the whole cable from the street to the house - quite a feat considering I live half way up a hill. He reckons that the cable most probably was broken in a few places - not snapped all the way through but one of the lines might have had a few tiny breaks in the wire - causing the intermittent drop out of the line I was experiencing. He also believes this may contribute to why I haven't been able to get broadband ... so I spoke to my telecommunications company and they said to call again in a week (long story involving the myriad of telelcommmunications companies that have monopolies on certain parts of our network) and they would retest the line for me.

So I'm being cautiously optimistic.

Oh and last night?

Last night I was soooooo peeved! Because its non-ratings time, the television networks in their infinite wisdom decided to cancel airing both Bones and Stargate Atlantis. Bones only had two more episodes until he end of the season !!! And Atlantis had only just begun - they've only shown three episodes !!!!!

SO in retaliation, I finally did it last night - I finally joined the unwashed masses and bought pay TV. We *just* started getting the sci-fi channel here in Australia on 1 Dec. Mum has it and she's been ringing me up and telling me all about these shows she's been watching - and sooo many of them I've been saying "Ooooh I always wanted to see that" or "I've heard so much about that from my overseas friends" but the clincher is that they also have a station called UK TV which shows Dr Who and Torchwood (early next year) and from July 2007 they will be airing them at the same time they are in the UK.

UKTV and the Scifi channel are on the same plan (so no extra cost) and they have a deal going at the moment in my area for free installation as long as you sign up before Xmas.

Well I signed up - but I wont be getting it installed until 28 Dec. Apparently a few other people earlier in the day decided it was too good an offer to pass up too!

Mind you, I did better than other people, another couple in the same shop signing up at the same time I was (with a different sales assistant) got told they couldn't be connected before 5 January. At least I get mine on *before* Dad comes to visit. Oh and for the first month you get *all* of the channels free - so Dad can channel surf to his hearts content for sport and other items I don't tend to be interested in (and wont be paying for).

Sooo tired - its a little after 9:30pm here - might go stitch for a while and thence to bed.