On Christmas Eve the package arrived from my Stitchers’ Angel, Kerri at Kerri’s Provincial Patch — and it was some package! A wonderful little needle book, a fabulous scissors holder, a great caddy, a super little bag, a pattern and a copy of a magazine that I’ve not seen here!

The scissors holder had these great little scissors in it!

The inside of the needle book.

The bag. I love the fabrics used in this bag.

And this magazine. This will be great fun to curl up and look through with a cup of hot chocolate. Thank you, Kerri. Everything is just wonderful.

The group of pieces in the lower right-hand corner of this shot has now almost turned into a completed gift. So one almost done and two to go. One has to go to its recipient by a delivery service. The other two can be delivered by hand. But this is definitely cutting it too close.

What was I thinking leaving things so late???


I’m not complaining — but suddenly this week work has picked up a lot. Totally unexpected. And cutting into my stitching time!!

I got my partner info for the Four Seasons Quilt Swap today and have so many ideas floating around in my mind that would work for the quilt for this. It’s monochromatic this time. One of the colours my partner likes is blue. I love working with blue and I love the fact that my partner is someone whose blog I have been reading for quite a while. 🙂

Lester doesn’t like it when we go out. He has a habit at night of sleeping on our shoes. I’m not sure if he’s guarding us or trying to ensure we don’t sneak out in the middle of the night or something. Tonight he decided DH’s slippers looked like something he should make sure couldn’t go anywhere so he put his two front paws in one of them. Definitely had us laughing.

I joined the Black and White Challenge a couple of weeks ago and keep meaning to write about that. I had made these little black and white stars earlier in the year, along with some others, and think I will do something with these blocks to begin with. Although I do have plans for another black and white quilt, these will give me a start.


Christmas gifts are being worked on, so I can’t show them. I even wrote my first pattern as a result of one of them. It was an interesting experience and I certainly learned that I need to learn how to use some better programs when it comes to adding illustrations! All a learning curve — and this one I think is going to be rather exciting.

This has been a brutal week insofar as headaches go. I had a migraine last night that had me up until 5:00 a.m. I think there’s a big weather change coming, yet again, and that was the reason behind the headache.

We never tire of these “double” pictures of Smudge. He looks like such a different cat in his reflection!


And Lester in his favourite spot — with the warm air blowing up on him.

Do you like redwork? If so, go here — Gail Pan is giving away a sweet little design just in time for some quick stitching for Christmas. I plan to use the design in a special Christmas card for an elderly relative.

If you haven’t been to Freda’s Hive before, go now. She has a fabulous blog, great designs, shows some amazing fabrics and this week is celebrating her blog anniversary!

Lester and Smudge think both those sites are well worth a visit!

The mailbox had a nice squishy envelope in it today and look what was in the envelope! It’s my Another Little Quilt Swap quilt — called “Box of Chocolates” from Charlie at It’s Just Me. The pattern is fun to look at and the colours are so wonderful!


I’ve often thought about making a pink and brown quilt and now I can just think about it some more as I have one! I remember seeing this on Kate’s blog and thinking how much I’d love to receive it — and here it is! I think Charlie must have spent some time on my blog and picked up on my passion for pink — either that, or it was an amazingly good guess!

The squirrels are very very busy tucking away food for the winter and the cats are very very busy watching them!

My little quilt for the Another Little Quilt Swap was posted on Wednesday and is on its way to my swap recipient. I called it “Purple Hydrangea”. It was made with 1″ hexagons and half hexagons.

The tale of two kitties began with the two of them sitting staring out the window at the leaves and the squirrels. At this point everything looked calm.

Next thing we knew, Lester was — well, it looks like he was trying to perhaps nudge Smudge out of his way.

Then Lester was, I think, basically walking over or around Smudge. Well, trying to is probably a better description.

Then another nudge?

And then the flying paws. A few hits at one another and then it was over and they were at either end of the window.

I have changed the settings in the comments section. No further anonymous comments will be allowed. Why? If someone feels compelled to leave a nasty comment, they will have to take ownership of it.

Does he look sad to you in this photo? I’m not sure if he’s sad that the leaves are falling off the trees so quickly or if he’s just plain tired out from chasing them as they drift past the window.

For some unknown reason, I seem to have not shown any of the pictures of the things I’ve made/am making for the Stitchers’ Angels and Another Little Quilt Swap swaps. I guess I got so engrossed in the Snow Crystals that I totally forgot to show these.

First up — for the Stitchers’ Angels swap I made a project book. Edited to Add: It’s my own design and is based, in part, on a project book DH made for me when I was making diamonds from Quilted Diamonds. That one was made from a Duotang binder and had no spot for pins or scissors, but had the felt “pages” and I loved it!




… a star pincushion and …

… a small needle book. These goodies are off on their travels to their new home.

My partner in the ALQS likes purple. I decided on a big purple flower made of hexagons. A stem and some leaves have been added and I will have pictures of the completed top sometime later this week.

Lester, keeping an eye on the goings-on out on the roof garden. That was taken a few days ago. Today there are less than 25% of those leaves left. I love that we’re into November and still have leaves on the trees at all! Every week that the leaves stay is a bonus.

This is about as scary as it gets around here. Weird kitty photo eyes.

Hope it’s a safe Hallowe’en for all the little ghosts and goblins out there!

We were at the gas station yesterday (wow, have gas prices here fallen!! lowest since February) and I couldn’t resist this photo. Love the golden colour of these leaves.

Then I noticed this tree and the little patch of red leaves in amongst the mostly still green leaves really caught my eye.

At the St. Lawrence Market (fabulous market in Toronto), I couldn’t resist snapping a picture of this bouquet.

And this one! Look at the colours — love the richness of them!

Lester looks almost small when he curls up like this to sleep.