Progress and Christmas Wishes (and More)

Hi folks. I'm trying something new with my HTML, so I hope it works. I hope you're all having a lovely holiday. I'm actually in the mood, finally. I got a great Christmas pressie today with a Bengals win over Pittsburgh, ensuring us a spot in the playoffs. (Whoo hoo, I was too excited by that.) I also got another nice gift, on the phone. I was watching, and listening to, videos on youtube.com yesterday. I was looking at Christmas carols, and on the list at right, I saw… The Nutcracker. It's a BBC release. I was so excited by that, I had to watch it. I like ballet all right, and this one is one I have personal experience with. My godmother, Aunt Jackie, took me several times when I was a little girl. I was fascinated by it, of course. I was thinking of her with the ballet, and so I decided I needed to give her a call, so I did. I called today to see if it was the right Jackie, and it was. I got to talk to her for almost fifty minutes. We played catch up. She caught me up on what was going on with her, and I caught her up with my family. It was nice. I told her mom and I will have to take her out to lunch. It would be nice to catch up with her in person, ya know? It was nice to talk to her though. She's doing pretty well, and so I'm happy to hear that. Still independent, and that's a good thing! I told her mom would call to make arrangements with her. And I've been stitching and chatting and playing a lot these past few days, too. I got quite a bit done on Shore Patrol. (Since I'm not using the huge rose as a Christmas ornie, I'll never get them done in time. Of course, there's always next year. So I'm back to working on my regular schedule. It's Beach Romance Sunday, Time To Go on Tuesday, ornie Wednesday, Noah's Sub Thursday, and rotation Monday, Friday, and Saturday.) I started working on them as of Thursday of this week. I really, REALLY enjoyed having different things to stitch on again. It was great.

The first piccy I'll show you is Shore Patrol (JCA Creations). It's coming along well. I got quite a bit done on the fox, and he's almost finished except for a few fill ins. I also got lots of the dark gray done in between the two foxes. (I did play quite a bit, though. We just had a new expansion pack come out, and it had two new character choices in them. Of course, I started one of each right away. I now have a thirty seven Half Bagi (the Bagi Warrior is a big, touch character that utilizes his strength. He's a male, so the Half Bagi is his female counterpart) and a twelve Black Wizard (the Black Wizard is the male character to the Incar Magician. She uses a wand or staff, and he uses an orb). The Half Bagi is much more fun to me at the current moment. I can't wait for the other characters to be released. We still need a male Segita Hunter (bow, crossbow, or dagger character), and male Aloken (spear character), and a female Azure Knight (male character using great sword, great axe, great mace, or sword and shield). I love new characters though, hence the starting one of each right away.) Anyways, piccys. That's where I was going with this, lol. As you can see, I did get quite a bit done on Shore Patrol for only having had two days on it. I think it's looking great, and I'm so glad my mojo came back with this piece. Moving on from the fox for a short time helped, I think. So now I'll be working on my next rotation piece, Dad's Memorial. (Fitting, I think, for the week of Christmas since he died during the Christmas week two years ago.) Hopefully, I'll get some decent progress. I have trouble with that with this piece, because I can't see through the towels like I can see through the evenweave I usually use.

And then I'll show pics of the almost ornie (which I've decided to frame) that I've been working on on Wed. It was gonna be my sister's ornie, until I figured out how big it's gonna be. (Almost seven inches in diameter. It was supposed to be stitched over one, oops.) I really love the way this is looking. The confetti is a pain, but it looks fabulous, I think. I've started the leaves to the left now, and they're moving right along. I tried to do all the reds first, but found the confetti was making me so slow, I was chomping at the bit to do more than a few stitches at a time. So I do several colors of three stitches at a time, or whatever it happens to be, then I do a color of green which is a lot of stitches at a time. It keeps me going at a fairly good clip and I'm grateful that it's not all confetti. I may, I haven't decided yet, give this to Julie for Christmas next year. She has room to hang it, and red is her fave color. But I don't know if I want to keep it or not, so I'll be making that decision when it gets done. I'd like to frame it round, but I don't know if my framer can do that. I may take it out to Keepsakes, as they have a whole room devoted to framing, and lots more options than Hobby Lobby has. So I have that thought firmly in the back of my mind while working on it.

Next up is Noah's Sub (Stoney Creek). I really enjoyed working on this piece this week. It was the first thing I had worked on besides ornies in a long time. And I got quite a bit done on it. I'm getting closer and closer to a first page finish on it. And I'm excited about that. I love the colors in the sky. I worked with purple, then blue, then purple, then pink. (The middle purple and blue were only a few half stitches of each, so I didn't really get THAT much done on it.) It's looking good though. And I do feel like I made good progress. It was so nice to work on something not a rose, lol. Gave me a great lift, and that felt good. I did have to frog a few stitches, but not many. Maybe between ten and twenty? It was just a little frog, lol. I wasn't sure I liked the color I was using though. Compared to the other blues and purples, this one looks brownish to me. But I've decided it blends in just right. (It doesn't look as brownish in the piccy as it does in real life, I don't believe.)

And my last project to show is Beach Romance (Janlynn). I got some good work in on it today, while watching the football game. It's nice to have lots of progress to show. I put in parts of his left leg. (LOL, it's his left leg which is on the right of the project cause he's facing the camera view. It sounds funny to say his left when it's on his right.) He's coming along nicely. I will work on some more sand when I finish this leg, as there's still lots of sand to go. I'm glad to work on it again, as I know Amy is anxious for updates. I still love the color of the fabby I'm using. It's such a pretty color! It will show off the words beautifully, and I think it will look great all finished on that particular color.

And last but not least, I'm gonna need to learn a new HTML skill for this last paragraph. I finally (last week, a week after Feast of Carols was over) got the link to the audio files from our November UC Choruses concert. I'm gonna try to upload a few of them here, so y'all can have a listen. I really think we sounded great, except there was a small hiccup in the key change of Vindo. It's not bad, but it's not great. (It's hard to do a key change when you're a capella, cause there's nothing to follow. You just have to nail it in midair, so to speak. (When I say midair, I mean with nothing to support it.)) Anyways, here are the files. Okay, maybe not. The darned video files don't want to embed. And since I've never done it before, I don't know what I'm doing wrong. But after five tries, all of the failures, I give up, lol. I'll link you instead.
O Pastorelli Adio
Out of the Morning
Vindo
Those are the three songs we did alone. Then the men did a song, that I love, and I uploaded that for you as well.
Gaudete
And here is the combined piece. It's Beethoven's Opus 80, and be warned, there is a lot of music to be had before you get to the choral part. The orchestra and piano play for almost fifteen minutes before the chorus sings. So if you don't like classical music, give this one a skip. Otherwise, it's a beautiful piece. Okay, never mind the combined piece. Youtube.com says the video is too long, which is stupid. I just watched an hour and forty seven minute video of The Nutcracker, and this is only twenty minutes long. Stupid website. Anyways, I had to add a piccy of me (and of the men) to make them video so I could upload them to youtube.com so that I could embed them here. Just ignore the pics, lol. The music is beautiful. My fave is Gaudete, then Vindo, then O Pastorelli Adio, then Out of the Morning is last on my list of what I like to listen to. I hope you enjoyed them (or will enjoy them). Also, I really hope all my blogger friends have a wonderful Christmas, and a happy and profitable year for 2013. At this time, I'd also like to say another thank you to all my friends (blogger, messenger, phone, in person) and family who were so supportive of my dream of going back to school. I don't really consider it work yet, as I've enjoyed the learning way too much to call it work. Hopefully, this next semester will be the same. But your comments, your love and hugs, all of your prayers, they mean the world to me. So now, so close to the end of the year, let me tell you thank you, from the bottom of my heart. The support I have means everything to me. I thank you for sharing of your lives with me, and for leaving me all the comments you do. Here's to a great year next year, for ALL of us!!!Oh, and greetings and rubs and Merry Christmas from the ever lovely Yes Dear too. She's mad cause I didn't put up a tree, lol. (She likes (no, likes is not a strong enough word) adores playing with the ornies she knocks off the tree.)