I Am Not a Slacker!

Honest! I swear; I’m working so hard that you probably can’t even see me as anything more than a blur as I fly past. December is always a busy and stressful month due to holiday preparations at home and end of year pressures at work. Add to that my attempts to move into a new position at work and you get chaos. 🙂

My lists are all that keeps me sane, I think! They are getting longer and longer, but otherwise I would probably forget a lot more than I already am.

I’m driving a poor coworker insane today. Perhaps that is the high point of the day? 😛 I’m documenting a new application that he’s writing and I keep sending him emails when I find little things that are spelled wrong, not working quite right, etc. I know I’ve sent him more than a dozen emails today. That’s what he gets for working at home. 😉 Otherwise, I’d be trotting over to his office every few minutes – better exercise for me!

Anyway, I hope he won’t be terribly sore with me by the time I see him tomorrow. LOL.

Oh, AND… tomorrow morning at 8 AM is my debonding appointment!!! YES!!!!! I’m finally getting my braces off after nearly 18 months. I am SO excited, I can hardly stand it. 😀

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Still Slacking? Still Sick!

Okay, I’m still sick, so I don’t have a lot to post. Missed scrapbooking night last night and was hoping to be able to do some at home, but couldn’t drag myself off of the couch to do so. Had a BAD case of insomnia last night, probably thanks to the Dimetapp I took right before going to bed, so I got back up and stayed up until 5 AM stitching on my dad’s Christmas present.

Just finished stitching and signing the piece a little bit ago, so here’s the scan. Much more to do, of course. For every one item I cross off of my huge list, I’m adding twice as many additional items. ARGH!

Spent a few hours outside today trying to help Terry cut up the huge chunks of poplar tree that came down earlier this week with the high winds. Man, was there a lot of tree to clean up! Finally got the tree person on the phone since they haven’t been returning T’s messages and the answer was that they’re booked until the end of December. *sigh*

Oh, and there’s the whole mess with our school district taxes, the mortgage company and our escrow account. We mailed the tax bill to the mortgage company to be paid out of escrow when it arrived in late July. We got some notices from them about the taxes being due, but disregarded them because we had already mailed it in. Well, we finally get a call from them in late October and – surprise! – they say they never got the bill; hence it won’t be paid by the October 31st deadline, which equals a 10% penalty. Ouch! Okay, so they overnight it on October 29th. We get a final notice tax bill in the mail this week, so we call the mortgage company. They still say they sent it out, but the check never cleared. Call the tax office and they say they never got it. SHEESH! Okay, so at that point we decide this escrow stuff is crap and we’ll just do it ourselves. So, the mortgage company lets us out of the escrow – fine, more work for us, but at least it we know it gets paid. EXCEPT, there’s still the problem with the existing bill that’s due by December 31st or a lien will be placed on our mortgage (cute, eh?). Call the mortgage company back, they put a stop on the check, but say it’ll take up to 60 days for them to get the money back so that they can send it to us. So, what does that mean, boys and girls? That’s right, we have to come up with $4500 out of our pockets to pay the stinking bill (oh yes, and that’s including the 10% penalty from the mortgage company not getting it the first time!) by the end of the month. And we won’t get the reimbursement from the mortgage company until the stop is processed and refunded, which will probably be sometime next year.

!)@#(%&#)$_@!#@(_!!!!!!!

It sucks to be an adult… sometimes.

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The Slacker is Back!

Sorry, out on vacation and now I’ve been sick. Blah! Anyway, I’m back with a vengeance. So much done, but so much left to do before Christmas! Presents are all purchased, but none wrapped yet. The spare bedroom (craft storage) closet has been reorganized, but the room still needs to be cleaned up before company. Frantic stitching continues – nearly completed stitching on my dad’s piece for Christmas, but still working on my sister’s graduation piece. Need to finish (finish, finish – cutting out, sewing on backing fabric, stuffing, adding cording, etc.) a couple of ornaments for small gifts. Just printed all of the photos out last night for a last minute gift idea for my other dad – a small scrapbook of childhood pictures of me and my brother).

So, while the shopping may be done, not all of the presents are! Lots of frames and mats to buy before Christmas. I may have to finally invest in a mat cutter, as the graduation piece for Ginny is a non-standard size.

So much to do and so little time!!!

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Comments Are Gone For Good

Sorry folks, but the comment spammers came back with a vengeance, so the comment feature has been taken away for good. If I feel like it at some point in the future, I will make it available to registered users only.

In the meantime, back to my vacation.

Happy Thanksgiving!

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I am a Stitching Machine!

I’m da bomb! 😀 I started and finished a Christmas gift for an online friend, L.C., this weekend. That’s pretty much a record for me, though the design wasn’t tough. That includes having to rip and restitch several paw prints in the border. I’ve scanned and posted the results of my work. If she’s reading this, hopefully she won’t ruin the surprise by clicking on the link, but she is a notorious brat…

If I’m able to continue at this rate, I’ll have all of my Christmas gifts done with time to spare! At least, I hope so. I’ve even added another one back in that I had given up on being able to stitch in time. That one will probably go to Phoenix with me this week, along with a couple of other small pieces to kill time on the plane.

All of this stitching, plus I expect to finish all of the laundry tonight and I got the dishes cleaned up (except the new stuff we just dirtied) and I even groomed the dog! Woohoo! That’s a pretty productive weekend for waking up with a cold yesterday morning. 😉

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Getting Ready to Scrapbook

Okay, so I’m making up a special scrapbook for Christmas gift, but I won’t elaborate in case the recipient reads my blog. Tonight, I decided to tackle the job of sorting photos and choosing which ones to print for the scrapbook. That was NOT an easy task. I started out with a couple hundred scans and ended up narrowing them down to 43. It took several iterations of choosing and winnowing the selections, but I managed to do it somehow.

The next step will be to crop, retouch and print the photos and start scrapbooking! It’s been added to my to-do list. 🙂

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Forget It, I’m Finished

The winter freebie exchange ornament is officially finished – cut out and all. I’m going to go scan it and post the photo. I’ll link to it in tomorrow’s entry. 🙂

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Still Steaming Along

Yes, the stitching train is still going! I’m nearly done with the Chartswappers freebie exchange gift I’m stitching. That will definitely be done by the weekend. Woohoo! Another one bites the dust. Plus, I mounted a graduation / Christmas gift for my little sister onto Q-snaps and started stitching the border. Plus, I did some stitching on the model I’m working on right now. Plus… nah, just kidding.

And there’s much more to do. Two Christmas gifts arrived today, so I’m feeling good about that. I only have two more people to buy for and it’s just a matter of placing orders, really. I should be done by Thanksgiving, per tradition. Yes, that’s right, done with Christmas shopping by Thanksgiving. You can curse me; it’s okay. 🙂

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It’s Monday… Nothing New

Nope, nothing new to report. We’re about to leave work and maybe stop at Home Depot for plumbing stuff and trim, but we’ll see. I’m tired and have no idea how Terry’s feeling.

I sent out a Chartswappers trade package to a woman in Australia today. Too bad air mail cost more than I had intended; I should have built it into the trade. Whatever. It’s stuff I wasn’t going to stitch, so if someone will use it and I get something I need out of it, that’s what counts.

I’m feeling brave and turned back on the comments capability. We’ll see if it’s abused. If so, off it goes!

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Fruitful Sunday

Okay, so now I have a headache from straining my eyes all day, but I knocked another several to dos off of my list. Replaced by even more, of course. I finished stitching version 2 of the November ornament for the Chartswappers SAL. I then completed the stitching and backstitching on a fingertip towel for a housewarming gift. After that, I pulled a WIP that’s currently on hold off of Q-snaps so that I’ll be able to reuse them and hopefully mount the fabric for my little sister’s Christmas / very belated graduation gift. And then I stitched on the model I’m currently working on. Sorry, can’t show you the scan of that one. 😉

I also scanned in a bunch of photos from my childhood, to be printed and used for a special Christmas surprise for a family member (who I’m not going to name, in case they read this).

Terry did a lot of work this weekend, as well. He did the plumbing rework for the bathtub and shower fixtures yesterday, then mounted the porcelain shelf, mirror and toilet paper holder today. Just need some extra parts for the plumbing and then he’ll be able to install the new bath and shower fixtures. It’s looking good! Once that’s all done, I’ll touch up the paint in a few areas, then we’ll purchase and paint the trim and clearcoat the decorative paint, since it’s susceptible to moisture.

Lots more to do on the stitching front, as well. Need to work on my gift for the Chartswappers winter freebie exchange. And so many other things that it’s too depressing to list. I’ll cross those bridges when I come to them. 🙂

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