Add stitching and combine gently

I am happy you guys enjoyed some of the foodie love I offered yesterday (and to answer a Q, that table linen is 4 yards of gorgeous fabric that I found in NYC last fall... cannot remember the name of the store, but it was a shop in the garment district that is nothing but linen).

I was thinking today about my go-togethers. I have favorite movie genres that I pair with various types of handwork that depend on the focus needed for each.  I should make a chart sometime (it's right there in my head, I just need to write it out). Jeff and I have exhausted almost every single British period piece available in the Netflix instant streaming offerings.  We were so sad to come to the end of all of the Catherine Cookson novel adaptations (where even the low-budget ones are 10x better than most anything on the television).  All the drama.  So entertaining.  The typical British kind.  Wealth.  Poverty. Getting knocked up out of wedlock, etc.  (Why do we relate so well?  Hm.) I get frustrated when I have lots of handwork to do and Jeff wants to watch something with subtitles.  Although, maybe not as frustrated as he does, because he begins reading the movie out loud to me if he notices that my eyes are cast on the fabric and not the screen.  So funny.  He really does love me.  Documentaries are really good for handwork that requires a lot of focus because while its nice to see everything, it is just as good to listen.  Today I've been watching (listening to) Wild China.  Utterly fascinating so far.  I'm finishing up the works that will be featured on the front of my new embroidery patterns.  Anyone who drops by, lives or works in this house will tell you that I pretty much always have something in my hands.  My left arm felt no pain, not even a twitch, at holding a candle through midnight service for 3 hours at Easter because it is so used to holding a hoop up to my face.  It might become permanently bent.

But before it does.... I have a big announcement!  I've been working away to put together a really, really fun needleworks weekend for this fall!  I love Nashville.  So why don't you come here?  I am so excited about sharing it with whoever is able to join me.  And I am loving my new book so far too, so I am beyond excited to celebrate it's publication during this special weekend.  I've put together preliminary information here.  I'll also be sending out an email to everyone on my mailing list today.  I'm letting you know a week in advance of the workshop being available for purchase so that hopefully anyone who is interested will have time to plan and see if it's a possibility.  I can't wait!  I plan to post more info on that store page on Monday that will hopefully answer any of your questions.  Stitching goes really well with friends.

I'll be packing my needles and threads tomorrow to head for a weekend at the Biltmore with my mom and sister.  Just the three of us.  I am hoping they will speak English so I can keep my eyes on my work and not read the subtitles under their heads.

smack.  AM