Up On the Housetop

Can you believe we are down to the final two days of August? Where has our summer gone? I feel like I was hardly outside due to the heat and humidity this year... And to prove it wasn't only in my head, the Pittsburgh area tied with several other cities as 10th highest in the nation for number of days (61) with temperatures above normal since June. Is your city shown on the slideshow? My sons kept telling me it's always this bad and I kept saying, "No, I never remember a summer this hot and humid!" It's nice to know that old mom is right every now and then!! So, you can see why I've been stitching Christmas ornaments in an attempt to cool down...


My first ornament is what I should have stitched during July for my ornament-a-month goal. I'm sure you all recognize it as a Prairie Schooler, don't you? It's from "Up On the Housetop" Book No. 25 and is stitched on some 32 ct. dark grey mystery linen that I bought on Ebay. I changed the color of the house to this pretty yellow (DMC 676), but the other colors were as charted. I've always had a thing for little yellow houses--they look so cozy and inviting. Do I have a yellow house? No...but maybe some day! I didn't plan this, but look how well the house color matches the trim color. Guess it was just meant to be...



For my August ornament this Prairie Schooler addict chose, what else--another PS design! This one is stitched over one on 28ct. Country French Cafe Mocha linen with the suggested DMC colors. It is just about 3 inches square--the perfect size for an ornament. This design can be found in one of the new PS charts: "And To All A Goodnight" Book No. 167.



Since this is quite a "busy" design, I kept the finishing pretty simple--just backed it with the fabric shown and added the plaid bow and red buttons for the hanger. It didn't even strike me that I was stitching the same basic theme as the previous ornament (Santa with his sled and reindeer) until I was just about done with the second!


The mailman delivered this beautiful Hillside Samplings chart this week as a gift from Melissa at Words and Blooms. Melissa had a special giveaway for some of her already-stitched charts for her regular vistors/commenters (see it pays to comment!!) and I was lucky enough to win this beauty. Thank you so much, Melissa--I am truly looking forward to stitching it and will definitely "pay forward" your kindness when I am done...


Most of you know that I love to bake, but without my sons around (except for Sunday dinners), I bake very little anymore. My middle son kind of teased me about it a while back saying, "Remember when you used to bake cookies, Mom?" Well, if I did bake them as much as I used to I would gain 100 pounds. My three guys were little cookie monsters when they were younger--there was no keeping up with them. So, as a special treat for their Sunday dinner today, I tried a new recipe: Oatmeal Raisin Bars from Everyday Food magazine. I love that magazine because it uses ingredients that you actually have readily available in your kitchens rather than having to hunt down exotic ingredients that you might use once in your lifetime! These were just great--moist and flavorful and you could really substitute any dried fruit for the raisins. Yum!!

I really enjoyed reading all of your comments on my last post about how many "unfinished finishes" you have hiding away at your houses. It was nice to know that I'm not alone! Some of you even had more than my 82 which made me feel much better. At least I've been good about finishing my monthly ornaments this year. And to show you how well I've kept up with their finishing...here they are from January through August:

Thought I would leave you with a collage of the winged beauties that have visited my garden this month. I'm just fascinated by dragonfly wings--that iridescent quality is so lovely...


And once again, thank you so much for each and every comment and email--they mean so much to me and I truly appreciate the time you take in writing me. May your week bring you only good things and I hope my American friends have a relaxing and stitch-filled Labor Day weekend. Bye now...