October 12, 2026 - Floss Organizing

 This is a MUCH needed project and has been a long time coming. In the grand scheme of life, this is not a huge problem but it has been something I've been thinking about and trying to figure out how to "fix" it for quite a while.

When I started cross stitching at the end of 2020, it was hard to get supplies so any time a color of floss came in stock, I would order a couple of skeins. 

I can justify my out of control floss stash . . because I manage to justify all of the crazy things I do but . . hear me out! First, there was not a cross stitch shop anywhere near me. There was one in Tulsa and one in Branson and one near Kansas City. All of those places are at least two hours from me IF there's not at least one 18 wheeler turned over on the interstate, which seems to happen daily! Second, back then if I needed two colors of floss, there was a good chance I'd have to order from two different shops to find one that had it and that meant paying shipping for each skein of floss that cost less than $2.50.  So, if I was going to order floss, I was going to order a LOT of floss and make that shipping cost worthwhile. If you've been around for a while . . you know how I am. It could be worse!

When I started out, I bought loose leaf binder rings. I kept my floss in alphabetical order - separate for the brands - Weeks, Classic Colorworks and Gentle Art. I kept DMC in small plastic boxes according to their numbers.

I did a great job of keeping the floss organized until about 2024. Then I decided I would give up on alphabetizing, mix the Weeks, Classic Colorworks and Gentle Art and keep them organized by color - all the reds together, all the oranges together, etc. I got about through the "L" colors and decided . . nope, don't like that system but I never changed it so A - L was all mixed together by brand and sorted according to color but all the floss I bought after that was put on new rings according to brand and alphabetized. Then a friend who was no longer stitching sent me some of her floss - all alphabetized with the brands mixed together. She had BIG rings and maybe A- F was together and then G - M was on another ring, etc. So, if I was looking for a color, say Chestnut by Weeks Dyeworks . . I would have to look through the A - L ring that my friend sent, the ring I had mixed up in 2004 to find a brown (Chestnut), then I would have to look on the new rings I started after I sorted them by color and, I had a box for each brand where I put floss that needed to go on the ring! 

To further complicate matters (feeling sorry for me yet? <G>), the floss was all stored in the sewing room closet.

Problem #1 with this setup: The closet is dark. The light is in the ceiling but with all the shelves, the light didn't do a lot of good. I had asked Vince about a brighter light and he said it would be the same - the shelves and "stuff" on the shelves blocks the light. 

Problem #2 with this setup: The sewing room doesn't have good lighting. It was meant to be a family room/game room and the light is fine for that. Vince offered to have more lights put in but I didn't want to go to that expense. I don't sew and for the most part, the lighting works fine. If I'm cross stitching in there, I have a magnifying light and that works great.

Problem #3 with this setup: Just outside the closet doors, there sits the long arm that should have been sold 8 or 9 years ago! I can barely walk past the table. We haven't tried to sell it  . . don't get me started on that!  :)

So, if I'm thinking maybe I want a brown that isn't so dark instead of Chestnut, I make my way to the closet, grab a couple of browns, make my way to a room with better light, decide none of those work; go back in there, put those colors back on the right ring, pick a couple more . . and give up and use Chestnut!

I've been thinking and thinking about what to do and I came up with a plan.

There's a little "foyer" type room at the bottom of the stairs in the basement. It's right off the family room where we watch TV, flosstube, I stitch - basically this is the room we hang out in. There's a door off the foyer that goes into the downstairs garage, which is air conditioned/heated and where I do my canning and we have things stored that need to be in a climate controlled area.

When we first moved here, the light in that little foyer was just awful so Vince got a better light and it is the brightest light ever. In fact, the people we bought the house from were over one day and Vince said "Oh, come see the light I put in the basement!" The former owner was joking and covered his eyes because the light was so bright. It's great though because it lights up the stairs at night better than the little lights going up the stairs and, as old folks, we need light going up and down stairs at night. We can turn the bright line off and on from upstairs or downstairs.

So, I thought . . what if I put some kind of hanging system on the wall in that little foyer. No one sees it but us. It can easily be taken down and that small wall repainted if we leave and my plan would not be expensive (nor is it pretty!)

I had the idea to take a board that is about 1" thick and 2" tall, four or five feet long, drill holes all the way through it about every 1-1/2", put a few spacers behind it and put S hooks through the holes and hang my floss there. I explained my plan to Vince and while he wasn't as excited about it as I was, I'm sure he thought . . I might as well do this because she'll probably never shut up about it if I don't.

We talked about it and threw around some other ideas. I took Vince into the sewing room and showed him my current setup. When he saw how I had the floss hanging, he said "What if we just get dowel rods and hang those up on hooks on the foyer wall?" Oh, yes! Much easier and probably less expensive.

This morning we went to Menard's and Home Depot and ended up with most everything we needed. Vince came home and got four dowel rods up on the wall for me.

You can see the stair rail and the door leading to the garage. 

The top row has the Weeks Dye Works floss that I got re-organized last week. It's all now on rings in alphabetical order. The next two dowels will have Classic Colorworks on one and Gentle Art on the other, both of which have to be re-organized alphabetically. The bottom dowel has Colour & Cotton. I was hoping to add Victorian Motto to that row too but there isn't enough room. I don't think my Classic Colorworks or Gentle Art floss will take up the entire dowel rod so, if they don't, I can put some Victorian Motto at the end of each of those rods and I can squish the Colour & Cotton together a bit and make more room and put more Victorian Motto there.

I'm so happy to have this new setup because (1) The lighting is great there; (2) It's easy to get to and I have a spot where I can spread it out and make sure it all works together. If not, I can put it back on the rings and put them away easily. (3) Since I walk by the floss 100 times a day, if I'm thinking . . this Chestnut color is too dark, I can glance at the colors as I'm walking by. I think just seeing it all so many times every day, I will be more aware of the colors I have so when I think a color is too dark, I might be able to go right to a color I think might work.

I can't wait to get all the cotton (except DMC) on there!!

October 11, 2026 - Blackbird Academy Progress

 My project for October is Moonlit Garden and I'm making good progress. Since I took this photo, I've finished the letters at the bottom and have the stars down the right side. All I have left to do are the stars on the left side, fill in the roof, stitch the light bricks in the house and finish the moon. That's still a lot of stitching but I feel like I can finish this by the end of this week.

As soon as I finish this one, I will get back to the September project, Come Into My Garden.

I'm pretty sure it's only going to take four or five more days on this one to get it finished. I've been wanting to get a frame ordered but have held off until the stitching is done. Can't wait to get this one on the wall.

I haven't even thought about what my project will be for November.

October 10, 2026 - Baking Day

 It seems like forever since I've had time to make different types of recipes - two types of bread and cookies. Most of the summer, I was barely keeping up with having one kind of bread available. 

I started with a Marbled Rye. It was the first time I've made this recipe and it was perfect. Such a great dough to work with.

The kitchen was so hot that all the dough was rising way faster than I had planned so things got crazy in the kitchen!  Plus, Vince was planning to watch the Georgia Tech/Duke game. I always ask Vince the night before if we have games to plan meals around so I can plan what time we eat. Last I knew, the game was at 6:30. At some point during my baking frenzy, Vince told me the Tech game had been moved up to 2:30. Here's what Vince thinks he communicated to me: Because the game time got changed, we need to eat at 1:30. Here's what I heard: They moved the Tech game from 6:30 to 2:30 because of the weather. Here's what I thought: Oh, good, he'll be downstairs watching football and I can turn my music up loud!  

I never thought about having dinner on the table by 1:30 . . my brain was concentrating on bread and rolls and cookies. Then about 1, he said "Are we still going to eat by 1:30?" Huh? Who said anything about eating at 1:30?  We were having a broccoli and chicken casserole. Chicken hadn't even been cut up yet but I got busy. Once it was in the oven, it only had to bake (at 450) for 20 minutes because the chicken got browned quickly in a skillet on top of the stove.

I had the wall oven, which is what I mostly use, preheating to 350 to bake the bread so I switched it to 450 for the casserole. I store many of my cast iron pots in the regular oven so I had to take all those out, get it preheated to 350 for the bread.  

The casserole was cooked, I had leftover homemade pasta so I heated that up . . and that was dinner. 

The rye bread was baked, then the rolls/hamburger buns went into the regular oven. It was a bit chaotic for a while but it all worked out. We ended up eating about 2:15 so Vince probably missed a few plays.

All that to say that I had hoped to have the rolls ready for dinner but we ended up cutting into the hot rye loaf for our bread. It was past ready to be baked and the rolls weren't quite ready.

I used Grains in Small Places Sweet Dinner Rolls recipe for the rolls I made.  I made 7 rolls and 3 hamburger buns. We're having grilled pork burgers tomorrow.

Next thing to bake was Grains in Small Places (can you see that I love her recipes?) Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies.

I don't like chocolate, and I didn't have any chocolate chips in the house so I used white chocolate chips. I also added chopped walnuts.  I think next time I make them, I'll leave out the chips completely. They are really good cookies!

It's after 5 now; Georgia Tech game is still on. I'm headed outside to see if there's anything left in the garden I can salvage and maybe plant some arugula and get one bed of garlic planted.

October 10, 2026 - Weather

 If you thought I was finished complaining about the miserable heat here . . nope! Not yet.

We've been back in the 90's for the past week and it continues mostly through this week. I think Sunday - Wednesday, we may set records every day. There's a huge difference between 91 and 114, which is what we had several days in August so I'm not complaining . . at least not was much as I was. And, the evenings cool off nicely. When I get up in the morning and go out with the dogs, it's so nice not to open the door and feel like I just opened the oven door, even though it's still not even daylight yet.

But . . I have hope!

A low of 37 in the forecast probably means 31 or 32 at our house. I'm optimistic enough that I brought our jackets downstairs today so we won't be shivering when we go out with the dogs.

I'm ready for chili and soup and gumbo weather!

October 9, 2026 - Prayers For All Affected By This Hurricane

 First off, let me say I'm praying for all in the path of the hurricane. My heart hurts for you all. It's stressful even if you don't take a direct hit - lots of anxiety waiting to see where it will hit and having friends and families who will suffer, even if you don't. I lived near the coast in Louisiana from the time I was 5 until Vince and I married in 1997. As a kid, a hurricane warning and evacuation order  meant an extra trip to grandma's. They lived two hours north of us and even though they could get winds and rain, it was mostly safer there. Then when I became an adult and especially a home owner, I wished it was as simple as packing a bag and going to grandma's house. In all the years of living there, we never had a direct hit or serious hurricane damage but that area has had several very damaging storms in the past decade or so. My uncle still lives there, as well as many friends. 

Even though Louisiana, at least not southwest Louisiana where I am from, should be safe, I do feel for all of those in harm's way and pray you will all be safe and not suffer damages and if you do, getting things put back together won't be too stressful.

I talked to Chad today and they are not headed to the affected area. I've seen pictures and it looks like there are lots of utility works headed to the area; many already as close as they can safely get. Please pray for those folks too, as well as their families left behind.

You may remember that several years back, Chad had gone to New York (Long Island I think) to help there. They were there for weeks - maybe a month or more. They started back and on the way home, a derecho hit . . Iowa maybe. They got re-routed back to that area and were there quite a while. Then when they got home, he was home one night and was sent to Louisiana when Hurricane Laura hit there. I think Chad spent one night at home in 3 or 4 months. I'm always happy when he goes to help but I'm happy when he's home.

October 4, 2026 - A Found Project

 I'm going through each bin of charts to come up with the charts I want for my roulette project. There was a system to the way I filled those bins - a system that worked well for a while but, as with most everything around here, it's all now out of control. Some bins may have kits; some may have started projects; some may just have charts but most have a combination of everything.

Yesterday while going through a bin, I came across Elle Brode des Lettres Carmin. 

Not long after I started cross stitching in 2020, I came across The Gift of Stitching collection which was available to purchase - either as a PDF to download or as a CD. The internet tells me that The Gift of Stitching was an online stitching magazine that was published from 2006 - 2012. I purchased the PDF and that's where I found Elle Brode des Lettres Carmin. It was a six part series. Of course, I started it and didn't get very far. Here's what I have done.

Not very far, huh??

I do plan to work on this. I thought about stitching on it one day per week or making got my Sunday stitch but, for now, I don't have any empty frames so I can't do anything on it until I have a frame.

One change I'm going to make - a bit below halfway, there's some stitching with a silk ribbon laced through it. I did order the silk ribbon but I think I'm going to leave that band out. I'm not much into the decorations so I would like it better without the ribbon.

Some day, maybe I'll get this finished. It isn't hard - there are two colors - a deep red and a brighter red. I'm using Vikki Clayton silkse I will stick with this and get it done.

October 3, 2026 - Two More Projects for the Roulette Box

 Two more bags are packed and in the roulette box. It may be months (or days) before I pull something out of the box to start working on. I have to be up to date with the Blackbird Academy projects (I am not finished with September's project) and I have to have at least one empty scroll frames (I do not!)

Here are the projects I added to bags today:

The first one is Little Deeds Sampler by Plum Street. It was already kitted with floss and linen but the linen is the old Weeks (not Zwiegart) and I don't really like it so I changed it to a 40 count natural tea bag by Graham Cracker Linens. 

Here's the point where I can do a little planning. The stitched area should be 6-1/2" x 7-7/8". I'm just going to call it 6-1/2" x 8". If I were to leave 3/4" on each side, the frame would need to be 8 x 9-1/2" . . which would likely mean buying a custom Frame. If I add 9 more stitches to the side borders, that would make it come out the perfect size for an 8 x 10 frame and I have LOTS of those so I've made a note to add a few extra rows between some of the places that look a little crowded and that will save $$ on the frame!

The second piece that was added to the roulette box is 

The second one that was added is The Light of Winter by Brenda Gervais. This is one I got as a kit and this is probably the final kit I will ever buy. First, I have all the linen I will ever need . . probably floss too. Second, I understand the shops get LOTS of orders and cutting linen takes time but . . some of what I got in the last few kits I got was totally not usable. On 40 count, which was included in the kit, this would be 8-3/4 x 8-3/4". If I leave .75" on all sides, it would be 10-1/4 x 10-1/4". I would like to have at least an inch to wrap around to do the lacing so that means I would need at least 12-1/4" square linen. The piece that came with the kit was not cut straight and by the time I pulled a thread to make sure it was straight and to be sure I have enough linen, my piece is 12" x 12-/14". I can do it but if I had been using linen I purchased, I would not have gone with less than 13" x 13". Most anyone will suggest starting with at least three extra inches on each side. I'm happy with two extra inches but I'm not happy with shops that cut it too close. So . . no more kits for me.

So, I pulled two extra piece of linen. The piece that came with the kit is the one to the right of the chart. The linen on the bottom left is Colour & Cotton's Golden Oak. The piece on the bottom right is Cedar River Linen's Coffee Stain. I think either of those pieces will be fine so all three linens are in the bag for this project.

Both of these have now been setup in Markup R-XP so I'm ready to go . . when the right time comes!

Four projects in the roulette box!!