I was cleaning the living room earlier today and I finally piled up all the designs I bought from eBay during December... the pile was about 30 centimeters high (and as it consists of booklets and leaflets you can imagine how many patterns there are...) and it doesn't include those Wentzler's I bought for Linda and few frog booklets I sent to US.

I need to list them, which doesn't sound like a very enjoyable task, and then I need to find a place for them from my craft shelf... which will be yet another achievement, but the main thing is: loads of beautiful stash and it is all mine!

Never say "never"

I have proved this true once again: you remember how much I hate vacuum cleaners?

You do? Great.

What if I tell you that I have one nowadays?

While I was still looking for a job I was watching Home Shopping Network one day and saw one product which raised my interest for three reasons: it doesn't have dust bag (if that is the word) so no need to run in stores to look for replacements (you know how much fun that is...), it has a HEPA filter and it filters the "sucktion product" through water which should catch most dust particles on their way (in a regular hoover smallest parts go through the whole system and it's bad for an asthmatic person).
Well, after thinking of it for few days I got it.

As surprised as I am it actually is a pleasant product to use (no dust smell when hoovering and no coughing), it works like a charm and it reveals amazing things about the lifeform called "cat hair".
You can sweep the floor twice and still you have two egg-sized furballs in the water container when you have hoovered living room floor.

I am afraid that this thing may make me clean more often (well, Mr. Wonderful has that affect too: he is NEAT)...

Still on the face of the Earth

It has been rather hectic week and I am surprised that I have actually found time to stitch.

Anyway, I got some belated birthday goodies in mail Wednesday: Dusty sent me a birthday card and some yummy Splendour silks as part of Birthday Thread Exchange.

They feel absolutely divine so I hope some project yells for them soon. ^^

Head issues

Surprisingly I am still having loads of energy even I have lowered my sertraline dose, but that is only a good thing: I have painted the vestibule (finally!) and reorganized the cleaning cabinet during the weekend and still found time to write emails, idle and stitch! o.O (Though now it's time to slouch a bit and make some coffee... *yawn*)

Plans

I have played with one thought regarding my home for few days.
As I seem to spend most of my time in one room, and seem to prefer to sleep in that same room (I have lately slept on the living room floor (I like hard surfaces, I may have mentioned)), and it's not good for an asthmatic to have bookshelves in their sleeping quarters (because books gather dust (I haven't noticed such a thing, only the shelves themselves gather dust in this house)).

Now, the plan is that I move out from the bedroom and make it my library/ craft room/ office which would mean that I move the big bookshelf, my sewing table and my bureau to the bedroom and my futon to living room.
The benefits of this setting would be more room, less dust and easier cleaning in living quarters. In addition to that I am able to sleep longer than 5 am during summer months - the living room windows are facing west, unlike the bedroom window which heads to east, which means that my bedroom is hot as hell during summer months.

I still need to figure out what I do with the desktop or do I simply leave it in the living room even it's fans are not that silent - though its humming is just background noise.

1780

You know how it goes... there is a finishing method you have wanted to try for a while and then someone decides to organize an exchange for that spesific finish...
This means that I have now stitched one humbug on light fabric (I love how it came out) and am still to stitch another one, with the same design and same floss, on dark fabric.
And of course, being me, I have designed the design I use (actually I have also dyed one of the fabrics I use), and, just to make it fun, I have designed additional pieces while stitching the first one and it is becoming a series...

I see the series stitched with certain Crescent Colours' silk on flax Newcastle - just when I had swore to myself to stay away from flax linen for a while.
It's good to have my creativity back, but I'd rather transfer some of the energy to be used in the tasks of life, at least for a while as I am seriously lacking mental energy...

Though, I have surprised myself by doing some serious spring cleaning (it doesn't look like it yet as I have also reorganized my living room, again) and not suffering from it too badly - I still can't stand long time physical activities without straining myself somewhat, but I am doing way better than I was last year about this time (last year this time I couldn't lift one 20 kg pellet sack (hardware stores sell wooden pellet used for heating and grocery stores sell the same wooden pellet as kitty litter... guess which one is WAY cheaper? *grin*) and nowadays I have no problems to lift them up while cleaning the litter box).
Admittedly my lungs sound worse under physical stress than they did last year this time, but I think it may be because my lungs are better now. (As odd as it sounds one of the symptoms of severe asthma can be that you can't wheeze because your airways are so obstructed.)

If I just have enough energy tomorrow I may actually be able to clean the place up. Then there's only left reorganizing the bedroom, washing windows and pile of carpets - maybe I can finally use my carpets now that Masa is castrated.

And... as I can't show you my happy dance piece I will leave you with a picture from last summer:

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I've officially lost my mind (again). I've been... *gasp* cleaning and rearranging my furniture. (Only things left to do are rearranging living room's bookshelf, computer table and clean the bedroom.)

But... this place looks good. In addition to that it's idling, cat and stitching friendly - and spacious (small miracle in itself noticing how much stuff I own).

      

Masters approve too.

Silkweaver and stitching

I had to! It was so cheap! Ordered three pieces of fabric from Odds and Ends, and paid whopping $10.5 (incl. postages), but they did surprise me... shipping notice came about an hour(!) after I placed the order.

No updates on stitchy front. Still having traces of that darned migraine... have placed few stitches on one secret project (which I should finish asap, preferably in last month *g*) though.

But, how about some floss? My misc. box ended up being like this:

Ah, the colours!

(And I think I may have a slight crush on someone... oops.)

Mental exhibitionism.

Well, you shouldn't provoke lunatic... So, I 'had' to try Yahoo's 360° and added my blog feeds to there...

Then I found Feedburner while fighting with too easy feed addings:

That is what followed from it...

Crazy? Maybe, who knows?

Household activities.

It seems that laundry is only thing in my done list today, nothing else will be done today as I haven't been eating today and I'm tired.
Yes, I should eat but what to do if you're not hungry or you don't feel like eating? I haven't even made any coffee today.

Though I really should try to do that barley based pizza... been planning trying it for some days already.

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