The Dresser and the Tapestry

The story of the dresser and the tapestry begins in the mid-90s in Mississauga. Our friend Dave gave us a dresser from his house. He had inherited the house and its contents from his mother, his father passed away in (I think) the 70s. When Dave decided that the house was too much for him and was selling to move to a condo he called me over and gave the dresser to me.

Click on any of the images to see larger.

Inside one of the drawers there was a paper Eatons bag. Inside the bag was a long narrow needlepoint tapestry with a few other items.

Dave's father worked at Eatons all of his working life. It was over 50 years that he was there. I remember seeing the 1/2 century club certificate that was awarded to him.

I remember Dave telling me that his father did needlepoints. He had made all the seats of the chairs for his dining room suite. They were very beautiful. Dave told me that he was working on this needlepoint when he died so it's still a WIP.

Well, if I want to finish it, at least I have all the stuff I need! Check out what was in the bag. There's the tapestry with treaded needle and two extra skeins of the tapestry wool.

Check this out! The original product tag from the tapestry with its original price sticker! I love old stuff! I love Canadian stuff (Eatons) but it cracks me up that even back in the early 70s this item was made in China! And it wasn't a cheap item. $13.99 was a good chunk of change back then .

The two birds are worked using Petit-point which is very fine needlepoint that yields a much finer image than the larger needlepoint areas. Amazing work eh?! I really should finish the row that was being worked and then take this to a professional to frame.

These three pictures show the details of the tapestry.

























Yeah, I know...I have a really old ironing board but I LOVE it! My step-mother bought it around 1971 at a Rummage Sale held by the Brownies for a whomping 50 cents! My dad did the "repair" on the leg where it was broken. He wrapped a bunch of masking tape around it and I can remember my step-mother going on and on to him about how it wouldn't hold and such...hahaha. More than 4 decades later I'm still using this ironing board and the tape is still perfectly in tact. Way to go daddy!

Winter's Here!

Swampy Bush
Originally uploaded by Beaker's Stained Glassworks

We had a beautiful Indian Summer this year so we really can't complain. We are starting to get proper winter weather now. This picture was from the other morning. I was heading home after having morning coffee with my town buddies and where Southgate Road 71 ends and 4th Line SW Melancthon begins there's this swampy bit. Deer cross here ALL the time. Even I clipped one with the VW. He didn't even slow down to look at me. I'm sure I only gave it a sore bum for a few days.


I got all the wood stacked against the house. After I had piled a bunch of it I stopped so Rusty could build some kind of structure around it. Well, he built a structure alright! It's better than the addition on our house...lol. Well, not really but it's close! He put up a plywood roof and sides and then shingled the top to match the house. On the open side, he has two big green tarps. Let's see how that goes, There might be some type of better side next year.

I'm finding it colder than I ever have before. I'm sure it's due to the weight loss. Just gives me a reason to knit more warm things!

I'm going on a weekend women's retreat to a place in Bracebridge. It's normally used for quilters but they rent it out occasionally to knitters. I believe there are 11 of us total going from the shop. I'm really looking forward to it. I'm sure I'll get out and about while I'm there, I intend on taking my snowshoes and camera.

I've been enjoying getting in touch with old friends via Facebook. It's really an incredible thing. I'm lucky because there really isn't anyone that I really don't want to hear from. I don't hold grudges against people. I've been chatting with a friend from back in the Meadowvale days. Laurie and I have been friends for a long time but we drifted apart for a number of reasons about the time her son was born. Well, almost 16 years have passed and Voila! There she is on Facebook!! It's been a blast chatting and catching up and hope to see her again soon. We've got to get the scanner out and scan a crapload of pictures so we can share them all. Sounds like a fun thing to do on a stormy winter day near a warm fire (and maybe a bottle of White Zinfandel.)

Today we're in a storm warning although I see blue sky and white clouds out there right now but from what they're predicting...uhoh. 30-50 cm of snow over the next 2 days?? Wow, that's a lot of snow. Even for here! My big weather vanes are telling me it's gonna snow too. The windmills are facing Barrie (North-East) and when they do, we get snow. Let's see if it holds true today because as I said, the sky is blue with white puffy clouds.

Well, back to the housework, laundry, ironing, vacuuming, you know...normal stuff...lol. My guys didn't come home last night because of the weather so I have food for tonight so I don't even have to leave here today at all! YAY.

:o)

Global warming??

Right now I'm not sure you could convince me about global warming...lol.

It's cold enough here to require a fire almost every day now. Sheesh, not sure my 3 bush cords is gonna last the winter! I like to hold off until the end of October before I start burning fire wood.

I was to a wedding in Collingwood yesterday. It was a lovely ceremony of James and Meegan, new friends from town. They were married outside so weather was a factor. It was quite overcast, windy and cold yesterday but just before the ceremony was about to begin, there was a break in the clouds and the sun even showed up for a while. It was very beautiful but still a tad chilly. The altar where the ceremony took place was only a few feet from Georgian Bay! Just at the end of the ceremony, two Trumpeter Swans landed on the bay behind the altar!! Holy crap, I asked them how much they had to pay for that!! hahahah.

Unfortunately my hubby was still sick with the flu/cold so I went stag. He would have been my DD so I had to be a good girl and keep it to two beers. Those who know me should be proud of me! I stuck to my guns, and had only the two.

Today I decided it's time to start planning the lamps for the house. I want to make one that will hang above the love seat in the living room and another one for a wonderful glass lamp that a friend (Jimmy-bob) gave me. It has a large round clear yellow glass base on it so I'd like to make a shade that would match.

Rusty is outside fixing my old truck. The solenoid went in it last week. Of course this happened when I was in town WITH one of my dogs. It would turn over but the started wouldn't catch. I called the tow truck guy I know and then went to the bank machine to get some cash to pay him. When I got back to the truck (remember now, I cranked it over for about 20 minutes) I thought I'd try..."One last time" Well, lo and behold ~ it started! I quickly called the tow guy back and canceled the truck. I guess it's a good thing that we replaced the battery in the truck last year. I'm concerned that now it's gonna start nickel and diming me now. The old F150 has very few clicks on it (123K) but it's getting a little long in the tooth. It's now 18 years old! I hope it makes it through another winter. Even though it's 2WD, I just toss in 3-400 lbs of sand/gravel in bags into the box strategically placed over the rear axle and it just plows through everything! It's a great old truck even though it has a crappy, easily misaligned front end.

Well, I guess I better get into the pattern books and check out what I can make for a hanging lamp. It's so dark on the love seat that it makes it hard to knit at night and that's where I like to sit and there's no room for a side table there really.

Have a great day, keep warm!
:o)

Um, yup...I'm still alive.

Wow, been a long time since I blogged. I've got blogstipation.

Been busy lately.

My oldest lad, Mike and I went on a wee road trip to visit a friend near North Bay. We had a great time. I got to properly meet my friend Loony and her family. Mike went fishing from the shore of Callander Bay. He caught a 10 pound Northern Pike! Wowee...that's a biggie.

Here's a pic of the fish:

Once back here, the work began.

First I got a commission to do a stained glass corner piece. It's been a while since I made a 120 piece item. My hands got a little sore! I love the piece he selected and the glasses we used just made the piece. Here's a picture of the completed Grapevine Corner piece:



In addition to stained glass, I have many knitting projects on the go and I'm also the webmaster for my local yarn store. I've been updating their website and hope to be publishing a large group of changes early next week. Stay tuned for the new Woollys Yarns Website.

This weekend is busy too. Tomorrow we have a wedding to attend in Collingwood. I need to get to Orangeville in the morning to weigh-in and then stop by the yarn store to pick up a ball of yarn to finish the socks I'm making for Loony's hubby. It's a great yarn that I'm using on these socks, looks wonderful worked up and feels really warm. My youngest son saw the one sock that's already made and asked who it was for...hahaha. "Hint, hint." he said to me!

Here's a picture of the first sock completed. I'm at the heel flap on the second one.



I'll try to be a good blogger and blog more often. It's one of those things that is on the To Do list but keeps getting bumped to the next day's list.

Have a nice weekend!!
B :o)

The Bad News Bees

OMG, OMG, OMG...and I didn't get a picture of it.

I was sitting at the table in the kitchen reading my email and drinking a cup of tea and I heard a strange sound. I thought to myself, "What the heck is coming up the driveway now?" Thinking it was some type of farm equipment or tractor or something. I looked up at that point and looked out the window. To my horror it was a massive swarm of bees all flying madly around like they were really super pissed at something!! My first thought is KILLER BEES on a rampage. I SCREAMED for Buddy as he was just previously outside sound asleep on the deck. I ran from one end of the house to the other making sure all openings were closed off so they couldn't come in the house.

Still I don't have Buddy, he's nowhere to be seen and of course with my morbid imagination, he's dead on the ground after being horribly stung by bees. The bees, still flying around MADLY, went past the side entrance and then headed around the corner of the house. You could easily hear the mad buzzing through all the closed windows. The other three dogs who were previously sleeping in various locations around the house are all freaking out and barking. Partially due to the bees and partially due to me freaking out and screaming for Buddy who still hasn't shown up.

I ran back to the front door and very carefully opened it and looked for the mad swarm. I didn't see it on this side of the house so I yelled again for Buddy. This time he comes around the corner and runs into the house. His fur was all standing up on his back so I guess they freaked him out too and he headed for the hills until they passed the house.

Now there is no sign of them. I don't hear them. I hope to hell they don't come back!

Hmm, on a side note, I wonder if I should be reporting this to someone. MNR or whoever. What are your thoughts on this? Should I contact the Ministry and report a huge swarm of rogue bees? I fear that if they approached someone, they wouldn't hesitate to sting. They were super pissed.

3/4 of an hour has passed since this incident (which only lasted a couple of minutes, maybe less) and my heart is still beating hard and my hands are all shaky! Freakin' bees.

After 3 days of cutting

After 3 days of cutting
Originally uploaded by Beaker's Stained Glassworks

Well, it's finally done! Yay, the lawn is cut...lol. Doesn't take much to make me happy eh?

Good thing I got it done yesterday, currently we are experiencing some pretty intense thunderstorms.

There was so much grass that I don't think it's possible for my tractor to mulch the cuttings back into the lawn. I may need to rent a power sweeper or something. I just can't imagine trying to rake 3 acres by hand.

Well I guess it's a good day for inside stuff. It's too humid to wash floors but I still have enough stuff to keep me out of trouble for the day :-)

Tonight is our Fingers & Toes class at Woollys Yarns in Shelburne. I think we're learning toe up socks tonight...not sure. I will blog and post pictures of what we're doing later. I've been trying to finish up the other Feather & Fan sock made with hemp yarn. I'm at the heel flap on it so there's not that much left to do.

Well, I've been into town for my coffee and breakfast. My dogs are all sleeping in various locations around my house staying away from the thunder. I've checked my mail both electronic and the stuff in that box at the end of the driveway, posted some pics, now it's time to get some housework done...lol.

The thunder sounds far away now and it just got a whole lot brighter outside so maybe this will clear off and I can hang my laundry on the line rather than using the dryer.

l8r
:o)

Revenge of the Lawn

Long time, no blog. I'm a bad blogger person...bad bad bad. LOL. It's funny really. When I'm sitting on the lawn tractor for hours on end, I compose these awesome, articulate blog posts in my head. When I sit down in front of the computer to type them up, the only thing that comes to mind is "duuuuuhhhhh."

The summer so far? Rainy, thunderstormy, weird weather. We had so many thunderstorms in a row that the river that runs across the lawn in the spring was back with a vengeance! At the tail end of these thunderstormy days, I got some type of flu. I was down for the count for 5 days. It was horrible. I feel back to normal for the most part now, just get a little light headed from time to time still.

Well, all this rain has made for a very lush lawn indeed! Holy crap! I tried to cut with the secondary tractor as my Craftsmom was still down. We got the part in the mail to fix the blade assembly and Rusty put it back together for me. I got into the thick part where the river runs across the lawn and the cutters got stuck and I had much burning belt. The cutters wouldn't dis-engage so I ended up damaging the drive belt. It was a really old belt to begin with and needed to be replaced anyway so off Rusty goes to town to get another belt. I head back into the house as the little red tractor will not even go through this thick lawn. He comes back and puts on the new drive belt. After he puts the new belt on, he tries to start the tractor. Nope! The starter motor fried....lol..the Gods don't want me to cut my lawn!

Off on the road again, this time to a friend who does small engine repair to see if he has a starter motor for my wee Craftsmom tractor. Yup, sure enough...Chris has the part we need and back he comes home.

So after all this running around, I have my Craftsmom tractor back up and running. It's like a little bush hog on wheels, you can cut almost anything with it. I've finished the first cut and am about 25% of the way on the second cut.

I think I'm done for today though. My ears are ringing and I'm a wee bit sun burned. According to the weather network, it should be nice for at least the first part of tomorrow. I should be able to finish the rest of the lawn then.

Last week we had a nice unexpected visit from my brother and his family. They came on July 1st after he got off work. They live in Windsor which is a good 4½ hours away so the sun had just finished setting when they got here. We had a small fireworks display for Canada Day.

The next day they headed out to Inglis Falls for a day trip, I stayed back on the farm to get a few things done. The next day we went on a wee road trip. First to Markdale in the morning to have breakfast at Sidekicks Cafe. They make awesome food! If you're near Markdale, Ontario, and it's between the hours of 6 am and 2 pm, you should drop in and try something! We went from there to Meaford via some back road. Along the way we stopped to take pictures of Canola fields and Georgian Bay. We went along Highway 26 (I think) from Meaford to Collingwood where we attended our favourite store on the main drag, Altered Native. Oh yeah, we stopped at WalFart too...lol. We then headed back to the farm. Unfortunately my bro had to work the next morning at 7 am so they had to head back to Windsor around 7 pm. :-( Too short a trip.

It's so quiet here right now. Rusty and one son are in the shed fixing something (imagine that!), youngest son gone out with friends, oldest son not home this weekend. All the dogs are strewn about the floor in here sound asleep except Buddy who is on the deck just outside the door, also asleep.

There's a nice breeze coming in through the open windows and it smells so fresh and clean. I love living here! I can't imagine living anywhere else.

I promise to try and blog more frequently. Even if it's just a few words about what I'm working on.

:o)