Stitching from Stash and Pin Cushion SAL and other stuff

Hello all (I like to pretend that there are more than three people on the planet reading my blog), hope you are all surviving the coming of spring. For those of you that are dealing with flooding and those that are still seeing snow, my prayers are for your safety and strength to see you through this.

As always, I will start with my stitching stuff and leave the boring journaling to later on.

JCS Petal Pin Cushion 
The picture below is not very good, its what happens when you are taking pics of a yellow fabric in a yellow house with a yellow light. Nothing I did with the camera could correct this. OK, so the question is do I finish the bottom of the pincushion with the colorful fabric or the matching yellow?

SFS 2014
I am having such a blast with this. This is my April submission. This month I am working on the pin cushion as my stitch from stash project. I am also still working on Major Tree. I did spend $ 9 on a yard of 36 ct linen at Joann Fabrics...I know. It never occurred to me to buy suiting linen for my stitching. Someone suggested this and I just remembered it and so I went with my 50% off coupon and voila, a whole yard of linen! Who knew? Does anyone know of any drawbacks to stitching with this stuff? I did notice that the crosses aren't square.

So far, during this challenge:

Jan- spent 0
Feb - spent 0
March - spent $4
April - spent $9

I do have a tip to share about how I stay well within my limit: I still do visit the web sites and read their newsletters, and then I fill up the on-line carts with all the stuff that I want and then, then...I hit the delete button and make it all go away. Crazy, I know, but I get that rush of picking stuff out and thinking about it but without the cost.

Another tip is that I have stuff already kitted and ready to go, so no real reason to shop for anything.

Anyway, that's it for now. Hope to have pics of Major Tree (in daylight) soon.

Boring Journaling Stuff
My kids are taking their FCATs this week. They are stressing about it but I told them that they had done the work that all they could do now is take the test and hope for the best. I try to think back on what I went thru for testing but I was a nerd at school and studied all of the time. Testing didn't stress me out - I knew the material. I was an honor student due to incredible study skills. Problem now is you can't just memorize stuff anymore, and of course, the education is different. Kids are sat in front of a computer reading "articles" that might be 3 paragraphs long, and then spit out answers on a computer. Very odd. I do agree that institutions are investing in the "dumbing down" of America. I am watching it before my very eyes, seemingly powerless to stop it. I augment the "education" with other activities - use of a microscope, cataloging specimens and talking about science and the cosmos. Competitive edge? There isn't one apparently, unless you are in the upper economic class. My girls are cute though, so maybe that will get them through life, for a while anyway.



Christina