40 years and counting

Counting what? 40 years since I graduated from the hallowed halls of Wichita North High School!

I just attended my 40 year high school reunion last weekend, and emerged smiling and unscathed. It seems every year we care a little less about who/what we were in high school, and care a little more about just seeing each other. Hey, it's a miracle just to recognize some of my classmates!

I started the weekend with lunch with 3 of my best buds from high school (actually, two friends I've known since grade school). We met at NuWay, the quintessential Wichita diner that has been there longer than us. Conveniently, it's just around the corner from my house. I'm the happy one, 2nd from left, slurping on my cherry limeade, eagerly anticipating my NuWay burger (no onion, extra pickle).

Later that night we met at a local bar and did the usual reunion thing...wore nametags with our photos from our senior yearbooks! Actually, this was really useful, even if a little painful. Note to other reunion attenders...don't bring spouses to these events. We have enough trouble recognizing each other, and spouses are just confusing. 

Alas, have no idea why I wasn't smiling for my picture. Maybe that Farrah Fawcett hairstyle was stressing me out?!And I have to note that my hair has mysteriously grown blonder over the years....hmmmmmm.

Maybe I wasn't smiling because I was bemoaning my departure from this beautiful old school! Even when I was young, I appreciated the lovely architecture of North High. Sure, there were some drawbacks to attending a high school that's old enough to be on the Historic Register (really, it IS on the Historic Register!). No air-conditioning meant sliding around on your wooden desks on hot days, not to mention a swimming pool that was condemned. But a new school would never have the beautiful Proverbs scripture engraved on the wall under the tower (see it above to right of tower).

North is famous for it's terra cotta artwork adorning the exterior building, including the nearby "matching" bridge. North sits on the site of the original native American settlement in Wichita on the Arkansas river, hence all the Indian motifs.

I have fond memories of canoeing on the river in gym class. It was sure easy to tip over a canoe with 4 laughing high school girls inside who may/may not have been following instructions from the gym teacher shouting on the shore.

We were greeted on the school tour by the famous buffalo "Butch". He's been there forever, though he doesn't hang in the same spot as when I attended. North has had several multi-million dollar renovations since I left, and he had to find new grazing grounds. Before he was well affixed to the wall, he was often stolen by opposing high schools. Strange, he hadn't aged a bit!

A good natured batch of cheerleaders led groups of reunioners through the halls. My graduating class had 600+ seniors, but the school isn't as crowded now. The hallways above was news to us, as a wing has been added along the river recently - we never saw the river unless we were skipping school and going to the nearby island (not that I participated in this).

My husband came along to photo document our tour. Thanks, Alan, for snapping alot of pics along the way and allowing me to be in the pictures!

One highlight for Alan and I was visiting a painting that hangs in the "permanent collection". Our daughter, Sarah, did this reproduction of the famous American Gothic when she was a senior. Now she's busy teaching high school art in Chicago at Lane Tech http://www.lanetech.org/

We also visited the pretty outdoor courtyard (also a recent addition) and managed to find the bricks we donated in our daughter's names.

There are about a zillion photos in the halls of past classes, and we had to have a look! Would you believe the photos from the 70s are in black and white? YIKES!

We finished the tour with an optional climb to the top-secret TOWER. Even the location of the entrance is a secret to students, although it's pretty easy to discern where it must be. Alas, Alan stayed on the ground as I trudged up floor after floor of tight winding steps to the top...no Non-Alumni allowed! I'd show you some pics of the inside, but....wait...that's a North High secret!

The stairs were worth it, though, as I looked out through stained glass windows at

beautiful city views. It's a North tradition that Seniors visit the tower and leave names/messages on the walls. Almost a 100 years of senior scrawls is quite a mess, but what fun!

Forty years and counting! I'll close with the school motto....Once a Redskin, Always a Redskin!

Part 2 and more October goodies!

What's happening at L*K? We're shipping new designs on October 4, so things are humming around here. The Boxers are piling up in anticipation of their date with the shipping table.

Sadly, all the other new releases aren't here yet...YIKES! They're all marooned at the printer where they're having equipment problems. They've promised delivery soon and we may have to call in some elves this weekend to get everything sacked and assembled in time. I sense a Mexi-food emergency, because Mexi-food is my go-to for extra energy and stress control!

Here's what's coming to your favorite needlework shop in October!

Part 1 Holly & Hearts Mystery Sampler

Here's the cover! Look closely and you can catch more sneak peeks of the whole mysterious stitchery. The little Christmas bird (center of pic) is included in the Part 2 design. If you haven't joined in the mystery club, it's never too late. Just contact your LNS to order the charts, and optional fabric and fiber packs. Just for this project, L*K is in the fiber and fabric biz, and are providing the "whole deal", just to make your lives easier.

#161 Flora McSample's 2013 Stockings

Flora is our young sampler friend, and every year she designs a set of Christmas ornaments. This year she decided to do little stockings, and we're glad she did! Chartpak includes set of 3 mini-stocking patterns, as well as embellishments (buttons and beads) for all 3 projects. These stockings are small, but they're BIG on vintage charm and holiday spirit!

#160 Life is Not Measured

We've had a lot of requests for this wonderful saying, so here it is! It's not too big and not too small, just a satisfying size to stitch...and enjoy for many years!

B45 Good Friends are Like Angels Inspiration Boxer

Amen! The older I get, the more I value my friendships...both long-time friends and precious new friends! Kit includes 30 ct. natural linen, hand-dyed muted blue flower buttons and a tiny golden heart for the bonus "Angel" design.

What is THIS? I know it has NOTHING to do with the rest of this post, but I wanted to share my passion for "playing with my food". I made these cute little Twinkie school buses last week for a church event with a Back to School theme. Let me tell you...there aren't a lot of school themed things to do with food! 

I found this project on Pinterest (of course!) and got to work sawing the fronts off some Twinkies to turn them into buses. They would have looked much lovelier if I had bothered to put frosting in a pastry bag, blah, blah, blah, but everyone loved them. And we're still enjoying the remainder of the giant bag of M & M's I bought for the wheels!

The wheels on the bus go round and round.....

Falling for fall

So, it's HOT here today...and I'm making a huge mess around the house getting out FALL decorations. A braver blogger would have taken a picture of the huge "before" mess, but this post is about "decorating" and there's nothing pretty about my messy seasonal habit (and I forgot to take the pic before I enlisted my husband to return reject items to the scary basement).

WHY do I do this??? I know it's not entirely normal for a mom with grown kids to turn things upside down decorating for the holidays. But it happens...every few months or so...every year...I can't stop my seasonal urges.

I start out thinking "Hmmmm...I think I'll freshen things up a bit around the house, and get out a few seasonal things". Then an explosion occurs somewhere between the basement and the main floor and totes mysteriously appear, existing decor is stacked for storage, seasonal things come out of said totes, more decor is temporarily retired and relocated and (yes, sadly) even some new seasonal things magically appear. Gotta love Dollar Tree for emergency seasonal decor!

Here are the final results. Yes, some of these pics are very similar to last year. I actually photograph my seasonal decor and file my pics on computer so I can attempt to speed things up the following year...and sometimes it works. I changed a couple things from last year in my entry hall, but my favorite Santa/witchy man is still under glass...he never ages! It's hard to see but he has a sack full of pumpkins on his back and a nice black/gray coat ensemble.

Yes, I have a GIANT sized fireplace mantel. It's also rather high off the ground, so it needs BIG stuff, or in this case, a lot of stuff!  I am fortunate to have an outlet hidden up there, so I can plug in my old-fashioned un-candle (orange lit thing) and some of the black branches on the left have tiny lights. Sorry, couldn't wait for dark to take the pic.

I have a minor obsession with old tole-painted trays, and you can find them scattered pretty much all over the house. The black background ones are my favorite, so I put them "front and center" during the fall. I tried to keep things simple on this big shelving unit in the family room. Just refreshed big glass jars with fall stuff, added the feathery owl and a few other autumn accents. 

This owl is a funny guy! He weighs almost nothing - must be papier mache with feathers glued on. Friends and family think he's pretty creepy, so sometimes he shows up in unexpected places, for dramatic effect!

Here's a closeup of the little October 31 frame thing. I had an extra black frame from a needlework project. I made this little graphic on my computer, printed it on regular copier paper, and once it's in the frame under glass, it looks pretty cute.

Here's my favorite decor area in the kitchen. Yes, the kitchen walls really are chartreuse! It's a surprisingly fun color to decorate around. Looks great with spring and fall colors, and really glows with holiday reds. It's hard to see (limited photography skills abound!) but there's a wonderful cross stitch I did from Birds of  a Feather in a starring spot. It's really primitive and a little creepy and I love it in this black frame.

Also in the kitchen, over the stovetop is the little shelf above. I made the bunting with some scrapbook paper. Just cut triangle shapes from assorted paper. Tie them together with ribbon after you make holes with a regular hold punch. When you're done for the season, fold it up and put it away! The giant black thing is one of my favorite tole trays. It has beautiful painting on the other side. I took it outside on the grass and sprayed this side with blackboard paint, then got to work with chalk. It's fun to change the message seasonally, when I'm not displaying the pretty painted side. Fall leaves are courtesy of Dollar Tree!

Time to go dig up last year's mums from the garden and put them on the patio and make the annual pumpkin pilgrimage! Happy Fall, y'all!

Our Purple Pride!

Yep, it's that time again...football season! I admit I'm not the biggest fan ever, but I sure do enjoy watching games with my K-State friends, eating game day food, cheering and chatting. Games are a great excuse to spend hours with some of my best purple pals!

Usually, we watch from the cool comfort of our family room with the giant TV (Alan somehow talked me into this several years ago), but occasionally we score some real game day tickets. Then we make the 2.5 hour pilgrimage to lovely Manhattan, Kansas (fondly known as the "Little Apple") and home of the Kansas State Wildcats!

Alan and I met there, so it's full of fun memories and nostalgia rules when we drive into this lovely college town in hilly northeast Kansas. You didn't know there were hills in Kansas? Wrong...just happens to be flat where I live!

Above is the new WEST HALF of the stadium...a mere 90 million dollar investment for the home team. The day after the final game last year, they imploded the existing west half of the stadium, then worked like crazy to rebuild and expand. We were there for the first game in the newly expanded facility...and thankfully our tickets were on the west side in the SHADE. It was still over 100 degrees at 7:30 game time.

What's game day without some parking lot tailgating? Our friend, chef Doug, brought along some tasty kabobs, and the men grilled while we set out other potluck food we had brought along. Did I mention it was HOT? I have no idea what the temp was in the parking lot, but it was staggeringly HOT. I'm not very heat tolerant, so I collapsed in one of those folding sling chairs and drank and drank and drank....water, I mean!

It was so hot, I almost lost my appetite....almost! Brenda had brought along some amazing peanut butter/chocolate chip cookies, and they're my favorite. I figured the sugar was good for me in that HOT environment, not to mention the protein in that peanut butter!

We have lots of pals who regularly go to games, driving from towns around the state and often out of state. Here are my long-time friends, Greg and Julie (and husband Alan with his mouth full of food on the right). Julie was my roommate in college, and we're still good friends. You may remember Julie from my summer post on the lavender farm.

Dinner's over and we're ready to brave the crowds INSIDE the stadium, with friends Doug and Vicki.

But first, a photo op as we enter the stadium. Boy, was this a hard shot to get as hordes of loyal fans were massing through the gates. The only people not in purple were the green-shirted security guys behind me. I'm standing with the new statue of our beloved coach, Bill Snyder. He's still coaching and he's no youngster. And he's always wearing the same purple windbreaker and carrying a clipboard, just like his statue. We had bets if he would emerge this night wearing the windbreaker, since it was rumored to be 136 degrees on the field...but he did!

We set a new attendance record with over 53,000 in attendance, and enjoyed the full football game experience...awesome marching band, traditional cheers, our mascot Willie the Wildcat, big salty pretzel (I needed the extra salt to combat the heat) and all that. After a full bottle of water in the first half, and a giant Diet Coke in the 3rd quarter, I think I finally cooled off for the finish of the game. What a treat to get to attend in person, but I'm watching the next game from a cool recliner!

Invasion of the threads, fabric and charts!

Yikes...they're HEE-RRR-EEE!!!!

We just got a giant shipment of beautiful hand-dyed threads from the talented gang at Weeks Dye Works! Here's a little Q & A about our big project...coming soon to a needlework shop near you!

Q. Who is this incredibly sweet-looking family?
A. It's the family behind Weeks Dye Works! It truly IS a family affair at this dynamic fiber/fabric biz. As the products at Weeks Dye Works continue to expand, it seems the family is growing, too! We always enjoy seeing the McGahey kids (and parents Miranda and John) at Needlework Market. They graciously shared a few pics with us of their WDW factory.

No, they don't work from home like we do at L*K. It's a large building located in Garner, NC.

Above is the Dye Room, where all the color magic happens!

WHOA! That's a lot of floss, ready for a colorful bath.

Here is Delia winding the 6-strand floss onto cones. Each cone holds an amazing 3,250 yars.

And, finally, here's the productive gang at Weeks Dye Works, working hard to bring beautiful fibers and fabrics to the needlework industry. Thanks for the mini-tour, John. I'd like to visit in person next time!

Q. How many threads arrived at L*K?
A. The most threads I've ever seen in my history at L*K. Enough threads to DIVE into, cannonball style (if we did that sort of thing at work!). Four giant, slightly-smushed boxes arrived at 7 PM via UPS last night.

Q. Who put all these threads in their lovely little sacks?
A. Again, the gracious staff at Weeks Dye Works sacked them for us (giant blessing for us!). Alan, Linda and our helper, Carmen, thank them with all of our tired little fingers.

Q. When will L*K customers get to see and hold the "mysterious" thread packs?
A. We'll be packing orders during the holiday weekend. Hey, it's aptly called LABOR Day! We'll be shipping to shops inside/outside the US on Tuesday, Sept. 3.

Q. What does the thread pack look like?
A. It's a beautiful rainbow of muted holiday colors, including one new color that Weeks Dye Works developed on our request. It's a grungy olive green color called Oscar, named after the ever-famous Sesame Street resident, Oscar the Grouch.

Q. With all those threads, how about the fabric?
A. We picked up a whole carload of lovely hand-dyed linen and Aida from nearby Picture This Plus a couple days ago. The hard-working gals at PTP worked really hard (nights, weekends, overtime) to dye the fabric for the Mystery Sampler project. Then they went a step farther (actually several steps!) and volunteered to cut the fabric, serge the edges, fold, package and label each convenient pre-cut. Fabulous for shops and customers alike!

Q. How about the patterns?
A. Hey, we've been working on this part for 6 months!  After we designed and stitched the model, we worked on the printed materials. There's a pretty color cover, then 3 additional pages including color key (hang onto this!), chart for Part 1, stitch guide and BONUS pattern. You can see the final results on the photo below...sacked and ready to leave the nest!

Q. Whew? Do you celebrate after a big shipment? How?
A. You betcha!!!  Always, our post-shipment celebrations center around food...duh. The Sept. 3 ship date cleverly coincides with our 36 wedding anniversary, so we're having a few friends over to eat and party! Actually, we're doing a triple celebration...our 36th anniversary, another set of friends are having a 34th anniversary and our special friend, Doug, is turning 60 years young! We'll grill steaks and shrimp, fill in with some veggies, and finish with Vicki's famous German chocolate cake and Alan's renowned homemade vanilla ice cream. The evening will be filled with friendship and laughter...our favorite combination! And (bonus!) we'll have lots of hands available for cleanup afterwards. I'm nominating the men, in advance, for the cleanup portion.

Q. What's next at L*K?
A. Once Part 1 is out the door, we'll begin prepping to ship Part 2 on October 1. There won't be nearly as much confusion, as most of the threads/fabric will go out with Part 1. Still, each order is "customized" for each shop, so every order is different.

Enough photos and blogging...it's time for a rest! Here's Will from WDW lounging in the kid's area at WDW. Sweet!

it's time to start packing orders. Happy Labor Day, everyone!

It's a HOOT!

What's a HOOT?  It's our newest Halloween kit and it's called HOOT!

I love designing little bits for Halloween, and this project was a real HOOT! We're sending this Limited Edition kit to Needlework Market this weekend with our friends at Norden Crafts (fave distributor!), because we couldn't attend this year. We're staying home to pack orders for Part 1 of our biggest project ever....the Holly & Hearts Mystery Sampler!

Here's the back of the biscornu. Yes, it's reversible!

This is the first time I've ever designed a biscornu. If you don't know what a biscornu is, it's pictured above. It's a little 3-D thing that looks like a pincushion...only much prettier and cooler! 

Here's your French lesson for the day. Biscornu is actually a French adjective, and means "odd" or "bizarre". But they're not at all "odd" in the needlework world, they're just fun little projects! You begin with 2 stitched squares (must be exact same size!), then attach them by offsetting the corners, stuff it and...oila (as they say in France)...you've got a puffy, 8-sided masterpiece.

As long as I was designing a biscornu, I decided to make the back as pretty as the front, and throw in a bonus fob design for more fun.

Here's a few pics to show how these little gems evolved. I designed and stitched all 3 projects...in 2 days...I was on a true biscornu mission!

Here's the biscornu after I started assembling. I had a serious moment of finishing anxiety on this one. I usually (read that NEVER!) do my own finishing. I just drop my project in the mail to my finisher, Mona, and it magically comes back looking prettier than when it left. But I was in a hurry on this one, so I required some hand-holding from my local needlework owner and her staff. It's really one of those things you need to do yourself...in your own little hands...before the instructions make sense!

Then I got to work on the publishing part. In addition to the color cover, there are 2 insert pages with instructions and graphs. What are those red scribbles? Those are corrections my proofer caught (thanks, Debbie!) and they will be amended before we print. Those red marks remind me of school papers, with those ever-present teacher corrections.

While we're waiting on the publishing, we're busy cutting and folding fabric...

and making embellishment packs! There are some fun goodies on this one...orange and yellow buttons, with black and chartreuse beads.

We'll send these to market via special delivery!  My local shopowner is driving to market, and she's agreed to schlep boxes of these with her. Hopefully, they will be going home with shopowners from around the country and maybe outside the US.  

If you're feeling a NEED for one of these kits, let your local shopowner know ASAP. These are Limited Edition, so when they're gone, it's sad faces all around.

Happy travels to you, my odd little biscornu friends!!!