Where did the summer go?

Not only has summer flown by, so has my blogging --- wasn't it just a week or two ago that I last posted? Well, obviously not.

I must say that I'm not at all sad to summer leave, this was a horribly hot and dry summer in Colorado. We had over 70 days of 90 degrees or higher and I think we had 5 days of 100 or higher. While I know there are parts of the country that have these temperatures routinely, we don't. On top of that, we had so little rain. The last week or so we've been in the 70s and low 80s and I'm much happier now!

September has been pretty busy and I guess that's going to be my excuse for not checking in. Sampler Guild of the Rockies, http://www.samplerguildoftherockies.org/joomla/, started up again. I love this group, I love samplers and I'm always excited when we start meeting again. We have fun things planned this year, our group annual project will be fun and I'll share pictures as soon as I get enough started to have something to show. We have a great seminar coming up next April - Ellen Chester of With My Needle, http://www.withmyneedle.com/ will be our teacher/speaker. I am so excited!

A couple of weeks ago a group of friends I stitch with, went on an annual retreat to the mountains. I wasn't able to go with them (more on that in a minute). One of the fun things we do up there is celebrate everyone's birthday together. So there is much exchanging of gifts and excitement. I've been teasing you guys lately with stitching and crocheting I'm doing, but haven't been able to post any pictures. Some of those were for birthday gifts for this wonderful group of ladies in my life - and now I can finally post some pictures!

I crocheted these pin cushion hats, added them to these cute boxes I picked up throughout the year at Michael's. Also, included were a little notebook, a Vera Bradley pencil and some Dove chocolate!!! As I heard the story afterwards, they were a hit!!! I'm so happy.

The reason I wasn't able to go retreating with my friends is that my 18 year old grandson graduated from Marine boot camp on 9/14. His older brother graduated 2 1/2 years ago and it is a very special, moving ceremony and I knew there was no way I could miss it.  Here is one of our newest Marines, J.K. Gonzales, PFC, with his older brother Niko.

I still have 3 Christmas presents that I'm working on so there will continue to be updates with no pictures. But in future posts, I'd like to show more close up shots of my hats. They were fairly quick and fun to do.

I do appreciate everyone's visit and if you chose to leave any comments, I love those as well. It's still amazing to me sometimes that we can all be friends from so far away and around the world in the click of buttons. To do this and share our passion is just the best.

I do hope everyone has had a good weekend. Stitch whenever you can - it's our lifesaver and our mental centering, well, for me it is! Hug family and friends today - until next time, have a good week!

Debby