First I must say that a few people thought this was our home and backyard where the anniversery party was held. This is my daughter's yard and she has 2 acres for the kids and dog to run so guess who ends up having all the parties.
My wonderful daughter planned this along with help from her 2 brothers and their two wives. We have 6 great kids and spouses.

Summer is almost over and our grandkids return to school various days this week. Florida is beckoning and we will be leaving here Oct. 10. If all goes well. This summer has been nothing but a round of doctor, dentist, eye doctor visits and we are both tired of them. Harv. was at the dermatologist this morning and I have been there 2-3 times this summer. Beware of the sun and what it does to you as you age. Hopefully Florida will not have too many Dr. visits this year.

I am already sorting and packing my hobby stuff. I am determined to not take too much down this year. I have my Brazilian Embroidery pieces either half started or laying there waiting. My new punchneedle book is beckoning and in that vein I have a gripe.
I picked a online company in Michigan to place an order for a coule of punchneedle pieces and the one in my book they had on sale plus they had the colors for it. Well I decided it would be worthwhile to order it already printed on the fabric then to have to trace it myself. Well I placed the order for the piece itself, plus all the threads to go with it from Weeks Dye Works and another couple of pieces. Well two weeks passed and this morning I went to my PayPal to make sure I had sent it and I had. she received it then credited my account for the amount of the piece I wanted. She sent a refund back to Pay Pal. She said it was mailed Fri. Priority and sure enough it came in today. Can anyone give me a good reason why she would say the pattern is no longer available but send me the threads I ordered to go with it. Would you not think the thing to do would be to email and ask if I still wanted the threads? I just think this is bad merchandising and would not place another order thru this gal. Luckily I have the book with the pattern in it and I can copy it onto fabric but what if I did not have the book? Tough luck to me I guess. Well that is the end of my rant.

I also have a few of Di van Nierkirk's books and for Christmas 2 years ago someone ordered the printed pieces to go with the books from her in SA plus the DVD for the first one. They are mainly silk ribbon. I have started it and need to finish those. Therefore I think my cq life will stay in Chicago and Florida will be an embroidery year. The last couple of years I have shipped 3-4 cartons down via UPS and then ship them back and one of them was the Embellisher and I am ashamed to say I didn't use it once so it will stay home this year. I do intend to get it out and make a few pieces of fabric to take with me for swaps, etc.
I think Pat (God bless her) will be doing the puzzle pieces again.

I am including 3 pictures that were my first BE attempts. There is a shop about 1 hour north of us in Florida and they have an open house on Tues. & thurs. afternoons and for $5.00 you sit and stitch and a gal is there to help you all you need. Her name is Peggy and she is great. They have a little contest and encouraged me to enter my first piece which is called Verena. I found an old frame at the flea market and framed her and never thought she would win.
My first ribbon because I never enter fairs, etc. I was shocked.
The first and second ones are a basket of flowers and it too is in a flea market frame and because it had the rounded old glass I left the glass on which I did not do with Verena. Verena hangs in Florida and the basket in my front hallway in Chicago.

It will be interesting to see if I can go all winter without my CQ.
Do they have an AA group for CQ addicts?