See Jane run?

Here's Jane.

Just one more big flower motif and the over one verse to go.  Sigh.

Love the bottom motifs with the big flowers.  And the sunburnt Adam and Eve.

I cheated on the snake.  It's supposed to be satin stitched I think.  Sorry.  Didn't do it.

I was wondering just now where Mia was.  I found her here.

Which makes sense since she'd done a bra pad run earlier during the night.  (Bra pads are one of her favorite toys.)  Where is this, you say?

It's the girl child's old room.  Mia is sleeping on an old futon which we'd put down on the ground for the girl child to sleep on the last time she visited.  The room is sad looking and abandoned.  We are thinking about painting it, which is the only thing stopping me from turning it immediately into my sewing/stitching room.  Ah, a room of my own for my sewing and stitching!  But paint.  To paint.  Hmmmmmm.

And we need a bed.  Quick.

Thanks for stopping by and saying hi.  I hope everyone has a wonderful week.

My first love

Today is my father type's birthday.  The first birthday in our empty nest.

My father type is such a good father.

(Can you believe this is the only picture I can find of the three of us at the girl child's graduation?)

Always so proud of his kids.

Always.

Happy birthday, dearest father type.  Time to enjoy our empty nest.

Getting better? TUSAL and a prize

Jane Philpott is slowly coming along.  I feel I'm stitching less with the boy child not here and Mia being clingy.

Getting to the good parts at the bottom.

Still a long way to go though.

It's TUSAL time.  The TUSAL is a fun sort of SAL, no effort required.  Here's my ORT jar among some of my pretties, including a Nicol Sayre doll.

I also won a giveaway that Marty of Carriage House Samplings was holding.  Here is my prize, one of Marty's new release charts, Cats' Eyes.  Very cute!

Thanks for the giveaway, Marty!

Mia and I are slowly getting used to having the boy child gone.  There are good days and bad days.  Mia has become my sleeping companion as well since she can no longer sleep with the boy child.  She has slowly learned that I am not a night owl like the boy child was this summer, and that I will not get up at 3 in the morning to play.  lol!  But she's still an early riser, so we have restless nights.  Slowly getting better though.

There's still a lot of this going on too.

The boy child is doing well so far and survived his first week of classes just fine.  He's slowly learning the routine and meeting other students, learning to pay bills, and live on his own.  We do text and IM a lot too, which I'm glad of.

Not much heard from the girl child, but she's settling back into her job and apartment just fine as well.  Also making decisions about life.

There's definitely a chill in the air these days, which is nice.  I will leave you with Mia trying to snuggle in for warmth.

Thanks for stopping by and saying hi.  I hope everyone has a wonderful week!

Missing the boy child

Jane Philpott is slowly progressing.  I'm pleased cause the border met up nicely.

That's always a relief!

In other news, I seem to have joined an SAL!  I've joined late, so I'm behind in posting about it, and am still waiting for my supplies to arrive.  But here is the project, the Susan Singleton Sampler from the Scarlet Letter.  (Picture taken from Scarlet Letter website)

She's just so gorgeous, I couldn't resist joining!  I'm doing this SAL with Terri, Deb, Sandra, Marsha, Gabi, and Suzanne.  We'll be doing it over a 2 year time span and will post every 3 months.  I think it's a good way to be able to look back and think that I started this SAL when the empty nest became a reality.  :D  Thanks, ladies, for letting me join the SAL!

The empty nest.  Well, we had the girl child around for a few days so that postponed the inevitable.  It was nice to have her around, get some good girl talk in, and see how life was going with her.  Then the girl child left for her apartment so she could pack and take off for a weekend in Washington State, to visit her best friend from college.  Lucky thing.  She's been doing her thing on Instagram so I've been following her travels and feeling very envious.

So yeah, the empty nest hit Thursday evening.  So far so good.  I think it's going to take some getting used to for both the father type and I.

But I think the one who misses the boy child the most -- or at least as much as I do -- is Mia.

She's been very very clingy, obviously confused by the boy child not being here.  Her night time routine is totally changed and she has been letting me know it too.  Apparently the boy child, night owl that he became over the summer, was playing with Mia during the night when the silly thing would meow and ask to be played with.  So Mia is missing her playmate and has been lonely at night.  She's been waking me up during the night, and early in the morning.  I think it's slowly getting better.  Last night she just wandered and bothered me a tiny bit, but mostly slept close to me in her favorite chair.  She usually sleeps with the boy child -- I guess I'm not a good substitute body to sleep on.  :(

So yes, Mia is missing her boy child, just like me.  Luckily, she will deign to cuddle with me at least during the day.  Unfortunately, she's so big these days that she doesn't fit very well.  lol!

Yup, that's my lap.  lol!

So the empty nester (at least one of them) and the Mia are missing their boy, big time.  But we're surviving.

The boy child starts classes today -- so exciting!  He's excited and nervous.  I'm hoping he loves it all!

Thanks as always for stopping by and saying hi.  I hope everyone has a great week!  Go Murray!!!

Empty nest

This is a day late since we got home yesterday evening.  The boy child is all ensconced in his new apartment, going through freshman orientation, and seemingly just fitting right in to his new music college.  This college is one of many, many, many, many colleges in Boston.  And Saturday was move in day for many of those many, many, many, many students.  You see, the leases for apartments start that day.  So yeah, Boston was a zoo on Saturday.  We were lucky to have my sister's house to use as a place to stay and to leave from for the big day.

Here is the normally quiet street that the boy child's apartment is on.  The double line of cars is all the double parking going on with the move-in.  The only way to get a rental truck (so many rental trucks!) unloaded was to double park.

But the moving went amazingly well.  BIL and my nephew helped, which was so wonderful.  We were done in 2 hours!  And that included unloading onto the sidewalk, carrying everything up 5 flights, and setting up and unpacking.

The boy child was very pleased with the results.  He had to take pictures to show his friends.

Love his bay window.  (That's BIL and nephew.)  (Note the vuvuzela in the window.)

Sunday was check-in day for the freshmen, along with picking up their new laptops.  After an hour wait for the laptop, boy child had to play.

He went off to take a couple of intro to the laptop classes right away too.

That evening, there was a great welcoming ceremony and concert.  It was so great -- the kids get peer advisors to help them through their first year.  All the peer advisors were cheering and clapping, there was drumming and it made the kids feel so welcome and inspired.

And the music -- well of course, it was amazing!

The boy child stayed in his apartment for the first time Sunday night.  Monday was the start of orientation, including some talks for the parents.  We didn't see much of the boy child, but we did get to say goodbye.  That was the hardest goodbye I've ever done.  But I managed to hold back the tears at least.  They came after.

The girl child is home for a couple of days to take care of doctor appointments, so we are easing into the empty nest.  It's very strange to have girl child home and boy child gone.  But I've already been texting with him so that's good -- he's not going to be totally silent.  I hope!

I miss my baby.

(Picture from the girl child's graduation.  Love his hair in this one.)

Sorry, no stitching pics this time around.  If you've read this far, I hope you enjoyed it.  Time for a new life for my boy child, and for the empty nesters as well.

Thanks for stopping by and saying hi.  I love being part of this blogging community.   For tennis fans, enjoy the US Open -- let's hope it doesn't rain toooo much.  I hope everyone has a great week!