Yes, I'm still around

Earlier today I got a sweet note from someone checking to make sure I'm okay. Yes, everything is okay, but my stamina is still not very good. There are so many things that I want to do each day, but I barely seem to scratch the surface. For example, all that I've done with Christmas decorating is to pull out our Christmas china and have Tom put up the tree. We still have a "naked" tree. Thankfully it is pre-lit. I wonder if anyone will notice if this year I don't put on any ornaments--I could say that this year I'm doing minimalism, right? (Don't worry--I'm sure we'll get the tree decorated soon and a wreath on the door.)

Right now we're expecting a HP serviceman to arrive. We're continuing to have issues with my new work desktop computer that we bought earlier this year. Tom has already had to replace the hard drive once. Yes, right in the middle of all my back problems, he was doing multiple backups of all my business files and installing a new hard drive. Would you believe that the new hard drive is now having issues? Have you ever heard of anyone having such problems so soon?

Tom spent yesterday once again making multiple backups of all my files. He found out that since the computer is under warranty, HP will send out someone to install the new hard drive. Tom has told me that it may be several days before I'll have access again to my desktop computer so we've been copying some files to my laptop so that I can do at least a few things. Please keep your fingers crossed that things work this time. After things are once again running smoothly, Tom will gradually start converting all his wonderful stitch diagrams and my product covers to Illustrator. They were all originally done using Designer which the new computer doesn't support. Yikes!! What a job!!

I've been working hard on getting some projects ready for the Nashville tradeshow in February. Last year I bought some wonderful paper mache boxes. There are two boxes in each set. I'm planning on lining them with a sweet cotton fabric, and then putting a stitched panel in the bottom.

I've stitched the panels. I'll show a photo of the boxes and the interiors in a few weeks. For now I'll tell you that the larger box has a large 3-story yellow house and the letters "A B C" painted on the front. For the interior bottom linen panel, I've stitched the same yellow house, some sheep, and a few more things. I decided that the house is too large to be a typical home, so I'm calling it a "Needlework Academy". The smaller box has numbers on the front. For it I've stitched two girls holding their embroidery. Of course, there are a few more things, but I don't want to tell you too much now. I will tell you that I've decided to name this project Miss Trenner's Needlework Academy.

I bought all the boxes the company had. Therefore this will be a limited edition project with shops going to Nashville getting the first chance at them. I need to count the boxes, but I think there are between 155 and 165. I'm hoping to come up with some special goodies to go in the boxes.

I'm also working on a companion project with a needleroll and scissors weight. The designs are coordinated to go with the boxes, but you don't need the boxes to enjoy this set of needlework necessities. There will not be a limit on these charts like there will be on the ones for the boxes.

I have temporarily put the wonderful Elizabeth Mears sampler aside as I get ready for Nashville. Thought that you might like to see an updated photo that we took last weekend. You can click on the photo for a better view.

Need to run---I'm off to physical therapy!