I had fun yesterday playing with my Circle Lord.  I found that the Featherz template works a whole lot better when you rotate the disc the right direction.  DUH! 🙂  I’m still getting some backtracking issues, but the 3rd wreath I did was better than the 1st or 2nd.  Like anything, it’s going to take some PPP to get the hang of it.  But so far, me likes!

I also did just a bit of playing with some freehand fillers and feathers. Nothing fancy, it was just fun to lay down a bit of thread.  I have recently made some adjustments to my longarm, retiming, and some adjustments to the electronics that affect the stitching speed, etc., and I wanted to make sure I have the tension back to good, and that I was getting pretty stitches. 

Sometimes it’s fun to just do some quick, easy stitching just to watch the pretty thread stitch out. 

I also used my practice piece to try my hand at a couple of stencils.  Becoming proficient at freehand stitching of stencils is one of my longarm goals.  My first attempt at this beautiful stencil by Anita Shackelford.  I still need some practice, but I was very pleased for a first try. 

I had to purchase this stencil, after Carla B. over at Feathered Fibers kept posting beautiful quilts, on which she had used this stencil.  One of the quilts can be seen here.

This is a stencil I am planning on using on one of my 9P & Stripe quilts.  I wish I could credit the maker, but the sticker came off of it, and I don’t know who designed this one.  I really like it, it was easy to stitch, on the very first try, and I think it looks really good. 

I haven’t started on my Storm at Sea, as I got up with stupid muscle spasms, under my left shoulder blade and around my left rib cage.  Usually it’s my right side.  DH massaged the muscles, I have iced it a couple times, hot tubbed, and taken Aleve and some pain meds with some muscle relaxer in it.  And, it seems to be working, so I don’t want to overdo.  Darn, guess that means I’ll have to take it easy on the housework, too!  I am so happy to report, that since I added massage therapy to my chiropractic treatment, my usage of Imitrex has gone way down.  I was going through a 9 dose refill every single month.  Sometimes, having to wait a few days before I could get a refill.  After starting chiropractic treatment, I noticed a refill was lasting me about 2 months.  Since I started massage therapy earlier this year, even more improvement.  I took the first dose out of my last refill on 3-1-08.  I took the last dose on our way home from our vacation trip (and I think that headache was prompted by the heat and sinuses after being on the golf course four days in a row) on 6-27-08.  So far, I haven’t had to take one out of my new pack.  That is a little over four months!  Anybody that suffers from migraines will understand how significant that is.  It’s a huge improvement to quality of life. 

My son told me last night, that the baby girl (her name is Riley) is also battling Salmonella.  So, I don’t know for sure if she has e. coli and salmonella, or if something has gotten lost in translation between two teenagers, and they have changed the diagnosis to salmonella.  Whatever, she is still very, very sick.  He said they haven’t been able to get much food down her, and what she has taken in, has come right back up.  God bless her.  I do hope the next news is good.  Thank you for your prayers and concern.

BTW, I didn’t mean my last post to sound like I was upset with any of my readers about my snake.  Just saying that I can’t make any promises! 🙂  Have a good one! Chat at ya later!