Baby samplers

I feel compelled to write about the cross-stitch project that I'm working on right now. It is a baby-sampler. I pieced together a pattern from purchased patterns and a design of my own. However, to keep it a surprise for the recipient of this project, that's all I'm going to say about it. It's been fun working on it, and as it is a design in progress, I'm excited to see how it turns out.

Here are some other baby samplers that I've done in the past. I think I have done more baby-related projects than anything else. At this point I don't have any completed cross-stitch projects in my own house... they have all been given away. And in the past, I did not take pictures of my work before sending them off. I think it would be fun to go visit all of my cross-stitches because they all belong to people that are very important to me. These two cross-stitches now reside in Chicago where I visited a few weeks ago.

Chicago

I visited this little cutie in Chicago a couple weeks ago. He had just learned to crawl a couple days before. Obviously, he still likes to keep plenty of toys within reach so he doesn't have to crawl to them.

On the flight home from Chicago, I had the pleasure of sitting on the tarmac for an hour... twice. This has not been a very good summer for flying. During the last hour-long tarmac drive, my overhead reading light did not work (and it was night) so I could neither read or use my laptop for an hour. As an apology for the broken reading light, the airline gave me some travel vouchers... which are already expired.

I'm back!

Right off the top, I'm giving all of my excuses for the lag in posts: not enough time due to traveling, adjusting to a new computer, no good photos to blog (actually I just don't have a good way to get photos to the blog). That's only three excuses, not too much. But to fight those excuses, I'm posting a blog with no photos.

Classes start up again on Monday. I'm excited to have a new schedule. I spent the summer working long days at a desk and then escaping out of town quickly. Which really isn't an ideal schedule. I'd rather mix up the days a bit so I'm not sitting the whole time. And being out of town every other week makes it difficult to get anything done at home. The long hours behind the desk and in airports/planes have gotten me out of shape. Fortunately, Jenn has put me on a running schedule to train for the Duke City Marathon relay. We need to be ready to run 6 miles by October 21. This will be the longest run that Jenn has ever done. And it is really motivating me to run at least 3 times a week, which I haven't done in a year and a half (since I did the Austin Marathon). It feels great to start the day with a run!

To continue my get-in-shape kick, I signed up for a yoga class (part of my free tuition) and bought a gym locker for the year. So I'll be prepared to workout anytime. At first, I was upset that the only yoga class that still had space is at 8am, but now I'm looking forward to getting out of the house early at least a couple times a week. Don't get me wrong, 8am is not early, but I rarely get to campus before 10am. For example, this morning I ran 3 miles, read a magazine, staked the cherry tomato plants, cut back the sunflowers and played some piano before leaving for work.