Very Small Progress

I managed to work on this a little bit in Sofia. It's something, at least. I'm feeling stitching pressure because I've gotten so little done this month. At least I got the major crazy quilting block done that I needed to, but still... I guess next month at home I can catch up some.

Want a Puppy?

So - Monday we had to go to the grocery store after getting home from Bulgaria on Sunday. As we were driving down the road where the store is, something small came running toward us. We stopped, and it kept coming closer. I got out of the car and ... this cute little puppy bounded to my feet. I couldn't resist picking her up.

She's between three and four weeks old and we're transitioning her to solid food. Never touched by a human until Monday most likely, she's decided she loves people. Very sweet disposition and she'll grow to about the size of my Mattie the Magnificent. That's why I can't take her home. I already have three dogs, including one Sharr. I've been forbidden! She's with us until someone wants her or we go to Decani on Sunday. The monks there are looking for more Sharrs to act as guard dogs. Anyone want her?

More Stash - Magazines

We passed a news stand in Plovdiv and the lady running it had three! magazines out with needle crafts. Needless to say, I bought all three. Two are cross stitch magazines and the other is crochet. Everything's in Bulgarian, of course, but the cross stitch magazines have Anchor, DMC and Adria ( a brand from Poland) colors. One of the magazines even has color charts! I'll have to stitch some of these things.

Still Working on It

While in Bulgaria, for some reason I did a lot less stitching. Even though I'm back in Kosovo, my stitching time hasn't increased much. We rescued a puppy on Monday and I've been dealing with her. She'll be a separate blog post tomorrow. Anyway... I have been working on my spring mystery and am finally almost done with part six. I'm sooo behind on all these.

Ready to Mail

This is Melisa's block from one of my crazy quilt round robins before I did anything. It was hard for me to figure out what to do, since this block and its embellishment so far is just not my style.

I finally decided to do two motifs. Both have been done in my time in Kosovo and Bulgaria. I also did the silver bead seam between them. This is the overall block after my work.

I spent about eight hours stitching this paisley. It's got two huge stem stitch roses, lots of bugle beads, and six rows of chain stitch. I think it came out pretty well.

And here is the tree I made below it. The trunk and branches are outline stitch and the leaves and flowers are French knots. It took me a few hours to do this, too, but I like the effect on the print. It almost looks like dawn behind it.

Stash From Plovdiv, Part 1

Okay, so I went a little bit crazy with fabric buying in Plovdiv. But we found LOTS of fabric stores! This is the set of fabric I bought from the first fabric store - and it was very reasonably priced. Most of the fabrics were under 3 euros/meter.

These next pictures are all close ups of the fabrics. The blue and peach florals are going to be great for motifs; some of the flowers are three dimensional.

Three stretch laces are also here - all of them under 2 euros/meter. I also liked the overall lace floral in the upper left here. I think it'll make a great store of motifs.

More of Varna

When you first drive in to any Bulgarian city, you see row upon row of high rise apartment blocks. Sofia has them. Plovdiv has them, but not nearly as many. And Varna has several miles of them.

They were built during the communist era, and you can see from these pictures taken with my camera phone from the car how dilapidated they look. For large numbers of Bulgarians, this is a step up from the rural huts of the villages. All of the cities are in the process of building new, better housing. It's needed. I thought it was important to show these and not just the pretty places.

We drove home to Pristina yesterday. I'll be here just over another week before returning to the States.