What the Huh?!

Ok, I am mildly irritated!! Ok maybe a little more than mildly....I have always been able to order my DMC floss from a certain retailer on line, since I have moved to Japan. I am not going to name the retailer, because I don't want to give them a bad name, however, right now I am NOT very happy with them at all!! I tried to place an order for DMC on Saturday from this retailer, but I couldn't figure out HOW, I thought that is weird there is no place to put things "in my cart", then I notice at the bottom of the page a note in red that says "We're sorry we are unable to deliver this item outside North America". So I wrote them an e-mail telling them that I have an APO address and so my mailing address IS in the US, just that I AM in Japan. She wrote me back pretty quickly and said "Yes, but the product will still end up in Japan, so we can't make your order, I'm sorry."

So, I sent another e-mail saying "Well, just out of curiosity, why not? I have never had problems with it in the past." I mean, do the silk worms have cooties or something? I mean, I know the Japanese are huge germaphobes but come on now!! (No offense intended, it's actually a good thing!) And I have not heard back from them yet! They promise responses within 24 hours and it's been nearly 35 hours since I last sent it. (I didn't write the cootie part in the e-mail, just the fact that I wondered why not since I have never had problems in the past)

So I was actually thinking that I could get around it, by just having it shipped to my parents, and then just have them forward the package to me, but if I don't get an answer then forget it, I'm not gonna reward bad customer service!!

So now I'm scouting around to see if anyone else does shipping outside the US, it looks like "1-2-3 Stitch" does, and their prices look pretty reasonable...can anyone tell me if they have used this retailer before and if they got good/timely customer service? Or! If I can pay someone to be my "Floss Fairy"...lol...I could send you money to buy it and send it, if you are in the US it is just like mailing with in the US, there are no airmail fees or anything....I'm just sooo frustrated!! The craft store here, although they carry a good amount of DMC, for some reason NEVER have the color(s) I need! GAH!

Anyway, so that is what I am dealing with on the stitchy front right now!
I wanted to thank all the wonderful people who left me comments wishing me safety in our next typhoon! It actually went the other way!!! So, we have just had a little bit of rain, but that is it!

Also I am super excited for this upcoming weekend, it is my first weekend working on an SAL with Jules from http://julies-creations.blogspot.com/. We are both working on a piece called "coming home for the holidays" and although she is quite a bit further along in the project than I, I suggested we do a SAL, in hopes that it would motivate me to work on this project a bit!! So, we will be sharing our progress next week on that!

Well, I finished another Christmas Card but this is already a really long post, so I will be posting it in my next post!
Thank you all for stoppin' in to say hello, I love all your comments!! and I am also enjoying hitting up your blogs and leaving notes here and there as well! And Also a friendly Hello to my new followers!!!

Til next time: Joyful Stitching!!

Hiding...

From all your blog rolls, that is!! Stop it, I tell you! Stop blog rolling all this wonderful stitchy blogginess! Don't you know, there are only 24 hours in a day?! And everytime I look at someones blog, I try not to, but sometimes, I can't help myself, I take a peek at their blog roll to see if there is someone I HAVE to keep tabs on, and my google reader is just getting FAT!! It needs to go on a diet! So for the love of my sanity!!! STOP posting all those lovely blogs! I don't have time to check them all out and that makes me sad! What if I miss something?!

I'm soooo kidding, of course!! This blogging thing is just about as addictive as the hobby itself! LOL...I love reading new (to me) blogs, and I keep finding more! It's a never ending journey!! LOL

Well, I wanted to also say I hope everyone out there on the east coast are doing all they can to stay safe from Irene! Don't try to be a hero, EVACUATE if they tell you to!! Do whatever you can to stay safe!!!

And while you are all batteling with Irene, we have a(nother) Typhoon on it's way here to our tiny Japanese island as well, slotted to hit on Tuesday or/and Wednesday...so we'll see what this one does! The last one took over 53 hours to pass through. During which we were all house bound....obviously since what idiot would really be out and about in 115+ mph winds? Hopefully no one!

I am going to be anxiously checking my google reader to hear from those of you on the East Coast, and knowing you're all ok!! Now go be safe!!

So much to do, so little time to do it all in!!

While I have not been blogging, (writing posts or many comments) I HAVE been stitching! Here is a finish on my first Halloween piece that will become a Card for some lucky person! Ha ha! This was fun and pretty easy to do!


And here is progress on Howling at the Moon:

Sorry for the uncropped picture! I don't know what happened, I edited it when I downloaded it but when I went to put it up only this one was in my pictures. I also took one of the whole thing with the additional part, but it is sideways, so I will just wait until next post to share it...

I have been really busy. I am trying to get more reading and stitching in, and with my daughter, who as she is getting older is harder to keep happy...she seems to want momma's undivided attention every minute she's awake...soooo...I can normally only stitch or read during her sleeping hours, which it's great that she sleeps all night, but I gotta sleep then! So it leaves me with about 6 hours to myself, between naps, and her bedtime at 8 pm, to do anything I want/need to do, and I have been trying to work out more now too, so I gotta get that crammed in there somewhere, and this past weekend, it seemed that everyone and their brother wanted to hang out with us! So, stitching and reading has gotten set aside, but I am still getting a bit done, but I just have been not on the computer as much, as when I sit at the comp, I get that itchy, naggy feeling that I should be doing something else with my time! So, I haven't really taken the time to write many comments, or here blogging, haven't hardly been on FB at all, just to answer direct inbox messages, or respond to stuff people leave for me. I'm seriously thinking that next year I'm gonna get rid of my FB account all together, but I'm conflicted in that that is basically the only way I am able to share my daughter with my family back home.

Oh well, if what I hear is true, a hacker is supposedly gonna "kill Facebook" on Guy Fawkes day anyway! (we'll see about that!) Then I'll be free to stitch and read with out guilt! LOL Hope you are all having a wonderful week! Thank you all for your encouraging comments, and for my new followers: Welcome!!

A Finish and some Progress!

Here's my progress on page 9 of Howling at the Moon. This is a close up of JUST what I've done on 9. And here is the whole thing with the new part on page 9. This page is really coming along pretty quickly. There are alot of large sections of the same color, so not alot of confetti stitching here, which I would guess attributes to it being so quick to stitch!

Here is my snowman piece finished. This is going to be a Christmas card, I love snowmen and think this is sooo cute!

So, that is all here for today. I have been so good in turning off the computer and really putting time in my stitching and reading this month.

So far I have

- Finished reading three books

- Finished stitching Page 6 of Howling at the Moon
- Finished stitching 2 cards

So, not bad so far, for it only being barely in the double digits of the month!! I wonder if I can finish page 9 this month? I don't want to get my hopes up... I have been battling depression alot lately so I spend hours a day doing absolutely nothing, laying in bed, because I just don't have the energy or the care to do anything at all. Well, that's it for me for now, I will post again soon!
I started my first Halloween card today so maybe I'll have a finish on it next time I post!

A Finish!

I finished the card for my parents! Look at the little bride's necklace! I made it out of a string of seed beads! The pattern originally called for French knots, but I totally suck at those, so I thought why not just use a string of beads. I think it came out cute!

Yay! We made it through Typhoon Muifa without a scratch! It lasted 52 hours long! During which we were house bound! But! We were some of the lucky ones...some people we know were without electricity (and still are) for HOURS! And we only lost power for about ten minutes this morning at around 7:30. Some people have flooding, we had none. We were very lucky! Thank you again to everyone who sent us good thoughts and prayers!

Category 2...

Our super Typhoon is loosing it's super powers...it went from a Category 4 to a 3, and now we are at a steady 2! The last one we had was a 2 also and while there was destruction, the lower the Category number, the happier, and safer I'll be!

And I still need to share progress on Howling at the Moon! I will, I promise! Just things are kinda crazy right now with this storm coming, whenever I go on the computer I'm just looking at the weather and tracking this storm. Plus I don't know if you've ever been in a situation like this, but if you have you know there is a certain amount of nervous energy that gets stored up.So, I find that I have not been able to settle to do much of anything, can't read, or stitch, I just pace alot or dabble in mundane house chores, and then check the computer again. But now that it doesn't seem like it's gonna be so bad, maybe I'll be able to get some things done.

Thank you again for all your good thoughts and prayers! They are greatly appreciated!