In extremely exciting news, my very own Woot Bag o' Crap is FINALLY on its way!!!

They had some sort of massive backlog with the Woot-Off, so it's taken them this long to ship out the Bags o' Crap. I'm somewhat disappointed in Woot. This is not the first time they've had a Bag o' Crap during a Woot-Off, so I don't know what their deal is.

Not to mention that my card was charged way back on 9 June for the Bags o' Crap. I know it's only $8, but it's the principle of the matter -- they're not supposed to charge your card till it's shipped. Or at least right before they ship it, anyhow.

So my Bag o' Crap will be coming next Wednesday!!!!! WOOO!!!

I'll let you know what I got when it comes.

Cross-stitching is a dangerous hobby, did you know that??

So here is where I am so far on my Peaceful Countryside project:

As you can see, I have the middle part of the project finished. Now I'm going upwards to work on the hills and the church that is there, but you can't see it because it's done in white, and white doesn't show up on ivory cloth very well.

Sunday night I was busily stitching away as I watched tv and Kurt finally got some computer time in. Poor guy -- he's a total computer addict, and when he's underway he doesn't get any decent computer time because they don't have enough recreational computers on the ship! Plus he's been working so hard that he hasn't had time anyhow. He sat down at the computer on Sunday and said, "Whoa... how does this thing work again??"

It was funny.

So I was stitching away, and I went to weave the end of my thread behind stitches I'd already done to tie it off. As I pushing the needle through some particularly tight stitches, I hit something that just wouldn't give, and my needle ended up embedded in my thumb. Not the sharp end of the needle (I am not using a cross-stitch needle that's rather blunt; I'm actually using a sharper needle), but the dull end where the eye of the needle is. And it didn't just skim the top few layers of skin -- the darn thing stabbed me down into the meat of my thumb.

Owwwwwwww.

Monday morning it was sensitive, but I could still deal with it. Tuesday morning it was infected, so then I did a bit of minor surgery on myself to try to open it up enough to get some antiseptic and antibiotic ointment down in there. But then I made meatballs for dinner, and my band-aid wasn't going to stay on anyhow, so I had my hands full of raw ground beef. It still hurts a bit, but it doesn't look infected. It should be all right in a few days.

Then last night I was stitching away (it's not like a minor wound like that is going to keep me from my obsession!), and again I was tying off a thread when the darn needle got me in the middle finger on my right hand. I have a callous there for just such a reason, but it even punctured the callous! Fortunately it didn't bleed or anything, and it's nearly healed already.

I tell you what, though... trying to stitch with a wounded thumb and a hole in one's middle finger is not easy to do! Every time I tried to tie off a thread, I was injuring one finger or another.

The things I do for my passion! :o)