Easter photos

(some pictures can be clicked on and enlarged, some not - I never understood how Blogger works, if you understand it, please let me know, I think it might be a codes problem when they are uploaded and in the way they are placed)

Easter brakfast - starters...

The Old town square in my hometown. I decided to show H. a fantastically restored cathedral and do the swieconka there. Shamelessly I'll copy a description from Wikipedia below:

Święconka (pronounced [ɕvʲɛnˈtsɔnka]), meaning "the blessing of the Easter baskets," is one of the most enduring and beloved Polish traditions on Holy Saturday.
Baskets containing a sampling of Easter foods are brought to church to be blessed on Holy Saturday. The basket is traditionally lined with a white linen or lace napkin and decorated with sprigs of boxwood (bukszpan), the typical Easter evergreen. Poles take special pride in preparing a decorative and tasteful basket with crisp linens, occasionally embroidered for the occasion, and boxwood and ribbon woven through the handle. Observing the creativity of other parishioners is one of the special joys of the event.

In the basket, we put a piece of bread, salt, boiled eggs, a piece of sausage, a sheep made of butter, a piece of ham - that's the basic version which some expand to their liking.

As a proof of the bad weather, the old town square was desert... at 1 pm...

The Fara cathedral - too bad I can't show nor find pictures online of the renovated interiors. They are amazing - dark, deep purple, pink and reds in gorgeous shades and styles.

More pictures from the Old Town

One of the symbols of Bydgoszcz, the monument for the victims of the II World War - a major point of my childhood. I used to visit the old town regularly with my grandparents on my tiny tiny feet, feed the pigeons, observe the fire burning...

In the background, the Town Hall.

A new attraction, Twardowski showing himself each to people gathered at 1:10 pm

Again, from Wikipedia:

According to an old legend, Twardowski was a nobleman (szlachcic) who lived in Kraków in the 16th century. He sold his soul to the devil in exchange for great knowledge and magical powers. However, Twardowski wanted to outwit the devil by including a special clause in the contract, stating that the devil could only take Twardowski's soul to Hell during his visit to Rome – a place the sorcerer never intended to go. Other variants of the story have Twardowski being sold to the devil as a child by his father.
With the devil's aid, Twardowski quickly rose to wealth and fame, eventually becoming a courtier of King Sigismund Augustus, who sought consolation in magic and astrology after the death of his beloved wife, Barbara Radziwiłł. He was said to have summoned the ghost of the late queen to comfort the grieving king, using a magic mirror. The sorcerer also wrote two books, both dictated to him by the devil – a book on magic and an encyclopedia.
After years of evading his fate, Twardowski was eventually abducted by the devil at an inn called Rzym – the Polish name of Rome. However, while being spirited away, Twardowski started to pray to the Virgin Mary, who made the devil drop his victim midway to Hell. Twardowski fell on the Moon where he lives to this day. His only companion is his sidekick whom he once turned into a spider; from time to time Twardowski lets the spider descend to Earth on a thread and bring him news from the world below.

The new attraction is especially popular among kids - first music is played, then Twardowski appears and bows to the public, then he hides while a terrible laughter is heard (the Devil)

'Bydgoszcz little Venice" - an absolutely charming part of the town, loved by all, with the river winding its way betwen a large park and old houses built 'on the river'. Still nice when I was a kid and used to have walks there with my grandparents, then left to abandon and devastared, then finally the new mayor decided to use EU and town funds to start restoring this gem. Of course i took pictures on a grey day and bad day and probably the charm is not immediately visible if at all for someone not from my town :)



A visit to my mother's, grandparents' and uncles's graves... (not shown on pictures). I meant to show all the flowers people bring for Easter...

My father and wife took 2 dogs from the local shelter last year. The 4 years old female is just the most beautiful mix breed I've every seen and she's just as sweet!

We took their 2 dogs and Happy on a long walk.... see the tangled leashes, we had so much fun!

Each headed of course in a different direction...


Streets around my father's...

Back home finally!

Oh, that was a busy Easter! And a delightul one! Where do I start, from the beginning? :)

I will be uploading many things to show today so please come back for several updates!

I received a gorgeous PS exchange from Sharon and a very cute PS fob from Milly!

And to top the good news, Nath in France got back the PS exchange she sent me some weeks ago - the number for my appartment was missing and our regular mailman is on a long sick leave, the one who replaces him does a very lousy job (basically, he delivers only a fragment of parcels and half the mail has to be picked up at the post office) and he (or anyone else who sent back the parcel from Nath) just didn't bother checking or asking where this 'name' lives. Nath is sending it back - and I am delighted it didn't get lost!

Also, a big order from the US that was undelivered during Christmas (again, I did not receive the first notice and when the second was delivred, I was in Norway) found its way back to the US after 2 months and I should receive it within the next 2 weeks. Double happy!

Post-surgery news: I am feeling super fine, no problems at all. Next week I have more tests and doctors to visit but all in all, enf of April I should have all the answers, diagnosis and decisions about how to solve this and that.
The day in hospital was so enjoyable, if I might say so, that I do not fear more surgeries if needed - small ones, I hasten to add! :) :)

For the bad news, this week my cousin's wife had a spreading spot removed under general anesthesia and while she will get the official result in more than a week, the oncologist/surgeon already informed yes that yes, it is melanoma. She's taking it fine as we all are despite the stressed thoughts we all have - we're waiting for the results and well, we cross fingers this will be treated and won't present a major problem.

Easter - well, it was an Easter in snow, ice pellets, strong winds, snow tempests. Unbelievable! We had -4 Celsius some nights. Next Monday, they're announcing +18 Celsius, so don't tell me that the weather hasn't gone absolutely nuts in Europe! :)

The stay at my father + wife was very lovely despite all the traditional preparations in the kitchen and all the dish washing. His wife has a stunning tendancy to use five times more the amount of dishes - well, she wants it elegant, but if you ask me, since half of it has to be washed by hand.... I've had more relaxing Easters :)

Judy, you asked about traditional dishes - well, this year everyone helped me and my diet and we didn't have huge amounts of food as it always was. I of course made stuffed eggs, different fresh dips and sauces, cheese balls in herbs and lots more. My father made lots of good main meals, pastry wrapped ham, some chicken specialties etc.

We took dog and cat with us for our travels. Kitty became sick after 5 min on the way to my hometown - I will spare you the smell in the car till we found a gas station, bought toilet paper, water wahed her sherpa and cleaned it well... we traveled almost 5 hours in car and she was sick most of the way. She looked so poor that I was in pain for her... She had saliva hanging from her mouth.... poor round, watery eyes... she didn't sleep one minute. Happy the dog was, as usual, happy or at least fine. I am not sure what stressed her that much. She's used to travelling - she takes the plane to Norway and back regularly without a shadow of a problem. It must have been a bad day - or she didn't do her "things" before we left home - but how do you force a cat, heh? ;-)

From my father we drove 2,5 h to my aunt and grandma - my paradise on Earth, as I always say. Grandma was 99 in January and now the changes start to be visible, while she still looks at least 15 years younger. But comparing to the last time I saw her before Christmas, she walks much more difficultly and needs a helping hand to put steps, her stick is not enough anymore. But she stills has good memory and I enjoy talks with her - when she feels for talking. It's easy to see that being that old is not funny for her.

Tosca was amazingly fine with all the cats (5) at my aunt. 18 months before she stayed there 3 months and made life hell for them. Now she let in peace the two oldest females which she used to hunt - and concentrated her efforts on the young one. One night we didnt sleep much at all with H. because the small one didn't want to leave our room and decided to go to war with Tosca. After the eventual loud meeting LOL! it was more silent till the morning.
The biiig dog had to be put to sleep last month and Happy was perfectly fine with the small female. He even started understanding that he should bark when someone is at the door!

Then, trip in car back to Warsaw, 5 hours... then we discovered that my 18 years old TV, a really good ol' friend, died of natural deaths... We went to bed at 1:30 am, got up at 7, were at the store at 8:30 am (I never bought any electronic equipment at this hour! LOL but I found ONE shop downtown that opens at 8), H. connected the TV set and a new DVD recorder (I love it!) within minutes, took a shower - 3 minutes, had breakfast - 10 minutes and at 11:00 we were already at the airport. Don't ask me how we did it!!!!

So it's been a very busy 10 days but it was such a good one. H. helped me so much so I could take it slow at times. And we had such a good, smiling, time together, laughing, enjoying the time together... :)

Watch this space for more updates today!

A relaxing day in bed

Not much happened today.


H. takes care of everything while I take it slow :)
I thought I took a good picture this morning but I need to retake it. I finished Tanya's nw freebie over one on 40 ct - it is so cute.

and I'll leave you with a picture of a Easter rabbit cake I made last week.

I hope my other PS exchange packages arrive soon... They should have made it to everyone by now! :)

All's fine!

Just a quickie to say a big, warm THANK YOU to everyone who emailed me with good wishes... All is fine, I am back home, the surgery and anesthesis were a good experience, to say it that way, now I just need to relax one week without doing anything much else than laying in bed (read: I'll stitch a lot! LOL), H. takes care of walking Happy, preparing food and being nice :)
I was absolutely overwhelmed by the kindness of the medical staff of all ranks.
Now, back to bed. Results in 3 weeks but I'm not going to stress about it.

Another giftie arrived home...

So I can show it below.

It's a busy Sunday - H. arrives tomorrow and besides regular work I need to deliver tomorrow morning, I have the rest of the cleaning, sorting, packing, some shopping to do etc. With the recent disasters (moths and furniture falling in the kitchen) I am well behind my schedule so I might have to sleep just 2-3 hours this night... ack. Before I head for the airport tomorrow I still need to go to the Town Hall to fix some administrative stuff so I have to leave around 8 am... H.'s plane arrives before 12... then some nice time together over a nice meal in town, probably, and the usual chatter after some weeks of not seeing each other - and then it'll be time to fall asleep and Tuesday - surgery. Double ack. The rest of the week is unsure yet - either my father will come in car to pick us up with cat and dog or we'll first visit my aunt (if my cousin is in Warsaw this week with his car) and from there to my father's. Lots of traveling... Anyway, whoever has not sent their PS exchange to me yet might have to wait till the 26th for news... I will be away as I announced previously. That said I'm certainly in Warsaw till Wednesday, so I hope Sharon's piece will arrive by then! :)

Can you believe? They're annoucing some light snow! Oh this climate... When I see all the snow in North America in March... and we had absolutely no winter in Poland and Norway... oh the weirdities nowadays.

Time to show Harmien's giftie... it's a PS piece, of course :) I was so PS-inspired this beginning of year :) Good thing I am not so fond of their summer pieces!

Some of you have already seen it in our PS group.

Prairie Schooler - from leaflet #17 Woodland Sampling

It's the first time I tried to attach my name's label this way :

Some goodies too... the rabbit insisted to bring some along, so how could I refuse? :)

PS spring exchange # 1

Now I hope the other four arrive fast too! :)

Here is the piece I stitched and assembled for Nath.

Prairie Schooler - Spring Fairy

It was a lot of work but I loved the result :) I know this spring fairy found a good home in France!

These birds ought to fly down....

Thank you sooooo much for your lovely comments! I love that piece and I will have a hard time parting with it. I want to offer it to H. :) so it won't be hanging on my wall. Hah! Elisabeth understood my problem with the borders...! Of course I suspect that a non-stitcher's eye won't spot these small problems that ME sees :)


I didn't resist uploading one more picture to show how the frame looks beautifully in artificial light...



And here are finally some pictures of the gorgeous biscornu I made from a chart Nath from France sent me for Christmas. I finished it off last week bt I had a very hard time making a good picture of it. As I wrote precedently, the colors and the style are extremely delicate and bad winter light makes it hard to present it well to your curious eyes :)

I am waiting to hear from Ela, Nath, Donna, Cheryl, Sharon and some person whose first name starts with an H ;-) that my packages to them have arrived. I so hope they'll like what I stitched and sent them!


Apart from that it's a busy week. Yesterday I had to do the blood tests for Tuesday... the surgery. H. flies in on Monday to be here to take good care of me and our furry kids :) Each time I have to have a blood sample taken, it's a small horror because not only my veins are not visible, but also my blood doesn't flow regardless of how much water I drink before and God knows I drink a lot on that day! And since I have to take blood samples twice monthly recently, I don't find it funny. I was now told to tell the nurses that it won't work the normal way and that they need to use a syringe to suck it up (sorry for the gory details!) from my arm or hand - in the latter case it hurts like smths, as you might well know. Anyway, the results will be ready to be picked tomorrow. I need to find time to have my hair cut also before Monday :)

With all that war against moths and then works in the kitchen, I am well behind the schedule with my pre-Easter cleaning! What happened in my kitchen is that one big, hanging furniture fell on the 'hooks' and started falling down very dangerously.. it could kill Toska who eats below it and create big damage anyway. Two men worked a full 7 hours this week as it proved more difficult to be fixed but they also fixed some halogen spots etc.

With all that I haven't yet had time to worry about that forthcoming surgery! :) I'll wake up fine, right? Right... :)


And here's a headstart on The Sampler Girls's new freebie. I am stitching it over one on 40ct LL - yes, I know, I am nuts.

Back from the framer...

I'm excited to show this piece framed.... I am not 100% satisfied with this framer's work, the piece looks "uneven", I mean the backstitched borders don't look straight. I am not sure if it could have looked better... I don't think these people look at it with so much detail... and maybe I am the only one who sees it :) Anyway, I love the way it looks framed and I think I chose the right one for that design.
ADDENDUM: The picture below really doesn't show it well. Click on it to see it enlarged.
Now, in the evening, in artificial light it looks splendid, the frame glitters beautifully :)
ADDENDUM2: The problem as I see it is that the framer stretched this delicate piece so that the tiny backstitches moved to the left, right, became distorted. But maybe it couldn't have been done better, I don't know.

Litterary little #4 called My Everything (W.H. Auden) by The Sampler Girl

GOOD MOOOOO-RRRR-NIIIIIIIIIIING!

For all sampler lovers

I just came accross this blog yesterday, it is fairly new and I love the concept. Spread the word if you can! See here: http://galleryofsamplers.blogspot.com/

Weather, weather...

It's just been very windy here, but no real disasters happened, no fatalities. Today the world looked beautiful from my windows - the sky was very dark grey while a strong sun was bathing building roofs... amazing sight. I took this picture thru the net in the window that is meant to protect Toska from falling out. While it is practically invisible from the inside, it looks like prison barrels on this picture, sorry for that :)

Finishing time...

I spent the major part of my Saturday washing my big furniture inside, putting more loads in the washing machine, packing more dry clothes in bag... I really didn't need these ^&%$%^#%$# moths right now! So far my apartment looks like a hurricane went thru it, but I hope I'll have the situation under control within a week. And in two weeks H. is coming and I have my surgery and then there's Easter, quite a busy schedule :)

We were supposed to be badly hit by the Emma hurricane but it slowed down over Germany and we just got strong wind but nothing too serious - this time.

In the afternoon and evening I spent xxxxxxxxx+++++ hours doing the finishing over the rest of the pieces. xxxxxxxxxxx++++++++++ hours more tomorrow and I should be done with that! I had some 'creative' ideas I am impatient to show you all :) I can't say what I used as materials... but I can reveal I *also* used beads, thermofliseline, cording and ribbons LOL!

There's one piece I am not happy about... hope that person likes it. There's something about it.... Oh well.

I've been sweating on two pieces today because I tried to put into reality some idea I had... they both look very nice :)

The only piece I might need more time to send would be Cheryl's... I might need Monday evening to put the final touch on it.

Hope you're all spending a lovely week-end!

I'll leave you with a very bad picture of what will become a biscornu after I add buttons on it. It is done on 40 ct and very very tiny - the ladies at my LNS couldn't believe I'd stitched that (yes, of course I had to show it off! - nah, seriously, I went with the stitched piece to choose the right buttons). This is a Tournicoton design I received from Nath. I'll have to do more than my very best to show it well once it's sewed because the colors are difficult to show well and and it's very, very delicate in style. I just LOVE it, Nath!

It'd be nice to be rich

...says me... sometimes... OFTEN when I see handcraft work done by talended people. If I had 120 usd to spend on anything, here's what I'd order. Hmmm..... That'd be 480 usd - for my 2 pets and the 2 others who aren't with us anymore... What a wonderful way to remember them...
See HERE.

Friday's nothing to say...

I've done the finishing on Nath's exchange piece yesterday, and to me it turned very cute :)
Thank you to all the new persons who visited my blog recently, it's such a pleasure to meet new talented people and find older acquantainces (waiving to Judy! - Judy, do you have a blog/web album now?)
Not much more to say today... I'll spend the week-end doing the finishing on the last PS exchange pieces so I can post them ASAP... and battle more with moths... I found a whole colony last week in the furniture where I hang my warmer clothes and have my pullovers (the moths found some very yummy). I decided to wash all the content of that furniture, my washing machine thinks I'm nuts, but about 8 loads more and I'm done with that. Then I just need to iron a lot :)

I just have to share this..

John Cleese (from the Monty Python) was hired to play in a TV commercial for a bank loan. Controversial for some, absolutely loved by most! The TV campaign has just started here. Watch till the very end :)