This week I have most of the week off work. I still have a mess of vacation time to use, and this is a great week to use some of it up.
I spent Sunday evening working on kitting up cross stitch projects for the new year and writing show notes for my last flosstube of the year. There wasn't much else to do since it was snowing. *sigh*
Yes, I know I shouldn't be surprised about snow. It is the end of December, after all.
What I woke up to on Monday morning.
I miss daylight in the a.m.
Photos I took when I went out to collect mail.
It sure was bright and sunny towards the end of the day.
Why I say we do indeed live in Narnia.
It's so nice seeing bright blue skies.
My road.
The back 20.
By the she shed.
Towards the end of the snow clean up my son stopped to take a photo of the sky (I assume) I thought it was such a sweet moment to capture that I quick grabbed my own phone and took a photo of him.
He's such a good boy.
Yesterday was a publishing day. The last one of the year. Once the day was done I went out and plowed and snow blowed the areas my hubby didn't do in the a.m. before he went to work. It's a good partnership. My son cleared off the back deck and front porch.
I worked like mad on Monday to ensure I'd get the rest of the week off work. Today was kind of a slacker day for me. Which was nice because I was feeling a bit sore from yesterday's laboring. I did record my last flosstube video of the year.
I pretty much covered what my crafting plans are for the upcoming year so I won't rehash any of that here.
I'm looking forward to the new garden season, continued improved health (fingers crossed). I've been a good girl and haven't gone to the seed websites and perused, or anything. It won't be long before the big box stores start hauling out the seed displays and I'm not sure how long I'll hold up then.
On the health front I've been gradually improving in how I feel. If I over exert too much I flare up for what feels like forever, but it is getting better. I'm feeling optimistic.
I've been thinking of changes in the workplace that will be coming our way. I work in an industry that is changing and we need to change with it. There's been a lot of uncertainty for several years and things have finally peaked (If that's the right way to describe it) There are a lot of different emotions going on with all of us. But if the end result is what I hope it will be, that will be a really great thing. I've been at my place for work for almost 23 years and I'd hate for the place to completely fold after being around for 72 years (Almost 73).
If the last few years have taught me anything, it's patience and trusting that things will eventually work out. Some things just take longer than you expect. *ahem*
In a nutshell, I recognize that next year is likely going to have some pretty big changes, but there will also be some great things happening, too. I'm not making any great plans for anything. If something comes up, I'll just take some deep breathes and think of the best way to handle the situation.
So that's my great and profound thoughts for the upcoming year.
Don't mind me. I'm over here thoroughly enjoying my time off during this oddball time of the year.
This was me out in the she shed a few days ago. My husband saw me out there and thought I'd appreciate a photo. I did. ☺️ It's not often I get out there and spend quality time doing this and that out there.
How are you? How am I? Well, I'm doing fine. I've been resting and relaxing as much as I can during this transition to the new Year.
2026. Wow. Back when the calendar year turned over to 2000 (Y2K) I don't think I ever imagined I'd see this far over on this side of the year 2000. Did any of us?
Crazy.
I know a lot of people are using this time to reflect on the past year and thinking about all they want to do in the upcoming year. I haven't done any of that yet. Not really. I have a couple things percolating, but nothing really definite.
Which is probably part of why I haven't written for a while. I didn't know what to write.
I do know that I'll be approaching the new year with caution. The last two years have been a bit of a beast on the health front. I tried to make plans and goals for the garden and my crafting. The universe laughed heartily at me, and blew up most of my plans.
So, yeah. ... I'm being cautious right now.
What will I chatter about?
I'll tell you what a good job Furby Jr and her boyfriend did guarding the gifts and making sure no one snuck a peek.
Christmas was a nice day for the three of us. It was a quiet day with good food. Such good food. Surf and turf. I know, totally not traditional. We are starting to make our own traditions now. And so far I suppose our tradition is to be non-traditional. Ha!
I've noticed a trend across social media. People commenting about how different the holidays are now for them. Kids growing up, moving away. It's an adjustment for them to not have a houseful of people.
We might sort of resemble that, a little bit. Our son is an adult. He's in a relationship and he wants to spend time with her, and spend time with friends. It's a new chapter in all our lives.
We all received lovely gifts. I forgot to take a photo of what I received. My SILs sent me garden things and a cross stitch book. My son gave me a gift card to Hobby Lobby. I don't mind say that he spoiled me something fierce with that gift card. I received a tablet from my husband as an early Christmas present, so I've been using that for a while already. What a game changer! (I can't remember if I mentioned it on the blog already)
What else ... I feel like the perpetual broken record ... "It's been quiet." There's been work, crafting, snow ... Flosstube, and not much else, really.
Oh! We *finally* received the new appliances. There wound up being a bit of drama around the delivery. Ugh. ... The appliances were set to be delivered on a Saturday. The coldest day of the year, so far. ... The delivery never arrived and there was no communication about it. It wasn't until I called customer service a second time at 3 p.m., wondering what was going on. Allegedly the delivery people called me 20 minutes after I called customer service the first time around 11 a.m. No. They did not.
To say we were annoyed with how the whole day went is putting it mildly. Especially that there was no communication about the delivery being rescheduled for a few days later.
Finally, *finally* the appliances were delivered.
The one delivery guy was pleasantly surprised at how *everything* was ready for them to make it as easy as possible for them to haul everything in.
While I was making general chit chat I was told the guy who was running the truck for the original delivery had his diesel gel up and ALL the deliveries that day were rescheduled.
After being without these appliances for a while (A week-plus without a stove) it was SO nice to have a fridge and stove again.
The chickens finally allowed themselves to be sweet talked in to going outside of the coop.
And once they were comfortable with being outside, some decided they needed to play supervisor.
I almost forgot the best part!
The girls have started laying! They were hatched out later in the season so it felt like it took FOREVER for them to finally give us the first eggs.
I did receive some fun mail in the last few weeks.
Coggie, over at The High Fiber Diet Podcast was clearing out some of her bags and I said I would love one. She sent me two bags from the retreats she used to hold, plus a little extra. So sweet of her!
Jessica, over at Lumi Stitch contacted me and said she wanted to send me an ornament. She also asked if I would be interested in a cross stitch kit that she had but decided she wouldn't have time to stitch. I said yes and that I think I already had a spot in the kitchen for it.
The ornament is beautiful. As I'm typing this I'm kicking myself for not putting the ornament up on the tree for a photo. Yeah, as I look at this again I realize what a horrible photo this is. Well, I'll be sharing this stuff on my next flosstube/podcast so if you watch, you'll see them displayed in a better way.
Since my last flosstube last week I basically stopped working on any projects except the crochet granny square blanket I've been working on as a CAL with Kat, at Stitchin With the Griffin. As mentioned in my videos, I've been slightly frustrated with some of the squares, so I've been swapping granny squares out that cause me fits.
Well, this afternoon I completed it!
Project: Granny Square CAL with Kat Designer blog post: https://www.madamestitch.com/2025-granny-stitch-sampler-blanket-free-crochet-along/ Started: October 2025
Finished: Dec. 28, 2025
Yarn: stash yarns
Colors: Mauve, gold, green, white
Hook size: 5 mm
I wasn't sure I was going to like this blanket once it was done. ... As I'm typing this blog post, I'm draped in the blanket.
Okay, my laptop battery is getting ready to die, so I suppose I better quick get this proofed and published.
As it often happens, I think of a good opener for a blog post and then quickly forget it as soon as I sit down to write.
Oh well. Say La Vee! (Yes, I'm being cheeky)
December is moving at a swift pace. I thought December would be chill-ish and I'd be enjoying the moments, as they came along.
As usual, I'm in awe of the date. How is it December 11? Until I looked at the date just now I thought it was the 10th, despite my saying the date out loud earlier today.
So, in that verbose way, I'm saying I've been busy. Ha!
Busy, and do you think I can think of all the things that have been occupying my time? Not really.
My life has been full of work, Flossmas, and snow.
I realized I didn't even post a photo of my tree yet.
And at night
Furby Jr., and her boy toy are in on the decor', too.
Yes, I still think of my girl almost every day.
The month started with snow. We've received more snow. Now the Alberta Clippers are hitting the area. One day last week we woke up to temps in the negative teens Fahrenheit. We survived. Barely. 😉
The other day I was outside, before my work day started, and shoveling snow, plowing the snow, and snowblowing the snow I felt I couldn't move with the plow. Surprisingly, it didn't take as long as I thought it would. I felt it the next day. It's been a while since I've labored like that. It felt good to move, however.
I do have a bit of excitement to share. People over a certain age will understand my excitement.
We decided to get new appliances! What we had worked just fine, but my husband found a good deal on appliances after Black Friday and we talked about it and decided to pull the trigger. Everything is set to be delivered on Saturday. Fingers crossed!
The stove has already been sold and gone. The fridge is still in the kitchen, sold and waiting to be picked up, (hopefully Friday or Saturday)
Yeah, we've been without a stove since Sunday. With all the kitchen gadgets we have it hasn't been too much of a hardship to cook. Though you do have to change the menu a bit and adjust how you make meals. There was one time where I felt like baking some cookies and quickly remembered I couldn't.
On the crafting front ...
Last weekend I received a box of goodies from a friend who I'd lost touch with several years back. She remembered the name of my blog and found my email and we've been writing ever since.
She's been doing some clearing out and asked if I'd be interested in some crochet magazines.
Naturally I said yes and said I'd pay for the shipping.
I've done a quick look through a few of the magazines so far. No deep dives until January. What I did see where some really pretty crochet patterns for doilies, tableclothes and other house items.
Last weekend was the Jingle Ball. The tech gave me some troubles on Friday. I ended up having a migraine on Saturday, so I barely logged on that day. Over the course of the full weekend I did meet up with some fellow flosstubers and enjoyed hanging out with them. I have all the other online retreats already marked on my 2026 Book of Days.
I did recently finish a cross stitch piece, and I've been working consistently on another piece.
DMC: Called for DMC 310, 321, 3031, 3818, 3822, 3852, 3863, 3865
I know I'm going to turn this in to some sort of pillow. I haven't decided if it's going to be a pillow or a pillow cover.
The chart is only available on the Etsy shop until the end of the month. Then it will be released during needlework market.
The other piece I've been working on is another Etsy find. I don't have any current photos of my progress, so I'll save that for another day.
This is what it looks like:
I've been posting nearly daily flossmas videos over on my Youtube channel. So if you are feeling impatient to see what my progress is, you can see it on my videos.
Speaking of my flossmas videos ... it occurred to me yesterday that maybe I should be posting the videos on the blog. It was one of those "duh" moments, where I can't believe it didn't occur to me sooner.
Should I? I mean the series is almost halfway done.
In the meantime, here's the most recent one. I haven't been loading the links on the sidebar since they are being posted so frequently and it takes me a bit of doing to link them.
However, it's hardly anything to link them in a blog post
I've been enjoying the videos and the daily chit chat on my videos and other people's videos. Despite the hecticness of it all I'm really enjoying the entire experience. It's going to seem so quiet once January rolls around. I was hoping this exercise would get me used to sitting in front of the camera and not have to psyche myself up before hand. Well, I'm still needing to psyche myself up before hand but I think I'm relaxing quicker once I get going and I don't feel quite so awkward. Will it last? Time will tell.
Once again it's been almost a minute since I wrote a life update. I swear, November JUST started and now we are at the beginning of December.
Well, we got our snow. All 18+ inches of it. It started Tuesday afternoon of Thanksgiving week. I think I was in denial about it actually appearing.
When we woke on Wednesday and started checking things out we were astonished at how much snow had fallen.
Looking out the back door, I had to make a quick path across the deck so I could get out to the chicken coop.
Then I looked across the yard to the chicken coop I had a moment of panic because I thought a branch had fallen on the right side of the coop.
It was okay though. Can you see how deep the snow is over there? In some places it was above my knees.
In the front of the house, my husband opened the garage door and saw his vehicle was encased in a shroud of snow.
With 10 inches of snow, before 6 a.m.
Later in the day we took another measurement, off my vehicle, and there was 18 inches of snow. *facepalm*
My husband and son tried to drive in to work. The roads were so bad. The plow had gone by once and there was only one path for traffic and roads were incredible slippery. They turned around and came home.
After a while my husband took the tractor out and took the snowblower on it's maiden voyage. Something that would have taken us the entire day, probably, was done in a few hours. Maybe. I sort of lost track of time and we had to go out more than once to move snow.
Course that doesn't do us any good if the roads are crap.
My son started clearing off the deck and front. I was taking care of what I could, which also included shoveling a little path to the she shed.
The garden looked a little magical. I hoofed it through the snow as soon as I could and cleaned as much snow as I could off the greenhouse.
My sweet little greenhouse survived the snow and wind.
So much snow ...
My hubby very kindly snowblowed a path to the garden area for me, so I'll have an easier time getting over there and cleaning the greenhouse off.
At one point when we were outside we heard a cracking sound, like something breaking.
We suspect we heard this branch break and fall out of the tree.
It was a heck of a way to start the long holiday weekend.
Thanksgiving day was a quiet affair. My son worked. My husband work on pushing more snow around. I worked on the big meal.
No photos were taken of the spread. By the time my son got home, we all decided we were hungry right then and we started getting stuff ready and plated. Then we dived in to the meal, listened to good music and had nice conversation. We all proclaimed the smoked turkey very tasty. I ate so much food that I went in to a food coma for 20 minutes.
Friday nothing really exciting happened. There was no major shopping to be done. We did drive in to town, though. At 7:30 a.m. we were at Walmart and it was like a ghost town. Menards was more busy. The golden age of Black Friday Shopping is passed. Everyone kept telling me that everyone is online shopping now. Superior doesn't have much for big box stores. All the shops are in Duluth, up on the hill. There was NO way I was driving to Duluth.
Today was back to work. It was publishing day and a bit hairy. Things usually are after a long weekend. This was something, though. We got it done.
I'd say that's pretty much all the news from Lake Woebegone. We have to get used to the snow being here, and the colder temps. I'm still tiptoeing out to the coop in my garden clogs. Warm, right? Every thing takes a bit big longer to accomplish.
I almost forgot to mention that today is the start of Flossmas, or vlogmas, which every you prefer. My first video is out.
I wanted to do flossmas last year. The timing wasn't right. I'm feeling more optimistic about it this year. I still haven't settled down on a schedule. Every day, every other day ... *shrugs* I have no structure about it. At least not yet. I'm betting that by the time this is done I'll feel totally at ease in front of the camera.
Thank you for watching my video. I am so glad you stopped by! If you like what you see, please subscribe and click the notification bell to be notified of when I load new videos.
I'm on Instagram: AmniconStudio
Email: AmniconStudio at gmail.com
***Cross Stitch ***
Current Works in Progress
* Neon Cicada
Started: Nov. 5, 2025
Designer: Bad Stitch on Etsy
Fabric: Black cotton T-shirt
T-shirt inspiration from Katherine @KatherinesStitchingChronicles
“All I want for Christmas is Bigfoot by Sambrie Stitches. She has a SAL starting Thanksgiving Day. Digital chart will be available on her etsy site until 12/31/25
