Back to School Time Again

Hullo Hullo  lovely people,  hope you are all well and good out there in your various parts of the world. We are here, despite the week or so delay in updating.  But life happens as we all are well aware.

Now let's start with the heading of this post - no, I'm not going back to school - I have neither the time nor inclination for such things at this point in my life. I do however live in the heart of "studentville" and they are all well and truly back for the year. Lectures start next Monday and O Week started today - neighbours on the right are listening to NZ pop and the ones on the left are listening to classic rock. Upside that both of them this year seem to have listenable taste in music, but the combo of the two clashing genres defiantly has me reaching for the headphones for the first time this year. The price I pay for city living.

Because of the arrival of the students, I have been all over the place - which is also the reason I've been a bit quiet. The bosses wanted the new cafe up and running - which we managed, just, opening last weekend. As a result the bakery has been left to look after itself, which in reality we should be able to do,  but if you've ever worked with people you'll know as well as I do that hearding cats would be an easier profession most of the time.  I was also foolish enough to volunteer for market shifts like some kind of crazy workaholic.

What this means is that lots of projects have been worked on, but not a huge amount of progress has been made of any of them. Hyperactivity is a symptom of stress I think.

I do however have a finish - most exciting. 

New Zealand Map, by Heritage. I very fittingly finished this on Waitangi day. The pattern had also charted the text ' New Zealand' in the bottom right and the coat of arms in the top left, but I left them both off (as you can probably see, despite the terrible photo). As unpatriotic as it sounds,  I don't particularly like our coat of arms, and I figured I could remember what country it's a map of.

Then this is where the ADHD kicked in.

I tried one of my HaEDs, but only lasted half a row.

So then I tried my kit from China, but again only lasted half a page.

Thought maybe I needed something smaller, so I  started a Mill Hill kit that I want to do for Mum, for Christmas.

It's going to be a penguin, not that you can tell yet. As you can tell, my attention didn't last long on that either.

So then I tried my Astrologer and was a little more successful with that.

It's still on he frame in the other room at least. 

I also dragged my Chatelaine out at one point, but I have decided to scrap that and restart it at some point on different fabric. While I can handle stitching on black fabric, I have come to the realisation that I do not like linen. It's not even and that drives me to distraction. Eventually I will get some evenweave for it. I do still really love the design, but it can go on the back burner until I get through some of these other big projects. I'm not planning to by stitch stuff until the end of the year anyway.

And while I have just said that I don't like linen, I did start another project on linen. Not just linen,  but 40 count. But it is only small and I don't want to waste the fabric I already have.

It is (will be?) The Bookshelf by Little House Needlework. 

Finally, on the stitching front anyways, I at least have been keeping up to date with my temperature book mark.

I did warn you I was all over the show this month.

Reading wise, I was a little more consistent, finishing four books. Kind of.

First was yet another book bub freebie - that this is dangerous I swear.

While I did enjoy this one, I think I did suffer from having too many points of view. Whether this is something that works itself out further into the series, I don't know, but while it was a decent enough premise, (zombie like plague forcing the human race back to the middle ages) it's not particularly high up the list of series' I need to finish.

Went back to my favourite authors with this one.

Dean Koontz is one of my favourite authors.  And I do particularly like his stories with religious overtones and the themes of good verse evil. This one defiantly fell into that category,  and while not quite as good as The Taking, still very good.

This one probably doesn't count as a full book, but whatever.

The Man brings then home when he finds them in the thrift store to try and finish off our collection. Both of us read them as kids - me loving them with every fiber. And they are still super fun to read.

And lastly I finished this one last night.

Again, this had a really good premise - what happens to the normal kids, when the heroes are out saving the town. I had, you doubts at first, but it really did come through.

I think that's about it for this time,  sorry it's a long one. I've got one evening shift this week, the touch wood, I should going back to normal. With any luck that means my ability to concentrate will return.  Hope every one else has very pleasant weeks, full of all you want them to be - I will do my best to be back next Monday to prevent another mammoth post like this one...

Till next time