mail goodies and never too early for Halloween

Hello everyone, hope you all have gotten in lots of stitching time since my last post! It occurred to me that I have been negligent about showing some goodies which came in the mail recently,
so here goes--




This month I received two biscornus from the Please Pass the Biscornu exchange:



the first one from Bonnie is a freebie from a Russian blog (she did not say which) done with beautiful CC Bethlehem. The second, from Sheila, is a freebie from The Floss Box. Unfortunately I seem to have a terrible time getting decent pictures of these little things, but they are beautifully stitched and finished. Maybe some day I will remember to take photos of the ones I send out before they are packaged up, lol.





A while back I won a drawing from Marion of The Lake of Shining Waters blog in honor of her birthday. Marion sent this fantastic package--given my great self-control, I immediately dug in and stitched up the Plum Pudding Needlarts Bits of Blue as an Easter/birthday gift for a friend (I'd like to say I remembered to take a picture, but...). The Brenda Gervais designs are also really adorable--I had nothing from With Thy Needle and Thread in my stash before, and they are on my short list now!

I was also fortunate enough to win one of the many, many giveaways from Joyce at http://www.octoberfarm.blogspot.com/. I received the lovely milk glass candy dish on the right and then became enamored of milk glass--on a trip to my local antique mall I found the duck covered dish and had to add him to my small collection. I think both pieces are made by Westmoreland
but I am not sure of their age.





Finally, a little Halloween stitching. My DD left yesterday on a 3-day trip with her 7th grade class. She has been away from home before at sleepovers at friends' homes but never for this length of time, so I have been moping around reflecting on how quiet the house is without her, and how she will eventually grow up and leave for good, and there I will be, an old lady living alone with too many cats. So to cheer myself up I stitched up this little freebie from Primitive Betty's which will be finished up as an ornament for her upon her return. I know, we are an odd bunch--but she is a big fan of Halloween too, as well as of little black cats.



That's about all for now. I have been stitching a little on the BBD Anniversaries of the Heart pieces but mostly on exchange stuff, so no other stitchy pics. Thank you for visiting and for all past, present and future comments!