WOW - Speechless...... AND......

Okay stitching friends.... to say I'm speechless is quite an understatement here. I'm thrilled, touched, honored, humbled, blessed, lucky and probably a lot more, but I can't come up with the words. This may get long, but bear with me.....

I have a stitching friend, Teresa, that I met approx. 5/6 or so years ago through Char OH, whom I met via Cross Stitch Pals about 10+ years ago. Teresa is one of Char's closest friends and they are both truly wonderful people. Teresa is an amazingly fast stitcher and has rightfully earned the nickname "Turbo Teresa" for her amazing talent at finishing so many LARGE projects so quickly. Several years back when Stoney Creek came out with Hummingbird Trellis, I fell in love with it as did many other stitchers. I decided I needed to stitch it, but not as an afghan, but on a large cut of linen. At that time, all I could find that would work was a 20 ct linen & to stitch it over 1. Fine, right? I bought everything & got started. This is as far as I ever got with it before it quickly became a UFO.....
I'm not even sure what year this was! lol

Anyway, Teresa had gotten it as well & was just stitching away, as pretty as you please on hers. Last time I saw it, it was really close to being done & I was happy for her & told her I was jealous too! Kept asking her (teasingly, of course) when she wanted to work on mine. She kept telling me to give it to her & early last year, she told me to send her mine & let her work on it. I argued with her but she kept telling me to send it. It got to the point where her mother even told me to send it to her. Well, I packed that sucker up with all these millions of skeins of DMC it takes (well, almost a million) and sent it to her. She was supposed to visit in the Spring & I thought hey, if she can get a bit done on it, maybe I'd get motivated to finish it. I'd feel so guilty that I'd have to stitch it since she put time & effort into it, right??

Well, look at what arrived in my mail yesterday afternoon.....

I truly wish you could see how amazingly beautiful this really is. The pic isn't very good as it's hard to get a close of up a design that's approx. 24" x 28" over 1 on 20 ct linen. The colors are so vivid and the stitches are so tiny. It's truly just stunning! I have no idea what I have ever done to deserve such a kindness from Teresa, but I hope to be able to pass the kindness along in some way, someday, though it may takes years & years! I do plan to do something special for Teresa, even though I know she did it because she wanted to, not because she expected something in return. She is truly a remarkable person and I'm blessed to call her my friend!

And btw, last Springs plans changed because we were building the new house & the schedule kept changing, so Teresa didn't get to visit then. I'd thought I'd see her in Oct at the Pal Fall Fling but she moved from OH to KY & had to work.... so she just kept on stitching.... I NEVER thought for a minute she was going to finish it when I sent it to her.... but I'm so thrilled that she did & it will ALWAYS have a place of honor in our home. THANK YOU Teresa!!!!!!!