BUCKLE UP, BUTTERCUP. THESE GIRLS ARE PLAYING BIG GIRL BALL.

If you happen to live in these here parts and know Martin's Supermarkets, then you know that they have some of the nicest people you've ever met working for them.  One if my favorites happens to be a guy named Mike.  I call him Mike the Butcher because...well...he's a butcher.

So Mike the Butcher had occasion to meet Misses Charlene amd Jane on Saturday, and when I happened to see him again today he mentioned how happy he was to see that I a) had actually found friends and b) that these ladies looked like they were definitely out of my league in the smarts department.

(Mike the Butcher gets a pass, since he has a very witty sense of humor and was just saying these things to tease me.)

(At least I hope that's the case.)

Last night, though, I really started to wonder if I'm repeating the "Thunderbird that really looked like a deranged chicken" incident of 1984, when I returned to Chez Spinster completely exhausted from my day and evening with Misses Jane and Charlene and the ladies of the guild.

These are women to admire and adore, I tell ya, and there I am just hoping to somehow fit in and hang with them without completely embarrasing myself right into more of a hot crock pot full of mess than I already am.

Thus the comparison to 1984... Senior year at Lima Central Catholic High School.  For the big game against our arch rival Shawnee, my BFF Valerie Murino and I got the bright idea to charge the field before the game as a fierce Thunderbird (our mascot) defeating an Indian (their mascot).  We planned out a little skit demonstrating a battle of epic proportions, and although we imagined what would be today's equivalent of the Game of Thrones Battle for Winterfell, the result was...eh....not so much.

I enlisted the help of my cousin Brian to build the fiercely fierce Thunderbird costume, and given the budget (which was probably loose change I fished out of my car) and the time frame (which was probably about fifteen minutes), the end result was more..."large spray painted foam chicken head perched on the shoulders of a portly and hopelessly uncoordinated idiot who insisted on carrying out this little extravaganza despite the dire warnings of the band director, the head football coach, and most of the St. Rita's Medical Center emergency medical staff."

But I did it, kids.  I was determined to hang with my team and show my school spirit, and in the midst of all of this, hope that my bravery, athleticism, and fearlessness in the face of certain humiliation would be enough to earn me a spot at the table with the cool kids.

I gotta tell ya....the class of 1984 has nothing on my Guild ladies!  These are some wickedly talented, funny, smart, and lovely women.  And when it comes to stitching, they play in a league all their own. There are cross stitchers and needlepointers and beaders.  Some of these ladies also quilt and sew and knit and crochet...some are great chefs...some are hardcore bike riders or golfers...some are business women or teachers or accountants or nurses...and some are professional artists.  Most are moms or grandmoms, some are not, and some are wives or girlfriends or widows or exes.

And then there's me...adjusting my big foam chicken head and plunging head first into anything they've got going.  I don't know if I am going to be able to keep up, and I don't know if I'll figure out how to not be such a babbling numbskull around them...chattering like a circus monkey that got into the liquor cabinet, but at this point...I'm just thrilled to be invited to play!

Stitchy updates soon, I promise.  I've had a little hiatus, but am totally reinspired by all of the fun stuff I saw at House of Stitches (and by the two new projects that made their way into my shopping basket.)  I'm thinking that I will plunge ahead with Twilight and see if I can't get it completed this week, and then I think it will be time for some cross stitch!

Happy Futzingday, kids!  Do something futzy and come tell us all about it!

(Aren't you glad I didn't call it Hump Day?!)