Monday, May 25, 2015

I did like cruisin' with Norwegian in the Carribean

Finally got my Photoshop Elements to work well enough to get photos for blogging, so I thought I'd share a few of the fun or unusual thing we loved on this trip aboard the Gem.
Best place in my not so humble opinion:  The Baths at Virgin Gorda. You can go though a massive collection of toppled boulders to get to a fantastic beach area.

There are some slippery areas and a few places that are a bit tight or require care when traversing, but it's not difficult to get through.

You do have to walk though some water, but this is as deep as it gets

Almost to the beach!


We made it!

I collect rocks from places I visit, but these had to stay.
Now for some of the unusual.  This family strolled onto the beach while we were there.

I'm pretty sure Mom was telling her chick to just ignore the rude tourists snapping photos here.

I'm also pretty sure that was not their blanket, but what do I know about chickens!

The islands seem to have a thing for letting their chickens roam freely.
Just hanging by the side of the road.
 Then there were the feral cats at Puerto Rico--not so many that it's annoying, but they were plentiful.

One blue eye and one green!  How cool is that!

Nothing wrong with him.  He was just stretching after a nap.
Iguanas!  I love them.  I wish we had them here.  Maybe I should move there. Yeah, I wanna live here, too.

Last, my favorite place and activity on the ship:
Sun, sea, comfy lounge chair, and my Kindle.  Perfect.
It's only been a month, and I'm ready for another cruise.

Sunday, May 24, 2015

And Another Graduation!

Yes, I am going to bore you with photos of my son Kyle's graduation with a master of divinity degree from Union Theological Seminary in New York City.

Precommencement picnic at Riverside Park.  That would be me, Jordan, Kiefer, Kyle, Brian, and Keegan with my sister taking the photo.

Kyle ready for his big day. Good to be a sewer who carries a needle and thread to fix that broken snap on the collar.
Union is as old as dirt apparently, 177th commencement!

Graduation was in a beautiful courtyard.

Kyle's room is in the center overlooking the courtyard.  Oh, how these students suffer living in a beautiful building in one of the most beautiful areas of NYC.

It's real when the diploma is in hand.

Back up again for the Julius Thomas Hansen Memorial Award.  They aren't told beforehand that they've won which makes it a fun surprise.

Al Gore won an award, too, but it pales in comparison to Kyle's for some reason...

Oh, yeah!  Now that is a real Kyle smile.

Future father-in-law Rick was able to come.  (Melissa, hope you get online to see this.  We will soon be welcoming you home from Mongolia for a nice vacation.

End of the day view taken as we were heading home.  I wanna live here.


Saturday, May 23, 2015

Agnes' Baby Quilt

Wanted to share a quilt I made for my son Kyle's goddaughter, Agnes.


The basic design is a combination of two ideas I saw online. I made a few changes, of course.  My over-sized pinwheel has soft interfacing to give the pieces body which helped with the name embroidery, too.   Look at those fun flaps!

The center circle has a quote from Shakespeare:  "Though she be but little, she is fierce."  Why?  Because I like the idea of raising daughters to be independent and fierce.

 I found "Agnes" ribbon on eBay--what??? Can you believe that?  What are the chances of finding that name on anything?

 Rather than wrap the quilt, I just tied on the ribbon.

Best part:  I actually got photos of the lovely lady on her quilt.  With all the baby stuff I've made over the years, this is the first time someone has sent a photo of the item in use.  Here's the lovely little lady sitting on her new blanket.



Love those little fingers and toes.


Monday, March 23, 2015

The Quest to Stop Cutting Corners--Or Embellishments in This Case

I am still working on my goal to do the extra embellishments on my sewing projects rather than rushing to get 'er done. I even got this mug to serve as a reminder.
 I'm getting better at this!  After finishing the first two pouches of this set, I thought, "I could have embroidered something on those."  These next two got some embroidery.
As I was finishing up these two, I remembered the box of lace and rickrack that I always mean to add to some project.  One more pouch to go.  It will have trim and embroidery and some kind of zipper pull.  Yes, I'm ashamed to say that I didn't even add zipper pulls until I started following Sandra, The Queen of Pouch Making's blog.  If you don't know Sandra, click on that link which will take you to one of her many, many pouch projects and note the glitzy little zipper pulls in particular.
Just in time!  I have to start packing for a cruise to someplace sunny and warm today.  Can't wait for some sunshine, warm temperatures, and someone else cooking and serving all my meals. 

I See Brown!


The river is still frozen, but look at that brown!  Mud season is just around the corner! We still have a lot of snow by our house, though.  It will take a while to melt down those snowbanks,
 but areas that didn't get that extra pile-up of snow are way down.  I am most interested to see how long it is going to take to melt that solid block of ice on top of the pool cover.
What a winter here!  It's been pretty sometimes,
 and it has been the best year for icicles EVER.
 The term "gripping cold" came to mind when I saw this one with it's two graspy little fingers.
Spring is, however, on the way!  Kyle, our son who lives three hours south of here in New York City, says they have some actual green there.   I held off on changing over the chalkboard from the St. Patrick's design to something for Easter as long as I could.  The deal was that I would remove the snowman if I saw even one crocus.  Didn't happen.  Unfortunately, with Easter arriving early this year and spring taking a particularly leisurely stroll northward, there is little chance that the snow will be gone for the big day. So here's the snowbunny wishing you a happy Easter from a still quite snowy northeastern New York!

Monday, March 16, 2015

Edgy Pouches and Bits of Bling

I finally got a bit of sewing done!  I had a hankering for some new pastel pouches for an upcoming trip.  Despite using a stabilizer on the lining and quilting batting to the top fabric, it was still looking a bit floppy.  I thought about top stitching the four corner edges for more stability. decided not to take the chance of ruining it, remembered my New Year's resolution to step out of my comfort zone, and ended up top stitching every single edge about 1/8th inch in.  I like it! 
Then I decided to try a square pouch. I only used a decorative stitch down the center for the batting on the top fabric which I regret.  I think more quilting would look better.  The pale thread for the decorative stitching was not a great choice since it's barely visible.  Won't do that again.  Love the edge stitching, though.
Also love the double bits of ribbon at the zip ends.

I tried out the new metal pieces I ordered for making ribbon key rings.
Yup, forgot to put the clip on the second one.  I was so busy lining up the extra piece of ribbon on top that I forgot the most important piece.  The metal crimps worked beautifully.  I need to find a little silvery charm for the hole at the top.  These key chains cannot, however, compare to the blingy key chains I ordered on eBay to use as zipper pulls for larger totes.  This first one is going on the bag I made with the Japanese fabric a couple of weeks ago.  Lucky Cat!
This batch arrived in today's mail.  OMG! I LOVE BLING.
This guy is my favorite.  I'm not sure of the meaning behind a frog with a lucky gold coin in its mouth,  but I find it particularly appealing. I shall let you know if he bring me any luck.
As for achieving the New Year's resolutions:
  • All the fabric, interfacing, and batting were from the stash ✔
  • used some of the  ribbon from my recent ribbon-buying binge✔   
  • tried some new things with the ribbon crimps, square pouch, and the edge stitching ✔