What a pro!

We live on a golf course and Jerry golfs our course a couple of times a week. Now, even though he golfs on a regular basis he is by no means ready for the senior tour. I believe he usually hits in the high 90's/low 100's for 18 holes.

Occasionally he will golf elsewhere and today was one of those days. He was participating in a charity tournament with a few friends at a course across town. Before leaving for the tournament he was complaining that he wasn't really thrilled about going. It was a hot day today and he doesn't really like tournament formats. It's a good thing he went because he got his first hole-in-one! I'm so happy for him.




When someone gets a hole-in-one they have to buy a round of drinks for everyone in the clubhouse. Luckily his foursome was one of the first finished and there were only a few people at the bar so it wasn't too expensive. He has also won what was described to him as an electronics package. Someone will contact him to give him more info about that.

I think I'm more excited for him than he is!

Memorial Weekend

The Memorial Day holiday weekend has become the traditional Pirate's weekend at the lake house owned by our friends Jim & Susie. This isn't the best photo of them, but it's the only one I took over the weekend so will have to do. (click photos for larger view)


The house is on Lake Gaston which is on the Virginia/North Carolina border. Jim's family has had a place on the Lake for years so I guess it was a given that he and Susie would buy a place there at some point.



They are located in a little cove which is nice because the big boats don't come speeding by constantly. It also made for a calm spot to go kayaking. Since I'd never been out in a kayak before, it was really important for me to be somewhere calm!



Usually there are 4 couples in attendance on Pirate weekend. Unfortunately, this year 2 of the couples were not able to attend and we missed them. Hopefully we'll be able to all get together again soon.

More California

I wanted to share a few more of the California trip photos. The morning before we checked into Asilomar for our quilting classes we visited the Monterey Bay Aquarium. It's a beautiful aquarium and I always made sure to visit every time I was in the Monterey area. I especially love the jellyfish exhibit.



Shortly before our visit they opened their new seahorse display. I had no idea there were so many varieties. Most of my seahorse photos didn't turn out very well. Luckily I bought the exhibit catalog and used some of the photos as inspiration for my class design.



Joanne looks like she enjoyed the exhibit doesn't she?



Earlier in the trip when we were still in San Francisco we made a stop in a sweet tea shop. Joanne and Karen had the traditional tea.


Frances, the good southern girl she is, had iced tea and I splurged on a mimosa. It was an enjoyable stop and a great respite after a full day of sightseeing.

Catching up

I didn't realize it had been so long since I last posted. Time just gets away sometimes.

I don't think I ever posted a photo of my project from the Empty Spools Seminar at Asilomar. My class was with Susan Carlson who does fabric collage work. The first evening of class she showed us how she works with small scraps of fabric. She suggested we might want to cut bits off of the larger pieces of fabric we'd brought with us. That put an image in my mind (and of others in the class) of needing to work with really small pieces of fabric.

When I began designing my seahorses I was using those small bits and really did not like the way it was turning out. It took me a day or so to decide that I needed to work in bigger chunks of fabric. Once I started doing that I was happier with how the work was developing. Here's what the work looked like in class. (click photo for larger view)



I finally put this back up on my design wall here at home this week and have begun tweaking it. Now that I can rummage through my entire stash I've replaced some of the fabrics with ones I feel work better. I haven't decided on the background treatment yet, but it will be in ocean colors. While in class I dubbed this George and Gracie. Don't know if that's what the final title will be, but that's what I'm mentally calling it right now.

Before and After

Remember this photo from way back 2 weeks ago? It was taken at the Charleston airport as we were waiting to board our first flight. Everyone looks so fresh and excited about the upcoming trip.



This photo was taken at the San Francisco airport last Friday evening as we waited to board the red-eye back home.


Obviously our nearly 2 weeks of sightseeing and sewing caught up with us. We were all exhausted.

It was a wonderful trip but it sure was good to get home!

Wednesday and Thursday in San Francisco

On Wednesday we decided to rent bicycles for a ride over the Golden Gate Bridge and into Sausalito. It seemed like a good idea at the time!

For 4 women that don't do much biking it was a real workout. We spent so much time walking our bikes up hills that we decided we had invented a new sport called Bike Walking. (click photos for larger view)



Don't we look a little cold? (l-r - Joanne, Frances, Karen, me)




Once in Sausalito we took the ferry back into San Francisco and enjoyed cruising by Alcatraz and seeing the Bay Bridge close up.

On Thursday we took a full day tour of the city and Muir Woods. We actually wanted to take the tour the first day we were there but that didn't work out. We saw some sites we'd already seen, but it was still good. We even got to go inside one of the famed Victorian homes.


I never visited Muir Woods when we lived in the Bay area so it was a treat to see. The redwoods are amazing.



Here are Joanne and Frances enjoying the beauty.




While walking through the woods we met 2 couples from Iowa that were really a hoot. They kindly took a photo of the 4 of us standing in this tree.




We then took a photo of them. I promised that I'd post the photo on my blog of the Iowa Winos (as they called themselves) and I also promised I wouldn't mention that one of their group had arranged for the rental car to be waiting in San Diego, instead of San Francisco!


One of the last stops on our all day tour was an overlook between Muir Woods and San Francisco. It was windy but beautiful.

San Francisco

We arrived in San Francisco safely late on Monday. Both of our flights were delayed because of bad weather in Atlanta, so it was a very long day.

Here are Karen, Frances and Joanne in the Charleston airport. Everyone looks so happy because we hadn't learned about the flight delays yet!



We were major tourists today. It was very windy and chilly - especially along the waterfront. No trip to San Francisco is complete without spending time at Fisherman's Wharf.






We also took the required cable car ride to Union Square and bought chocolate at Ghirardelli square. Through out the day we saw our share of the unique people that make up San Francisco. I think my favorite was the man earnestly playing his violin - but it had no strings. The only sound coming from his instrument was that of the bow rubbing against the bare wood of the violin. The panhandlers are getting more honest. One fellow's sign said "please donate to alcohol research." Ahh...San Francisco...there's nothing like it.

California here I come...

Tomorrow I leave for California with Karen, Joanne and Frances. We will be spending 4 nights in San Francisco and then 2 nights in Monterey before checking in at the Asilomar Conference Center for 5 days of classes at Empty Spools Seminars.

My class is Fabric Collage with Susan Carlson. Karen is taking a class with Janet Fogg and Frances and Joanne are taking a machine quilting class with Jill Schmuacher.

It was really hard to pack my supplies for this trip because I wanted to bring my ENTIRE fabric stash. I would have had to charter my own private plane to do that. I'm sure I'll get there and realize I have all the wrong fabric for my project, but I'll just have to make do.

Yesterday some of the TTT gang went on an outing.



It's sometimes like herding cats to get the group together for a photo. In the back (l to r) are Frances, Virginia, and Betsy. In front are Maureen, Joanne, Sheila, and Karen. Missing from this photo are Janice, Cindy, me, Judy and Jolene. Someday we'll get the entire group together for a photo!

Birthday Boy

Today is Craig's 36th birthday. I have no idea how he got to be that old!

In honor of the day I thought I'd share some photos of his early days in Scotland. He was born in Dunoon Scotland and we lived there until he was 18 months old.

This was his first professional photo. His hair looks like it had a red tinge in this photo but it was just the way the color was adjusted.


I knitted this blue bunting while I was pregnant. I sure was taking a chance making it blue because back in the old days we had to wait until the baby arrived to find out if it was a boy or girl. We brought him home from the hospital in this bunting.


We had a traditional British pram for him and it got used on a daily basis. Because our fridge wasn't much bigger than a dorm sized fridge I would have to grocery shop nearly every day. In the pram Craig would go and we'd walk to the shops in town. Most of the shops were quite small so prams would not fit inside. The prams would be left outside the shop (with the baby still inside) while patrons were inside shopping. Often you'd see someone leave the baby outside but bring the dog in.


Happy Birthday Craig!

Lax blogger

The QuiltArt list has been talking about blogging and whether most bloggers end up quitting after a short time. The conversation made me feel guilty because I know I've been slacking off on my blog lately.

I'm always of the belief that without photos nobody is interested in a blog, but I haven't done any new work lately so don't have any quilting photos.

Instead, I'm posting a photo I came across as I was cleaning out some files. This is Mark, the best man at our wedding in 1972. Isn't that 'suit' just too much? the jacket was that heavy double knit polyester. I'm especially grateful that the pants were not of the same print! (click on photo for larger view - if you dare!)




We had an open bar at our wedding and it looks like Mark is taking full advantage of the situation. He probably was trying to drink away his shame at wearing that outfit!

A day in the life of Hayden

Hayden had a busy day today.

For lunch she had some spaghetti that was left over from Noah's visit to an Italian Restaurant. I thought the noodles had all been cut up before I heated it. Guess I was wrong.



She was modeling her tutu when she came across a magnifying glass. She spent a lot of time examining everything within reach.



She decided she needed a closer look at my camera while it was in use - which made for a neat photo.

3 weeks and counting

In 3 weeks I leave for a trip to California along with 3 others of the TTT gang. We will fly into San Francisco and be tourists for 5 days. We then will drive down to Monterey and play for a couple of days until we report to Asilomar Conference Grounds for 5 days of classes offered by Empty Spools Seminars.



When I lived in California I was able to attend a session of Empty Spools every year. I knew that it would be the thing I missed the most when I left. I'm so excited that a group of us is going to be able to go. The other 3 have never attended so I hope their experience will be as great as I keep promise them it will be!

I'm so looking forward to the trip and to seeing the beautiful scenery again.






Now, if I can only figure out what to pack for my class. In the past I could drive to Asilomar so I could bring half of my fabric stash if I wanted. How I'm going to get all the fabric I want into a suitcase is a dilemma.

Blast from the past

I recently came across the email address for an old friend. Dave served aboard the USS Canopus with Jerry back in the early 70's while it was tied up in Scotland.


We made good friends during that tour of duty - some of whom we still hear from at the holidays.

Dave emailed me this photo which was taken at a department picnic in August '73. I'm on the left, the middle is Colleen and the right is Jeanne. The little blond boy in the front is Coleen's son. I can't believe how young I was. And that hair! (click photos for larger view)




Jerry is on the right in this photo. He sure was skinny!




What fun it was to see the photos Dave sent.

Lazy evening

This is how Grandpa and Hayden spent part of their evening last night. I'm not sure which one of them fell asleep first! Aren't they sweet?

Back from retreat

I've been offline for a number of days for two reasons. One - my laptop died a week or so ago and I just replaced it today. Two - the TTT (Tuesday Thimbles and Threads)gang just spent several days at Camp St. Christopher having a mini quilt retreat. The 12 of us started laughing on Sunday when we arrived at the camp and we didn't stop until we left for home on Thursday morning. What a wonderful group of friends I have!

St. Christopher is located on the barrier island of Seabrook Island and we were able to enjoy our ocean views from our sewing room. Several nights we had beautiful sunsets. (click photos for larger view)





I brought a couple of projects with me.
These colorful stars were a kit I purchased at a shop in Tenn. I don't usually buy kits but this was on sale really cheap, so I went for it. Karen suggested that I alter the kit plan by adding wonky black borders around the stars. I think it's a good idea, so I plan to do that.




I purchased this next kit several years ago at 50% off from an on-line source. It calls for much more complex piecing than I usually do. I spent the last day of the retreat tearing apart 20 blocks because I'd put them together wrong. Very frustrating, but I think the end result makes a very sweet quilt.



It was a great week!

The height of style

This is a photo of my nephew Eric and his wife Melissa. I snagged this photo off Eric's facebook page...or was it Melissa's? Anyway, isn't it a hoot? I particularly like how the color of the hat coordinates with Eric's tie.



I found a source for the Aretha hat but can't figure out how to photo shop it onto a photo of me. Probably a lucky break for anyone who stops by to read this blog! Eric & Melissa make much better hat models than I would.

What not to say

A member of my guild splinter group passed away the other day. It wasn't unexpected as she had cancer.

Several of us went to the visitation at the funeral home last night. After paying my respects to one of Marge's sisters she said "thank you for coming." Old foot-in-mouth Corky immediately responded "thank you for having me." Well, could I have said anything more stupid? When will I ever learn to think before I speak??

Celebrity look alike

Who do you look like? According to the website MyHeritage I look like these celebrities:



Not sure how I feel about some of these people, but I'm afraid I do see a bit of resemblance between my photo and Roseanne's.


Here's Jerry's list of people:


I see less resemblance here than I do with my matches.

Who do YOU look like?

Do you want a scoop?

We owned the world's oldest ice cream scoop. It was of some odd metallic material that seemed to rub off the scoop onto the ice cream. Most unappetizing. The last time we had ice cream I told Noah that on the next gift giving occasion I sure would like a new ice cream scoop. Well, for my birthday I received not one but EIGHT ice cream scoops! Craig said he visited a bunch of kitchenware stores in the area to get a proper assortment. (yes I know the smallest one is probably really supposed to be a melon baller, but it's the perfect Hayden sized scoop.)



We tried out several of them to scoop the ice cream to go with my birthday cake. (click photos for larger view)



If you ever need an ice cream scoop, give me a call. I can probably help you out!

Birthday girl

Today I celebrate my 57th birthday. My brother Claude left me a happy birthday message this morning and stated he knew that it was a significant birthday what with me turning 60. He thinks he's such a card, but all I have to do is remind him that he's 4 years older than me and that usually shuts him up.

Here I am blowing out the candles on some long ago birthday cake. That's my good friend Liz on the left with the birthday hat on. I'm pretty sure the guy on the far right - the one in the striped shirt - is the aforementioned Claude (you know, the guy that will always be FOUR years older than me.)(click photo for larger view)



Liz and I both moved out of Detroit as adults and it has been years since I've seen her. Liz, I know you've visited my blog in the past and if you're reading this, please drop me a note. I miss you!

My big plans for the day are to eat junk. I've been dieting for several months but tonight I plan to have pizza and cake & ice cream.