It's Been A While

It's been quite a while since last I saw the two eagles together. Try November 2012! I never ride into the neighborhood along the shores of Lake Conway without checking the "eagle house," and on occasion I am treated to the sight of one of our magnificent National birds. It must have been Monday morning that while riding up, I noticed one in the high pine tree and, you won't be surprised to learn that I pointed it out to a woman walking on the street. Stopping my bike I was gazing up at the tree when she, who had not stopped, called out that there were two..."come look here", she said. Well by golly....

Heading into the back yard, where the folks have given me permission to roam, I watched as they perched 75 feet above my head. Before long, the one on the right took off, followed shortly thereafter by the second one. Talk about good timing!!

It's also been awhile since Pam has sewn, however, after our visit to the quilt exhibit she left totally inspired to ferret out her long abandoned project. As in nearly twenty years of abandonment! During the time she and Glenn lived in New Zealand, she had every intention of making a quilt, going so far as to cut the pieces, however, that is as far as she got. Too, she thought her machine wasn't working properly, so I suggested she bring it over and we'd check it out together. Following a little tinkering Monday morning, she was off and running!

Because it had been so long since last she sewed, we agreed to start simple and small. Let me tell you, she took to it like a duck takes to water. Before leaving for the day she'd gotten this far.

Isn't it neat? The black adds so much drama! Wednesday she returned for session two, finishing the back and the machine quilting, leaving with not only satisfaction, but a thirst to make more. Sewing is so much fun to us, however, back when Isaac Singer patented the sewing machine it was used for more utilitarian purposes. You might be interested to know that one of his partners, according to the link I've provided, built the Dakota apartment building in Manhattan, in the 1880's, such was the wealth of the company. As well, the Singer building in NY was, in 1908, the tallest building in the world! In days gone by, every girl knew how to sew, whether she liked it or not. Today? Does any young girl know how to sew?

I remember when our pool remodel was completed in October 2010, there were tiny frogs on the beautiful new mosaic tile running along the top edge of the pool. Well, they were back in full force this October...

Actually, I can't be sure it isn't a toad, but anyway, the other day there must have been nearly twenty of them! Well, I don't know where they have gone, but we are once again frog-free. And did I tell you it has been sweltering? So much so that the pool temperature has been on the rise again. Warmer than our natural springs! Will it ever end?

Because my last post was so lengthy I called it quits before I showed you another neat place we stopped.

I'm not so sure I saw many artists, but there were lots of interesting things spread over two buildings. We visited only one on this trip as I was pretty well starving.

It may very well have been a while since last you saw only the front of a VW. Right? So, we went to Crate & Barrel last week to buy the wedding gift for this weekend's upcoming wedding. We saw a red cooler Bruce thought was pretty neat. Well, we saw the original at Trader Mae's.

Pretty much a replica at C&B, Bruce said the old guy was much better made despite the wear and tear. But you knew that, didn't you?

Perhaps I mentioned that the quilt show is spread over two venues? If not it is. We thought our friend Lisa was going to be in the area, so Pam picked me up, along with Jennifer, to start again at the show we saw last week. No need to worry--we loved it just as much the second go round. In fact, I wanted to show you a gorgeous quilt not pictured before. From what we could gather this is watercolor on silk, with quilting so wonderful it is hard to imagine.

Jennifer thinks she painted the flowers on the hand dyed silk, followed by quilting. Seriously so good.

Turns out Lisa was not able to join us, so after re-living our previous visit, we went the few miles over to the nearby Crealde School of Art, to see the remainder of the quilts in this really fine show.

Interestingly enough, or it was to me, the quilter of the above piece was formerly an x-ray tech like yours truly! Pam pointed out her use of our mediums color scheme. If you've no interest in quilts you may not be interested in the rest of this post, but perhaps you are interested, and want to go further?

Let's do it!

The thing is, it was hard to pick a favorite, and the truth of the matter is, why would we even try? Human nature I guess. The above, a Y pattern, consists of thousands of cut pieces and an amazing color palette, not to mention that it looks as if you are looking down upon loads of buildings set closely together. There's that dramatic black again. White too, adds drama...

As in the above middle quilt. Such an interesting and colorful pattern. On the right you see a huge, and 28 pound (!) quilt, made entirely of folded triangles attached to a king size sheet backing!! The quilt on the left was also made my hand...so amazing it is hard to imagine the quilter sitting for hours on end hand quilting the piece.  Whereas I am often too lazy to get up and go, I am grateful Pam finally gave up her gig at the Polasek museum so she can plan outings!!

As well, she drives us in her Chevy Volt. It's a good thing she had a good charge going because it has also been a while since last I sat in a serious traffic jam. In fact, the last one I recall was coming home from the DeLand Art Festival with Matt and Tom on Sunday with a packed vehicle from the show. First it was raining, dark too, and we were going nowhere on I-4. One of those times when you have no idea why traffic is not moving. I recall we sang some Christmas carols as it was the weekend after Thanksgiving. Last November I guess. Anyway, Tom regaled us with witty stories of the Christmas pageants of his youth in Britain, seriously making the wait somewhat tolerable.

I hope some stories I told this afternoon made the wait on SR 436 more tolerable for Pam and Jennifer. I felt it was my duty as I'd suggested the route as fast; we were planning on a visit to Wandering Stitches now that Pam has the bug. NOT TO BE. Jennifer had her iPad and checked the traffic delay, which was considerable by the time she looked. We inched our way for miles. According to the map, the traffic eased up when we got to Curry Ford Road. Well, now we know why that would be. It was CLOSED to traffic. Once we finally got to the detour to CFR, we had scrapped our plans to ogle at fabrics, instead heading home to care for pets.

Turning on our local news when I got home,  it seems as if there was a hit and run accident involving a pedestrian. Hideous.

It's also been a while since I've eaten, and so that's what is up next. Bruce is making a quick trip to Houston to pick out the granite for his Orlando job, leaving me to dinner for one.

Leftovers, here I come.

Gail