Manly Stitching

Hello All!

I hope you've enjoyed a long, long holiday weekend as nice as the one I've had, which in all honesty has been spent completely at home. I haven't left the house since Thursday, and I'm as happy as a clam about it. I love going out on the weekends and having fun little adventures, but I love staying at home burrowing in just as much. We've watched the first two seasons of The Walking Dead, I've stitched a TON, we've made great meals, and quality time with my critters. Last night one of my best friends came over and we belatedly celebrated her birthday with some delicious Skip & Go Naked's. I slept in late today, and now, I'm making what promises to be some killer bbq sauce, from scratch, and chatting with you fine folks while Ferris Beuller's Day Off plays in the background. Yes, a very good weekend, indeed.

Speaking of birthday's, my hunny had his a couple of weeks ago, and I made him a little something that I thought I'd share, continuing two recent themes at once, the red, white & blue, and hexies!

I made Sean an oversized hexie mugrug with ice hockey motifs, his favorite!

I had everything I needed to make this in my stash and I whipped it out in just a couple late night sessions after he'd gone to bed. It was pretty straightforward to make, seven hexies arranged just so, stitched on to a piece of red craft felt and trimmed, then the red felt was stitched down on top of a piece of dark brown, wool blend felt and trimmed again. All top stitching and all by hand ♥ Cold beer in the hot summer creates a lot of condensation, but I'm fairly certain no drips will get through all of these layers to the wood of our tables, yay!

I don't know about you, but I always find it a really big challenge to make things for my guy. I mean, I make lots of things for lots of people, but I rarely make anything for him and after conferring with a couple of my girlfriends, we decided that the simple answer as to why is this: making boy things is hard.

Cute? Pretty colors? Easy. Masculine, clever, relevant? Harder.

Anyway, I think I succeeded with this little make, he's used it everyday since he opened it. 

She shoots, she scores!!

So what did you guys do this weekend, anything exciting?

oxo,

Lisa

Georgia On My Mind

Hey Y'all!

Sorry it's taken me so long to get this post up, there's something about editing a ton of family photos, then picking through them to see what goes here on the blog, what goes on Flickr or Facebook, who gets tagged, etc. that I find daunting, so I freely admit... I've been dragging my feet. We're all guilty, right? 

So! We went to Georgia last week  a couple of weeks ago, it was a quick trip to visit family and get a peek at the deep south. We visited Augusta (where our family lives and where my niece is stationed at Ft. Gordon), and Savannah. Since we were only going to be there for 3 days, and mainly to see family, I knew we'd barely get to skim the surface, but as per our usual style, we crammed it in. 

It was so good to see my nieces again! Alex has been serving in the US Army for the last three years, and almost 2 years ago, Ana moved to Georgia to be near her. I love & miss these two. Our first day in Augusta, Ana played tour guide and we visited the downtown area, along the river (she tells me those houses back there are in South Carolina, not Georgia) an old cemetery (love those!) and cruised around some of the older, beautiful neighborhoods of Augusta. It's hard to get good photos from the backseat of a moving vehicle though, so instead I just soaked it in.

I really liked the look of this little old house and tried to get a good shot, but again... moving vehicle. Bah. 

Now, that's what I call four wheel drive! Living in the breadbasket of California, I'm pretty used to seeing all sorts of large farm equipment, but generally, not on the highway. Something that struck me about Georgia, was how green & lush everything is, and from what I understand - year-round  It's so pretty, there are so many trees, so much open space. Very unlike California. Not that there's not a lot of open space in CA, there's tons, but unless it's landscaped, or irrigated, the wide open spaces of my beloved home state aren't green, or if they are, it only lasts from March to mid-May when things heat up and everything turns brown. 

Savannah! We only had one afternoon, so we did the best we could and walked everywhere downtown and along the River Walk.

A cookie bigger than his head. Yes, my husband was in heaven.

Alex was in heaven too, this kid loves candy! We found some great stuff at Savannah Candy Kitchen. 

Alex & Ana goofing with my camera.

My first glimpse of Spanish moss,

What an eerie and beautiful plant. 

Commemorating the 250 year anniversary of the founding of the colony of Georgia and those Georgians of Irish ancestry for their contributions. It was not lost on me that Jaime & Claire made their first landfall in the United States in Georgia at the end of Voyager, I kept daydreaming about them as we passed along some of the older parts of the city. Such a nerd.

The gaslights along this stretch of buildings was very pretty.

Sean and I... and a rouge photobomber.

The Savannah Cotton Exchange

I love this kid. 

Another stumble upon that we encountered was The Lady & Sons, Paula Deen's restaurant! We weren't hungry for a full meal, and we didn't have reservations anyway, but I thought maybe we could grab a bit of desert, and seeing as how we were in the peach state, I wanted something like that. I got a piece of peach cobbler, and Ana got a bit of the Gooey Butter Cake to go. I had high hopes, I mean, Paula Deen! Unforch... is wasn't very good. Bummer. 

But girls, I ate alligator!! And ya know... it wasn't half bad, but I don't care what anyone says, it does not taste like chicken.

The River Walk in the evening was lovely, and this guy, wow, he could sing!

We took a ghost tour! Most of my pictures are rubbish, but I managed a few, like this one of our (hunky) tour guide, Don.

And this one of Sean getting the jeebers! All the lights on the EMF detector lit up. Hehehe... It's silly.

Speaking of silly fun, the last place we visited in Savannah was the Moon River Brewery. What's so special about that? Well, lemme tell ya... Ghost Adventurers! We love that show, those guys can be so corny and scare the pants off of themselves, they filmed an episode at this location. Although... sometimes I admit, that show gives me the creeps, but it's all in good fun.

All in all, it was a fast blast, we wished we could have stayed for longer, but we had to get back home to our little critter family. The only things I didn't get to do that I had hoped to was have tea somewhere poshy and visit a historical plantation. Ah well, next time! 

Hope you enjoyed a few little vacation pictures! Now back to crafts n' tea & stuff!

oxo,

Lisa

And The Winners Are...

Hello Good People of Bloglandia!

Thank you for being so patient in waiting for this announcement (you have been on the edge of your seats, right?) I ended the Fabulous Mystery Giveaway last Sunday, and I didn't have a chance to pick a winner until this weekend. I enlisted Sean's help. I was afraid that subconsciously, I would somehow reach into the Jadeite bowl and magically draw out the names of my friends, so I made Sean do it for me. I love my husband.

I think he was pretty happy to help, wouldn't you say?

Reason number #301 why I love Sean: He's as big a goofball as me.

Here's Sean making sure to mix well.

Getting a little crazy with the cheese whiz...

Alright Sean, enough mixing already, pick a winner!

Ladies & germs, drum roll please...

Winner #1

Kamisha!!

Winner #2

Katevet!!

Winner #3

Melissa!!!

Disclaimer: Yay, Sean managed to grab the name of one of my very best friends after all! I can vouch, this was totally legit, there was much mixing (and giggling, he cracks me up with his silly faces) in between each grab. Melissa, coincidentally just started her very own blog, pop over and welcome her to Blogland when you have a sec. She's rad and she's on a journey.

So yeah, there we are!!

Ooook, confession time. I haven't quite finished the fabulous giveaway prizes yet... yipes!

Can I use the excuse that it's December and I'm making all my Christmas gifts again this year and time seems to be disappearing faster than usual?

           Aww man, I suck. Actually, I don't have much left to do, but they're not 100% yet. Pictures to follow soon, pinkie swear! (and drat this grey, gloomy weather, it's horrid for picture taking!)

Winners, I'll be emailing you for your snail mail directions, 'cept for you, Mel. I already know where you live seeing as how we're BFF's and all :o)~

To the rest of you THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF MY HEART for playing along.

You are the best, really you are.

oxo,

Lisa

Everybody's favorite... Vacation photos!!

Hello Lovies!
Thanks so much for all your kind comments on my toy drop! It was really a fun thing to do and I'm looking forward to doing more of them. I need to work on gender neutrality though... As cute as the Tea Time Teddy was, it was definitely girly. I want to make things for the toy drop that would be nice for either a boy or a girl to find.

So, I'm back! Bet'cha didn't even know I was gone, right? Sneaky~sneaky! Sean and I just returned from a vacation road trip, we went north and visited Oregon, Washington and a wee bit of northern Idaho. I thought I'd tell y'all a little about it and share some vacation photos, hope you don't mind too much. If you don't already know, please be warned, I am a very snap-happy person. Translation, I take a lot of pictures. On this vacation I think my camera said there were about 600. Hehe... yeah... In all fairness, I've deleted a lot of them for one reason or another, and I'll try to limit them here to only a few from each city. "Try" being the key word.

Settle in, lovies. This is the mother of all posts.

Ashland!

First place we visited was Ashland, Oregon. Beautiful, lots of hippies! I loved it.

This was the view from our hotel, good morning Oregon!

Mmm, breakfast in a park. A marion-berry muffin and a cuppa coffee overlooking a little stream right in the middle of town, lovely way to start the day.

Ashland is the home of the Shakespeare Festival, it's a terrific little town, wish we had more time to visit and see a play...

I liked this little statue. I couldn't get a very good picture of it, it was much more beautiful in person.

"Whoa, nelly! Let's go in here, ok hunny, ok? I won't be long, I promise!"... sound familiar?

What a great little store! Super friendly ladies at this store, I felt right at home. I found a few things I just hadda have.

Some very pretty variegated floss, and coordinating wool felt. I think I'm going to make myself a little pin cushion with these. And some silk ribbon so I can try my hand at ribbon embroidery. I've wanted to try it for a while, but I've never seen the silk ribbon in stores before. I'm excited to give it a go. And an oblong hoop. My local JoAnn's just has the usual round ones, I like the shape of this one and think I'll use it a lot.

Have slushie, will travel. Goodbye Ashland, helloooo Portland!

Portland!

Our Portland stay was quite short as we were mostly just passing through, just one night and most of the following day. We stayed right in the heart of downtown Portland at The Benson Hotel, which is beautiful and has a history all it's own. We were however able to have a nice dinner and beers out at the Deschutes Brewery, which was only a few blocks from our hotel and a walking tour of "Underground Portland" the next afternoon. 

Here are a few snaps from our visit to Portland.

Beautiful arched windows, downtown.

The famous Oregon sign. Our tour guide told us that they put a red light on the deers nose at Christmas, isn't that cute?

Part of a memorial to the Japanese Americans inturned during WWII. It's such a beautiful, yet sad piece.

Voodoo Donuts. This isn't your average donut shop. Now, I love a good donut as much as the next person and I was all in for a donut from this place based only on the heavenly scent wafting from it's doors, but uh... it was like 4:00 in the afternoon, and you see that line? There were about 25 people waiting outside just to get inside... for a donut... at 4:00 in the afternoon... yeah.

Can you guess what this is? It's a VERY large acupuncture pin. No really, it is. And I think this pin was about 25 feet tall! This is actually an art installation piece  for the Portland Acupuncture Project and there are several of them placed strategically around the city in order to "heal" certain ailments within the community and the land. It's an interesting concept, and I hope that it has some effects. Without disparaging our host city, it's evident that Portland is in need of some healing.

As much as I want to say that I loved our time in Portland, after all this is the hometown of Alicia Paulson! Portland was not my favorite place, which was a bit disappointing. I had such fond memories of my long ago visit... I know that all big cities have their problems, and we were in the heart of downtown which is where those problems are most visible, just seemed a lot seedier than I recalled. I'd certainly like to visit again, I know I didn't see the best Portland has to offer. I only hope that the next time I visit, I have more time to explore and a local remind me of what makes that city so great.

Seattle! You are beautiful!

Not a lot to have to explain here, I'll let the photos do the talking (mostly).

A five minute walk from our hotel!

Windy!

The cups say "Space Needle, A great place to chill" - I couldn't agree more.

(fyi - these day & night pictures were taken on different days, we didn't really camp out there all day long, hehe.)

The Experience Music Project, they were already closed when we visited (insert sad face here).

Can you believe that building? It's incredible. I took A LOT of pictures of it.

This was an amazing, happily accidental find. I wish I could share the sound with you guys. 1000 cast iron wind chimes hung in the trees in a small area at the Theater Commons. The sound, such a gentle tinkling... wonderful to sit still and close your eyes for just a few moments...

Our hotel in the Queen Ann district. Another hotel with a lot of history. Wonderful, except for the lack of elevator.

Too much luggage and too many stairs.

Ahh, this is what I needed. A good strong cuppa tea. Blackberry Ceylon. Yum.

Only bummer about this experience... the $43 parking ticket we got for parking at Safeway while I had a quick cuppa. Lame.

Need a tea break yourself?? I don't blame you, this is a long post... go on... I'll wait.

...

.

...

Spokane!

Near nature, near perfect. That's their slogan. Spot on if you ask me. I don't know what I was expecting, but I was kind of holding my breath for this leg of the journey. I did a lot of homework on this town, research for a life shift that Sean and I are starting to contemplate... What we found was a lively town full of friendly, down to earth people, good food, great coffee, beautiful scenery, gorgeous affordable housing, animal friendly, tons of parks. Yep, looks like a nice place to live.

Manito Park

Spokane River

River Park

4th of July

Gondola rides!

Look at that face! He's tryin' to scare me.

Now normally I'm not usually afraid of heights, but...

A little plastic cart dangling over this would be enough to frighten anyone, right?

Actually, it was not that scary, hehe... suUure.

Totally false advertising here, people. There was no tea party... just some old guy talking about taxes and other boring stuff. Sheesh, total rip off. I stamped my feet and whined like a baby.

We are everywhere.

We liked it here. I'm already planning another trip back. I'd like to see this city in all seasons, especially winter. I think that might be the hardest for this California girl.

Couer d'Alene!

In the early afternoon of the 4th of July we drove over an visited Couer d'Alene. It's a nice little town, reminds me of Lake Tahoe. There was a large parade downtown so we drove around the lake. It was cold and windy. There was almost no one in the water, and most of the folks on the beach were wearing jackets or wrapped in a blanket. Brr. Looked like most of the stores were closed due to the holiday, so I'll be honest, we never even stopped. We just poked around and looked from the windows of the truck.

Wowza, that place is gorgeous.

Whoa! That dude isn't wearing a helmet!

Neither is he!

This is such a foreign concept to me. Helmet laws have been in place in California since I was a kid.

It's weird for me to see someone without one.

Haven't seen this in a long while either! You can't do this in California, it's illegal.

De plane, de plane! We watched this plane land on the water, how neat!

Later that night back at our hotel, we watched the fireworks from our balcony...

Oooh!

Ahh!

The fireworks setting on my camera is trippy.

Baby, we're coming home!

We left Spokane the morning of July 5th and drove straight through until we got home, 860 miles.

This is along the Columbia River that seperates Washington & Oregon.

Oh look, a parasailer. Well, that was fun.

Then it mostly looked like this for a loooooooooong time.

We finally saw a sign for a little park and decided to stop, stretch and make a sandwich before we continued on. When we pulled in, we saw this sign...

Well that's a little disconserting.

Ooh, I get it now.

See those tiny dots on the upper left? That was a family of about 10 people, which would make this a very looong drop. Yes, doggies are best left in the vehicle, like the nice sign says.

Ok, back in the truck!

That there is Lake Kalamath in southern Oregon.

Not too long after we saw this,

Mount Shasta! Yes, we're almost back to California!

Home! Home! Home!

We arrived back home at about 12:30am, we left Spokane around 9am the previous morning...

That was a long drive.

Our dogs were almost as excited to see us as we were to see them. The cats were indifferent.

My mom stayed here at our place during our stay, she's the best housesitter/dog & cat watcher/garden waterer, ever!

Look what grew in my little garden while I was away!

These were tiny when I left! 10 days, a little heat and some faithful watering was all it took for veggies to blow up like balloons! Thanks Mom!

Ok boys and girls, that about wraps up my summer vacation! Was that the longest post in the history of posts, or what?? Only too about three hours to write, upload and link this baby, whew! I thought about breaking this post up into several, but I want to talk to you guys about other stuff, so I decided to make one giant vacation post and get it done. Hope you didn't mind, and that maybe you enjoyed it a little.

What are y'all doing this summer? Any vacation plans?? Remember to take lots of photos!

oxo,

Lisa

p.s. Vacationing far from home got me wondering where YOU all are from... Please leave a comment and tell me where you're reading this, I'd really love to know!