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

Happy Independence Day

Hello~hello,

Wishing all my American friends & family a 

Happy 4th of July!

♥

To all my non-American friends, happy Wednesday!

Hope you're doing something fun and relaxing today! Will you be watching fireworks tonight?

A special thanks to our men & women serving in the armed forces.

 Here's my favorite soldier, my niece Alex.

This is too old a picture to be sharing, but it's all I've got handy. This was her graduation from Basic Training in the US Army (about two and a half years ago). I'm sure she has a few more ribbons on that lapel these days. She is going to be a made a Sargent soon!

Want to see something funny?

 Here's something else I found while rooting through photos from this set.

Ain't those glasses grand? HA! They're so corny! The soldiers call them BCG's, they are the mandatory eyewear for soldiers who wear glasses during basic. Anyone know what that stands for*? It's pretty funny!

Ok, I'd better get busy, having a few friends over for a little BBQ and fireworks tonight. 

Oh, and I'm making a small batch of apricot jam, woo! I've never made jam before, wish me luck.

oxo,

Lisa

*Birth Control Glasses - because yeah, no one will hit on a person wearing these awful spectacles! Lol...

Potter Time Again!

Greetings Witches, Wizards and Muggles alike!

I'm really excited to share something with you guys today, this was something I made my niece, Alex for Christmas, and I'm really pleased with the final result. I think it's magical (harr harr)!

I should probably first state that while cross stitch isn't my forte, I do like it, and have some other things in mind, I don't think it's my strong point, but practice makes perfect, so I'll keep at it. I've definitely made some mistakes with this piece, but I'm not going to point them out, heehee.

I LOVED this pattern that I found in Kristy Kizee's Etsy shop, Bombastitch, and decided this is what I was going to make for Alex.

Ok, so this is about where we left off...

And here we are, finished!!

Oh, but I wasn't done there, I had plans to frame this piece, which ended up being a wee bit of a challenge because of the long narrow shape, but! Where there's a will there's a way. I had to cut my own picture matting, and I think it turned out great!

Dark Mark!

I frayed the long edges a bit, then sewed the stitched piece to a black patterned fabric. It's not the fabric I'd originally purchased for this project, it was left over from another project, and I like it so much better. And it's fitting too, because that project I made for Ana, Alex's sister... I love a happy coincidence.

Before framing I layered the piece with batting, adding some dimension so as to not look so flat under the glass.

And did I tell you? I stitched this Dark Mark with Glow In The Dark Floss by DMC, and I'm really happy to say, this sucker glows really well. Unfortch, it's not that easy to photograph, but you can kind of see it here.

Woop~woop!!

I sent this piece (carefully packed in bubble wrap) to Alex with a couple of other great Etsy finds too, and with permission of the shop owners, I get to share these with you guys as well!

You should know something about Alex, she's not a froo-froo girl. She's a tomboy, and a straight up nerd. And despite my deep love of delicate tea things and a passion for embroidery, so am I. It's easy to shop for her, because I get to pick things I like and I know she will too.

First I found this shirt by S&S Ink. I still get the giggles when I see it.

She loved it, naturally.

Super mega bonus here, people!! The gals at S&S Ink have offered a special for my readers (this is so cool, I've never done this kind of thing before!!) if you go to their shop and purchase anything, make sure to use the promo code: BLOG20 for a 20% discount!!!

Yeehaw!

I also found these amazing, custom made key chains on Etsy in Tesoro Jewelry's shop.

The front...

And an added surprise on the back...

I absolutely adore these key chains, I think they're so terrific, I ordered two!

I'm pleased to say that Alex freaked out when she opened her box, she told me that she couldn't wait to get back to the barracks, so she opened it in the parking lot at the post office. She said she actually squealed (loud enough to garner the attention of passersby) when she unwrapped the stitched piece, and if you knew Alex, you'd know... that's pretty major. She loved the key chain & t-shirt too. Yay!

I'll be honest, I was feeling pretty pleased with myself when she told me about her uncontrolled squealing. That's one of the things I love so much about handmade. It's always nice when you give someone a gift that they really like, but when it's something you made yourself, there's a deep satisfaction which is almost like a gift to yourself. You guys know what I mean, right?

I have a bunch more stitching to get to this weekend, but as I write these words, the sun has come out from hiding and I have the day off, which only means one thing... it's time to get my Vespa out of the garage and go for a ride! Seems like it's been forever since the last time, and I got some new winter riding gloves this week that I'm dying to try out! No more frozen fingers for me!

Hope you are all having a great weekend!

oxo,

Lisa