Happy Birthday

We had the pleasure of seeing one of the boys this weekend. We celebrated out son's birthday while he was home. This photo is the best. Look at all the smoke from all those candles! Guess that's what happens as one gets older, more and more smoke with all the candles.

Taking the honors to cut the cake . . . there was plenty to go around. It was a yummy lemon cake with low sugar vanilla frosting. There is lots of cake left over.

I haven't had lemon cake for a long time. It sure was tasty. We enjoyed the visit with our son and his fiance. It was fun to have the opportunity to get together over the last couple days. We had lots of catching up with the two of them. We got out of the house to see the new James Bond movie last night.

All in all it turned out to be a great weekend. They headed back home this evening in order to be at work tomorrow. Now it's back to just the two of us in the house (and our three dogs) again.

I ended up going through some of my stuff in the red room and the studio this weekend. Turns out I found I can "donate" some of my extra stuff to my son's fiance. She's nearly done with her teaching degree. She's starting to collect things she would find useful for teaching classes. I have lots of extra "stuff" so we went through some of that. I managed to send several boxes of "stuff" out the door with them when they left. I have so much though. It's hard to tell anything of it is gone. Now that I know there are things she might be interested in using with her future kid's classes I can put some more things aside as I continue to sort and purge while I organize my studio and all my "stuff".

I still want to go further in sorting, purging and organizing my stuff. Just this weekend, looking in boxes I haven't opened in so long, I find I'm in need of being more critical and ruthless in disposing of things. I am liking the idea of getting rid of more stuff to open up the feel of the room. There are just too many boxes and containers of stuff that it feels crowded and closed in. When I see photos of some sewing rooms and studios I find I like the ones that are open, well lighted and airy. I like the idea of more space. That's what I'm aiming for. It'll come one day, I just need to pace myself and keep working in that direction.

The Boys

We had an opportunity to see the boys today. It was fun to do that. We brought some of the things from home, helped move some stuff, went shopping for necessities, ate pizza, and had a great visit. They seem well on their way to being moved in and getting their new apartment in order, just a few more items and they'll be set.

It ended up being a long day of driving for my husband and me, but we made it back just fine. The dogs were overjoyed to see us back home. It was a long day for them also. I took a little time before I head off to bed to look through the photos I took. Am posting just a few right now. The rest will have to wait since it is so late right now.




Thanks for a fun visit guys!


Here are a couple close up shots of the boys.





There's still a lot I need to learn about my Photoshop program to correct photos. The one of Josh on the left had his face in the shadows with the sun behind him. The one of Ben above had too bright a shot of the sun on his face. That's what happens taking pics on the fly, I just keep clicking away hoping to get some good ones among all the rest.

Introducing another household pet

We inherited this goldfish, Harold, from my youngest son, Josh when he came home for a visit during Spring Break. Since they closed the dorms at that time he couldn't leave the fish behind. Harold has since become our adopted fish. It's just a tiny little tank - what a lonesome life this fish has been called to live. But it has trained us well; when it keeps coming to the top corner of it's aquarium we know it's looking for food. Thus we oblige it a couple times a day. Pretty low maintenance with dropping in fish flakes and occasionally changing the water in the tank.


You'll never know how many times I tried taking this picture and just missing. I would have thought a little fish swimming round in circle would be a bit easier to capture on camera. I had lots of pictures of it just coming into view, just exiting from view, out of focus, glare from the tank, etc. I see a bit too much flash on the fish here, but this picture will have to do. It was the best of the bunch.

I ran across this stitch out when I was looking for something else the other day so thought I would share it. I made it using the PictureStitch module of my Husqvarna Viking Professional software program. PictureStitch works by turning an image into a stitched design. It can be done in a single color like is shown here in black, or with four colors of thread that are supposed to represent the four colors you see in printed images with cyan, magenta, yellow and black. I like the single color I chose for this rendition. The size is not more than 6", but they take a bit of time to stitch out. Obviously the four-color option takes longer than the single-color choice to stitch. It is a picture of me when I was a little girl. It is black thread stitched on an ecru muslin background. The project was for a software class I taught last year. I haven't made this sew-out into anything yet. It was going to become a page in a fabric book I was working on, but then thought maybe I'll make it into a totebag. Those seem to be so popular now with the decreased use of plastic shopping bags.

Well we've loaded up the truck and plan to head off to see the boys tomorrow. They're moving into an apartment together for the summer. So we packed up some of the last remaining "stuff" that belongs to our youngest son. He has decided not to come home to stay with us this summer. It looks like he's on his own from here on out. I've already started the re-arranging of that room to reclaim it for our turf. There still remains some lingering belongings from both the boys. They say they will come back to claim the last of their items sometime, but it is down to very little. I have already boxed most of that into plastic bins and tucked them away in a closet. It looks like we really are empty nesters now. Am I sad? Yes and no. It's a good feeling to see they are able to stand on their own. I remember that time of life as kind of fun when I did it, so I'm happy for them and know they will do well. Will we miss them? Yes, I think so. But I know we'll be okay with that. They are only a phone call away.