Monday, November 13, 2006



Getting to be that time of year again. Here are the results from efforts of a couple of years ago. Of course, they're all gone, now. Time to make more.

Monday, November 06, 2006

Here I am with my siblings. From left to right - Amy, Rusty, me and April (mother of the bride).














This is my brother-in-law, Al, with his "posse".

Sunday, November 05, 2006


And the flowers I initially made for Liza's cake became a little snack for Nedsel. These were the replacements and I wasn't nearly as happy with how they turned out. Isn't that how it goes? I made the first successful batch on a Saturday. I left them on the stove to dry. All that was left the next morning was a few stems. Nedsel even ate the silk stamens. Gaaaaa! How can you scold a cat with a face like this?




Here comes the bride in the necklace I made. She ended up not liking the dangly bits (well, they were a bit over the top) so I took them off.

Liza is, after all, a minimalist.






And here we have my mom, Mattie, and my oldest sister, April. I'm thinking they look like two little fall princesses. The fur belonged to my great Aunt Ola, the family milliner. She was an interesting person. We'll not go that direction now, however.




Thursday, November 02, 2006

At long last! Photos of the Royal Wedding!

Liza and Joe were married at Wintergreen Resort - Joe worked there up until he and Liza married. It's a beautiful place - up in the mountains in Central Virginia. On the way there we happened upon this strange little building which was built to look like a coffee pot. I want one in my backyard!
















My brother, Rusty, and I played for the wedding. Since it was outdoors we didn't expect there would be any place to plug things in. There wasn't. And we were attempting to sit on a grade that was at least 30 degrees out of our favor. The wind was rather brisk that day, also. Our music kept blowing off the stands, and then the actual stands started blowing over. I ended up putting my music on the ground (well, we *were* sitting on that rather steep grade). Oh, and it was COOOOOOOOOLLLLDDDD! Well, we were at a ski resort, after all. Duh.



















Here is my family along with the beautiful bride and handsome prince of a groom. Aren't they cuties?
















This was my favorite of the black and white pics we took.







I was very happy with the way everything turned out. And now I can get back to somewhat more normalcy!

Ahhhhhh.

Thursday, August 31, 2006

Great Googly-moogly! Another entry in the great Blog-o-rama catch up!

The little kitty has grown leaps and bounds. He's about four and a half months old now and is already as tall as Princess Stinky. Here's a little pic Raymond took the other night. Oh, and his name is Nedsel Ford aka Little Neddy.
















Cats fascinate me. Every one is so unique.








I promised a tatting pic. Well, here's a sort of bad one of the necklace I've been working on for my niece (among other things).





Heh. White on white on white. I promise when I get it finished I'll put it on some contrasting fabric. I should wind it up sometime this weekend.

I made a hat a while back. It's black velveteen and brocade. The trim is a stoopid scarf from AC Moore's $2 bin that I tied around it for "definition". At least that's my story for now. The coat was my big summer clearance bargain. I got it to wear up on the mountain when Liza gets married.






Here's a closeup of my sister's hat (that would be Amy) for Phil's wedding back in June.













And here's a closeup of Miz Mattie. She's a cutie!







Monday, July 10, 2006

I am so dismally behind in blogging. I have tons and gobs of photos from wedding stuff and tat-days stuff and projects and cats and kittens and such.

Woe is me.

First I'll start sort of backwards. Here's the new kitty, OpieTaylorChiChiRodriguesNedselFordViggoMortensen.



He's grown a whole lot since this photo was taken about a month ago. I'll update the pics shortly. First I absolutely must finish this post.

As you can see from little Neddy's picture, I started this post on July 10. It's now August 6. Does that say anything about what I haven't been doing?

Back to my summer "vacation". Hah!

My nephew, Phil, got married in June. His bride, Jacklyn, is adorable and we're very blessed to have her in the family. Phil is a scream - he's about to graduate from the university where I work. I am blessed to be able to get the kid a cup of coffee from time to time. Here's Phil and Jacklyn in their wedding finery.












As some of you know, I had to dress a hat for my mum to wear to the wedding. Her eyes are very sensitive to light, but can she wear sunglasses like a normal person? Heck, no! She prefers those little foam visors like they sell in the craft department in Walmart. She had an idea to dress one up with tulle and lace and little bows to wear. I looked everywhere for a suitable dressy hat, but to no avail. This is what I came up with - it's one of those paper hats from Walmart, but I sort of gave it the Krylon touch. And the Erin touch, too. I trimmed the other hats as well. Mattie (my mom) is the one in pink. The redhead is my sister, April, the brunette is my sister, Amy, and the bald one is my brother, Rusty, father of the groom.









I'm the chubby one on the right. What's with that leaning stance I've assumed, I wonder? Too many scoops of ice cream at Tat Day? Hmmmmm.

I love that pair of shoes - I got them at K-Mart for $7.00. My kind of bargain. And my hat matches them! The joy of Krylon! I used "Satin Pink". Who would ever have guessed?

I have some tatting projects and some other things to post. I'm presently helping my sister, April (the redhead) with preparations for her daughter's wedding in October. I just finished her veil. I'm waiting for a pic from April to see how it did. I'm also tatting a few wedding goodies for Liza. I promise updates shortly.

;-)

Thursday, May 18, 2006

I thought I would share more pics from this spring. Here's one of the stunning view of Lake Canandaigua - just 4 houses from Sherry's. What a wonderful trip! I want to go back, please. ;-)

Sherry, I'm starting that "Ithaca" fund. . .

The next is the "Knock Out" rose I planted last fall and the last pic is of some sort of alium looking lily in my neighbor's yard. I wish I could figure out what it is. Pretty, for one thing. Raymond took that photo.







Wednesday, May 10, 2006

Here's a few more pics from Hector. Geesh, it doesn't seem like it has been over a month since I was up there. Time flies (or as Daddy used to say, 'Tempus fugits').

We have Gina and her monkies, Debbies beautiful array of bags (I could just dive into those, but wait, I think I did...), and there's Rita hiding beneath the beautiful array of threads she brought.

Ahhhhh, the colorful life of a tatter....














Thursday, April 20, 2006

On International Tatting Day we celebrated with lots of yummy treats.














And more treats...













And even MORE treats! You will note that hiding there in the back is a bowl of nutritious, delicious and untouched fruit.















And you know, we had to have ICE CREAM!!! But nobody tell Jane Eborall and Sue Hanson. Since they weren't there that meant lots more ice cream for the rest of us! We all thought of them as we ate lots and lots of yummy, rich and decadent ice cream. Here's Mark and Judith having a bowl....MMmmmmmm! Cookies and Cream!


























And here Debbie and Rita toast to Jane and Sue across the pond. Wave "Hello", ladies!

Monday, April 17, 2006

Part of the fun of attending these events is getting to see how people package their necessities. Here's Debbie Arnold's bag. If I were Debbie I would have a really hard time choosing my favorite bag. She and her sister make lovely bags - can you tell I'm a fan? The thing I like best about the bags (besides the workmanship and the muy faboo fabrics they use) is that the bag has a 2-3 inch "lip" around the outside when opened that prevents your stuff from falling out onto the floor. I managed to leave with 2 bags and a shuttle pocket. And yes, both bags had some pink in the print. Oh, I'm hopeless.















Here's a cute pic of the gals! From left to right: Debbie, Rita and Gina.













A blissful Debbie strikes a flirtatious yet coy pose.

Sunday, April 16, 2006

The long-awaited Hector Tatting Convention pictures are finally here. I had such a delightful time. And there is much, much, much to tell.

I flew into Rochester on Friday, March 31. Sherry was patiently awaiting (NOT - she was in a slight panic as Mark hadn't arrived on his scheduled flight). Seems Mark was stuck in Chicago. Sherry and I had a built in opportunity to grab a cup of coffee and catch up on things. I needed some caffiene, too. The Bonine and Benadryl cocktail was getting the best of me.

Mark arrived safe and sound and we all piled into Sherry's daughter's car and off to Canandaigua we went! Our adventure had begun in earnest.

We had a lovely evening of show and tell and tell and tell. We got to bed way too late for children our age. We awoke the next morning to a wonderful breakfast and more caffiene. Yum! Off to Hector we went.

It was so wonderful going to Hector. The gals had really outdone themselves in making us all feel warm and welcome. I was thrilled to run into Georgia and Rita. See my thrilled face? I'm thrilled, I tell you, really! Just ignore those extra chins there.














Here's a cute pic of Gina and Sherry. I took both of their classes. Great classes, ladies! Sherry taught dragon making and Gina taught a great beaded hat trim technique. I actually finished that hat, too, Gina. Look! I even have a model!

















Stinky loves the hat. She thinks it's hers now.

Thursday, April 06, 2006

Oh, my. There's so much to tell about. It's been a while since I've posted here, mainly because I've been busy having all manner of adventures.

Here's the last from my figure painting class. This was the model's first sitting. Ever. Needless to say, I'm sure she was really thrilled to find out all I painted was her face while she sat there in her birthday suit. Raymond snapped this picture. He took it outside - he thought the shadow of the branches made it look "more artier". Heh.





Here's the next to last painting I did. I can see some improvement.







Enough of that for now.


Back at the beginning of March my adventures began with a trip to Atlanta to attend the Atlanta IOLI Lace Day. I had intended to take a Torchon class, but ended up in Louise Colgan's Milanese class instead. I think Louise should be awarded a bronze star for tolerating my newbieness and general stupidity. I'm still working on my project (the heart). I may finish before I turn 60.

Here are some of the other pillows and folk from the class.
















Enough of that.

While I was in Atlanta, Amy and I shared sisterly bonding by making some things for the set of the play she was directing, "You Can't Take it With You". We did a 4 foot square stained glass window for the set out of Gallery Glass. Here's a pic of it in progress. The play didn't open until the weekend after I was down there.





Nothing would do but for me to take Mattie back down to Atlanta two weeks after the lace day. Here's the set Amy came up with.






I think it looks just like the interior of one of those browstones you see in the movies.


Here's the window. Oh, and Mattie. Doing what she does best.


Sunday, February 12, 2006

Okay - I've waited far too long to update the blog here.

I've started back into figure painting. We did these studies the other night. This one came out looking surprisingly like Chrissy. I was fairly happy. My sort of snooty classmate (who is a very evident veteran of art classes) informed me that it looked "just like it was done in graphite" - well they call that mixture of French Ultramarine Blue and Burnt Sienna "French Gray" - duh.

Anyway, here's the pic.



I'll have to scope Snooty's work tomorrow night and see how she does. You can almost hear a vacuum from her sucking up to the teacher. Oh, I am so bad.











Lace wise - here's a sample of Scandinavian Holes - I'm up to lesson 7 now. I need to get my act together, too. The Atlanta lace-day is coming up next month. Egads. Tempus fugits when you're having fun.

Here's the "Scandalous Hos" (that's Raymond's name for them).



And here's what I've got on my pillow presently. What on earth was I thinking? I used machine quilting thread. It's okay, but I think I might need some glasses. Some real ones instead of my festive pink and yellow ones I got at the dollar store. For a dollar. But they worked for an awful long time.




I took this picture of Chatty who is so incredibly fascinated with any and all of my handwork accoutrements. As you can see, he not only likes to paw about my tatting bag, he darned well sort of gets into it. Hey - check out that toenail polish. I told you guys they stay painted all the time.







Oh. We had snow this weekend. This is what they sent us running to Kroger for milk, bread and toilet paper for.