Bold and Colorful

I am not one for making New Year resolutions. Don't think they work anyway! But this year I am going to step away from my comfort zone of pastel colors into the bold and colorful. It's actually a bit more difficult than I imagined. In the fabric store with my daughter over the weekend I once again migrated to those "safe" colors. "Mom" she said, as she steered me toward the retina burning neon colors. So home I came with some brighter colors than I would have normally picked.I do have to say though that now I have them I am getting all kinds of ideas popping into my head. Maybe this will work out for me after all!I am also back to working with felt again. Don't you just love felt! It does what you want it to do. Comes in a gazillion colors and best of all it doesn't fray... yippee, lets hear it for felt! I have been cutting out felt shapes for some new ideas and projects. A great job to do while sitting in front of the TV in the evening. I just love those times when my brain is brimming over with new ideas. Now lets see if my making abilities match my brainy ideas!While staying with my daughter last weekend we decided to go out for Sunday lunch. There is a lovely little tea shop in Bothell called Three Cups of Tea. They serve the most wonderful heart shaped scones with strawberry jam, lemon curd and whipped cream.All gone... yummy!

Well off to work I go to work with my new colors.
Have a super day today!

A visitor at breakfast

What a lovely surprise we had at breakfast yesterday morning. This wonderful fellow came to take a bath in our little pond. It is a Varied Thrush. He wasn't alone, he had the Mrs. with him.
He patiently waited on the rock while she took her bath. What a splash of color in the garden at this dreary time of year.

I often wonder who or what uses our little pond... especially at night while we are sleeping. I can always tell when the raccoons have been for a visit as they love to turn over a few of the rocks. Probably looking for a tasty morsel or two. I guess I could get up in the middle of the night and take a peek out there but it is so warm and toasty in bed that I only think about it for a second or two before rolling over into dreamland again. Maybe I could poke hubby and get him to go and take a look.... what do you think? Probably not. So I guess it will remain a mystery.A Northern Flicker has been hanging around at the suet feeder. We sure do go through a lot of suet in the winter.While this is not the clearest picture it is very interesting watching these two House Finches fighting. You can barley make it out but there is a female in the middle of all this squabbling. She is sitting on the fence just minding her business when all the ruckus started. Could be that maybe an early Spring is on tap... I hope so!Still managing to get some sewing done. I made myself this itty bitty coin purse. It is really tiny. Only about 2 inches long. I have lots of wool scraps lying around and there was just enough for this little purse. I also made a couple more pouches for my little shop. This one is made from wool and ultra suede.This one is completely different. Very bold and bright. I fancied doing some applique so this is what turned out. Sure does make a deary dark afternoon a little more pleasant working with such bright colors.

Well that's it from me for this week. I will be staying with my daughter again for the weekend where I will be working at my "other" job... soap making!
No rest for the weary!

See you all next week.

My First Post...

... of the New Year. Thank you for all your lovely comments on my last post. As always they are so much appreciated.

Hubby and I went out to lunch today. We ate at a lovely seafood restaurant in our capitol, Olympia. It is surprising to me how many people think that Seattle is the capitol of Washington. Even people that live here make that mistake. Anyway, lunch was delicious. Of course because of the bad blogger that I am there is no pic of my lunch as I left the camera in the car. It was to cold and I was to hungry to run back outside to get it. So you will have to take my word for it that my lunch was scrumptious!
I did take this lovely pic of the view from the restaurant. The misty fog seemed to just hang around most of the day today. Our weather is changing though... back to rain tomorrow. That's not so bad though as it gives me more time to sew. I have been making all kinds of new goodies for my little shop. I just have to photograph them and get them listed. I bought the fabric for this little covered note pad thingy today. (Still having a hard time coming up with a name for it... ideas would be appreciated). Sewed it right up shortly after dinner.
I also made a couple of days ago this little insulated lunch tote for my daughter. The inside has a waterproof lining which was very interesting to sew. It has a tendency to stick to the sewing machine so it doesn't glide freely along while sewing. After a few choice words we came to an agreement and it behaved!

Well so far 2011 is starting off rather well. A lovely lunch and some great sewing time.... hope it continues.

Yawn...time for a warm bath before bed.
See you soon.

My Last Post....

... of the year! Did I worry you all? Tee Hee!
I had intended to blog earlier today but the battery in my camera needed charging... I just hate it when that happens. Well anyway here I am so let's get started. Walking and sewing, two of my favorite things. First the sewing. I have been making a few new things for my little shop. Eyeglass cases and some more pouches. These little pouches are a bit smaller but can be clipped onto a belt loop, which makes them really great. They are very handy if you are out taking a walk and want to take along your cell phone, house keys etc.

I love having a bright colorful eyeglass case. I so enjoyed sewing these that I have made a few of them.
Are you a sock monkey fan? I just love this fabric!How about a fun little turtle pouch. As you can probably tell I am having great time with all this new wonderful fabric.
A special request from my daughter had me making this ID card holder. She has to wear one at work all day and wondered if I could come up with something that also was combined with a small pouch. How lucky was she that I was in a very creative mood. I made her not one but three of them. (Sorry I forgot to take pic's of the other two). It is so much fun when you have an idea in your mind and it actually turns out the way that you see it. Quite often I have a great idea and it turns out really crappy and I have to go back to the drawing board.

Well that's the sewing part now for the walking part. Yesterday was just a spectacular day here in the Pacific Northwest. It was very cold but the sun was shining. So we bundled up and off we went. Hubby's camera was working over time. If you can believe we actually counted 35 Bald Eagles down at the Nisqually Refuge. They were all high up in the trees overlooking the Nisqually River. It was indeed a sight to see. This one flew right over the top of us. I thought hubby was going to fall over backwards taking this pic. All the ducks are starting to return and a whole lot of pairing up is going on. This is an Asian Wigeon. There were several Sea Lions in the river. Just like the Bald Eagles I am sure they were getting their fill of salmon.

Well the sun is shining again so it's time for me to bundle up and head on out.

I hope you all have a wonderful New Year!

See you soon!

Once upon a time....

.... a long time ago ( well just over 3 months ago) I used to blog! So here I am back again hoping that I will be able to blog a bit more regularly than I have been doing.

What a year it has been! I have made pounds upon pounds of soap and bath products that I think I could now do it in my sleep... in fact I think at times I probably have. Every weekend since the middle of July I have stayed at my daughters house soaping away, sometimes til 2 o'clock in the morning. As we got closer and closer to Christmas we were literally working around the clock. It was a tremendous amount of work for just two people. We made it fun though and chocolate helped a lot!

I do have to admit that I did have some time for other things to. I still ventured out on my lovely walks and hubby still took those great pictures. This is Joan. All 1500 hundred pounds of her. I met her on a delightful day at the Point Defiance Zoo in Tacoma. She was so very kind to share her wonderful fishy breath with us! I kind of like Joan... what a gal!

I made a point of trying to walk regularly down at the Nisqually Refuge (one of my favorite places in the whole wide world). We have so many terrific photo's that it is going to be really hard to pick some, but here goes. A Yellow Rumped Warbler sitting atop a measuring stick.
A Golden Crowned Kinglet looking very beautiful on a moss covered branch. A tiny Hummingbird catching snowflakes on his tongue. A Ruby Crowned Kinglet that was quite hard to photograph as they barely stay still for a second. I have to admit that this was the first time I had seen a Great Egret down at the refuge so I was pretty excited and stood watching him (or her) for quite sometime.
Well I could fill many pages with all of the animal pic's that were taken in the last 3 months. I will save the rest for future blogging.

Like many of you I still have sewing and knitting projects that are unfinished. I did manage to get some more socks knitted though and were very welcomed by my feet while out walking.

I also made a few things for my little Etsy store... and even sold a few things too.
These little pouches were fun and pretty quick to make. I just realized that I never showed some of the soaps that I made. We had an idea to make tiny guest soaps like little cakes for tea. We were really pleased with the results. Many people bought these for stocking stuffers.

Well I think that is about it for now... don't want to bore you with to long of a post.
Before I go I just wanted to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and the most wonderful New Year.

See you soon... I promise!

Cooking, Walking and Knitting

Once again it was another busy weekend... they all seem to be like that lately! Hubby found a wonderful recipe from this magazine. Have I mentioned that hubby is a bit of a wine aficionado... don't you love that word. I can hardly believe it. I just did a spell check on it and I got it right! Good grief, I am so surprised! Anyway where was I... Oh yes the recipe. It was on the front cover and it looked really yummy and best of all it called for lots of fresh tomatoes... and those we have by the ton! So here is the finished recipe. It tasted as great as it looked. The addition of all those fresh from the garden tomatoes made it light and wonderful. It was the perfect meal after returning from a lovely long walk. I hope that this photo of a young Peregrine Falcon having his dinner doesn't make you to squeamish. I had thought that maybe I shouldn't post it but it was on our walk and as you know I always take you along and show you all the wildlife that we spot. We watched it for the longest time. He was about 150 yards from us and didn't seem to mind that we were looking at him. Toward early evening on our walk we spotted this very large Beaver having his dinner... this time it was more of a salad. He was happily munching away clearing a path as he went. I always love walking in the early evening. We see so many different kinds of animals than we do during the day. Not to mention it makes me really sleepy and ready for a good nights sleep. Sometimes I can hardly keep my eyes open sitting on the couch after we return home. But I did keep them open long enough........ to get started on the sleeves of daughters sweater!
All in all I was quite pleased with our weekend. We saw a lot and did a lot. I like weekends like that, don't you?
See you soon!

This and that!

What a wonderful crop of tomatoes we have had this year. Not sure if it was the weather or the type of tomatoes, but we have a ton. The neighbors are happy of course, as they get plenty of them. I already have noticed a difference in the garden though. I don't think summer will be with us to much longer. Some of the leaves on the trees are already changing color and some of my flowers are starting to look a little tired. Looks like soon I will be doing some garden work getting it ready for the Autumn. I have had this lovely pattern book from Rowan for quite a while. There are lots of great patterns in it that I would love to make. Quite often I can only find one or two that I like and I really dislike having to by the whole book just for a couple of patterns. So this summer I have been working on a lovely sweater from this book for my daughter.
It really is a very easy pattern to knit. If I can just get to sit awhile and work some on it then I just may get it finished so she can at least wear it once before the cooler weather comes. I already have the front and the back finished and it has been blocked. Now I just have to finish off the sleeves. It is made in the loveliest shade of pale pink. Maybe I will just have to turn off the phone, not answer the door and just say no until I have it complete! A few nights ago we had the most wonderful full moon. Hubby was home so out came his new camera. Yes I did say new camera.... this is becoming a very expensive hobby! Well after numerous shots he was very happy with this one. He was in and house a lot and just happened to let in a pesky mosquito which proceeded to make a meal on one of my arms which itched immensely and produced a lump the size of a small mountain. Needless to say I wasn't a happy camper that night! It's OK though he made up for it by making me a lovely cup of tea... so all is forgiven.

Time to go and water those tired looking plants... see you soon!