Vacation Highlights - PA and NJ

This post is a long one.  Grab a cuppa...

June 24th I headed off to my sister's, who lives in Honey Brook, PA (about 30 minutes from Lancaster).  I drove (not the first time); but let me tell you, it will be the LAST time.  Flying from now on!!!  What was usually a 14-15 hour drive, took me 18 hours.  From Richmond through Washington was ridiculous!  Never again!  Never again!  Yes, I know I could have spent the night somewhere, but it's not so easy when you have a dog with you. She's a great traveler, though!  And that was one of the reasons I wanted to drive -- to bring Tasha with me and also have a car, as I planned to do some visiting and didn't want to rent one.  Like I said, never again!  LOL!  Although coming home, I had no problems...

Anyway, on to the good stuff.  I hadn't seen my sister, brother-in-law and niece in two and a half years, so it was a joyful reunion.  My sister took off a few days from work, so we could spend quality time together.  I won't bore you with the details, but here are some pictures to share...

10th Annual Chester County Balloon Festival

My niece, Morgan, and my sister, Meg.

Me and Dad.
My sister and I share "joint custody".  *grin*  I have him from October-May, she has him June-September.
I only saw him a couple days as he and my youngest brother were going to be heading off to Eugene, Oregon for 12 days to see the Olympic Tryouts.

A fire pit evening in my sister's backyard.

The sunsets were breathtaking!

Doggie friends -- Heidi and Tasha

I also was able to get together with many friends.

On July 6, my NJ quilty friends (whom I haven't seen for 5 years) met me at my sisters for a day planned in Lancaster.  Can you say "Quilt Shop HEAVEN!"  I just love Lancaster.  But before we headed off, my sister had mentioned a wonderful lunching spot called Wyebrook Farm.  The place was a-d-o-r-a-b-l-e and the food was amazing!  If you click on the link above, you can read more about it...

My girfriends, Jackie, Bonnie, Adriana and me (l to r) enjoying our surroundings and our meal.

Stunning views!

Ambiance can't be beat!

An additional eating area.

Entrance (looking out)

Exploring the farm.

With our bellies full, we then headed off to Lancaster and requisite fabric shopping.  We even enjoyed homemade ice cream in the village.

It was a wonderful day spent with wonderful women.  I will miss them terribly until we can meet up again.  :o(

On another note, the following evening I met up with a NJ high school girlfriend whom I haven't seen in 35 years...not since my elder daughter was an infant.  I didn't even realize she lived so close to my sister's area until I posted about my upcoming trip on Facebook.  She contacted me and we met up for dinner and reminisced.  It was like the years melted away as we caught up with each other's lives.

Brenda and I

The following day, I traveled to Trenton, NJ to meet up with my co-worker friends.  I spent the night with one of them so I didn't have to drive the hour and a half back to my sisters afterwards (don't drink and drive!).  I can't believe I've been retired for over 8 years!  What a blast we had!  There were probably 20-30 of us total, as some sporadically came and went during the course of the evening.  If we look like we were melting in the pictures, we probably were.  There was no working air conditioning at the nightclub!  Crazy but we had fun anyway.  :o)

I have a few pictures to share, but was too busy hugging and talking to really take any myself.  Still waiting for some others to share the ones they took.  ;o)

Bonney was my partner in crime at work. *wink*

I was also able to meet up with my girlfriend that I'm going on Bonnie Hunter's Mediterranean Cruise with while she was touting about in her new RV. She has a brother who lives near my sister.  It really is a small world we live in!

Got home safe and sound around midnight on July 11.  New memories made...

Family and Friends are Forever,

Suzy

Vacation Highlights - Cape Coral, FL

Hi all.  I know I've been MIA for a while.  Between being away on a couple vacations, getting re-situated, living life, etc., I've been neglecting my blog shamefully.  However, you will now be inundated with a multitude of postings.  Me playing catch-up.  *grin*

In early June my elder daughter, son-in-law, granddaughters and grandson rented a gorgeous 4 bedroom pool home in Cape Coral, FL on the west coast about an hour south of Tampa.  Although my younger daughter couldn't make it due to school (college) conflicts, nonetheless we had an awesome time.  

It didn't start out awesome however.  We had originally rented a home in Siesta Key, FL, but the day before we were to arrive, we received a phone call informing us that the homeowners double-booked and the other party was already in the home.  Long story short -- it all worked out in the end.  Not only did we skirt the tropical storm in the area, we found an even nicer home to rent in its place in Cape Coral.  Air B&B picked up the price difference and the homeowners of the original booking is giving us all a free week at their beautiful home whenever we choose in the future.  Best thing out of the deal is we can now pick a time when even my younger daughter can make it.  Win, win.

I didn't take many pictures as I was enjoying myself too much.  In fact, although the entire home was drop dead gorgeous, I only have pictures of the pool area as that is mainly where we were while there.  LOL!  It was like a tropical oasis and we had a blast!

I'll leave you with some pics...

My dog, Tasha, enjoying the day.

My son-in-law, the Master Griller!

One of my granddaughters, and their little puppy, Murphy.

Our gorgeous poolside oasis also came with a hot tub!

We had a momma dove and her babies in our family room window.  A sign from God that my hubby and Heather's Dad was with us on our trip.

Checking out the local marina. 

There were some seriously expensive boats there!

Storefronts by the local marina.

The doggies got along famously!  They look so much alike you'd think they were truly related.

While Heather and Richard went off on their own for a bit, I took the kids to a local pizza joint.  Never saw a claw game like this before!  LMAO!

Family time rocks!
Suzy

Charity Quilt For Veteran-In-Need

Our Guild provides charity quilts to veterans, many of whom are wheelchair-bound.  I finally finished this quilt yesterday and hope it provides comfort to someone in need.

It took a lot longer to quilt than I anticipated.  You'd think with just straight-line quilting it would go quickly (at least I did -- LOL!).  Not so.  The stitching lines are about 1/2" wide.  That's a lot of quilting.  But it was good practice and I hope it warms the lap (and the soul) of a wheelchair-bound veteran.  It's the least I can do for those who serve our country with such selflessness.

Home of the free, because of the brave,
Suzy

Two Community Service Quilts Are Now Done

See...I promised I would be back soon, and here I am!

I just finished the binding for these two charity quilts which will be given to my Guild when we meet for our monthly Community Service get-together on June 1, where we will work on even more charity quilts.  I did the bindings completely by machine, as I'm sure they will get quite a bit of use.  I haven't done binding by machine for quite a while, so I forgot just how much faster it is to machine stitch it rather than hand stitch.  Was kinda a fun change of pace.

You'll probably remember this fun, happy, scrappy half-log-cabin from when me and my quilting friends got together on our usual Wednesday gathering.  We worked on it on and off for several weeks.

And then I pulled all my scraps that read either pink or purple and made this one solo.  I have to be honest and say this one is killing me to give up.  It turned out so awesome.  But give it up, I shall.  If I miss it too much, I can always make another for myself, right?  It's not like I don't have more scraps...  :o)

Give 'til it hurts,

Suzy

P.S.  The blue/green/yellow boy's spiderweb charity quilt top is completely done and is being quilted as we speak, so hope to have pics of that one soon.

Keeping Busy

Obviously, I haven't posted in quite a while.  I've been keeping busy with life and with quilting...just not taken time out to blog about all the goings on. So, I'll update you with a few fun things today.

Firstly, on April 6, I hosted our Wednesday Quilt Group (we call ourselves "We Come In Pieces". Those of you who know me, have probably correctly guessed I suggested the whimsical tongue-in-cheek name, and everyone voted for it).  Anyway, it also happened to be Mona's birthday, so we had a little cheesecake celebration.  The entire day was fun, as usual.

Secondly, I finished a Christmas quilt top that I've had in progress for some time now.  Remember that year when I wanted to make a Christmas quilt a month?  Yeah, lasted for all of three and a half months before that one fell to the wayside.  Darn life interferences. Anyway, finally finished the one I had started during month four.  I imagine I will quilt something fun in the empty center squares.  Didn't use up nearly enough green/red scraps.  LOL.

Lastly (for now anyway), I've got a few vacations in the works.  Not quilt-related, but fun for me.  :o)  My two daughters, their families and I have rented a gorgeous home for a week in early June in Siesta Key, FL, about a 3 hour drive from here on the east coast of Florida.  It's a five bedroom, three bath right on the canal with a built-in pool, a three-minute or so walk to the beach and not much farther walk to downtown.  I paid for the home as I wanted to do a cruise with everyone this past Christmas, but their work/school schedules interfered, so this works as an early Christmas/Birthday gifts for this year. My daughters said since I paid for the house, they'll do all the cooking.  I think I got the better part of the deal, don't you?  *grin*

I'll also be going up North to visit my sister and many, many friends at the end of June into the middle of July.  Very much looking forward to it, as I haven't seen my sister for 2-1/2 years and my friends for even longer than that!  

Oh, and I have my Bonnie Hunter Mediterranean Cruise coming up in August.  I'll have more on that later, as we now have the information for the quilt we'll be working on during the days at sea.  I'll share with you the quilt and my fabric choices.  The quilt is from a magazine, so I'm sure it's okay to share a pic.

Well, that's it for now.  Although I did get some quilts back from the quilter...so keep a lookout for more updates once I bind them.  Shouldn't be too long, I promise.  :oD

More later,
Suzy