Purple leaves

I took out previous Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks the other day.

Boy time flies! I have a lot of blocks to turn into something. I realized it's the one block a month I like, even with as many as four series going a year.

The fun is in doing one cow in a color for instance, one flamingo or guitar a month. Seeing them accumulate.

I made this little book with a list of ideas for just rainbow scrap challenge blocks this year as well as lists of previous year's blocks.
I like the idea of this bear's paw block too, and printed it out to use for my little folding book.

Things like this homemade book make me happy. Less likely to lose the list.
two sheets of paper folded in half, then stapled along the side (spine) and then write in it

I'm not sharing the list of possible's for this year as I might get to a few. For now, I like hand work so I tried basting curves through the paper. I usually baste through just the fabric on the back of hexies and diamonds, or glue baste. I like basting thru the paper, slowly pulling the fabric over an edge for a stitch, then the next little part, stitch.

Who knows what the colorful leaves will become. Something bold and graphic, representing growth.

I hope you look around while you're visiting my blog... hit that home button to see what else is new. I am doing a series on Thursdays called " I Like" of items that made me glad that week.

linking to RSC http://superscrappy.blogspot.com/ 
http://myquiltinfatuation.blogspot.com/
among other link parties on my links page

In honor of our dogs

As you know, if you know me, I lost my poodle son to cancer at the very end of July. I am still stunned and sad that he's gone. Recently three friends I met through blogging have lost their dogs too.

There are really no words to comfort someone, so I made a remembrance to honor their furbabies.

First up is Easy rider... who was a cheeky weimaraner who lived in France. His mama Katty is a terrific writer (easyweimaraner and I pulled two images of Easy for her. This one is sweet Easy, snuggling with her on the bed.
It is 6" square with peltex instead of batting. The corners are funky because it's so small and stiff and I was doing good to just make it in the first place.

I haven't sewn much since November. I sew from a happy place and my heart hasn't been in it. I was grateful to be able to sew again, for a friend, for a reason, and my heart needed to reach out to theirs.

There were tears.

The heart is lame'( the really thin metallic dress fabric), stars on the orange (Katty loves bright colors) are metallic embossed, and I beaded it with bugle beads like exclamation points! I free motion wrote his name with metallic gold thread.  Easy was very bright and bold and lived life with an Exclamation point!

This image is more like "naughty" Easy chewing Daddy's shoe... it's on the reverse side. Somehow I managed to take this picture skewed but it's evenly sewn.

It felt like getting it done was more "impawtant" than fussing over the binding but the sentiment is the real message.


All the little quilts are a mix of improv, photo transfer, applique and piecing. All machine quilted with gold metallic thread.

Seamus... this is the image I pulled from his blog. (3poodlesandanana) Printed onto printed treasures fabric, it printed out more pale than I wanted. I got out my prismacolor pencils and inks and made this

Appliqueing gold lame' hearts and adding in the charm, Adore.

Next is Eliza's (forestpoodles)  quilt honoring D'Art. I almost called Cole D'Artagnan but he misbehaved the day I did so we chose Cole, and he was quite pleased with that. Eliza lives with several poodles but D'Art was her constant companion and shadow...

There are two charms and the title" D'Art was born with a heart of gold".
I love this image of him, with his reading glasses and a book.
 Poodles love a good book.
Again, colored in with pencils and inks, but the background was from her image. I liked the blurring there.

Cherish

I hope these pups are running with Cole in Heaven.

 I felt Cole's spirit on three occasions after he passed over to spirit form. Unmistakable.
On one occasion I felt him jump on the bed  while I read my book.
 Strong and sure, which told me he was young and able bodied again.

When Cole's ashes came home to us, we put them on his sofa. Slowly we added in his favorite things, The pillow I made, his duck, his giraffe ball, the quilt my friend Mary made to honor him and help me, her friend.
It says
"Dogs' lives are too short. Their only fault really" by A.Turnball

Remember this funny Cole-di-Locks and the big bad bed post? We three loved Lake Placid trips... the link
http://lapaylor.blogspot.com/2015/09/cole-di-locks-and-big-bad-bed.html

when you are finished looking at Cole, look at this video on the power of puppies. Each view brings a pound of dog chow to shelters

https://www.youtube.com/embed/SJoE_lNQdHU

linking to show-off-saturday

"I Like" Thursday #20 Birks, Beads, and Birds

National Gallery of Art at Christmas

"I Like" Thursday Number 20!
These posts have kept me  noticing the small every day things that please me.

1. I like my neighbor Paul. He has a significant brain injury from a fall. He is always, ALWAYS, cheerful.
Nothing lifts my spirits like seeing Paul out on a walk. Over the years I have learned much of his life story... born in a country no longer there, grew up in Italy, brought to the USA because of his mother's marriage to an American,  served our country in the military, and has seen a lot of life.

Paul teaches me Italian when we meet on the sidewalks. Today I learned What's happening?
He laughs that he has to work to remember Italian when I ask. I have to work to remember Italian too.

2. I Like walking. I can't believe I haven't mentioned it by now, but I walk twice daily at least. It clears my mind, I often do walking meditations, I breathe deeply which I forget to do around the house, I see nature, I find inspiration for art. I breathe in for four steps, hold four steps, out four steps hold four steps. Over and over, because it slows down my panic, quiets my mind, gives me a focus and more oxygen is a good thing.

Does this sound stupid???  on my walk recently I saw rain filled potholes. Birds and squirrels were all using them for waterbowls, getting along together too... and I became thankful the potholes provided something for nature. We sure take enough away from critters, it's something to think an annoying pothole provides nourishment at least.

This week I had not brought my camera but saw an amazing sight. I looked up to see an airplane in the sky, and a crow flying in the same direction between the plane and me. It struck me hard that we all fly in different ways at different speeds and with different goals. But we can all fly in some way.

When I was growing up, it was a big deal to fly. We dressed up in our best clothes, and felt very special. No security gates, people met us at the gate to welcome the travelers. They fed us the cutest little meals on tiny dishes. There was room in the seats for our legs. We got to see the earth from another perspective, especially if you got the coveted  window seat.

3.  I like my new Birkenstocks. I have worn my old winter "Boston" for the last 14 years, and invested in a new pair over the holidays. They are thinner suede, and a bit smaller than all my other Birks... what's that all about?  They are expensive to me but my feet need arch support and they are the best for that.

I am one of the few who love the feel of a new pair. The insides are still soft and they are all clean.

 I do not like how thin the suede doesn't hold it's shape, so I can't slide them on like my others, I have to pull them on like other shoes.All my other birks are the same size and fit great and these are a bit smaller (yes I got out a ruler to check, with Mr. not afraid of color to check too) grrr. But I like having a new pair, and how they look, and as always the high arch support. And taking things back to the store is no fun, so I kept them.

When I think of all my youth spent teetering around on Candies mules at the disco!! It's a wonder I didn't fall. Of course I was a ballet dancer and had good balance and was comfortable up on my toes. I was a high heel gal, but now I like my birks and sneakers.

4. I like Midsomer Murders TV show on BBC. The most recent season was released to DVD and we are watching it now. From our Library system.

5. I like the library. I feel like I go shopping there... "I'll take this novel, this cd of jazz, these two craft books, and several dvds... to go please!!" All for the cost of a few tax dollars... well spent! I love tax dollars being spent on people to enrich their lives!

Cindy's project... I Likeeee

6. I like beads... still like beads. I got together with my good beading buddy Cindy and we had a morning of shiny sparkly beads. I restarted the bracelet for Nancy. We talked about sparkly things, we compared the virtues of different kinds of beads in a project. It's like quilting, same fabrics that look great in yardage next to each other, may lose impact when pieced in. I needed to change a finish from glazed to matt so that the bracelet worked.

We met at the library, thank you to them again!

7. I Like warm and natural batting for wall quilts. I used to buy it by the yard but now just get a queen sized bag on sale, and cut it up. I do rinse it first, this time twice as it smelled, and dry it on medium heat. I measured it after and it lost about two inches over the entire enormous piece. That's really nothing but it might be significant in a wall quilt.

I do not like the chemicals remaining in fabric and batting so I rinse and dry them. No surprises that way and less chemical outgassing going on in the studio. I also do not get surprise shrinking in one direction or another distorting my quilts. For bed size quilts I like 80/20 and also prewash. It's a dream to quilt with a prewashed batt.

8. I Like receiving surprise gifts... my good friend and sketching partner in VT Carol at http://quiltedfabricart.blogspot.com/ made and sent me a notebook with a quilted cover.
Bears. I love bears. Bears are my totem. Note the little bear button.

9. I Like the post office. Really.  
Maybe not the lines but this week I went in to mail three sympathy quilts to friends who lost beloved pets recently. Bacon had informed me it was compliment day, so when the worker called me over I told her about compliment day and said her eyes were beautiful. She had enormous dreadlocks and long, long nails painted kelly green, but I chose her eyes. She was awesome to me the whole visit. What a gift!

And what a system of convenience. Being able to send something to someone far away for such a relatively small fee.

10. I like doing improv whether it's comedy, singing, beading or quilt making.
So much fun to make it up as you go along.
It's like  playtime. So my friends Ann (fretnotyourself)   and Kaja at http://www.sewslowly
are giving suggestions on how to do improv quilting this year. Want to try it? check out their blogs. 


What did you find to like this week?

Visit these other fine folk who also wrote "I Like" posts
1, craftscaviescontras
2.imworkingonaproject
3..http://littlepenguinquilts.blogspot.com/
4.3poodlesandanana
5.tu-na quilts

On shyness and strength

"I reached out, she grabbed my hand, and we have been friends ever since" Gwyned wrote.

the sentence "I reached out" is big.

Recently my friend Gwyned and I were discussing the joy of having couple friends. She and her husband became couple friends when she reached out to the wife during a health crises, and they all bonded as four friends not two couples.

Reaching out is the step a lot of people miss for several reasons.

I was shy, very shy, growing up.
I was an A student, but once took an  F rather than stand up in front of the class to do a report.
I was an artistic sensitive person who grew up in an authoritarian abusive household, and self expression was not rewarded.

Confidence cannot grow in that soil. 

When I was in college, a girlfriend and I met some guys (who were students from Toronto) at Disney World and we all kept up a writing friendship when they left Fl. One of them told me being shy is a waste of time!

Huh?

I had never thought of it that way.
Joe said, "just put yourself out there, take the risk you'll be rejected or ignored".
 "What's to lose really?" he asked

He was telling me the response from other people was less important to me than  reaching out was to me. He was telling me their response did not define me.

A little passing sentence in a long line of letters between college kids ended up changing my life.

I began that week to look people in the eye as I passed. I began to say hi when I sat near someone. I began to look at people rather than the tops of my shoes.
I became less shy.
I became more me, the person who wants to know others.
I became more powerful in a way, taking the risk of rejection knowing it would not un-do me to be rejected.

I became happier as I met some very nice people for a minute in passing, or who later became friends.

I learned I was a person who was interested in others, and by looking at them, and talking to them, I could learn about them. It enriched my life.

As a child, I longed to be a performer. A singer and dancer in shows. I was painfully shy, fearful of others, so I put that goal behind me as unreachable.
I approached University as a straight A student, confident in my ability to learn and succeed in school. I decided to be a surgeon instead of an actress.

I went through 2 1/2 years of pre-med classes, succeeding but increasingly unhappy. I went into counseling at University where I continued the real path to finding out who I was under the shyness. I took a turn from medicine toward psychology as I realized that fit me more. 
It was like the shyness problem... I didn't listen to my heart. I did what I thought I was meant to.
When I opened my eyes to the possibilities, and someone asked what I wanted to do instead of telling me what to do, I moved into social science field.

I blossomed and began to know who I was, and it wasn't who I was told to be. I never made much money as a social worker, but I learned about people in a way most people do not. I learned to see and hear them, that there were many choices in life. I learned self respect as I made choices too.

I've never been good at choice making because I become paralyzed trying to make the right one. Then I learned there is not always a right one to make.... you make a choice and live with the results until you make another choice. Making no choice may be the worst choice.

My baby steps toward speaking to strangers, reaching out to others became a marathon. I still have bouts of shyness, when self doubt and old parental disapproval plays in my mind. It's when I overcome and take the risk of standing up for myself, that I grow in strength.

The kind of strength that is real, the inside kind of quiet strength of character that is called for in society.

 I admire people who quietly know who they are.

With nothing to prove, they have no need to overpower others. When I am around them I am reminded that my opinions are valid and respected.

People who seek power at the expense of other people are dangerous and disgusting to me.
They see life as a competition with winners and losers. They find joy in overpowering others.  They can charm you in a manipulative way in order to steal your power.

I learned back in college what real strength was. It is quiet and deep.  I learned from a passing sentence from a new acquaintance.

Strength is knowing who you are, what you believe, and acting on that.

Strength takes away nothing from others.

why didn't I pay more attention in Geometry class???

Aren't  Angels and Angles the same thing??? LOL!

Why didn't I pay more attention in Geometry class in High School?? 
1. I didn't know I'd need it 45 years later
2. I did pay attention and made an "A" but learning for a test and learning how to use it are
     two different  things.   

My friend Mary told me her son who is in 11th grade, was told by his Math teacher to "show his work" when answering a Math problem.

I've spent the morning trying to draft a hexagon pattern myself with a star in the center. I saw one made, and the pattern was free, but I had to sign up for some daily feed to receive it. I am at my limit of daily notices online so that wasn't happening. I just want to do an interesting EPP ( hand piecing) pattern while watching TV in the evenings.

Snap! I'll draft one myself!

Which brings me to Geometry class, the trauma of angles, and "show your work"

Thing is... I often work on whim and intuition. I am not the "show your work" kind of gal. When I develop a technique that could be taught in a class, my process is

Figure out what I want to do
Figure out how to do that
Do that
Then go back and figure out the steps and measurements to create a pattern.

Sometimes I don't want to show the work, I just want to make it. Sometimes I'd like to know how I made it so I could make it again, or show others who will ask how to do it too. Sometimes I don't want others to do it too.

In this circumstance I am starting from an image someone else figured out and still making it hard on myself!

I have spent the morning exercising my brain cells, brushing the dust off the synapses, by "re-inventing the wheel"
I could involve my engineering husband (AKA Mr. Math) or just join yet another daily feed from which I can't extricate myself.

Or I can accept myself the way I am.
Do you take the easier way out or figure things like this out yourself? 

"I Like" Thursday #19

Welcome to another "I Like" Thursday... here's what I liked this week....

1. I Like Finding inspiration in my files. I keep images from magazines, drawings, cards, etc in folders labeled so I can go look when I want to draw an adirondak chair for instance. I looked through the files this week, to see if I could throw anything out.

 Well, the good news, or bad news, is I only got rid of maybe 10 sheets of paper as I still love all the snips!
Especially the folder labeled Faces...

 Oh so many fun faces, which made me want to run to my fabrics, my paints, my machine to make art. That's a good thing, y'all.
Speaking of faces...

2. I like the new BBC show  Victoria . It airs Sunday nights, relieving some of my missing of Downton and The Durells. Well done, and I had no idea how she had to fight for respect at the start! The actress playing Queen Victoria  has the "it factor"

3. I also Like the TV show "This is us"

It is maybe the most well written and produced show on US television right now. Like layers of an onion that peel away revealing the next layer, the concept of family and the connection between members is explored. Funny, touching, and very real.
I was told as an adult that I had been adopted as a newborn. There is a lot to the story and maybe I'll share it here one day.
I have never fit in and long to.
Which brings me to this like...

4. I Like the blogger I'll call "G" here. She shared  with me, her story of finding her birth family and gave me tips on my search. The call gave me a sense that somewhere there might be a place for me. (unfortunately it's not within the adoptive family) Hope springs eternal.

This is my Husband's drawer of shirts

5. I Like folding my t-shirts like this, and storing them in the drawer so I can easily find just the right one. It's the same way I store fabric, so I can see it at a glance instead of lifting some out of the way. I fold them in half lengthwise, then the other way,  fold  in half, and again and they fit in a drawer.
I used to store them on top of each other like this

where you can see the top one and have to dig to see the ones three down.

Now if I could just stop overstuffing the drawers.

Which leads me to my new bead storage...

6. When I saw these at my friend Cindy's I fell in like with them!
I used two Joann coupons to get two for half price and started the "Great Bead Reorganization"

I don't know about you, but I am in search of organization like the holy grail.

Generally I don't like moving stacks of containers to get to the bottom one. That's what I have to do with beads, but still I love this system as the beads are visible at a glance, contained in lidded jars so they don't skitter around.

I store fabric by color because that's how I work. I store beads and threads by type as that's how I use them. I need a few more containers like this before all of them find a place to belong, then need to find a place for the containers in here

I can do it!

7. I Like having soup on hand. I made Great Northern Bean soup this week, just dried beans, chicken broth, celery onions and spices. Really good. My hint is using a measuring cup instead of a ladle.

It works like a charm, lifting a cup at a time without having to deal with a little ladle handle. Try it.

8. I Liked learning about Ava Vanderbilt in Newport RI a couple months ago. She was very wealthy with a lot of prestige and power for the day. She could have just thrown party after party and spent her money on clothes.

The Vanderbilt china

  Instead she worked for Women's rights.
She raised money and awareness with her tireless efforts for women's rights.
It was a difficult fight, and many women were jailed, beaten sometimes killed, risked their jobs and families who disagreed with them.

To all the women who stood up for the right to vote, and own property, and have a voice in their own country, who fought to stop sexual harassment in the workplace, and allowed me to claim rights I have now, you have my undying gratitude.Thank you for speaking up.

To my sisters standing up for women's rights (which are human rights) this weekend... Thank you  

I am unable physically to do the march but I intend to support the continuation of women's rights and Free Speech even as some elected officials seek to quiet us. 
We have the right and responsibility to make our voices heard in America. 

That's about it this week and as always, let me know if you did an "I like" post to share. Keep the good news coming, I'll add links over the next few days...
visit these fine people next... Love and peace, LeeAnna
1. http://littlepenguinquilts
2. http://imworkingonaproject
3.http://pugmomquilts 

thankful for polite folk

From the photo exhibit at Smithsonian Natural History Museum

I am thankful for polite folk. 
I'm not quite sure how so many people lost the desire to "be nice" but so many now grab what they want and believe the rest of the world should give it to them.

That's not how it works.

Research has shown people want respect. Sometimes in the workplace respect has more value than raises.

Polite behavior is like the oil in a sewing machine. The machine has these sturdy metal parts but won't run smoothly unless there is oil.

Recently I went out for a walk in my neighborhood. In order to walk a couple miles I must walk in the streets as there are only a couple sidewalks. It's a neighborhood with a posted 25 mph speed limit for cars.

I will go so far as to say MANY residents ignore that, speeding past at 45 to 50 mph and within 3 feet of me. It is terrifying and disrespectful. I've seen cars veer into my path to avoid a pot hole or another car when the polite ( and lawful) thing to do would be to slow down or wait for a safe moment to pass.

I've heard from others who walk that they are angry at this behavior.
Anger is an easy reaction to go to when disrespected. It also harms the disrespected person more than the offender. Anger can ruin a day, and left unchecked can ruin a life.

What can we do to increase kindness and understanding? 

We can be polite when it's easier to be demanding.

The world owes us nothing, but we owe the world everything.

However hard you work for what you have, you still need clean air and water, and other people.
We work together in societies because it's better for all.
We take care of each other because it's better for all.

Recently I encountered two polite people and it renewed me, healed me a little. 
It was spiritual balm.  

After yet another truck pushed me to the side of the road while I was out walking, I heard,
"Miss! Miss??" I turned expecting to have the driver shake his fist at me as has happened many times.

Instead the driver said, "you dropped your glove!"

Oh. I expected more incivility and was surprised with kindness.
 I would have desperately missed than new wool mitt.  I felt gratitude and happiness at this interaction. You can believe I let that sink in and learned from him. Not to just tell a person about a dropped glove, but to take the merest 'blink-of-an-eye'  moment to reach out with kindness to a person who expects less.

It changes us.

The driver knew in his heart he could have driven by without a glance but he chose kindness.
That is the kind of thing that increases self esteem too.
A person may "get away" with ugly behavior but somewhere in their heart they know they didn't choose well, and decent folk feel guilty about it.

Another encounter was at a bead shop. I was looking hard at a wall of beads wondering what would work in a current project. Another shopper came in and came to the same wall. She said " excuse me!" when I glanced up at her. She stepped back not to invade my space.

I often encounter shoppers who shove me out of their way, while they talk on their phones and step in front of me to look at something. In fact it happens so frequently I have come to expect it. It leaves me angry as if they are more important than I am, as if their desires trump mine.
As if I don't matter, indeed to them I do not.

Another image from the Smithsonian Natural History Museum exhibit

 Each person deserves respect and I am saying the world will be more content if we respect each other.

This has been weighing heavily on my heart, and I feel I must express it...

It is not acceptable for anyone to deride citizens, especially our leaders speaking disrespectfully.
 It is not understandable nor acceptable nor an American value to denigrate groups of people.

We would not allow children to say derogatory things out loud, that are being said by some elected officials. If a person speaks for America, I expect them to represent all of it's citizens with restraint and respect. We deserve that. We should expect no less from them than we would a friend, a spouse, a child or a neighbor.

Apparently owning all the merchandise in the world, having all the money available, getting your way at the expense of someone else, is not making people happy. I see very few truly happy people.

It is my idea that respecting each other, being polite, will increase happiness. Note I have tried to express myself in a polite way here. 

Tell me of a time when someone changed your day by being polite, please. 
Thank you.

A little silk purse

We exchanged zipper bags at our holiday bee meeting.
With so many patterns out there, I chose this one the sewing chick  to loosely follow, and it's free.

I have a drawer of silk fabrics so I decided to use four of those, and piece them with free form curves.
I did not take photos as I worked, so sorry, but if you like I will try to do a video tutorial on how I do them.

Silk is generally very well behaved for me, with a bit more fraying. These are four different weights and weaves, with the larges one having gold threads woven in... so pretty in person. I quilted the front and back with YLI gold thread also in a free curved design, which repeats curves but not the same curves.

Some of it is tie fabric, like the lining here. I covered the raw edges with  brown silk ribbon. 

Silk has a sheen. Not sparkle, but shiny. Reflective.
The zipper was so easy to put in. 

I like how a bag looks when you box the bottom so it will stand up.

While I was sewing I thought about embellishments and chose these.
I think they add a lot of character and beauty to a finished item.

Texture changes. A curved line leads your eye. Beads catch the light. A ribbon and charm on the zipper.
I hated to let it go!

"I Like" thursdays # 18

T-shirt in Nordstrom's  children's section

Welcome to this week's "I Like" list!
Thanks for coming, grab a cup of something tasty and join me won't you?

 poster by Krista Brooks

1. I Like that first cup of coffee.
The first of my morning and the first from a freshly brewed pot.
It doesn't always happen but I like when I get just the right amount of milk to coffee, the perfect ratio of strong roast to creamy milk, the perfect balance. The perfect taste. The perfect heat, not scalding not cold.

As an aside, I grew up with a father who drank black coffee all day and a mother who drank cokes and iced tea not coffee. I learned to enjoy coffee one semester when I had an unfortunate 8 AM statistics class in university. Being a night owl, I learned to drink coffee from the vending machine in class.

2. I like down time. I like having a whole day stretched out in front of me where I can decide when to get up, when to get dressed, when to stop drinking coffee and move on to the next adventure. I might be a home body. I am never bored at home because it's filled with things I like.
And dust and clutter.

3. I Like coloring. I've always liked coloring, since a little girl. I scribbled color across lines with those big fat crayons to see color next to color. Then I refined my coloring when given a " box of 64"big girl crayons, the one with the built in sharpener.
Heaven!
I carefully outlined in pressed down crayon the black lines, and filled in the areas being careful not to go outside the lines.

At some point I decided I wanted to color outside the lines again!
Or draw my OWN lines then color outside them!
Or color first, then draw lines on top!

4. I like the color Red  right now. I kept out the cardinals (from our tree this year) out on top of the TV cabinet where I can see them.

This towel is really red not pink like the picture

 I am using a lot of red kitchen towels. . Red carries energy I need.

Nature made this heart out of berries! I just noticed it

Did you know color vibrates? We might not perceive it,or sense it but it's a fact y'all.
Colors vibrate and we react to them in feelings according to our perception.

Pink is a tint of Red so I kept up my little pink tree in the entry, and added in the jewel hearts for V-day.

Sparkling Red!

5. I like the posts labeled "Dear Bacon" of pet photos each week. This week is especially hilarious to me.

https://piglove.wordpress.com/2017/01/10/dear-bacon-119/



6.Lord and Taylor  has pretty dresses lining the aisles right now... look at this one with pearls crusting the neckline...

What a lot of beads and pearls!

It's heavy too. This is the back which reminds me that I like a lower back.

A person who needs support cannot get away with this but a young really thin woman could.

I have always enjoyed fashion, and it's kind of sad not to be able to wear the things I would like, but I am all about comfort now anyway. How about you?





7. I like these chocolate covered strawberries at Godiva

This shot through the window doesn't do them justice but they looked so pretty as we walked by.
Very French (to an American) display of fancy work.

Eating a chocolate covered strawberry is sometimes challenging to me, since the first bite causes all the chocolate to fall off in your lap.

Still, the display is pretty and would feel decadent to receive a paper cone of them wouldn't it?

Are they worth the calories?

I do love to see how stores display merchandise. Wonder what that is all about? Is it kind of like home dec?


We were walking in the mall instead of the neighborhood this evening, as it was very cold and icy. I am drawn into Crate and Barrel and Pottery Barn as if I'm coming home. AS IF!

8.I Like knitting socks. Who knew the yarn on the right with mottled color would knit into that lovely pattern on the left? That's the leg portion of my new sock, and I'm about to do the heel. I knit socks on two circular needles now. I used to do two at once but they get heavy at the end. I LOVE the feel of hand knitted socks.

9. I Like  the Great American Baking Show on NBC right now, Thursday is the finale. I used to bake, even used to make eclairs, loaves of bread, and crepes regularly. I do not enjoy that as much now, but I love seeing a beautifully made pastry! The show is fashioned after the British baking show which was bought out and will change character now anyway. Ick. Expect more nasty competition.
Last episode one contestant cried when another was sent home, saying she should be happy to be one step closer to winning but she has come to really care about the other contestants.

Wow. Imagine. One doesn't have to step on another to win. One doesn't have to squelch all competition to still win a prize. One can retain their humility and kindness in life. Good goal.

 10. I Like ear nibbles from a pup
(This isn't him but looks like him) (just google small blond shaggy dogs)
There's a young woman in our neighborhood who walks a little blond doggie.

It's mixed..... part sweetness, part excitement, and a little adventurer. I always say hi when we meet. This time he jumped up. I managed to mostly avoid the jumps but then he looked into my eyes and asked me "please get close to my face"

I said, "oh, he wants to get close to my face... oooop!!" He jumped up, I held his little feet and bent down, and he looked into my eyes intently, then snuggled up to my face and nibbled my ear!

His girl said, "he does like to bite our ears"

Don't you love how each dog has a thing? His thing is earlobes. I can't lie... it felt nice!

What did you like this week?

As usual let me know if you also did an I Like post and I'll put a link here. Enjoy visits with these people:
1.http://littlepenguinquilts.blogspot.com/
2. http://imworkingonaproject.blogspot.com/2017/01/i-like-1.html
3.http://paulabquilts.blogspot.com/
4.http://3poodlesandanana.blogspot.com/