No Sewing Today!

I had every intention of sewing today but instead I filled my day with other things. First off we went to my nephew's baptism at 9am with a family lunch after.

Then I went to American Quilting and picked up my new BOM block but didn't get to stay and visit or have time for fabric therapy because my family was waiting for me in the car. So, I ran in and I ran out.

I was going to sew the blocks together but made the mistake of sitting down and doing some blogging and then I decided to finally join facebook. So, that kept me busy for a few hours and then my daughter Ariel wanted to do a photo shoot. She told me she found a really cool spot in the neighborhood to take pictures and so I went along to have a look.

As you can see from the pictures it was worth it. . .






We have a riverbed with a covered bridge in our neighborhood and right now the riverbed is dry so we were able to climb down and take pictures in the tunnel under the bridge and in and around the riverbed. It was fun.

Our Day in SFO

More vacation pictures. Enjoy.

We spent the day in San Francisco on Thursday, July 2nd. We jumped on the Bart Train in Fremont and found our seats.


While we were sitting there I noticed a young man possibly in his later twenties maybe early 30's moving from one compartment in to ours. He came toward us and sat in the seat right next to where we were sitting. We had the opportunity to start talking and found out that he had been a taxi drive in downtown San Francisco and was no longer driving due to the fact that he had been shot 5 times while waiting for a fare and nearly died almost a year ago and he was headed into the city for a doctor's appointment. What a story. He told us that he was impressed with our family and in his words, told us that he could see our purity and that's why he sat next to us. I thought that was really sweet. We had a wonderful conversation about the importance of family's. He was impressed that my husband and I have been married for 26 years and we're still together. I guess that's more of a rarity than it use to be.

Mark and Harry (his english name).
The young man who sat next to us on the Bart Train.

This is the first thing my daughter saw when we came up from the Bart station into the city. A Forever 21 store. She was excited and practically ran to the store. She had a great time shopping and going to several vintage stores and also the H&M store. It was fun to see her having so much fun.

Myself, My husband and Kenna walked around Chinatown while my other two kids were shopping and then later we met for dinner.

Just another one of the monkies. . .
Speak NO evil, Take NO pictures, See NO evil and Hear NO evil! LOL!

I Lost My Heart in San Francisco. . .

The St. Francis Hotel. What a beautiful hotel.

An Art Show was going on in Union Square.

A view from the Rooftop of Macy's Department Store.

We had a great dinner at the Cheescake Factory that's located on the roof of Macy's Department Store located in Union Square. After a great dinner & delicious cheesecake we headed over to the Orpheum Theater to see Wicked. What a fun experience and an exhausting day. We finally got back to our hotel in San Jose at 1am and slept in the morning until 10 or 11am. That's why we got such a late start to the Monterey Bay Aquarium the next day. We crammed in a lot during our trip and put nearly a 1,000 miles on the car. Wow!

Bloggy Links

Allison at Cluck Cluck Sew has compiled a wonderful list of Sewing Crafty Bloggy Links for us to peruse at our leisure. I'm going to be checking a lot of them out over the next few days or weeks. Enjoy!

Monterey & Carmel

We drove down to Monterey & Carmel on Friday the 3rd of July. We started out around 1 o'clock and as we started driving we wondered why there was so much traffic. Well duh?! We realized that a lot of people were off the day before the 4th and everyone would be heading out of town. This was just a little reminder of what we don't miss about California. We miss a lot of things but this isn't one of them. It took us over 2 1/2 hours to get there from San Jose but we had such a great time at the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Carmel that we didn't mind at all.






We loved seeing all the different kinds of jellyfish. I had no idea there was such variety.

Do you see the seahorse? The New Seahorse Exhibit was fascinating and worth seeing. We almost missed it but I'm happy we didn't.

Here we are standing outside of the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Next we headed toward Carmel and did the 17-mile drive. It's one of our favorite things to do and I loved watching my family and taking pictures of them. I let my family walk down to the water's edge and I enjoyed standing back and catching moments like these.

Mark and Kenna

Father and Son

Ariel

The next three pictures are my favorites of each of the three of my children that came on this trip. My oldest is married and stayed home with her family. She was sad that they couldn't come with us this time.

Mark

Kenna

Ariel

While we were at the beach we just had to do some Ariel the Mermaid poses on the rock. It was fun and I could bore you to death with all of the pictures I took.

Just to end this post I wanted to show you one of my favorite Victorian homes along the coastline near Lover's Point. It's called Seven Gables Inn and it's a bed and breakfast Inn. We've stayed there a few times and loved it. Very quaint and beautiful.

Fun with Friends

Those of you that read Lori's Blog Bee in my Bonnet already know that Kenna and I had lunch at Gardner Village with Lori and Kassidy. We've been looking forward to meeting both of them for a while now. We all had a great time eating lunch, visiting with friends, and shopping at Pine Needles. What could be better than food, friends, and shopping for fabric all in ONE day?



The girl's had fun meeting and we look forward to getting together again for a SEWING Day with the girls. We're shooting for August.

New Friends: Kassidy and Kenna

Both of the Girls love Webkinz and so they picked a Webkinz buddy for each other. This is the Silver Fox that Kassidy gave to Kenna. She loves it so much that she took the fox to bed with her. She always has a few webkinz friends to protect her at night.



Lookie what Lori made for me. I was really excited! I've always wanted a Starch Cozy and she even picked two of my favorite fabrics. Don't you just love those pom poms? They definitely add to the cute factor. Thanks Lori for thinking of me.

After lunch we had fun shopping together at Pine Needles and I finally bought Material Obsession. I've been wanting to get it for a while now but with all the money I spent at the shop hop I was trying to put it off a bit longer. I also enjoyed some fabric therapy. I need a summer job so I can afford more therapy! LOL!

Doesn't my Starch Cozy look CUTE next to my new book?

I just loved the reds and turquoise fabric on the left and the Civil War fabric on the right. I'm thinking I need to make a skirt out of the red and turquoise fabric.

After shopping we took pictures and said our goodbyes. What a fun time we had together!!!

Thanks Lori and Kassidy!

After our meeting I had a few other things to do and Kenna was willing to spend the day with me so I took advantage of that. You know how it is to be 10, right? She spends her days playing with friends and cousins.

Most of you know that I recently had a giveaway, right?

Well, I had a chance to deliver the Patriotic Star Pillow in person to Patsy. When I went to email Patsy to get her address I realized that she might know Nedra from Cactus Needles because she mentioned that she had come over from Nedra's blog. So it was fun to find out that we are all connected in one way or another. When I found out that she lives close by I emailed her and arrange to deliver it in person. She was so happy and excited to win especially since she's never won anything before.


After meeting with Patsy we headed to Barnes & Noble to buy some books. My daughter had bought me a book called EVERMORE by Alyson Noel for Mother's day and the second book was coming out July 7th so, I was anxious to get it as soon as I could. I've had a gift card for Barnes & Noble since school ended so it was burning a hole in my pocket. I also got a couple books to read with Kenna. I've been meaning to buy Fablehaven for some time now. It's been very popular and is written by a local author, Brandon Mull. The other book you see is a book that Kenna's 4th grade teacher read to the class and she liked it so much that she wants to read it again. We started reading it before bed last night.

What a WONDERFUL day we had together!

MBS & TM Giveaway Winners

Thank You Everyone for the Great Response to my Moda Bake Shop and Texture Magic Giveaway. It was so much fun to read all of the comments on my Blog and Moda Bake Shops Blog. My friend Nedra reported that Superior Threads saw an increase in internet traffic on their website. How exciting! Thank you for spreading the news about Texture Magic.

The Winner of the Patriotic Star Pillow:

Patsy Jensen

The Winner of the Two Packages of Texture Magic:

Kim Wall
Valerie DeMarco

The Winner of the Titanium Needles:

Dayna Williamson

Congratulations Ladies!

Home Safe!

I'm very grateful to tell all of you that we made it home safe and sound. It was a very long and exhausting trip home. Our short 8 hour drive from South Lake Tahoe (where my husband's brother lives) turned into a 12+ hour drive home that involved a flat tire 18 miles outside of Wells, Nevada. There is absolutely nothing out there and it gave us a deep sense of gratitude for our Faith. We knew that we would be okay and even Kenna was calm being that she's the one that PANICS!!! It was kind of scary there on the side of the rode with all those trucks and cars speeding by at 75-85 miles an hour. I'm just grateful the flat wasn't on the other side of the car facing into the road. It took about 30 minutes for my husband to change the tire with the help of our son, Mark. I'm sooo grateful for the MEN in my family!


We were also very grateful to have cell phone service where we were located and so I called my daughter Natalie, to have her google WELLS, Nevada and see if there were any repair shop services available. She gave me about 5 options and I started calling the businesses hoping and I mean hoping that they would be open on a Sunday and that they could help us. Luckily, the flate occurred at 4pm. Of course, I didn't get one person on the phone and we thought if anything we could spend the night in WELLS and wait for Monday to get it fixed.


As we drove slowly toward Wells. It took nearly 30 minutes to drive the 18 miles making sure to go slowly. We certainly didn't want our spare to get a flat. That would've been terrible. Anyway, my husband took the first Wells exit and we felt like we should go left. I saw an Auto Body Store and told my husband we should stop to get directions to the Les Schwab Tire Store my daughter had looked up for us on the internet. My husband hesitated but stopped for me. He told me I had to go in though. I went in and told them that we had had a flat tire and asked if Les Schwab's might be open today and he told us that they were closed but, that Kevin over at International Tire Service is open 24 hours a day and that he could help us. He gave us his business card. I called Kevin up and he gave us directions to his store. He took care of us in less than an hour. I'm so glad he had the right size tire, too! Thanks Kevin saving the DAY!


We arrived home with very grumpy and tired children at about 10:30pm. They all hung in there but it was tough there at the end of a very long day. In fact Ariel is still sleeping and it's NOON. I think I'll let her sleep. If you know what I mean...

Just a side note. I will be posting more fun pictures over the next several days along with the WINNER of the Moda Bake Shop Giveaway. Stay tuned!!