Another Day in New York City

Did that grab your attention - LOL!! Yes, this was an actual real place on the south side.

We were lucky both days of our tour that we had pretty darned good weather. I did get on the bus without a hat, and jumped off quickly at the first stop and bought a hat from a sidewalk vendor. Pink, and it says New York Princess.






This is a wall that is a memorial to all the children killed during the 9/11 attack. All these photos and cards and mementos. Was really very moving.






See that window next to the "feel" word on the banner? I think that is where Keith does his broadcast for MSNBC! My political resource idol.

We actually got off the bus here and went into the building. Didn't take a tour, but did go through the gift shop where I bought myself a Countdown coffee mug and a Top Chef apron.

I turned around after taking that photo and got this photo of Rockefeller Center. Where those tables and umbrellas are is where the ice skating happens in the winter. And straight ahead between those buildings is the huge lighted tree.

The only "famous" person we saw was Anne Curry. She is very tiny!

Connie and I had the most amazing lunch at a Cuban restaurant that day. She had a sandwich with a pulled pork and pickles, grilled like a panini. I had a great pork dish with an amazing cuban rice and bean side dish. Just awesome.
Coming up this week will be some wonderful photos of our trip up to Cooperstown. It was our second visit to this little town and we would definitely go again.

What I'm hoping to be writing about in the next day or two is the arrival of the new Templeton!! Full moon tonight, and Genie was having contractions still about 10 minutes apart about an hour ago. Guess I better try to get some sleep, in case my phone rings in the night!!

A Partial Tour of New York City

I love taking the open air bus tours in cities I visit. The first day Connie and I took the bus to the south end and then the north on the second day. This is the MOMA which was near the end of the second day. I really would have loved about 3 more days in the city to explore things a bit closer.
Did I tell you about the horse biting me???





this is a shot of it actually happening!! Stupid me! At least I had my hand open. It really was just a bit of a "love nibble"...I learned a lesson here though. These officers and animals are there to do a really, really important job, not be photo ops for the tourists. I also wish I could figure out how to crop these photos before posting them so I can eliminate some of the belly!

This is my friend Connie choosing some fashionable attire at the Macy's in Times Square. It's the Macy's anchor store and largest in the company. I thought it had a very confusing layout. The sales people were real New Yorkers....didn't really care much about customer service. Sorry if that is a generality but there it is. The coolest thing about the store was the upper floors that still maintain their old wooden escalators




I was surprised I left this store without buying anything! Oh wait, that's not true. I bought some face wash from the Origins counter.

In the fashion district is this very cool statue. Being a bit of a sewing person, it was quite touching.





And down about two blocks on the other side is
THIS






Being the Project Runway fan that I am I was thrilled to see it. I never did get to Mood though, but I surely will my next visit to NYC.

See ya soon with more of my tour!

Life with a Dog in the House

I had forgotten what it was like to have a dog in the house. Everywhere I go, there he is! My new best friend. He really is a very good dog. Loves to chase the ball, or anything else we throw for him.

Jillian had a temp of 103 today....wondering if it really was just too much sun at the waterslides yesterday. Also a headache. Lots of water, cool cloth to the head and some kids ibuprofen seems to have it under control, but we are going to hang out and chill today, just to be careful.

Up and Running Again

A pledge....to get on the blogging role again. Thanks so much for those of you who pop in and leave me a note, it means a lot.
Many, many things have gone on since I was posting regularly. It's now almost the end of July, and we are awaiting the phone call of the arrival of the newest baby Templeton!!! The due date is actually the 29th, and Carter arrived a week past due, but we are all thinking it could be this weekend. I was able to go down for a bit of a visit last weekend, after helping sister Carol with her garage sale.
And there is the photo of a couple of sleepy guys!! I had fun playing with Carter for a couple of hours while Genie was able to get some rest. I remember those days being so very pregnant!! They have settled into their new MUCH larger house and will be enjoying bringing baby boy Henry home in just a short time, I'm sure.

My garden is so far behind!! Maybe tomorrow I'll get myself out there to clean up the herb garden anyway. Jillian and Ethan and dog Cosmo are her for the weekend, while their parents enjoy their wedding anniversary away for a couple of days.

I did get a quilt done (okay, no binding yet) and it is on my guest bed, over the kids!
This is a quilt I started about 3 or 4 years ago, using the tri rec rulers. I love how the circular look comes about.

My small group had an extra sew day this month and we were able to put together two oversized lap quilts for the husbands of two of our members husbands. One has been recently diagnosed with an advanced cancer, and has begun a chemotherapy regime and the other has been suffering with age related health issues for quite some time. Two of our other members husbands are dealing with Alzheimer's, so we are thinking they all need some extra hugs these days.....

I am still planning to post my photos and share some stories from my New York trip, so stay tuned for that!! Be back soon. Really. Truly...I mean it!

July and not sure if it's summer yet!

Our weather has been down right odd.....I was even tempted to turn my furnace on yesterday morning to take the chill off in here. Today, was pretty darned nice though.

Here is my latest new start. I am trying a different method of counted cross stitch where you do a 10 x 10 square block at a time, and you "park" your leftover thread. I've done two blocks, one of top of the other and now moving to the lower right block. I'll post photos as I go along. This is 16 count cloth, which I've discovered is really the smallest I can work on. Can you tell what it is so far????

We had the adventure of the missing kitty last week. Rocco, who loves to be outside in the evening hours didn't come in on Monday night. His curfew is 10 and he's pretty good about it, though when the mousing is good he sometimes isn't in until 12 or 1. He has been gone overnight once before. This time about the third night, I accepted that he was "gone" either to be some coyote or eagles late night snack or something equally horrible to imagine. We were looking and calling, checking the roads. He has a microchip so we thought if the city had picked him up they would have called. Then Saturday morning, on Lynn's 59th birthday, he sauntered in the door like "ho hum, what' s up?" No sign of injury or starvation. I'm guessing somewhere, someone invited him in and he thought he'd just stay a few days.

His big brother Dutch was even happy to see him, spent a few minutes licking Rocco's face and ears. And that day he actually kind of followed him around. Very sweet.

Tonight I am cooking the never done ribs on the grill. I did Emeril's dry rub, then put them on for the 2 1/2 hours. It has now been 3 1/2 hours, Lynn is starving and they still aren't done.....GRRRRRR . Once in a while I make great ribs, and then these things happen.

Will let you know how they come out!