… not quite back in the saddle yet.

Thank you everyone for all your cheerful birthday wishes! We had a wonderful vacation to New York City, and I enjoyed a fabulous birthday. I took hundreds of photos, but I won’t bore you with too many here. I will post more on my flickr page. Here are just a few highlights.

Me in Central Park

One of our favorite things to do in the city is explore Central Park and different neighborhoods. I love the variety of street scenes you come upon, just wandering around. We do a lot of walking!

Times Square

More and more Christmas lights and decorations were popping up over the week, which put us in a festive mood.

Radio City lit up!

We spent a couple days exploring different parts of Central Park. It was a nice surprise to see fall leaves throughout the park.

Bridge in Central Park

I love the beautiful statues scattered all over the city, intermixed among the skyscrapers, making them seem more magical. One of my favorite statues is the angel at Bethesda Fountain in Central Park.

Me in front of Bethesda Fountain

We lucked out with a gorgeous day of hiking at Harriman State Park, which was about 45 minutes north of Manhattan.

waterfalls at Harriman State Park

There was so much moss in that park, making the forest feel mystical.

moss in a mystical forest

Luckily, my sister-in-law and brother-in-law came back with us to spend some time in Madison, helping to ease our transition back to realty.

I haven’t done any blogging, surfing or emailing in over a week, which feels weird to me. I take pride in staying connected with all my fabulous blogger friends, so I have a bit of catching up to do. Hope you all enjoyed a happy Thanksgiving.

We are headed for the city – New York City!

Remember last year, when we went to New York City to visit family? We were celebrating my birthday. Yes, it was a big one. What a great place to celebrate a milestone! This year, it’s just another day, but we’re still going to celebrate. (On the birthday card envelope I got yesterday from my closest friend Tami, she wrote happy 4? birthday. Classic, don’t you think?!)

(envelope & card from Tami)

We usually make the same rounds: Purl, the public library, the Met, the Rose Center, Times Square, and plenty of Irish pubs in between! I do have a shopping list for M&J Trimming and Mood Fabrics so I am going to drag my husband there again. He’s such a good sport to go to those girly shops!

inside of M&J Trimming

This time around, I think we are going to skip a couple of those places, and try a few new things. We are planning to go hiking at Harriman State Park and sightseeing through Central Park, which we haven’t done in a couple years. I have always wanted to check out Tavern on the Green, so I hope we can get in, maybe just for afternoon tea or a cocktail. We will be trying out Cesca for the birthday dinner.

(funny office magnet from Tami!)

We are hoping to try out the Morgan library and the Frick Collection, which is showing stunning drawings right now.  I love stopping in to St. Patrick’s Cathedral, which is such a gorgeous old church. I love the gothic architecture, the stained glass windows, the candles burning everywhere. My sister-in-law works in the Rockefeller Center complex, so we will have to look for The Tree too.

What grand plans we have! Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend. See you back here around Thanksgiving.

I don’t have a lot of gifts to buy because we give couples’ gifts on Dave’s side of the family, and we exchange names on my side of the family. We have a relatively new tradition with friends where we just go out for dinner instead of buying stuff for each other. But I did a little shopping on etsy anyway.

I bought these fabulous handmade pewter ornaments from Bee Hive Kitchenware. I loved each one of them so I just bought the whole set.

I also bought one of these felted balls from Flapjack and Pippin for no reason. I just loved it. It can be used as a pincushion, practical, yes. But it can also just sit in the corner of my drab desk at work and cheer things up a little bit.

I bookmarked a few other fun, whimsical handmade items on etsy that I might order before the holidays, just for the fun of it!

I mentioned this weekend that I was working on a few Christmas projects to list in my shop. I finished them on Sunday night, and even though it’s been cloudy for a couple days, I took pictures anyway. It gets harder and harder to take pictures of projects this time of year, as our daylight shrinks!

I made four stuff sacks in Christmas fabrics, which will make great gift bags. I improved my design on these stuff sacks by adding piping to the bottom, making them a little more sturdy and giving them a more finished look.

The stuff sacks are 8.5 inches tall with a 5.5 inch flat bottom.

I also made six drawstring bags in Christmas fabrics, great for gift bags.

I have a really nice variety of fabrics for these!

And a nice variety of sizes, from 7.5 inch squares to 9.5 inch squares.

The best part of these gift bags is that they are reusable! You can put a gift in them, you can give them as a give, you can use them as a purse, and you can even use them as a travel bag to hold toiletries or dirty laundry inside your suitcase. I made TEN of them so be sure to stop by my little shop to see more pictures of these reusable gift bags!

Yippee, it’s Saturday. My favorite day of the week!

I have some vacation time that I have to start using up so I don’t lose it at the end of the year, so I took a day off on Friday and worked on some Christmas projects for my little shop. I savored each moment of my day off so much that I wasn’t as productive as I thought I would be, so my projects aren’t done enough to share final pictures yet. Soon, though.

Today completes my NINTH week of working out! I started a new workout routine on September 14, with 20 minutes on the elliptical, 100 crunches, and 20 minutes of weight training three days a week, and here I am NINE weeks later, still going strong. My primary goal was to get in shape and tone up a bit. Now my clothes are a little bit looser (yay!), and I feel great to the point where I think I would be upset if I missed a workout day. (My knees are especially happy because I have rheumatoid arthritis and the best remedy is exercise.)

Another great thing about Saturday is my favorite tv show is on tonight. You may not know that I am a HUGE fan of Saturday Night Live. By the way, did anyone else watch last weekend’s show, with Taylor Swift as the host and musical guest? Her monologue was hilarious and her digital short, which was a spoof on Twilight, was even funnier. I laughed so hard I thought I was going to hyperventilate. I don’t know who the host is this week, but I am still looking forward to a few good laughs.

Here’s to hoping you savor every moment of your Saturday!

I was going to keep up with the one-a-day quilt-along that was going around this summer, but I got distracted. Sometimes I’m just not that good at keeping up with the crowd!

I liked the quilt on the cover of this magazine and decided that would be a great project for the Darla fabrics I had in my stash.

Here’s what the finished top looks like, which measures 50 inches all the way around. I think it turned out cute and sweet with two sugar cubes on top!

I finally made time a couple Sundays ago to quilt it, sewing diagonal lines in both directions through each square and nine-patch block. (hard to see in the photo but each square and 9-patch has an X sewn through it)

I pieced the back together like this.

Now I just need to another Sunday to sew on the binding fabric.  It will be nice to check this UFO will be off the list. Then I will only have about three more UFOs to complete.

Look at what I made!

Aren’t they cool?

I took a silversmithing class on Saturday at the university art department as a part of their continuing education programs. There were only four people in my class, so we were each able to get personal attention from the instructor, Kay Rashka. She’s a hobby metal smither who teaches jewelry making and design in her spare time.

All those lovely earrings pictured above were made by our instructor, and we were able to choose one of the designs on the bottom row for our beginner class project. The designs on the top two rows involved soldering or more advanced techniques that we didn’t have time to learn on the first day.

We got to saw a raw sheet of metal, sand and file the shapes, forge texture into the shapes with hammers or stamps, melt a piece of silver wire to make a bead on the end, drill holes for the wires, shapes spirals with wire, and assemble all the pieces into a cool pair of contemporary earrings. I have always wanted to learn the art of metal smithing, but I’ve never had the opportunity until now.

Our instructor was so well organized that she had stations set up for each step of the process, as well as individuals work stations for each of us to come back to and continue at our own pace.

It was fun learning about the tools used in silver smithing, from the hand tools to the power tools. It was also a great feeling to take raw materials and shape them into art wear. I’m already sketching ideas in my new sketchbook for more earrings and pendants, so I can’t wait to try this again!

I am so glad this week is over and the weekend is here! I had to deal with internal audit at work, which I really hate doing. But I don’t like to talk about work, especially here in my creative space, so let’s talk about something else.

(Callie trying to get some sun on her belly!)

I am taking an art class today called Silver Art Wear. We are going to learn to cut a raw silver sheet, forge and hammer, file, pierce, and dome, all toward finishing a pair of silver earrings. I have always wanted to try silversmithing, so I’m excited for the day’s adventure. I hope to have some pictures to show you tomorrow.

I have also been working on some unfinished projects, a quilt, a table runner, a couple Christmas gifts, just the usual. Enjoy the best day of the week!

Awhile ago, my blogger friend Amy did a post on her blog looking for someone to do a swap with her – knit her a pair of fingerless gloves as a trade for something she could make for the volunteer. I volunteered! I made these fingerless gloves to help Amy get through the winter.

In return, she made me this Denyse Schmidt Promenade Market Tote!

The back is just as cool as the front.

It has a big inside pocket and a flat bottom with a sturdy plastic insert, making it great to carry a book or groceries. I will probably use this tote to carry a winter knitting project, but I could also take my newest book to the cafe and hang out for awhile.

Amy even included one of her new scrap-busting cards and an adorable drawstring bag with this cute ribbon and vintage buttons.

I really enjoyed this swap because it was a one-on-one  trade with a fellow sewing friend, making me feel more grateful for the personal touch that went into her efforts. Thank you SO much Amy!

We had a nice dinner party on Halloween night. We invited my aunts and uncle who live in a retirement complex so they could see all the trick-or-treaters in our neighborhood.
I think we had at least 30 kids, and they were all wearing fantastic costumes. I was so impressed! After our guests left, we hung out at the neighbors’ bonfire for some cocktails and a few laughs.

Next up, I finished quilting my table runner today! I mentioned previously that I used Anina’s pattern, which I liked and would recommend. I don’t think I was as precise as her pattern calls for, so it turned out a little more wonky, but in a good way, of course! This project is made from the Natural Territory fabrics by Terry Atkinson, which I found at my local quilt shop.

(My photos turned out a little dark – I had to hurry before the sun set early today with our Daylight Savings time change.)

I used the walking foot to quilt random lines across it, which was fun. I think the straight lines gave this project a cool, modern effect.

I just need to finish hand sewing the binding to the back and then it will be ready to use through the month of November. It measures 17 inches x 46 inches, just right for our buffet.

I am looking forward to working on a few patchwork products this week to post in my shop for the upcoming holiday seasons. Hope you all had a great Halloween weekend, and have a great week!