emails, facebook & ravelry

that's about the only way i've kept up with people over the last few weeks. have been keeping plenty busy, and know an update is long over due. since getting back from chicago we hosted an exchange student from toulouse, france for 3 weeks-such a delight-we wanted him to experience what is typical for our family and what may be considered typical for american teenagers. we also got to do somethings outside our normal routine as well. thanks to an awesome coupon from groupon, i'll be putting together a digital scrapbook to send to him later this fall.
there has been some knitting-a finished baby gift (an perhaps the source of my wrist problems),a shawl for mom,
a pair of socks for me. i've started another a shawl and a pair of socks for me, and need to cast on a toddler gift (hopefully more easy than the giraffe-different yarn/different needles). am hoping to finish que sera soon, and start on coraline(blue yarn below-love it);, then i'll have 2 sweaters for fall.

there has been a very little bit of sewing-i made a birthday gift, and finished this quilt-and made
i took a class to make this with kathy last summer, and was unhappy with the fabric selection, more my fault because i didn't understand the "quilting" lingo i guess-the class sample was black and white, and when she said 16 fat quarters from 2 color groups, i took that to mean a color plus white. it was too late to change as i'd already purchased the fat quarters. ANYWAY, figured this will be a great quilt to keep in the car for that impromptu picnic, or something where i won't mind if it gets dirty. BUT it can be marked DONE, and i didn't let the fabric languish in my stash. now i can move on to the other sewing projects i want a couple specific projects done by the end of september before our sewing weekend in hilton head-want to work on new projects that weekend.

we also had wisdom teeth pulled (pj), school starting- pj a senior and andrew a sophmore-wow!annual doctor visits, a carpel tunnel test, and regular work stuff. oh, and a birthday complete with cupcakes-lots of yummy yarn and food-mexican and 'ritas!
i've got lots planned so hopefully i'll be better about sharing-

chicago wrap up

one more photo before leaving chicago. can anyone really resist the blues brothers? i enjoyed chicago, quitology (in the lincoln park area i think-had to ride the subway to get there) was awesome a great selection of non-traditional fabrics, big airy store and a wonderful shop owner. sheffield's proved to be an awesome choice for dinner, just one stop north on the cta-salad with grilled chicken and an ice cold beer (chicago proved to be very warm) once we were back in the city we stopped a more cupcake-DI-VINE. i had the chocolate champagne and the raspberry cream (not at the same time, saved one for the next day) oh my! after a short rest at the hotel, i headed to the navy pier for the fireworks which were a lot of fun-made a quick stop at dominick's for bananas and apples for snacking and the flight home. on thursday we stopped in at millenium park to enjoy the gardens and sculptures before heading in to see some amazing art. the only disappointment at the museum was that the american quilt and english embroidery exhibits were closed. have also learned that i much prefer NY style pizza-don't know what's up with chicago deep dish-like where's the cheese and don't get me started on the crust-don't know what's up with that. all in all a good trip, treated myself to some goodies, and the art was truly stellar. decided to try my hand at videotapping the fireworks. and that's a wrap.

chicago

am enjoying visiting a new city. the hotel is sumptuous and the weather stunning. part of me wants to use my downtime to continue exploring the city, and another wants to enjoy the quiet solitude of the hotel room. i've tried to balance the two. on monday i explored the area and visited loopy yarns and had dinner at italiasia. dinner was a bit of a disappointment and the dessert horrible. i wish sara had been there cause she would have been able to describe the sad excuse of chocolate mousse cake- i needed a steak knife to cut through it. should have had it removed from my tab-oh well. yesterday after training my co-worker and i visited a used jazz record store-i bought the boys a few lps, did some clothes shopping and had a wonderful dinner at india house-more food than either of us could have eaten, but very good. today our plans after training include visiting quiltology, more cupcake, bbq at sheffield's (couldn't resist), also a bit more shopping and looking forward to fireworks on the river this evening. tomorrow will be the art institute of chicago and chicago style pizza-i'm sure there will be lots of knitting in there as well. photos are on flickr, but for some reason links i can't get links for this post- :-(

celebrating the 4th

started the day at the road race-5th time-always fun, and think it should be classified as atlanta's longest outdoor party-there are probably as many people that watch it as there are that run it (okay, MAYBE not that many, but close).
got my "prize"
after a much needed nap and shower, we had a wonderful time with friends from church, charlie and lynette. great food* and company.
*edited-forgot to list the baked beans, cheese and crackers, and changed pie to cobbler-it was awesome!

here's to celebrating the fourth.

lunch.

i live for lunch. i headed outside to eat, enjoy the shade, some knitting and podcasts. although it's in the low 80s it was truly glorious. i also get to do some stealth people (co-worker) watching. we have several large trees in our parking lot, so no one usually seems me until they get to their car. i love the startled looks! i really really didn't want to come back inside. oh, and hello july-where did you come from?!

look for me.

got my number today-this will be year 5 (2006 was pre-blogging)-i love this race, of course, for me it's just walking, but it's awesome fun.

summer love

one of my favorite things about the summer (or at least warm weather) are the wonderful fresh veggies-here's part of tonight's dinner fresh from the grill-served along side sauted polenta, caprese salad and grilled chicken.

on a side note the road trip from last week was amazing-we saw and experienced so much it's impossible to post about it. the photos are here. we're making plans for next year already!