Happy New Year!

For everyone who is weary of winter already. Christmas cacti, and an orchid of some type. The Cacti is about 3 foot across and I have several this size. I don't do anything special to them. They are just very happy on my porch, and they actually bloomed at Christmas this year, instead of Dec 10 like they usually do!

We were thrilled to have David home again for Christmas. On Friday he cooked his specialty, hamburgers. But these weren't just any hamburgers. I am not sure exactly what he did, but it involved tomato sauce, seasoning, a special chutney dressing and swiss cheese. They were wonderful! He also made baked potatoes and asparagus.

Sewing day

We had a girls sewing day today.

Sewing is becoming such a lost art, that I relish any opportunity to pass those skills on. This is my niece, Rachel with the coaster she made for her very first project. She also made the tote bag. For her first day sewing, she did a great job and I am very proud of her!

Jacki came and sewed also. She is mending a tote bag here. The machine she is sewing on is a Singer Featherweight and was her great-grandmothers. When she got done with her sewing , she finished the scarf she was knitting, using Alpaca yarn.

I didn't get a lot of sewing done that day, but these are some projects I finished recently. The snowflakes are machine embroidered,and I made 19 of them. Everyone that was here on Christmas day got one.

Christmas! We had 18 people at our house for Christmas day. It was warm and we ALMOST turned on the ac. Somehow that just seemed wrong!

The picture on the left is my "angel tree". All of the ornaments are angels or Crismons. On the right is my "Florida" tree. This is a small tree that is in our entryway. I cross-stitched the picture above it of Santa on the beach.

Full moon over Lake Louisa. Taken from my backyard, Dec 12, 2008

San Francisco, again

Monday was the last day of the conference, and I decided to go into San Francisco by myself. I am such a country girl, that this was a big step for me. I managed to navigate everything successfully, and once there, wandered around the Ferry building for a while. The ground floor is set up with many markets and shops. Most sell organic food, flowers, and hand made items. No junky tourists shops here! Then I went down to the wharf, and kept hearing seals or some other animal "barking" I went around the corner and there they were, lounging on the dock like they belonged there! They are wild but the city has placed these floating docks around for them, so they don't go in other places, and endanger themselves or someone else.

Later I took a 1 hr cruise around the bay. We sailed under the Golden Gate bridge, turned back and went around Alcatraz, and came back to the harbor.

The next day, our flight left the Oakland airport very early, and we were supposed to stop at Chicago Midway, then on to Orlando by 6pm est. Well, it was snowing HEAVILY in Chicago and we almost didn't get to land there at all. We did finally get on the ground, and then nothing was allowed to take off for several hours. So we sat. Finally we took off around 7pm, and landed in Orlando around 11pm. It definitely could have been worse, and we were very glad to get home. I have to say, Southwest employees were very kind through it all, and kept us regularly updated, and were in upbeat moods most of the time.

On to San Francisco!

Our first view of the Golden Gate bridge.

We stayed in Oakland CA, for the composting conference that Steve was attending, but we were able to go into San Francisco for the afternoon. Driving and parking are such an issue, that we were strongly advised to take the BART across the bay, then use the streetcars to get around. After some initial trouble figuring out the subway maps, we got the hang of it and actually enjoyed the subway. I didn't figure out until after we rode it, that the subway actually goes under the San Francisco Bay. I knew it went underground, but for some reason I didn't think about it going under the water too. Duh!

We took the BART to the Ferry Building, then took a streetcar to Fisherman's Wharf. All of the piers are numbered and the most well known is probably Pier 39, which has many restaurants, shops, etc on it. We wandered around there for a while, then went down to Hyde Park Pier, which is owned by the National Park Service. We were able to tour this beautiful old ship. It was built in Ireland, and hauled people and good from England to California, then took wheat and other crops back. They were in the midst of a famine in Ireland, so the wheat and other crops were badly needed. This was before the Panama canal was built, so that was a long voyage indeed!

Later the ship was used to take goods to Alaska, and brought canned salmon back

The interior of the ship was nicely restored with crew quarters (tiny!), captain's quarters, mess area, and cargo. These are some goods they might have brought from England. There were all kinds of household items, books, clothing, practical items and some luxury items.