Monday Musings

Gentle Readers and Dear Friends we start off another long work week !!  The City by the Bay has been bright and breezy even on the warm side for this time of year.  

_____________

Saturday found us doing our usual early morning run to Safeway - the supermarket - for our weekly grocery round up... then it was off to some Estate/house sales.  There were three in the city this weekend.  We even visited a Goodwill and Consignment shop but all I found was single thing...

I found this at one of the House Sales - it is about 8 ionces square and is pottery / tin glaze in the style of della Robbia - marked Italy, I think it is really great.  When I was in Italy I saw similar things all over the place, from Milan to Capri and did not pick one up then -  so now I have - and am very happy I did. Also, buying it from a house sale saved me about $30 - so I am happy about that also!!

__________

On Sunday after mass - we didn't feel like going out to breakfast so we stopped over in the Mission District at Dynamo Donut and Coffee - 

I fist heard about this place on the Food Channel  - I learn so much about SF from TV!! - and we have stopped off here often.  It used to be just this awning on the sidewalk  - but they have expanded to a seating area behind and inside and an open kitchen....

The seating is to the right and just behind were I am standing to take this snap of the bakers working...  when we got there nobody was there, but in a few seconds this line appeared...

We got our coffee's and treats to go and headed for home...

Inside the box.....

was a vanilla bean donut and one of their super sticky buns!!!  Just a super morning treat!!!!

The rest of the day we spent inside - I spent it stitching and movie watching.  I'll have a snap of some stitching in the morning.  I also whipped up a super easy.....

... Pineapple Upside Down cake - I debated the recipes and went with easy  - but, even though this was easy and quick - it is really delicious!!  I'll post the recipe in the morning.

__________

That's about it for today sports fans - thanks for stopping by -  Do stop again!

Take care,

edgar

A Friday Post - Selling Some Stash

Gentle Readers and Dear Friends I was having so much trouble with Blogger yesterday that I just gave up and there was no post.  For some reason There are things I once could do and now can not and things I have a clue why they don't work with Blogger.  So I am hoping that today will be smooth sailing.

__________

Not too much going on still working on an exchange piece - except last night - I was off by on stitch as i neared the end of a section and didn't realized it until I popped the piece out of the Q-Snap - so i so spent most of last night unstitching - gotta get the frog off my back!!  Tonight I will go back a re-stitch and hopefully finish up the stitching part - there is still the finish part to complete - I have everything so there is not a problem or hold up there.  I would love to have it in the mail on Monday - but "best laid plans..."

__________

Recently I won a "Lot" of stitching things off of the Bay of evil to get a single thing, which left me with quite a few duplicates - and then going through the stash hep found some other duplicate charts and things I have stitched....  which lead me to an update on My  "Stash for Sale" Blog.  I do like being able to move on some charts to others.  Do let me know if there is anything you would like.

__________

How about a basket of Who Hound to end the week on.....

We have three big hound baskets, yet they often must crowd together into a single one.  I think the Smokie-nator was running around being his usual crazy self!!

That's about it for today sports fans.  Thanks so much for stopping by and for your continued kind comments, questions and support!!!!!!  It means so much to me.

Take care,

edgar

A Little Mail and a Film

Gentle Readers and Dear Friends thanks so much for stopping by and for your kind comments about the brownies!!  I am leaning towards baking a Pineapple Upside down cake this weekend....  had a hankering and now must have some cake!!  I have quite a few recipes for PUDC - from the ridiculously easy to the odd and bizarre - I will probably go for one of the easier ones... but you never know!

____________

Not much going on in our lives... I am still working on an exchange piece so no "real" stitching snap.  The mail brought a little something stitching related...

The next instalment of my every growing "Cottages" SAL.  I have pulled the recommended floss' and lets juts say that I am a little less enthused than I probably should be.  I am liking the over dyed choices, but the DMC's are on the pale side - and I am missing two of them - a "light blue" and a "cranberry" - they are very minor in the scheme of this cottage so I am not worried in the least about not having them.  What I am thinking is that I will go digging into my over dyed floss stash and pull other floss choices ....  I have a couple of things I want to work on before I tackle this so there is plenty of time.

____________

The film last night was "Evening" - 2007 - starring a lot of really great actors....

.....including Vanessa Redgrave, Claire Danes, Toni Collette, Natasha Richardson, Patrick Wilson, Hugh Dancy. Meryl Streep, Glenn Close - Directed by Lajos Koltai - I enjoyed the film - but really not as much as I had thought I would.  The film is told in two time periods the present and 1953 - and keeps flashing back and forth between the two to tell the story.  It is superbly well acted, well filmed and a beautiful production - so I am not sure why it wasn't a knock out.  At 2 or so hours it was nice to see, but slow in the telling.  I did like they way they summed up life in general....  that we make no mistakes, only choices - some good, some bad but in the end it is only our lives are our choices - gotta love that!!!
_____________

That's about it for today sports fans - thanks again for stopping by, do come again!

Take care,

edgar

A Little Brownie Baking

Gentle Readers and Dear Friends thank you so much for your super comments about ATS - it is a BAP if there ever was one!! It seems that I really enjoy doing larger pieces - I guess it's the challenge of the piece "me or the stitching....  who will persevere!!"  

I had quite a few emails about the who hounds in the laundry..  It is really only Lolly and Smokie that like to cuddle down in the warm fresh stuff.  In fact Lolly has second sight when it comes to me doing the wash.  She can be totally asleep upstairs and not even noticing me dragging the red hamper out the door to take down to our laundry room.  But, the minute I have something warm from the dryer to be folded she is there just wagging her tail for all she's worth.  So I dump out the finished laundry into a chair or onto the couch and like a bullet she is on it and wriggling down to the depths of warm bliss.  I think since Lolly is Smokie's chew hound he has just learned that laundry=warm place so he also flings himself into the pile of warmth.  I'll just pull things out and from under them until everything is folded and I have two sad faced little hounds without warm clean laundry to be on.

_____________

I did a little baking on Sunday afternoon and wanted to mention the site from whence (how often can one use the word whence) it came.  I found the recipe for "Double Chocolate Brownies" on a great Blog called "The Misadventures of Mrs. B"  The recipe is super easy and you end up with a pan of deliciously chewy Brownies.  You can click HERE for the recipe.  I got together the ingredients...

....... sifted together the dry stuff....

....stirred it up and poured the very stiff batter into a parchment lined pan - the recipe calls for lining the pan with foil, but I like parchment better - and about 30 minutes later out of the oven popped some super delicious Brownies!!

Although the recipe did not call for them I would think 3/4 cup of nuts would add immensely to these, but other than that it is a great treat!!  Give them a try!  and a BIG thank you to Jen for the wonderful recipe!!

________________

That's about it for today sports fans!  Thanks again for stopping by do stop again!

Take care,

edgar

Two Nice Days off

Gentle Readers and Dear Friends we had two lovely days off.  The weather was top notch - in the mid 70's and sunny so no fighting the rain or fog!  

We basically ran lots of errands Saturday - I dropped two pieces at the framers and will have them back in a couple of weeks.  One of the errands we ran was because we lost our replacement iron - it was a not so good one we picked up at Walgreen's for $10 to replace an iron we had for years - the RI (replacement iron) lasted for about a year - and finally was on it's last heating element Friday evening so we decided to just go out and get a good iron - and since there was a sale at Macy's off we went... we ended up with a super one from Rowenta - before the RI we had a Rowenta and I really liked it a lot!!  The one we got is this ONE...

One of the best features is that the cord retracts!!!  It also heats up fast and steams a dream!!

____________

Other than running errands, and doing laundry - with some help!!

There's nothing like some warm laundry to get into   Since the weather was relatively dry and sunny we steam cleaned the carpets.

 I did get is some stitching on ATS.  Here is an updated snapperoo of where it stands at the moment....

I have finished up the two side clouds and have started on the lighter, middle part - This piece will move to the back burner this week as I will be stitching and finishing up on two exchange pieces getting them ready for mailing next week.

___________

That's about it for today sports fans.  Thanks for stopping by.  Do stop again!!

Take care,

edgar

A Pretty Terrific Film

Gentle Readers and Dear Friends just wanted to leave off the week with a movie suggestion - We saw this a few days ago and I didn't want to forget to mention it - the film is "Hugo" 2011 - directed by Martin Scorsese.  It won 5 of the 11 Oscars it was nominated for - including art direction, cinematography and visual effects.

We thoroughly enjoyed the film - set in 1930's Paris the story follows a young orphan living in a train station taking care of the mechanical clocks and trying to fix an automaton.  The Orphan, Hugo, has a run in with a toy stall owner and the adventure begins....  unbeknownst to Hugo the owner is none other than George Melies - one of the great early pioneers of film. 

The entire movie is beautifully done with great visuals.  Some of the best are the clips of early film...  one of the most famous films is from Melies' 1902 "La Voyage dans la Lune" (Voyage to the Moon) - Here is a YouTube Clip from that film..

Yes, the original film was colorized - by hand painting each cell.  This clip is a restored version with modern music.

I would highly recommend this film and now that it is out on DVD you can even rent it for home viewing.

____________

That's about it for the week sports fans.  Thanks again for stopping by do come again!!

Take care,

edgar

It's a Short Thursday Post

Gentle Readers and Dear Friends thanks so much for stopping by once again to share a little time with me and my babbling.  I do enjoy this Bog and you’re commenting....  I did enjoy the comments from yesterday post..... 

Sweet Minnie...  thanks for the kind words about my glasses, but I really only have hair on the sides and on top it has gotten so thin you can see my thoughts!!  

Peggy Lee - you will so enjoy your Chucks!!  I don't know what I would do without them.  Since most of the tennis shoes out there are over thought and over designed - the majority of them do not appeal to me in the least.  

Dear Marly I think I have been the same size (which by the way isn’t too small!!)  for probably the last decade - it fluctuates a bit - but really sort of stays the same.

Melody mentioned stitching in hand.  I have tried that but with the way the linen gets so floppy when I tried I got way too frustrated way too fast - and it was so far from enjoyable that I would have given up stitching if it weren't for the Q-Snap.  I have never noticed a Q-Snap pulling any stitches - I have heard of that, but never seen it myself.  I do notice that the stitches will flatten out, but a good shake of the piece once released from the Q-Snap usually fluffs it right back.

... And Orlythe asked about how I use my Q-Snap...  I don't have a stand - I just sort of hold it with my hands with my feet propped up on footstool and my snap again my knee with left hand under and my right over the work.  I use both hands working the needle both through the linen with my right hand grasping the needle with my left then pushing it back through from underneath and catching it again with my right hand - it certainly sounds odd when written out.  I guess you could liken it to a sort of sewing machine action - I don't know if this way of stitching has a name but it works for me. 

Wrapping up the day - another Blast from the past...  and I hear you Beth, boy, do I feel old sometimes!!!

A super song from 1979 - "Knock on Wood" by Amii Stewart.  This video has about 20 seconds of sound without picture at the beginning  - but you will eventually get to the video  It is interesting to see this very early Music Video.  I remember that I had the 12 inch extended remix version - remeber them!!  I have listened to this about six times this moring and have been just bouncing away while I write out today's post - so enjoy!!!!  It's a great old song!!

That's about it for today sports fans - do stop by again!!

Take care,

edgar