Upcoming birthday musings

Oh dear, the days go by so quickly! Another anniversary of my birth is looming on the horizon.

  Such a lovely weekend, what with the art show and basking in all that glory of seeing friends and various others telling me how wonderfully creative I am. Almost an altered state, maybe a "high" of sorts.

Spent most of Sunday afternoon sorting art from the public display to its return to closets and walls in the hovel. Sunday evening, well spent, resting with compadre. 

 Monday, indulging myself in laughing and sharing creative conversation with trusted friends. Sometimes, Monday is the best day I can think of.

 Now, I'm thinking of the few days ahead, anticipating a small celebration for my birthday. At one point, I envisioned a grand party, but thought better of it. Since my special day almost always falls on the national holiday honoring those who actually work for a living, and nearly everyone has made plans for otherwise activities, I decided to forgo such nonsense. 

  I have outlived my father by a year and I pray to whatever is out in the universe that I will come close to living as long and productively as my dear departed mother, rest their souls. 

    Two sisters have gone before me in not so many more years as I have been celebrating my time on our lovely planet. I have thrown away all the pills and potions prescribed to me in an effort to ease the troubles of this modern life. I have pretty good hair and skin at this day and age. I have an attentive lover who appreciates the time and energy I can share with him. 

  Yes, I could complain about nit picky details......plenty of that...but why waste precious energy?  

We'll see how the next few days play out and hopefully the following post will be of a most happy day full of stories of how I celebrated my 64th birthday. 

Maybe I'll just stay home and listen to Beatles songs all day, then go to eatery around the corner for super girly martinis! In any event, there will be photos!!!

Still here

Gosh, I can't believe how long it's been since I last posted here. There has been a lot going on, so I will use that as my excuse.
Yard work has occupied a good bit of my time, but I manage to squeeze in some sewing and artwork. My most recent ATCs for the Fiber Antics swap turned out better than expected, especially since I did them at the last minute. And they were fun to do. I asked a couple of the gal pals to take my picture, printed it out on cardstock, altered the photo, scanned and reprinted to the size of trading cards, then embellished with a rubber stamped caption. Whew!!

You can see the finished card on Fiber Antics blog. The theme was "On the Fence".
  The dress I am working on is nearly finished, and will make its debut at Sewing Guild next Thursday. The dress is kind of a birthday present to myself, since I hardly get to sew for me.
That's all for now. More later and I won't wait so long to post.

Art stuff, etc.

Today I dove headfirst into the modern age by entering a quilt show online. It was the first time for me and quite nerve wracking, I must say. Since I am not computer savvy, I'm always afraid I will spend an enormous amount of time typing in information, loading photos that I am never sure are the correct size (I still haven't figured out the whole pixel thing) then with the swift press of a button lose it all to the wasteland of the interwebs, never to be retrieved again except by some master hacker.
 It was a bit of a relief to get the confirmation emails. Now I will have my fingers crossed waiting for the news that my entry has accepted---or not.

Sunday-former salon turned into eatery

Saturday--crowds at CY Festival

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday morning were spent in further celebration of birthdays in September. Virgo gathering at the Levitt Shell, with friends at the Cooper Young Festival, and yummy brunch with a good friend to celebrate her birthday. Busy weekend.

St. Louis Art Fair

What a great trip to the midwest!! The Noodlemans and I took the Mega Bus to St. Louis on Friday morning as planned and arrived there around noon. From Union Station, we rode the Metro Link train out to Clayton. The art fair is actually held in Clayton, MO, a suburb just to the west of St. Louis.
  The hotel had my room ready early so we dumped the luggage and rode the train over to Brentwood shopping center and found the Trader Joe's after walking the Bataan death march it seemed. It was pretty warm on Friday and the humidity was awful. But being the bunch of big kids we are, we survived and bought snacks and wine for our stay.
  On the way back to the Metro Link station we found the short cut so the walk wasn't as far. There was a little Asian restaurant near the station where we had a late lunch. And it was very YUMMY!!
  Back on the train, we looked at the sky and saw the predicted thunderstorms rolling in. We got back to the hotel just in time, too. Thunder, lightening, buckets of rain, the works! The weather people on tv were reporting tornadoes in the outlying counties, kind of scary. The art fair was scheduled to open at 5 pm, but was canceled for Friday evening. Once the rain let up around 9 pm, we ventured out to a sushi place half a block away from the hotel and Mr. Noodleman ordered a roll that was served on FIRE!! Too cool...it is called the "Oh My God" roll. For good reason, I might add.
   Saturday we awoke to a perfect day to be outside. High temps in the mid 70's, sunny and breezy. Lots of beautiful things to look at and purchase. Great music.Yummy food from local eateries and the most amazing people watching two judgmental women (Mrs. Noodleman and I) could ask for.
  We took a break in the late afternoon, then went back for more art and music. Earlier we made reservations at the primo Italian joint near the hotel, so at 8 pm we were shoveling more good food into our gobs. Even though we had walked all day and a half, I think we took in way more calories than we burned off.
   Sunday we headed out to catch the Mega Bus back at Union Station. We had a little time to kill there so we got to see some of the scenery there. Back on the bus and back to the real world--boohoo....now I have to starve myself to regain my svelte figure.

Union Station interior

Jazz band on the Main Stage

Union Station exterior

Mega Bus pit stop at Boomland

   I have had one hell of a birthday celebration so far and it is not over.

Labor Day

On Labor Day I had my birthday. I am 60 years old. Many days were spent beforehand wondering what I had to show for all these years. The conclusion to this pondering is that I have many good friends. They have helped me celebrate this milestone of my life on this lovely planet and have wished me well on the journey. In the perfect world, I will return all these favors.
  Fortunately, I have very good health, and look forward to many more years, whether I like it or not.  The last few days I have had more than my fair share of resources and there are celebrations planned for the rest of the month. woohoo!

a steak followed this hunk of lettuce

on the roof top of the Madison Hotel

the smoke alarm DID NOT go off!!!

 

this is what 60 candles on one cake looks like

  On Friday, I'm off to St. Louis with the Noodlemans to attend the Art Fair and have an urban adventure. We are taking the Mega Bus and will be at the mercy of public transportation for three days. How socialistic!!! I have planned a side trip to Trader Joe's via Metrolink and who knows what will happen.

Fun stuff

Earlier this month was my birthday and I spent most of that day doing something just for me. Just frittered the whole day away. This is what I did. Not my original idea, but very fun to make and so cute! Of course, I had to make a tiny box for the pixie shoes to live in and that was loads of fun too. Notice how I took the photos with out having my messy sewing room in the background to distract you.

The stolen bicycle situation near resolution

1 of 6 weddings

did I mention how big this is?

A couple of photos from the recent trip to St. Louis. (Obviously, I don't get out much, and you'd think I'd been on a world cruise as many times as I have written about it.)
    The plan for this weekend is to drive to Milan Tn and get a bike from my nephew who posted photos on his Face Book page of some of the bicycles he has been collecting and refurbishing. This dear child has offered me one of his lovely vintage bikes. This means so much to me, because I did not want to go out and buy some cheap thing to replace the bike that was stolen, which I had since 1993 and had recently been riding a lot. Big thanks to my generous nephew.

St. Louis

The trip to the art fair near St. Louis was so much fun. The Noodlemans are kinda crazy and it must run in the family.
  While at the Arch in downtown (and I cannot say enough good things about the commuter train we took to get there) I saw at least six couples, with complete wedding entourage, get hitched. And I was there for only about an hour and a half! Guess it's the thing to do up there. A limo would pull up, the entire wedding party would pile out, like clowns out of a VW, go up the stairs to the park at the bottom of the Arch, brief ceremony, photo op, then off to the reception.(I took photos too.) Brides in big fluffy white dresses, guys in tuxedos, groomsmen, bridesmaids--the works!

wearing my new earrings, waiting for the train

it is HUGE!!!

something on the tracks @ the downtown station

And the Arch is HUGE!!! The last time I was up that way was nearly 20 years ago and I never actually went to the park where the thing is, just drove by it. Last weekend we went to see it and I was amazed at how accessible it is. It just sticks up right out of the ground and it is HUGE!!! It reminded me of the machine in that scifi movie with Jodie Foster--"Contact"--did I mention how f***ing BIG it is???

Balance

The screen printed fabrics came out pretty good and I will post photos as soon as I take them. Last week was a bizzy one, full of activity playing nanny for my friend's children, making progress on a new set of graduation dresses and making the aforementioned fabric. On Friday morning, I went with the Noodlemans to attend the art fair in Clayton, MO. WOW!!! It was very nice and I had a lot of fun. We walked our feet off for two and a half days, stayed at a hotel a block away from the fair, ate everything we wanted (except the cheesecake-what was wrong with us?) saw more art than I have seen in one place in a long, long time and went downtown to see The Arch.
 St. Louis has a commuter train, the MetroLink, that is very easy to ride and stops at all the convenient places, plus isn't too expensive. We were able to park at the hotel and never get back in the car until it was time to come home. That is my idea of a vacation. (Sleeping is also a good thing to do on vacation.)

what I want to be when I grow up

So now I'm back home and my punishment for having fun--this is where the balance comes in--is that my bike was stolen from the shed in the backyard Friday morning. boohoo--I loved my bike and had I been here to monitor the perimeter, it wouldn't be gone with someone who might not love at much as I did. I actually cried a little last night, because in addition to riding my bike, I will miss the bell and the nifty side basket on it, too.

Another day older......

My birthday was the other day and as a gift to myself I made a meatloaf to go with the lovely tomato jam from my recent trip to Lexington. It was quite delicious. The bread was some I bought at the grubbery in one of those paper bags, the really chi-chi stuff. It has been so long since I've done any real cooking, I was surprised at how well it came out, so I guess cooking goes along with swimming and bike riding.