July 27, 2008

Here's a picture of the necklace I made last night while I was bored.

I put two different pictures of it on the Jewelry Page of Stylishly Crafty. Enjoy!

July 26, 2008

Last weekend we trekked down the road to see my folks. Mom had to have a lumpectomy on July 18, so we went down to be with her for the weekend. Her surgery went well and she didn't have too much pain afterward; she even went to Sunday school just two days after her surgery. The doctor was concerned that he might have to go back for more surgery, but said he'd wait for the pathology report before making anything definite. She got her follow-up report from the pathologist this past Thursday and the report was very good. She gets to keep her boob! YAY!

On Saturday of last weekend we went to the Nature Center in Kinston. They had HUGE snakes and lots of other things, as well as a nice nature trail by the Neuse River. It was very hot and very humid. Then we hit the road for Greenville to see The Dark Knight. Awesome movie. If you haven't seen it and are a Batman fan, it's a must see. Even if you aren't a Batman fan, it's still a very good movie. So far this summer we've seen Incredible Hulk, Wall-E, Hellboy 2, and Dark Knight. All have been awesome.

On Sunday (since there wasn't a NASCAR race), we headed down to the coast so Jamie could see the Atlantic. We went to Beaufort (we NC'ers pronounce it BOW-fort, not Bew-Fort like those weird SC'ers) to visit the NC Maritime Museum and check out the boats at the marina. Then we went to the NC Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores, which had undergone a HUGE expansion and renovation since the last time I was there. The largest exhibit is a huge tank with a 1/3 size replica of a German U-Boat that was sunk off the NC coast during WWII. We actually got to see three divers in the tank with all the fish, including some really big sharks. After our visit to the aquarium, we went to Fort Macon and to the beach. It was a very nice day trip. Pictures of our beach trip are in our Flickr album, as well as some pictures I took out in Mema's yard. I'll warn you now, my husband takes really good pictures of snakes.

On Monday before we left, we took Mom out for lunch in Greenville. It was a good weekend and we were all very glad to have the opportunity to be together, even under the circumstances. Mom will see an oncologist in a few weeks to make the decision on chemotherapy. We're all still hoping that she'll only have to have radiation, which is a lot less taxing on the body than chemo. She just wants to be able to go to the Charlotte races in October, since she already has her tickets bought and her hotel room booked. We'll be doing a lot of praying in the meantime!

July 12, 2008

Haven't been up to much this week, but I did just upload 183 zoo pictures to our Flickr album. Go and behold the wonders of our new camera at the zoo!

The other night I learned a valuable lesson, just because the ATM machine doesn't charge a fee doesn't mean the transaction is free. We used one of the ATMs at the zoo, which didn't charge a fee. However, today when I look at the credit card statement online I see that the dear, sweet, loving credit card company charged us TEN DOLLARS for that transaction. Next time I'm using the bank card. They only charge $5, I think. What a flippin' rip off!

Anyway....enjoy our zoo pictures!

July 5, 2008

Happy Day After Independence Day!

We were lucky enough to both have the day off yesterday, so we decided to go to the zoo. It was very hot outside and there were a lot of people who decided to do the same thing we did, but we had fun and took a ton of pictures. Here are a few of Jamie's favorites.

We took over 400 pictures, and so far I've weeded them down to just over 200. I hope to get them on our Flickr album soon, but in the meantime take a look at some new pictures I uploaded to Flickr of our Backyard Critters and of our trip to the zoo last November.

July 1, 2008

Maybe I should have my own HGTV show. Take a look at one of my weekend craft projects.

We've had the iron sconce over our bed for about a year now, but it always looked so lonely on the big bare wall. During my Friday afternoon trip to Michael's, I found a bin of silver letters that were only $1 each and some very pretty embossed gold scrapbook paper for $1 a sheet. On Friday, I bought an H (I have a thing for monogrammed stuff ever since we got married) and one sheet of the gold paper. I had no idea what I would do with them until talking to my mom and working out the idea of putting the letter in the middle of the gold paper and putting them in a black frame. It worked! We haven't put the H up yet, but Jamie is going to put it over the computer desk.

The H was so elegant and rich looking that I decided to go to Michael's on Sunday to see if they had a J and a B. I'd also received a 25% off coupon on Friday. Luckily, there was a J and a B in the bin. Huzzah! I put them together and then Jamie helped put them up over the bed. Now our sconce doesn't look so lonely on the big bare wall. We have a mix of gold and silver frames in the room, so the silver letters on the gold paper helps bring everything together.

Of course...just before going to bed last night the B fell off. And, this morning after we woke up I noticed that the J was missing too. Jamie said it had fallen off sometime after I fell asleep. The letters are currently on the bedside tables waiting for me to figure out how to better attach them to the paper. But isn't it nifty looking?

Last night, we also finally bought a subscription to Flickr so we could upload more pictures and better organize them (the free account only allowed 3 different albums). So head over to our Flickr Photo Album 1 to see some new pictures, including the full set of pictures from our trip to Reynolda Gardens. We have tons of pictures to add. I hope to add a new album every few days.

June 27, 2008

Jamie's at work tonight and I knew I'd be bored. So I browsed Michael's (right next door to Target) for some weekend craft projects. Here's what I found and made tonight:

What is it you ask? It's a brooch for my bodice.

I think my outfit is finally finished. I did some work on the sleeves from the previous picture and semi-sewed them to the armholes of the bodice so my shift doesn't show as much. Plus, I sewed a partlet (i.e. Renaissance dickie). Let me list the stuff that I put on in the order that I put it on.

• Shift (complete with blackwork embroidery around the neck)
• Corset
• Farthingale (hoop slip)
• Partlet
• Bumroll
• Underskirt with forepart
  
• Overskirt
• Bodice with sleeves and wrist cuffs
  
• Necklace, rings, earrings, neck ruff
• Beaded cap
• Pocket watch on a ribbon hanging from overskirt
  
• Pomander for warding off nasty Elizabethan smells, also hanging from overskirt
  
• Feather fan

Maybe one day I'll to wear the outfit out of the house, if I can drag Jamie to the Ren Faire in either Charlotte this fall or Raleigh next spring.

June 20, 2008

I made it back to our blog before letting a month go by! For the last couple of weeks we've been spending a lot of time together because Jamie hasn't been scheduled to work often. We've taken lots of trips to Kernel Kustard/Brew Nerds for coffee and frozen custard. We went to the movies and saw the Incredible Hulk. And, we finally made it over to Reynolda Gardens. It was a very warm sunny day and the flowers were very pretty! We both took some pictures with our new camera.

Work is going very well for me. The instructors are very happy to have me there. Apparently I do a bit more work faster and more efficiently that what they were used to. I've adjusted pretty well to working until 5pm. Luckily, the campus closes at 3pm on Fridays so the weekend starts two hours early. YAY!

Since we moved into our new apartment over a year ago, we've had six different bird feeders, and they've all bit the dust thanks to the squirrels. Well, actually the beautiful glass and silver one my mom bought us for Christmas was felled by a fat cardinal one afternoon. Anyway. We are now on our seventh birdfeeder.

The squirrels can't chew on this metal one. They can't easily get to the seed either. I filled the feeder with seed last week and it still has seed in it! YAY! Of course, the squirrels have found a way to get their revenge. They've started digging up the flowers in my flower pots. Meh.