Puzzles and birds!

 This week I have been working on my sister's quilt. I have it all together, so now I need to get it ready for quilting. I will be doing prim stitching on the top and then decide on whether to hand stitch or machine quilt, since I want to finish it, so I can get it to her. Now that Joannes is gone, I need to find a place to get discount threads. I always buy on sale days or with coupons.

Since I like to have something simple to work on and a brain break, I worked on a puzzle. I took advantage of prime day and got a good deal on a fun puzzle. 

Last week we got a walk in, at the lighthouse. It is always so much cooler on the island and I got to enjoy some birding. At the marsh I got to enjoy watching the new family. Both parents and two babies were in the nest. The parents were upset since someone was walking closer, from the beach area.

In another marsh, I caught a Great Egret. 

At home the Sparrows are on their fourth batch of babies. This time they had a couple and the babies are always hungry.

And in just one week, they have grown. This one was trying to cool off in the heat. It won't be long before they are out on their own.

I hope you enjoyed your week and have a good weekend. Hopefully I can get more time with my sewing and finish more quilts this year.

Friday Finish!

 

This week I have been working on finishing a pillow. It is the same design I did on a kitchen towel, but I wasn't pleased on how that came out, as a present. My sister is going through new treatments and I wanted to make her a happy present. 

When I was little, my mom would get me something when I was really sick, to cheer me up. I love keeping that tradition by giving gifts to cheer others up, when I can. 

I am also working on my quilt, the edges are all done and it is ready to quilt. Then I put together rows for another quilt for my sister, as a comfort quilt. I will be putting an angel at the top and squares on the rest. Lots of projects to sew next week. 

The pillow is a design by Barrooms. My sister loves to bike and has done a lot of biking vacations in Europe and still uses her bike at home when she is up to it. 

I hope everyone enjoyed their week. We had a lot of heat, but cooling off now, so it is a nice relief. 

Friday finishes!

 

This week I worked on a stitchery I am making for my sister. I am using the bike pattern and turning it into a pillow. I also worked on some paintings, though they did not come out as well as I hoped. The directions are basic, so I follow along when I can and do my own things on other parts.

This one came out darker than I meant, but with water colors, it is hard to fix mistakes. It is a nice way to relax and get the feel of doing watercolors, before I do my own projects.

The next one was a white daisy. I followed the instructions, but the flower looked plain, especially against the white background. This is one I wished I had practiced a muted background on, then the white would have worked. So, I painted over what I did in yellow shades. The butterfly was colored this way, but not very realistic. Even so, I enjoy the process. 

Today I didn't do much, seems I caught another bug, so I am taking it easy. We have nice weather, not too hot and no rain, so hopefully we can get out for a bit this weekend. I hope everyone had a good week and good weather this weekend.

Friday Finish!

 I realized tonight that I forgot to post my blog. It's been a busy week with unpacking and cleaning from the trip, to getting ready for the weekend. We have been taking it easy and getting some things done and spending some times with the kids. I got a bag of fireworks for the kids and let them have some for their house last night and tonight we had them for dinner and outdoor games, then a few more fireworks. I got all kid friendly and from a shop in NH, so I knew they were safer.

I had started a needle punch project a few weeks ago and finished it this week. It's been a while since I have done punch, so I made some old mistakes in my color choices and in the lettering, so not perfect but good enough. It is a pattern in an issue of Primitive projects by Tonya Robey.

Hinsdale, a town down the road from our camp, has a few historic buildings. One is their town hall, a beautiful building but hard to get it without warping, using a wide angle.

Another building is the oldest Post Office, still in operation in the US. New Hampshire has a lot of beautiful towns, historic mill towns that are sadly, run down, but a lot of buildings still remain.

I hope everyone had a nice week and enjoying the holiday weekend. It is sad to see the floods in Texas and I hope you are not affected by that.

Vacation: Part two

We got to see a lot of things and visit new places, too many to show. A lot of the views were on the ride and a lot of places have no place to stop for photos, so I just enjoyed the ride and the mountains in the distance. Lots of river ways and lakes are in the area. 

The bad thing in NH is most lakes and ponds are private, but we did find one that was free. Surry lake is a large lake with a boat launch and beach and it is free to the public. We stopped and let Bean get out for a walk but it was a little cooler and windy that day, so I wasn't in the mood to swim.

We started that day with a ride up the river to Bellows Falls. It is a historic town on the Vermont side. I wanted to see the old mill and get a photo. I was surprised at how beautiful the area was and also a lot of industry with the dam and fish ladder.

What I loved was the paintings on the buildings. This one depicts the town in a time, gone by.

At the mill area, I spotted a lot of paintings along the walls.

The mill museum.

As we walked by the building, I noticed a road and pathways along the river. They had a park in the back with gardens and viewing areas. This town is definitely worth a stop if you are in the area. The only thing I regret is, I found out I missed something. When I got back on Facebook that evening, a link popped up for the area. There are petroglyphs on the rocks below the dam area, I wish I had been able to see them.

After that, we headed inland to check out another place I found on the map. It is called Vilas Pool Park. They were getting ready to open next month, but we were allowed to walk around. It is another free place to picnic and swim, but they do have a donation box.

It has a small parking area and you walk across the falls, on a bridge.

The surprise was a bell tower up on the hill. They opened it up for us and the girls rang the bell. I asked, shouldn't it play a song, there are multiple bells. I guess the girls were new and when I walked inside, I saw the mini piano. So, I played a bit of the first noel, which was fun. As we walked back to the car, I heard the bells ringing and playing different songs. Now that the girls learned it could play songs from the charts they had, they were trying them out, lol.

I pick an area I want to visit and look for things along the way. The last day we took it easy and drove to the Connecticut river and found a nice path along the river. When we got back I rested, since I was still a bit sick. Then I hopped in my kayak and took a leisurely ride up river. I always feel better on the water and I got a nice surprise. I spotted a young Green Heron, fishing on the shore. 

On the way home we took the scenic route. I wanted to take a midway break at the Quabbin reservoir in Massachusetts. We took the wrong way in and got confused on which was to go for a parking lot and there was no reception in the park, so we had to turn around to get out, not easy to maneuver a trailer on park roads. I did enjoy a few views and plan on going back. We can camp closer to the area and visit all the towers and viewpoints at the park. Sadly, no dogs are allowed, so car watching is all we can do.

I hope you enjoyed seeing the beautiful places we visited. Enjoy the rest of your week and hopefully I will have my project I started, finished by Friday. I have been busy cleaning up and getting ready for the fourth. 

Vacation week!

 It always seems that you start enjoying your vacation and relaxing, by the time it is ending. But, we had a good week and lots of adventures. I am showing some things tonight, I took lots of photos and saw lots of interesting places, so I will do another post when I get home and can go through more of them.

Our camp is nice, right on the river so we can paddle up river and float down. We had three really hot days, so we swam in the river to cool down. The bad thing is the mosquitos, not fun sitting outside. We spent most of our time going places, so we swam, ate and relaxed in the trailer.  Bean is sitting in front of Bill.

Up river we found a sandy place to swim and Bean could play off leash, so it was a nice place. Most of the time he would run into the river and join the other families who were swimming from the launch. The kids loved playing with him, so I didn't mind.

I also spotted a lot of swallows flying around and found their nesting area. There are high banks along the river and they make their homes there.

On Monday we went to Cathedral in the pines. It is a beautiful place on a hill with stunning views. It is dedicated to the men and woman who served in World War II. You can see Mount Monadnock in the distance. 

They also have paths to walk along and lots of garden spots.

The next day we went to Harrisville mill store. They sell looms, yarn and roving. I treated myself to a few bags of dyed roving.

Because of the heat, we were limited to rides and short walks. I found a Gorge nearby and we went there. It was a little cooler, but still humid enough to wear me out. It has a path that follows one side and back up the other.

And we drove into Vermont. Along the way we have seen a lot of covered bridges. We stopped at one in Vermont that has a swimming spot. I walked around with Bean in the water to cool off.

Finally the heat lifted and we got to go to Madame Sheri's forest. It was the site of the home of a socialite. Originally it was a grand home and the pond was where they swam. Now it is in ruins and the pond is a sanctuary for birds. I also thought we were hiking a short circle around the pond and by the time my phone app kicked in, I realized we were almost at the top of the mountain. It was a lot of uphill and the skies looked ominous, so I didn't dare continue, so we turned back. 

I spotted a few birds and a weasel, along with a lot of chipmunks. I caught this Vereo who was happy to pose for me.

Today we visited some new places that are worth a stop, so I will post about them later. I hope everyone had a nice week. I am hoping I can enjoy a rain free day and avoid the weekend traffic on the way home.

Friday Finish!

 

This has been a busy week and I am exhausted. I made reservations at a camp in NH on a river, so I have been planning and packing and keeping up with the house. I made time to finish a painting I started awhile ago. Unfortunately I lost the instructions, so I just went by the photo and then added a couple of whales. The original was on a shorter board and my canvas was larger, so added to it. 

I do not have a steady hand so I am a bit messy, a bit wonky, but I am happy to have finished it. It's been a while since I did acrylics, so need to hone my skills so I can finish another I started.

Last weekend we went for a walk at the ocean park. It has longer trails and less people on the backside, so we enjoy that section. It used to be an air force training field in World War II. This path is what is left of the old runway.

Most of the other trails are overgrown and lined with all types of vegetation for the wildlife. We spotted this Snapping Turtle on my section.

Tomorrow is our 50th anniversary. I really wanted to rent a place on the island, but missed the opportunity to get an affordable place in time. The area we are going to has places I want to visit, and we have a river site, so hoping to relax and enjoy seeing some new things. We will be there all week, so next week I will share some of our adventures. I also have my art supplies and embroidery supplies, so hoping to spend time making up designs and stitching them, while I relax.

I hope everyone has a nice week and not affected by all the storms that have hurt so many. We are lucky to have good weather this week, but it will be hot, even up north.