February 2011 – Page 2

LuuuuV Day

47 Comments / February 14, 2011 February 12, 2012 / Peep Days, Sewing

Did you have a fun Valentine’s weekend? And Day??? Full of Luuuuv and hearts and smooching and Chocolate???? (My Sweetie surprised me with some Shari’s Berries — Oh. My. Gosh!)

Anyway, it was a fun weekend here in ThimbleannaLand. It started with a fun day with the Quilty Peeps. Us locals drove a few hours to see Gurney. We shopped (quilt shops, of course) and then Gurney ever-so-sweetly treated us to a Valentine’s Proper Tea. It was great fun and the food was wonderful.

Notice how the ladies know correct pinky etiquette? Extended … yet not overly so. (I have no idea what I’m talking about…just play along.) We had two types of tea — a cinnamon spice (yum) and a chocolate flavored tea. The foods were all finger foods — appetizers, sandwiches (cucumber was included, of course) and three delicious little sweets — a meringue heart, a mini-fruitcake and a little lemon shortbread type of cookie. I have the best quilty peeps ever and we had a great day. Thanks girls — and especially YOU Gurney, for the fun treat!

Other than that, it was a low-key Love-y weekend. I made a few gifts for my little sweeties. Boxers for the boys in my favorite recent crush — Thing 1 and Thing 2! Sadly, there were no cute models around, so I just took a quick pic on the cutting table.

I embroidered “Thing 1” and “Thing 2” just above the hemlines — just in case both boys are home doing laundry at the same time.

Then I wrapped them (with a little fabric surprise for SweetiePie) and packed them with a chick flick movie (yeah, the boys might not be too excited, but the girls should like them), lots of candy, and some dental floss and toothbrushes to counteract the sugar.

Then, last night I made our annual Valentine’s dinner. Steak Au Poivre, herb roasted new potatoes, and oven roasted asparagus. And for dessert, I tried a wonderful new recipe, Not So Humble Pie’s Bittersweet Chocolate Tart. It was delicious! Thanks to LindaNoBlog for the great suggestion.

Oh, and this picture isn’t our Valentine’s Dinner, but it was just as fun. Someone posted a picture on Pinterest and because I’m 5 years old and love to play with my food, I had to try it.

You should have seen TheManoftheHouse’s face when he figured it out. He ate his veggies first and he didn’t know why I was grinning. Then, he started to eat his spaghetti and discovered that it was connected to the hot dog. It was pretty funny! If you don’t think you’ll die after eating an occasional hot dog, you might like this fun little surprise. If you have kids, I’m betting they’ll love it!

OkeyDoke…off to pay some bills. Big Valentine Smoochies!

XOXO,
Anna

Treasure Island

39 Comments / February 11, 2011 February 22, 2011 / Chat

Well, in spite of the big money offer, I’m back. I’ve had a few questions about that million dollar e-mail offer to buy my blog. You know it’s spam, right? I’ve read a few other blogs that have received the same spam. After I read the first line, offering the millions, I quit reading. I’m pretty sure that if there were any offer to buy this blog, it would only be to shut me up! Alas, you’re not getting off that easy!

So, it’s time for the annual visit to the big school fund-raising auction. As you can read here, here, and here, MeMum and I go early every year to sneak a peek at the decor (because we don’t actually go to the swanky, black tie affair). MeMum didn’t feel well enough to go this year, so I had to sneak around without my wingman, which was no easy feat. The theme was Treasure Island and the decor was pretty darn cool. As always, you enter through a “tunnel” that they create in the high school locker room (not that you’d ever know that you were in the locker room).

At every turn there were skeletons, treasure chests, booze bottles,and even a parrot or two!

Once inside the auditorium on the Island, there were beautiful tables for feasting everywhere. These pictures are a bit deceiving — the lighting was actually VERY low (which explains the dark pictures).

The waiters were working on the tables while I was there. These place settings aren’t complete — there are still more wine glasses and silverware to be properly positioned.

The centerpieces were beautiful too. Lots of flowers and fruits and treasure inside of the coconuts. I don’t remember really seeing any other flower arrangements this year, which is unusual. The centerpieces are usually just the beginning of all the beautiful flowers at these events. I guess they thought the extra skeletons would suffice.

One touch I loved were these light fixtures made from old rum bottles. Very clever!

One last (very dark) view of the tables with the big island map in the background.

I thought they did a beautiful job this year, as always. I always enjoy seeing all the clever touches that relate to the theme. And now, if I start a new traditional closing line, maybe one day it will come true … I hope they go back to having a children’s book theme next year.

XOXO,
Anna

Monday Randoms

34 Comments / February 7, 2011 February 22, 2011 / Chat

Well, how was your weekend? It was nice and quiet here in ThimbleannaLand. On Saturday, I spent the afternoon at MeMum’s baking cookies and on Sunday I decided to batten down the hatches and stay home. It was a lovely afternoon of knitting, movie watching, and enjoying the glorious white view out of the windows. (Below is a view of TheUglyTree from the laundry room.) Over in KarolineKnitsLand, she calls it a “mini-nervous breakdown”. I think it’s only supposed to be effective if you’re playing hookey from work, but I’m here to tell you, it’s fabulous for a day of ditching your normal routines and responsibilities.

So, how ’bout a little bit of random for a Happy Monday?

Several weeks ago, Ms. SilverPebble posted that she’d added some beautiful lockets to her etsy shop. I followed her link, and before I knew it my fat fingers clicked “buy”. I’ve received this gorgeous locket and I LOVE it. Love Love it! Sweet Emma even included a pretty (big!) piece of fabric and some chocolates — some of which may or may not have been consumed before I even got out of the car after the post office run. I forgot to take a picture of the inside of the locket, and Emma’s pictures are so much better than mine anyway — you can see them HERE. Thank you SO much for your marvelous service Emma — I couldn’t be happier with my purchase!

Ms. Pleasant Home has a fantastic post on how you blogspot bloggers can make it much easier for your readers to comment. We all love comments, don’t we? Jodi summarizes the secrets so that your blog can be MUCH more reader friendly. I always thought most of the commenting problems were related to different computers, but it turns out that there are settings that you can utilize so that your blog doesn’t make a commenter jump through hoops endure 3 or 4 screens just to leave a comment. If you’re a blogspot blogger I hope you’ll take a few quick minutes to go see what Jodi has to say — it might mean more comments for YOU!

Shall we play guess which camera lens is real and which is fake? The naughty little temptress Julia posted a picture of her cute Nikon coffee mug on Pinterest a few weeks ago, and I couldn’t resist. I had an amazon gift card burning a hole in my pocket, so I splurged. They’re amazingly life-like. I might have to put Julia on probation– I bought a piece of fabric several weeks ago after seeing it on her blog too THANKS Julia!. Amazon has several different camera brand mugs for your viewing pleasure.

Some yummy yarn arrived in my mailbox today. The lovely and invisible NoBlogMsB. and I arranged a swap. I’m thinking I got the better end of the deal!

And last, but by no means least, I love TED. If you have 20 minutes to spare, here’s a video on new breast cancer detection advancements that I think all women should watch. Big things (among them more comfortable mammograms – woohoo!) look to be right around the corner.

Have a Happy Week!
XOXO,
Anna

Oh, and P.S. I’ve had a fantastic offer via e-mail to buy this scintillating blog for millions. I always knew this incessant yacking would pay off someday!!! However, because of my love and devotion for YOU, dear reader, I’ve decided to turn it down. Some things in life are much more important than money!

It Pays To Whine

44 Comments / February 4, 2011 February 22, 2011 / Around the House

In December, when Scotland was getting so much snow, I was whiney ’cause we had piddly little dustings of snow. Then in January, the East Coast got hammered and I was whiney some more. Even the South was getting more snow that we had, And now … we finally got some snow!!! I LOVE it! I’ve been having a great time playing with the snowblower this week — she’s my new best friend. She can throw that snow all the way across the driveway — WooHoo! {Insert Tim the Toolman Taylor Grunting.} (That’s BigDaddy’s driveway.)

I’m actually a little disappointed. They’d predicted that we could have as much as 16″, but we weren’t that lucky. Oh well, we’ll take what we can get. The ugly tree is loving his new winter blanket too. (Excuse the bright sun — I was just excited to be home before dark to take a few pictures!)

We have lots of animal tracks out behind our house, so I took a few minutes to check them out. I love seeing who’s come by to visit. I’m not a track expert by any stretch, so I can only guess. Any track experts out there? I’m thinking maybe a squirrel here?

And a bunny who drags his feet in the snow?

These pretty tracks trailed off into the sunset.

They’re deep and big and in groups of four. I’m guessing maybe deer here?

And look at these cute little tracks. See the shallow little “hand” print in the upper left? As far as I know we don’t have any little monkeys out there. A racoon maybe?

I found Big Foot out there too. Oh Wait. That’s Me.

Big Foot decided to come back in the house — it’s cold out there. We’re supposed to get a few more inches this weekend. Yipee!

Oh, and I wanted to show you a picture that I received from NoBlogJoyce. She saw the Wedding Quilt last spring and decided to make one for her kids who are getting married in a few weeks.

I LOVE it Joyce! You did a fantastic job — it’s fun to see the quilt with some color in it too. And isn’t that a pretty monogram — I love the way the letters go together. Thanks so much for letting me share your beautiful quilt, Joyce. I hope the kids love it — and Good Luck with the wedding!

Now…on to the weekend. Have a great one!

XOXO,
Anna

Month: February 2011