Luscious Fibers, Food and Life

looking for alligators

Grant, Grant's mom and I just left the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge. It's a favorite place to visit when we're in town. Today we saw many beautiful birds and 4 alligators sunning themselves. One interesting thing I noticed when I was looking at one of the alligators with binoculars, less than a foot away from the alligator, just hanging out next to it was this good sized brown rabbit. Yes a rabbit and it was alive. We thought we might witness some national geographic but the rabbit did hop away, at least for now...thank goodness.

hotter than a witch's...

Grant and I are riding in the snack car because our car is bloody hot. There's a bunch of us in here taking a break from the steamy, snore-filled car. I'm pulling an all-nighter. Gotta love the train...

on the train

Grant and I are headed to savannah on the overnight train. We just played Ludo (grant got it for christmas) and it's a lot like sorry. I won, but had an unfair advantage be cause Grant didn't really play games growing up. I even let him cheat and was still far behind. More on our travels to come...

On the train

So it's 1:30am, we're on the train and we're some place in Conn. We're in the quiet car and it's nice because there are only a couple other people sharing the car with us. I've actually slept for a couple hours, but Grant is pulling an all nighter so he can see the entire route (he's never taken this train route before.) We'll be home in about 6 hours. I'm looking forward to seeing the cats and meeting Marcella.

Oh and yeah Patriots!!! The conductor gave us updates (i also checked online). It was a nail-bitter.

On Vacation

Hey everyone! We're in Savannah on vacation. We do not have internet so I'm posting with my phone. I should be hanging out at a cafe with internet some time and will post then.

buongiorno

Italy was wonderful!  It was a tough road to get there but I'm happy we made it. Grant and I had such a nice time away and were able to see so many beautiful things, as is obvious by the hundreds of pictures we took.  I've made a flickr album that I invite you to take a look out. I've also written about some highlights below.

Our trip started in Venice. My family had been there a couple days already and Grant and I had about 24 hours.  In that time we did a lot of walking and soaking in the everyday life of Venice. We had dinner in an outside trattoria in Campo di Santa Margarita, a lively square with many people enjoying each others company, children playing, and delicious food.  The next day Grant and I got up very early and headed for Piazza San Marco. After getting lost a number of times, we made our way there. It was beautiful, but unfortunately, all the pigeons were still sleeping.

Next it was on to Florence. Our apartment was located in a artistically creative neighborhood so it was wonderful walking around and seeing the work of the local artists. While in Florence we did some shopping at the Ponte Vecchio, hung out in Piazza della Signoria, strolled through the Uffizi, and of course had multiple cappuccinos and gelato each day.

Lastly a visit in Rome.  Our apartment was located next to Vatican City. Seeing the Vatican, Saint Peters and the Pope were pretty important to my mum so this location was perfect.  While in Rome Grant and I went to Piazza San Pietro and the basilica, hung out in Piazza Navona and visited the Trevi Fountain, the Spanish Steps and the Pantheon.  Rome is such a huge city and there is so much to see. It's impossible with only 3 and a half days and none of us are much for running from place to place. So Grant and I also took a bus tour around the city which allowed us to see many sites.

I think we did the right amount of sight-seeing, relaxing, people watching and eating.  We took lots of photos of amazing sights, but also of great food and people.  It was a wonderful trip and I look forward to our next visit.

Trip to Maine

Maine was lovely - thought getting there was a lot less than desirable.

We got to BWI a couple hours before our flight was to leave, which was fine because I still needed to get my People magazine (I've now developed a thing were I have to have the latest People with me when I fly. When I realized it was a habit, I was leery of stopping - silly huh?)  We got to the terminal and learned that our 8pm flight was delayed because of Thunder storms in Boston. Wait a minute! Weather?! I expect there only to be weather issues when I'm flying in winter, not summer! So after much checking, wandering, knitting, eating yucky food, more checking in, we took off at about 11:30pm.  Getting us to Boston around 1:30 and the car rental line around 2:00am...no longer smiling...as we had a 3.5 hour drive to look forward to.   Well I decided that I was somehow still very much awake and wanted to go ahead and try to drive to my parents.  The first hour and a half was horrible. Heavy rain and night driving sucked! Not to mention that I was probably tired.  A few storms and Dunkin Donuts later, we were cruising along, music blaring and driving on fumes of excitement to be on vacation.  We finally got to my parents around 5:30am...we took a few hours of sleep and then our Maine adventure began.

Some of the things we did...
Lunch at Slates - YUM! Love this place...the food is delicious and the atmosphere fun. AND there is a yarn shop across the street - yeah!  I picked up some luscious fuzzy purple/blue angora to knit the fuzzy little baby booties from Last Minute Knitted Gifts. I don't have a baby in mind, but I love those booties!

We also went to the Acadia National Park, but made a pit stop at Perry's Nut House (a Maine tourist icon, with lots of yummy nuts, salt water taffy and silly gifts) along the way. As you can see, I had the fun of being "cracked" while there.

After leaving Perry's with some fudge and trail mix. We headed to Schoodic Point, where my dad says huge rocks come flying out of the water because the waves have so much power. We didn't see any of that, but we did see HUGE waves and a number of rocks that look like they were displaced.

We also saw a few people get a little too close (dummies) and get pretty wet. It's may sound fun, but it's kind of dangerous. We definitely kept our distance.

Other things we did...candlepin bowling (I almost broke 100), hanging out in the back yard, drives around my home town, knitting (of course) and lastly, it was my nieces graduation from high school - oh my! She sang a beautiful solo, the best by far and I'm not just saying that...it brought tears to my eyes.

All in all a wonderful few days and we can't wait to go back in December.

Back from Vacation

Hi Everyone,

Just a quick note to say I've returned from a wonderful trip to Maine and I'm sadly back at work today.  I'll provide more details and photos soon...

Back from Vacation

Well, my few days away were fabulous!  The Sugar Tree Inn was lovely and the owners were very hospitable.  Grant and I were the only two there, so we had the entire place to ourselves.  We felt quite pampered.  The road there was a bit scary...driving on the side of a mountain with no guard rails can be a bit unnerving, but we managed even in the snow.  Below are a few photos, including one of me knitting on the Inn porch.  You can also see the cookies and tea they made for us! We're already planning our next trip.

I also received some yarn while I was gone - yeah! This batch of sock yarn came from Knit Picks.  The colors are Yokun, Spring Prairie and Red Wood Forest.  The blues are for my secret pal...shhh.