Keeping Busy, Having Fun and Taking Orders

Well, I'm caught up from vacation. . . finally. Now onto other fun things. I shared with you all that I purchased a small sewing/embroidery machine a month or so ago. Many have e-mailed me asking to see what I've been doing on my machine.

Here are a few items that I have embroidered on recently. I am also onto doing graphics. I just finished some embroidered towels for my Powder Room with Fleur De Lis. I'll post those pictures later. I have to duplicate my towels to put a basket together for the cancer Relay for Life. I'll be participating this year with my daughter and the other 9th grade Cheerleaders. I have been asked to donate a basket for the silent auction from the cheerleaders. I thought a basket with bathroom themed items and embroidered towels would be something useful.

A couple of aprons embroidered with the recipient's name. . .

. . .which are tucked inside matching tote bags.

Cotton receiving blankets with the baby's name and. . .

a matching polar fleece blanket. Gotta love that polar fleece!!


And. . . a few more tote bags. I have done many, many of these totes bags. This is just a sampling of what I've finished. I sell them for $6 so that's been a big hit lately. They are nice for gymnastic clothes, music lessons, library books, whatever.

Well, I'm off to start embroidery on a few pillowcases now.

Blessings. . . until next time,

Tennis Anyone??!!??

What do you think?



While we were in Grand Cayman the Ritz Carlton hosted the "Legend's Tennis Tour" with all the old boys. We had just been strolling on the beach one day walking past the Ritz (2 hotels down from our Westin) and lo and behold, my hubby says "Hon, there's John McEnroe, snap his picture!!" Which I immediately did. For once, I actually had my camera!! Poor guy was just out for a little peaceful swim and probably thought I was the paparazzi!! He immediately turned from me and swam out so he couldn't been seen.

What was even funnier was that I had just finished (I mean just. . . like on the plane to Grand Cayman) the book written by John's ex-wife, Tatum O'Neil (Ryan O'Neil's daughter), "My Paper Life." John and Tatum has three children together. Of course, John is the "explosive personality" type anyways, but it was an interesting read none-the-less. . . and Tatum sure had her share of problems as well. I actually left the book in the hotel room because I didn't have room to bring it home. I'm hoping someone will enjoy reading it as well.

Here's a link to the local paper in Grand Cayman announcing this Tennis tour. http://caymanjuice.blogspot.com/2008/01/john-mcenroe-at-ritz-carlton-grand.html


I did find it odd that the Ritz has the condo units ocean side and the hotel units across the street with a sky walk to connect the two. I was very happy that we were able to stay Ocean Side at the Westin.

So, what do you think? Is this John McEnroe? Hubby and I sure think so.

Blessings. . . until next time,

Sher

All Good Things Must End!!

*I'm not going to be shading, framing or adding my name to my photos anymore. It takes too much time (something I don't have an abundance of these days) sooooo, if someone wants to steal my photos. . . go ahead :)

Wow, Grand Cayman was wonderful!!

We ended our vacation by going out on a 3 1/2 hour sail boat tour to snorkel. . . one. . . last. . . time!! We made a few stops. At one stop we saw the stingrays and another a shipwreck. Very cool. My husband said he can now cross "go sailing" off his "Bucket List." If you have not seen the movie "Bucket List" I would highly recommend you rent the DVD. It stars Jack Nickelson and Morgan Freeman - - two of our favorite actors.

I know, I know, I look ridiculous, but due to having Lupus, and the sun sensitivity caused from it, I must take precautions to cover up, slather on the sun-screen and protect my eyes. I put a big t-shirt to protect my skin and go in snorkeling anyways!

Then we finished our day by having a drink "in the pool!" You can see by the following picture there is a bar "in the pool!" See the stools? Kind of different. I can just picture some drunk falling off the stool into the water!

This was the breakfast chef. He made our omelets and waffles "special to order" each and every morning at the grand breakfast buffet at one of our hotel's many restaurants. I love this picture! The chef told us that one morning he came into work; was getting his eggs, veggies, cheeses all ready for the morning. . . then he turned around. . . and there he was. . . .looking at himself!! The pastry chef made this wax replica of this chef. It is an exact duplicate of this man. The character was captured perfectly. . .even down to the missing teeth, each and every wrinkle, the twinkle in his eye. AMAZING!! I think the pastry chef could easily get a job at Disneyworld making wax animation characters. The hotel didn't want to lose him so I'm sure he was given a handsome raise to stick around. And, he's already working in "paradise" so I don't know if things get much better than that!

I captured this last photo on our last night. I thought it was very fitting for a wonderful vacation. A sail boat sailing away while the sun is in the process of setting. Good by Grand Cayman. . . we'll be back someday!!

Now, I get to play "catch-up," on the bills, the house, the laundry, etc. Our girls enjoyed their time with grandma and grandpa very much. I hope grandma and grandpa enjoyed their time with the girls too!!

Blessings. . . until next time,

Grand Cayman Vacation. . . continues :)

Friends, I think I have found a little bit of "heaven on earth" here in the Grand Cayman. *sigh* The weather is "perfect!" Not too hot, not too humid. . . just perfect. When we were in Maui and Hawaii two years ago to celebrate our 25th anniversary it was humid! Not so here in Grand Cayman - - thankfully!!

Today we went snorkeling and had so much fun. The water was really rough with lots of waves, but that didn't stop us at all.

This is our Hotel, the Westin Casuarina Resort. It's beautiful with the most beautiful pools and huge beach.

This is the entrance into our Hotel. But. . . remember. . . we are in the British Isles - so you have to drive on the opposite side of the road. Even entrances are opposite to what we are use to. Thankfully, my husband is doing the driving. He had to get a driver's permit to drive here in the Cayman. I'm glad he volunteered, I think I would have had a head-on collision by now! You know the one thing that I noticed down here? Everyone is soooo patient on the road. It absolutely amazes me. I have been here on the Island since Saturday and have yet to hear one car horn honk. Can you believe that? Not like back home!

This is the balcony off of our room. We have an ocean side view. Hubby takes good care of his wife :)
We have an evening drink out here and watch the sunset in the evenings. Unless, of course, we watch the sunset from the beach. . . as we have also.

Walking on the beach in the evening with my feet in the water's edge.

This is my husband. He has his camera, I have mine and we are trying to capture all the pictures we can. We stopped along the road on our way to snorkel to look for conch shells. They are in abundance here on the island. The locals gathering them up in the AM and sell them. We only found broken ones and parts of ones the locals didn't want to bother with. We didn't keep them either.

And a "beautiful" Cayman Island sunset.

Tomorrow, we are having breakfast at The Old English Bakery in Georgetown, snorkeling again with the Stingrays and taking a loooonnnnggg walk once again on the beach.

Blessings. . . .until next time,

In Grand Cayman

Spell Check is not working again. . . sorry!! Well, we're here - - we are in Grand Cayman!! Having the most wonderful time already!! Everyone is so friendly and helpful on this island. It's amazing to us. . . and we've been to many of the different Carribean Islands.

The one thing that I found strange, however, was on the taxi ride to our Westin Hotel. The taxi driver made sure to tell us that we could go to Cuba from here, if we so desired. I informed her that U.S. citizens are not allow to visit Cuba (sanctions remaining from the Kennedy days and the Cuban missile crisis). . . her response was "Oh. . . yes they can! We fly them into Cuba all the time. We just don't stamp their passports so the U.S. doesn't know that you're in Cuba." Yikes!! No thank you was my response!! I don't care to go to Cuba, have some type of trouble and the U.S. would not have my back! I don't think so. She told us that you would be surprised at all the famous people who go to Cuba. It's beautiful and very affordable, I guess. It's OK, I'll wait until, hopefully, under Castro's brother's rule now, relations with Cuba will change. We may have different issues in the United States of America, but there is no greater country in the world for this American girl!

Tomorrow. . . snorkeling :)

Blessings. . . until next time,

It's All In The Details!

This is the Part 3 of the architectural details. . .In our foyer (you can see the light hanging at the top of the photo) we have a coat closet. Instead of taking that closet all the way up to the 20' ceiling. . . leaving all that space "dead", we did something a little different. Our builder framed the closet in and we have a plant/accent ledge above it.

Extending from this closet plant/accent ledge is a ledge to the catwalk that I placed my favorite angels upon. At the bottom of this photo (I took it on the stairs) you can see into the dining room. The open dining room is outlined with accent pillars and you can see my "fancy" paint job. Stripes. Wide stripes. The painter painted the walls all the same sheen (flat), then went back over and taped off at 9 1/2" intervals and painted those sections with polyurethane.

This is a framed-in ceiling drop / off-setting our open dining room. Another little detail.


Our master bedroom has a panned ceiling going up in steps.

The kitchen has a panned ceiling going down in steps. This panned ceiling is over the table. One of the elevations houses the recessed lights (again on dimmers). It makes a nice decorative element over the eating area. Something a little different than a flat ceiling. I had our painter paint our kitchen as well. It's a rag/brushing technique to resemble old world European plaster. I adore it!

Not an architectural detail, but I wanted to show you anyways. . . I just recently had our electrician add these two lights in the upstairs "cat-walk." They are placed on each side of the display table (again, on dimmers).

I plan on taking my laptop with me Saturday morning when hubby and I leave for Grand Cayman. A much needed trip, I may add. We are so looking forward to a rest. So, I hope to do a few posts while we are away. . . that is if we're not too busy snorkeling!!

. . . now off to pack that sunblock. Sun. . . something we haven't seen much of here in Michigan :)

Blessings. . . until next time,

More Architectural Detail

A little more architectural detail in our home. . .



Over the fireplace we had the wall built out a little and recessed lights on dimmers placed inside the extension. It looks very nice at night with these accent lights and breaks up the space between the lights and the ttttaaaalllll ceiling.


Another little favorite spot of mine is at the top of the stairs. We have a little cubbie with a recessed light there too. It looks very pretty at night illuminated and breaks up the wall. When we were building this house I remember my husband going out and spending hundreds, yes, hundreds of dollars on sliding dimmer switches. He said that was the time to have the electrician install them so he didn't have to do it himself later. We have like 69 recessed lights in this house and 90% of then are on dimmers! Many have several recessed lights assigned to one switch so we don't have 69 dimmers, but we do have a lot of them. Looking back, I'm glad my husband went ahead and did this. It makes all the difference in the world. At the time I was fuming about the "budget being blown!"

A little up-date on our youngest. We received the test results back from her Echo and her heart is fine. . . thank you Jesus!! Her doctor thinks it may just have been a viral thing she had. If the chest pains return, further testing will be done at that time (stress test). Next, we have an appointment in two weeks with the hand surgeon to review the MRI results. Thank you for your kind comments and prayers. We so appreciate them.

I think, hope, pray that we have turned the corner here in Michigan with our winter weather. It's been absolutely beautiful for the past three days. High 60's to low 70's! We'll take it!! Finally, all the snow has melted. Good bye, and good riddance!!

Blessings. . . until next time,

Where's the TV???

The Great "Wall!!"


If you have a house with an "Open Great Room," meaning 20' - 24' ceilings. . . it's always a problem deciding what to put on the "wall." The "wall" being where the TV is; the "wall" that doesn't have doorways on it, etc. Some put large TV armoires on that wall, or large TVs. But then there is the open space between the TV or TV armoire and the tttaaaalllll ceiling. It's hard to fill that space and have it look pleasing.

So, here's an idea for you all. We had our builder design a built-in TV armoire on the "wall." We were then able to add some architectural detail on both side of the armoire with a built in area to accommodate glass shelving and additional cubbies above them. We added recessed lighting on dimmers to these areas too. The pictures above are of our "wall." One picture is how it looks closed and the other (sorry, it's a bit blurry) when we have the doors open and are watching TV. The stereo sytems is stored in the area beneath the TV and we have DVD's, CD's VHS and photos stored in all the cupboards surrounding the TV. We are very, very happy with the finished results.

I'll show you a few more little architectural gems added to our home in the next few postings.

Blessings. . . until next time,

Exhausting Day at the Hospital(s)!!

What a day!!

Our youngest daughter had two medical tests today. . . at two different hospitals (across town from each other!) We are home now and the poor little darling is exhausted. Our adventure began at 12:30 PM when I picked her up for an early dismissal from Junior High School. We now officially have T.B. , also known as Tired Butt!!

. . . It all started with a cheer injury. She hurt her wrist, oh somewhere. . . way back in January. At that time we were told she had torn a ligament and sprained her arm. She rested it for 2-1/2 weeks and resumed her cheer workouts/routines. Only problem? Her wrist NEVER got better. In the meantime, she started having chest pains. Yikes, for an almost 14 year old that scared us. . . especially since my husband had a heart attack at 17!! It also alarmed our doctor. So that's how these tests all began . . .We are praying this is only a virus or some type of indigestion thingy.

First, the doctor ordered an Echo Cardiogram. Of course, the hospital on our northern side of town doesn't do them on anyone under 16 so that's why we had to go to the Pediatric Diagnostic Center on the other side of town at the Hospital's Southern location. It's about an hour away. We had a little bit of a wait before our test and then after her test, we drove all the way back across town the other way. We stopped in between for a bite to eat and for a potty stop.

A MRI was ordered for her wrist because after not healing, as her wrist should have, we were referred to a Hand Specialist who discovered some type of a growth. Of course, this test (MRI) was back on our side of town at our hospital. The MRI department was a bit behind so we were delayed again. The test procedure was about 40 minutes. We are praying it's only a cyst. Our daughter did very well during the MRI, but was very happy to get out of that tube when the test was complete. It does help that patients are able to listen to music during the procedure.

I was able to complete my entire week of my Bible Study (Beth Moore, When Godly People Do Un-Godly Things - excellent study) during the waiting times. We arrived back home at about 6:00 PM. Not a fun day for our youngest, or the mom. We did her homework (Civil War - yuck) and are now going to lay on the couch and watch the tube (something "I" never do) for the rest of the night :)

Please pray these tests come back with nothing seriously wrong. Hopefully, they were just for precautionary measures.

Blessings. . . until next time,