Update

After a week in the hospital and five weeks in a rehabilitation facility, Mom is home. She is not as independent as she was in August and we are in the midst of coordinating aides to help her out. I wanted to thank everyone for their well-wishes. 

Last weekend Hubby and managed to make a short overnight trip to Boston to attend our daughter and her fiance's housewarming and to meet her fiance's parents. Here we are with the happy couple. 

It was a great party, but the drives there and back were awful. On Saturday morning at 9:30 a.m. the normal half hour drive to get off Long Island over one of two bridges took over an hour. Then there was construction on Interstate 95 that further delayed us. What should have been about a four hour drive, give or take, took five hours. We were trying to arrive early as we were bringing a cooler, but we at least arrived right on time. Going home Sunday afternoon we encountered numerous roads with accidents on them. I used Waze to navigate around them, but at one point there were accidents and delays on every possible route. We spent 6 hours in the car to return home. Ugh!

Yesterday I made a whole bunch of food to package for Hubby and I and for my Mom and MIL. Here is a big pot of Meatballs and Sausage simmering on the stove. I want to cook some other freezer worthy items today so we have some easy weeknight meals and so does my Mom when I can't be at her home to get her meals.

 I also finally found a few minutes to add one measly piece to the Advent Calendar. Santa's sack finally got its brim.

I am hoping to work on this a little more today. The teddy bear in the sack between the house and the gift is the next item to add. 

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. I think I will make a cup of tea and go visit right now.

Thanks for stopping by! 

A Little Stitching

Mom is improving, but still in the rehab facility. They have her walking a little longer every day so that she can go home in a few weeks. I am still as busy as ever going to visit, doing her laundry and making some food for her, but I am not as upset as I was in the past few weeks as she is much more herself every day.

I did manage to add Santa's toy sack last week, but not it's brim. That will be my lowly goal for this weekend. 

I also finished knitting Mom's fingerless mitts. I have seamed one of them and will finish the other after this post.

 It is a little tight on me as Mom has much smaller hands and wrists.

Do you like my bright blue manicure? It is one of my favorite colors....Rich Girl, Po Boy by OPI.

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Slow is the optimum word in my life at the moment. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. I am hoping to add the brim to Santa's Sack. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Slowly

Mom has been hospitalized or in rehab for the last three weeks. On Monday I attended a care meeting for her and if all goes well she will be heading home in two to three weeks. She still needs to walk more steadily and improve on climbing stairs, but hopefully that will come. She is so looking forward to going back to her home. I am sure that her homecoming will bring many challenges for her and for me as she will need much more help than she has had previously. We shall see. I must thank everyone for their well wishes. They have brightened some really tough days.

Obviously, I have had little to no time to craft lately. Mom's isolation has been lifted so now I can bring a craft with me when I visit her, but I have been much too tired to do so lately. Her hands have been freezing, so I gave her my finger-less gloves and then realized that I really should make her a pair of her own as her hands are even cold when she is at home. I found this Easy Fingerless Mitts pattern and got started one night. Acrylic yarn from my stash for easy washing in a color that mom likes.

One is finished except for seaming and the other should be done soon. This should really be a quick one or two night project, but my time for crafting is quite limited. I hope to have the second one finished some time this week.

Last weekend Hubby and I did make time for a really nice date night. I had purchased 2 for 1 tickets through AARP to see the Broadway musical Beautiful.

This is the story of Carole King's life and music. We had dinner at a BBQ restaurant then saw this great show where we had excellent Orchestra seats. Afterwards we stopped at the bar of a local motel for a glass of wine before heading home. I adore Broadway musicals and it has been a while since we saw one. We had a wonderful night.

I had a little down time last Sunday and started working on Santa's Sack for the Advent Calendar. 

I didn't even manage to finish sewing on the sequins so that is my project for today.
I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. I am hoping to add Santa's Sack and its brim today.

Thanks for stopping by!

What to say....

Mom has been in a rehab facility since last Monday night since leaving the hospital. She needs to get better at walking and taking care of herself. Unfortunately she had another setback on Thursday when she was diagnosed with c-diff. This is a highly contagious infection that requires isolation and a second antibiotic. It probably was a result of the first antibiotic. Prayers are obviously still welcome. I think Mom has a long way to go before she can go home.

I was happily knitting a scarf while sitting with her that I now have to throw out so that I don't risk spreading the infection. Ugh! Better safe than sorry though. 

I did finish knitting another one of the Operation Gratitude Scarves at home so that one is safe to donate.

I won't be starting any more as now my time will be really limited what with school and university starting next week.

I found a little time to spend on another craft this week. I was desperately looking for something quick and easy that would occupy my mind and hands and this was it.

 I found this neat craft to make these cork pumpkins. You can find a tutorial here.

Hubby and I like a glass of wine every once in a while.....or with dinner....whichever happens more often. As a result I have quite a large cork collection.

Believe me there are plenty more where those came from. This is enough to make three pumpkins.

Ta-da!. They look pretty good don't they. The only thing I had to buy was the felt for the leaves....all of 39 cents.

The little house in Santa's sack got its chimney and I added a gift. 

I don't know whether I will get any stitching done today as I need to visit my Mom and make a bunch of meals for the week ahead while Hubby and our son are enjoying a round of golf. It is nice that our son is visiting this weekend. It keeps my mind occupied when I am home.

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. She asked us to share a photo of where we stitch when the weather is nice so here is where I sit on my front porch. I usually have a cup of tea or coffee with when the sun is not too hot.

Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching and where. I may try to work on Santa's Sack if there is time.

Thanks for stopping by!

What a week

Santa got one of the toys in his sack...the doll house. 

It's a cute little thing.

 I have been knitting a lot this week at Mom's bedside. My 91-year-old mom is in the hospital with a UTI since Tuesday. Unfortunately the bacteria entered the bloodstream and she was running a very high fever. She is getting better, but will need to go to rehab as she has hardly walked since Monday and is very weak. Monday night when I stayed with her at her house I needed something to keep me busy so I cast on the scarf on the right out of yarn that I had given to her to make Operation Gratitude scarves. I figured I might as well keep myself busy.

The scarf on the left I had already started at home. I have been visiting Mom about 4 hours a day so I am knitting a whole bunch. Prayers for her recovery would be appreciated. I am not sure whether or not she will recover enough this time to live as independently as she has. Her home is about 5 minutes from me and she has lived alone for over 30 years, but as school starts next week I will not be able to take care of her. She needs 24 hour care right now. 

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. I hope to find a few minutes to work on the Advent Calendar. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Santa's finished!

I finished Santa on Saturday. Isn't he fantastic?

 I am so glad to have him done. Now I can move on to his sack of toys which goes in between Santa and the Snowman. 

Of course then there are 25 mittens and stockings to work on. I don't really think this will be finished for use this year. Especially as I have another special project that I want to work on. Unfortunately, I won't be able to share that one at all until it is finished as I want it to be a surprise for the recipient who I know reads my blog.
 Saturday started and ended with two different mysteries. First, I went outside to pick up the daily newspaper and noticed that our garage door was open. I thought I had closed it when I returned home the night before. I went over to it and pushed the button to close it and nothing happened. I went inside and told Hubby about it. We had experienced some bad thunderstorms the night before and he thought that maybe we had either had a power outage or power surge that automatically opened the garage door. It was probably the latter as all of our clocks were still on time which would not have happened with an outage. Hubby remembered a button to reset the opener and it worked. Thank goodness.
Then last night at around 9:30 pm our fire-alarms throughout the house started to go off. They only rang for no more than a second or two, but long enough that Hubby had to check each and every one. We still don't know why this happened. I think it is time to replace all of the batteries. All of our alarms are hard-wired, but they have back-up batteries that should be replaced once a year. We usually do this in April, but we didn't this year. There are two that are on cathedral ceilings which make for some scary tall ladder stretching to get to. I am much too short to reach them (and very afraid of heights). Hubby can just barely reach them....he is not too fond of heights either. He is usually somewhat shaky after he replaces those two batteries. I think this will have to be attempted today though. 

I have also been working on the next Operation Gratitude Scarf as well as my Breeze Infinity Scarf. You can see both of them below.

I am hoping to finish the donation scarf by Tuesday so I can hand it in at my stitching group. 

I decided to continue reading An English Ghost Story by Kim Newman. 

I can't say that I love this book, but it did get more interesting once I got further along in the story. I am currently at a part of the story that I am once again not enjoying. It is a little too dark and gloomy for me with too much character angst. 

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. I will be working on the Advent Calendar today. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Saratoga

My husband is a big horse racing fan. Since we can't be away from home for more than a few days due to family obligations right now, we have been going upstate to Saratoga Springs, NY for one or two nights during the racing season as our vacation the past few years. There is a yarn shop and a quilt shop there so I usually have a treat also. 

This past Wednesday we drove up, hoping to visit the Gardens at Yaddo in the afternoon.....my treat for this vacation. This photo is dark because it is a dreary rainy day here today.

As the plaque says, Yaddo is a National Historic Landmark. It was conceived at the turn of the 19th century as "a working artists' community where creative artists pursue individual and collaborative projects in a supportive environment".

This gorgeous fountain is at the bottom of the hill that leads up to the mansion. The mansion is off-limits to visitors as it is still used for artistic pursuits and was covered in scaffolding as it is under restoration.

 Here is the entrance to the gardens.

 This is what you see when you walk through the gate.

 The gardens are primarily made up of roses with a smattering of sculptures.

 Here are some of the roses that were still in bloom. 

 Isn't the two-tone of this rose unique?

 Here is a pretty pink...

 and a peach colored rose...

as well as a pretty yellow.

In the center of the garden is a fountain with fish in it.

There was an interesting flower in this fountain also.

Off to one side is a sculpture of Christalan. "Christalan represents youth, chivalry, and victory over motality" according to the flyer. 

From the rose garden you could walk up to the pergola. It was starting to rain so we walked up quickly to see what was above.

This fountain was a treat to find. It is quite unusual. 

 There was a small stream down to yet another fountain, but it is dry as it is under renovation.

 When finished, it will be surrounded by spring and summer flowering perennials. There are a few there now.

 The sky was turning really dark so as we were leaving I snapped one last picture of an array of roses. 

The gardens were much smaller than I expected. We were there for maybe half an hour. Even on a sunny day I don't think we would have lingered for much more than an hour.

 We left the gardens just in time as the skies opened up as we drove to our hotel. We had a dinner reservation at an iconic Saratoga restaurant, Siro's. This restaurant is only open during the six weeks or so of the Saratoga thouroughbred racing meet. It is one of those places to see and be seen. We enjoyed a tasty meal. After dinner we went to the Harness Racing track for a couple of races. Hubby loves this atmosphere. I made one bet and had a small winner. Yay!

 We spent the next two days at the main thouroughbred racetrack. I would love to tell you that we won a bundle of money, but I spent those two days without another winning bet. I tend to bet Exacta boxes, which means that I am betting on a few horses to get 1st and 2nd place in any order. I came in 1st and 3rd or 2nd and 3rd more times than I want to count. There were a couple of races that my horses started out at the back of the pack and stayed there. Sigh.....Neither Hubby or I bet a whole lot of money on a race. The whole day costs us a lot less than most other vacation pursuits, but it can be quite discouraging to lose all the time. Hubby had a winning Day 1, but he and I were betting many of the same horses on Day 2 so it was a losing day for both of us. 

We had two nice breakfasts out and two great dinners. We spent two days out in the fresh air. All and all it was nice to get away.

I did bring my knitting and crocheting with me to work on in the car. I am knitting another Operation Gratitude scarf.

This is a similar pattern from the same old magazine as the last one.

I added a couple of rows to my Breeze Infinity Scarf.

Before we left, I spent a little time working on Santa's arm. 

Although I placed it in the correct position above, it is not attached yet as it still needs its glove.

I am hoping to finish it today, but our son came to visit this weekend so it may have to wait until tomorrow.

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. 

Thanks for stopping by!