Busy week off

Despite having this whole week off, I only managed to add one piece to my Advent Calendar.

One is better than none and I did manage a little trip as well. My daughter lives in Boston and just bought a house with her boyfriend in a town just outside of Boston. She hasn't moved in yet as they are renovating the kitchen and painting first. I have seen it in photos, but I wanted to see it in person. I drove up on Friday...through rain and snow...5 hours. Unfortunately, Hubby couldn't join me. I saw the house and then had dinner with the two of them. 

On Saturday, Katie and I took the T into Boston and visited the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. 

This is quite a unique museum. The scope and variety of items that this woman collected are just amazing. They are all housed in the palace that she built called Fenway Court. Here are just a few of the things we saw.
 This is the indoor courtyard of the palace.

 There are many Greek, Roman and Egyptian artifacts.

 This is a view of the elevation.

 This Madonna and Child are so pretty.

 This is the funeral statue of an ancient warrior. This kind of artifact disturbed me as it feels wrong that it was moved from the resting place of this person.

 There are hundreds of paintings. Many by famous artists and many religious in nature. This camping picture by American artist John Sargent is called "A Tent in the Rockies". This appealed to me much more than the many portraits.

 I was also disturbed by the number of chairs that Isabella Stewart Gardner collected. I think that furniture is made to be used and I find it sad that these haven't been in a very long time. I realize that they are now so old that this may be impossible, but often there are 10 or more of the same chair. I like to see this beautiful furniture, but this seems excessive.

 I loved this inlaid chest.

 There were several different versions of Sheffield silver candlesticks throughout the palace. I think the lines on this one are so beautiful.

 Okay, this is a famous painting, by a famous artist, but there wasn't any way for me to record the info at the time.

 Another beautifully inlaid piece....this time a guitar.

 This piece is inlaid with Mother-of-pearl.

 These two doors are just hanging in a hallway. They are gorgeous.

 This is a beautiful ceiling.

 This room was my favorite. It was the most "normal" room. This table is set for coffee and hot chocolate.

Here is a close-up of one of the panels on that pretty tablecloth.

 Mrs. Gardner was also an avid collector of lace. I thought the roll on the left was amazingly beautiful.

 Finally, there was this gorgeous stained glass window.

In each room there were laminated pages that described all of the pieces of the collection based on each wall of each room....North, South, East and West. There was a brief description each and every item.

We spent a few hours at the museum and could easily have spent longer, but we were getting tired and I still had to drive home. I was lucky that my daughter was going to a party that was about halfway through my drive so she drove the first half of my trip home. I left her at the party....she had a ride home... and then I completed the last two hours of the drive home. Thankfully there was absolutely no traffic on the entire drive home.....a very rare occurrence when driving to and on Long Island. 

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. I have to grade an exam that I gave my university class this past week, but I am hoping to add another piece to my Advent Calendar at some point today tomorrow. 

Thanks for stopping by!