It’s a roundup of the photos I shot for Project 365 (the occasional when-I-feel-like-it theme for 2017 is “words”), plus some snapshots I posted on Instagram during the previous week.
365 📷: 2017 217/365 – We spent the day hanging out with my parents and swimming in their pool. It was a nice day, capped off with a game of Apples to Apples in the little house in the back yard. [Taken at my parents’ house.]
Sunday
365 📷: 2017 218/365 – Isn’t half the fun of buying flowers taking their picture? I really fell down on the job with this batch of sunflowers from the farmers market. This is the only one left that doesn’t look like a disaster!
365 📱: 2017 219/365 – I probably shouldn’t have gone out for that mocha at lunch time. I’m going to get drenched getting back inside! [Taken in the parking lot at work.]
365 📱: 2017 220/365 – Our office window has a great view. [Taken at work.]
Wednesday
365 📷: 2017 221/365 – We went to Ocean Grove in the afternoon, and walked to Asbury Park for the evening. I love these little late-in-the-day trips. I wish we could take them more often! [Taken from the Ocean Grove boardwalk.]
365 📱: 2017 222/365 – The great thing about working from home for the day is that I can spend my lunch hour the way I used to before I had a “day job” – winding balls of yarn in front of a British mystery on TV. It’s not everyone’s idea of paradise, but it makes me happy!
365 📷: 2017 223/365 – Oh, the lure of a new project! Every minute I wasn’t working today, I was thinking about this shawl, and the knitting I would get to do when I got home. I know… I’m such a party animal! Friday night knitting! Woo hoo!!
Thanks for taking a peek at this week’s photos! If you want to see this stuff as it happens, please feel free to follow me on Flickr and/or Instagram.
I may already have plans to blog about some of these things in greater detail over the coming week, but be sure to leave a comment if there’s something in particular you want to know about!
It’s a roundup of the photos I shot for Project 365 (the occasional when-I-feel-like-it theme for 2017 is “words”), plus some snapshots I posted on Instagram during the previous week.
365 📷: 2017 189/365 – The young cousins came over today, and pulled all kinds of things out of our long-neglected dress-up trunk, including this hat, which is currently being modeled by my own little minion.
365 📷: 2017 191/365 – I started a new blanket last night. I’m six little circles in. I really hope I can crank this out quickly enough that I don’t lose enthusiasm before I finish – it’s always a risk with something as big as a blanket!
365 📷: 2017 192/365 – Say hello to Uncle Neil and niece #3! We’ve got 3 of each now, ranging in age from 21.5 years to 14 hours 😉 [Taken at the hospital.]
365 📱: 2017 195/365 – I’m glad these guys are such good sports about cming to Gather Here with me every year. They’re even holding my fabric while I finish shopping 🙂 [Taken at Gather Here.]
Thanks for taking a peek at this week’s photos! If you want to see this stuff as it happens, please feel free to follow me on Flickr and/or Instagram.
I may already have plans to blog about some of these things in greater detail over the coming week, but be sure to leave a comment if there’s something in particular you want to know about!
We went to Ocean City a week earlier than we’ve been going in recent years, and that gave us cold, wet weather at first. The last few days, though, were warm and sunny, and they made me wish I’d packed something other than jeans and sweaters 😉
As usually happens when we spend 4 days near the ocean blues, and the sandy browns, and the vibrant cobalt of our hotel, home seems very, very green when we return. It’s possible that spring just sprang a little harder while we were gone, but it is also maybe just a trick that our eyes play on us. Either way, all of that green, and the pops of pink as the peonies emerge make for a nice consolation prize of having to leave the shore before we’re ready.
It wouldn’t be May at TWiP, if I didn’t have one post that started off unbelievably blue, and ended in an explosion of green!
I noticed on Instagram this week that there is a new session of Picture Spring that has just begun. I would have loved to officially join the class, but when I thought about what my $40 would get me (or more importantly, how much use I would get out of it right now), I decided to just play along on my own with the prompts I saved from six years ago.
The class consists of daily prompts, but it also has a community aspect to it. I already have the prompts, so I’d be mainly paying for the community. Last year, I’d have jumped at that, but I have a lot less spare time now and I doubt I’d be able to invest as much in the community as I might have in the past. So, I’m taking my old prompts and playing along by myself on Instagram 🙂 (Only it’s not entirely by myself, because #hashtags!)
I started a few days late, so I’m doubling up here and there until I catch up.
It’s a roundup of the photos I shot for Project 365 (the occasional when-I-feel-like-it theme for 2017 is “words”), plus some snapshots I posted on Instagram during the previous week.
365 📷: 2017 134/365 – What a contrast to yesterday! It’s such a nice day, I think everyone and their mother is here 😉 We’re not used to having to share the boardwalk with so many people. [Taken on the boardwalk.]
365 📱: 2017 136/365 – Well, it’s back to work today, and what a beautiful day it is, too! I went out for lunch, and when I came back, I spent 10 minutes just sitting in the parking lot. It’s a shame to go back into canned air, when the outside is so nice. [Taken in the car at work.]
365 📷: 2017 137/365 – The peonies are almost ready! We’re going to have a lot of the light pink ones this year. Get ready for an onslaught of peony photos…
365 📷: 2017 139/365 – The first peony popped open today!
Thanks for taking a peek at this week’s photos! If you want to see this stuff as it happens, please feel free to follow me on Flickr and/or Instagram.
I may already have plans to blog about some of these things in greater detail over the coming week, but be sure to leave a comment if there’s something in particular you want to know about!
It has seriously been The Week of The Sweater around here. It’s all I could photograph, for several days. This sweater that I frogged twice before settling on the current design. This sweater whose colors are so hard to accurately capture. This sweater that I’ve actually gotten to wear in MAY because the weather is completely nuts.
Seriously, it’s been far too cold for May, and if I didn’t have a brand new knit that I was excited about, it would be making me pretty miserable. But I do have a brand new knit that I am excited about, and so I will not gripe about this weather. Not too much, anyway.
It’s a roundup of the photos I shot for Project 365 (the occasional when-I-feel-like-it theme for 2017 is “words”), plus some snapshots I posted on Instagram during the previous week.
Ready? Cast your mind back to this time last week…
Saturday
365 📷: 2017 126/365 – Had a nice visit with my parents today, and now I’m going to cozy up with my knitting for the evening. It’s really something else, how I can breeze through knitting the body in a few days, and then take a week to finish a single sleeve. I’m losing my will to continue, but I must persevere!
365 📷: 2017 127/365 – Finally. The sweater is finished and having a good soak. I hope I like it after all of this 😉
Monday
365 📷: 2017 128/365 – I still have a few ends to weave in, but aside from that, it’s done! And I do think I really like it. It’s going to be a chilly day tomorrow, so I’ll probably have a chance to take it for a spin somewhere other than my bathroom.
Tuesday
365 📱: 2017 129/365 – I took a little walk today at lunch time. I think I’m going to do this more often. It’s a pretty campus, with lots of trees, and it’s good to get out of the building and get some fresh air. Truth be told, I do go out most days, and while I get plenty of fresh air, I don’t get much exercise riding around in my car with the windows open 😉 [Taken at work.]
365 📱: 2017 130/365 – My pretzel stash is dwindling, and the future of afternoon snacking is in peril. [Taken at work.]
Thursday
365 📷: 2017 131/365 – I’m glad I checked the forecast, but I’m not thrilled about what I saw when I did. A suitcase destined for the beach in May should not have this many heavy sweaters in it.
365 📷: 2017 132/365 – We’re in Ocean City again, and it’s pretty chilly, but we have sun! And I got to wear my new sweater yesterday, so there’s another silver lining. Today I’m wearing my rainbow Porthole Pullover, and I found a matching beaded bracelet in a favorite shop (so, of course, I now own a matching beaded bracelet…) [Taken in ocean city.]
Thanks for taking a peek at this week’s photos! If you want to see this stuff as it happens, please feel free to follow me on Flickr and/or Instagram.
I may already have plans to blog about some of these things in greater detail over the coming week, but be sure to leave a comment if there’s something in particular you want to know about!
Sometimes it’s hard to come up with a title for these TWiP posts. I look at my photos and I see nothing to unify them. That hasn’t been an issue this week. It’s been a cozy-feeling week, with fireplaces, family, and cranberries aplenty.
When last we spoke, we were embarking on our annual trek to Cherry Hill, NJ so Neil (and Aidan, to a lesser degree) could attend Philcon. I did all of my favorite South Jersey things on Saturday morning and afternoon, so when my brother invited us to a game night at my parents’ house that evening, the kids and I didn’t debate for long before deciding to leave Cherry Hill a day early and join them. We ♥ game nights! (And Neil had his own car with him, so we weren’t leaving him to Uber his way home or anything 😜)
This has been a pleasant week. And now that Thanksgiving is over, it’s time for me to transfer some of my massive Christmas music collection over to my car’s mp3 player. I shared a small fraction of that collection last year, if you would like to have a listen, too!
It’s a roundup of the photos I shot for Project 365 (one image each day for all of 2016), plus some snapshots I posted on Instagram during the previous week.
Ready? Cast your mind back to this time last week…
Saturday
365 📱: 2016 324/366 – The 13-year-old and I went to the Collingswood Farmer’s Market this morning. I got cranberries, so now I have to make bread with them this week ☺ [Taken in Collingswood, NJ.]
365 📷: 2016 325/366 – We don’t have any firewood. And I couldn’t light a fire anyway because I’m going out soon. But this makes a cozy enough substitute.
Monday
365 📷: 2016 326/366 – Yesterday’s candlescape reminded me to order firewood this morning. I thought I’d have to wait a few days, but they delivered it this afternoon! We didn’t waste any time lighting a fire. Because it’s cold outside and we ♥ cozy.
Tuesday
365 📷: 2016 327/366 – My new printer displayed a warning that the ink was getting low, and then printed my page. Or half of it anyway. Uh, thanks for giving me such an early warning and plenty of time to buy replacement ink, Mr. Printer.
365 📷: 2016 329/366 – Nice, cozy Thanksgiving ☺ [Taken at my in-laws’ house.]
Friday
365 📱: 2016 330/366 – Hanging out in Mom’s kitchen, listening to Simon & Garfunkel, and making some chicken and rice. [Taken at my parents’ house.]
Thanks for taking a peek at this week’s photos! If you want to see this stuff as it happens, please feel free to follow me on Flickr and/or Instagram.
I may already have plans to blog about some of these things in greater detail over the coming week, but be sure to leave a comment if there’s something in particular you want to know about!
Between last weekend’s travel and this week’s task list, I’m not lacking for blog fodder. What I am lacking is the opportunity to set aside a few hours, process my photos, and write a couple of blog posts.
I also feel like my days this month have all had an undercurrent of anxiety flowing through them, just under the surface. My anxiety comes from a variety of sources, and makes it hard to relax even when I do carve out the time.
One of those sources (and probably the only one I can actually do something to alleviate)? Clutter.
I am collecting clutter at an alarming rate right now. There are yarn balls and swatches littering the family room, and piles of polymer clay work waiting to be carded and priced in the living room. I am in a highly creative space right now, and when I get that way, I leave craft supplies and finished samples in my wake.
Today is the only unscheduled day on my calendar for at least a week. I should probably clean something, but I’m tempted to put my clutter blinders on and spend the afternoon watching movies and selfish knitting instead…
It’s a roundup of the photos I shot for Project 365 (one image each day for all of 2016), plus some snapshots I posted on Instagram during the previous week.
365 📱: 2016 289/366 – At the Ravelry gathering at the NY Sheep and Wool Festival. It’s always fun to people watch at these things. Actually, I tend to sweater watch. I remember what people were wearing much more easily than I remember their faces! [Taken at the NY Sheep and Wool Festival in Rhinebeck, NY.]
365 📷: 2016 290/366 – Aidan and I stopped for a few hours on the way home from Rhinebeck, and visited the Storm King Art Center. It was like a huge, gorgeous park, punctuated here and there with modern art sculptures. We barely scratched the surface of all there was to see. [Taken at Storm King Art Center in New Windsor, NY.]
365 📷: 2016 292/366 – One crochet hook finished, 11 pairs of stud earrings drying in the rack, and 7 hooks awaiting sanding and buffing. Not a bad day’s work.
365 📱: 2016 294/366 – Ooh, the colors outside the kitchen window. I could stare at them all day. And I would, except I have a lot to do today. It’s probably best I make my coffee and get moving ☺
Friday
365 📷: 2016 295/366 – It’s that time of year again, when I look out the window and suddenly feel like I’m in a Hitchcock movie.
Thanks for taking a peek at this week’s photos! If you want to see this stuff as it happens, please feel free to follow me on Flickr and/or Instagram.
I may already have plans to blog about some of these things in greater detail over the coming week, but be sure to leave a comment if there’s something in particular you want to know about!
I am either about to completely burn out on all things knit/crocheted, or am heading into a super prolific period… Meet me back here next week to find out which, LOL!
It’s a roundup of the photos I shot for Project 365 (one image each day for all of 2016), plus some snapshots I posted on Instagram during the previous week.
365 📷: 2016 254/366 – I want to say I’m on a business trip this weekend, but it feels a lot more like a pleasure trip. Tonight, I will spend all of my time in this corner, working on a crochet project and watching a movie. Tomorrow, I check out of the hotel and hit the New Jersey Sheep and Fiber Festival [Taken at the Hyatt House in Branchburg, NJ.]
365 📷: 2016 255/366 – Back home, and rather than tackle the dishes in the sink or the laundry basket overflow, I wound my new yarn into center-pull balls. Priorities! This yarn, BTW, is from June Pryce Fiber Arts. It’s Coventry DK in the “arctic ice” colorway. It’s squishy and beautiful, and will become some kind of something to wrap around my neck in the winter. Maybe another Hitchhiker Shawl, maybe something else.
Monday
365 📷: 2016 256/366 – This is my second Porthole Pullover prototype. I was considering leaving it unfinished, since I’ve already tested the bits I needed to test, and I’m not sure I’ll ever wear it, since it’s a lot more fitted than I generally like. Still, I have found myself working on the sleeves. Maybe it’ll grow a bit with blocking and then I’ll want to wear it. We’ll see. There’s no rush.
Tuesday
365 📱: 2016 257/366 – Our last Back to School night in the middle school! [Taken at Eamonn’s School.]
Wednesday
365 📷: 2016 258/366 – Pssst! Hey, Eamonn! Look out the window!
Thanks for taking a peek at this week’s photos! If you want to see this stuff as it happens, please feel free to follow me on Flickr and/or Instagram.
I may already have plans to blog about some of these things in greater detail over the coming week, but be sure to leave a comment if there’s something in particular you want to know about!
I’ve been sewing. And antiquing. And lounging around on the beach. And grilling stuff. July got off to a rocky start, but I think I’m in the swing of it now ☺
As a matter of fact, we’ll be heading out for a swim this afternoon, and I’ve promised to bring a wineberry-based dessert. (That, my friends, may just be the most July-tastic sentence ever written.) I need to get off of the computer and go figure out what, exactly, that dessert is going to be!
It’s a roundup of the photos I shot for Project 365 (one image each day for all of 2016), plus some snapshots I posted on Instagram during the previous week.
Ready? Cast your mind back to this time last week…
Saturday
365 📷: 2016 198/366 – Now that we have an empty cabinet in here, it’s time to sort through all of the stuff that’s been sitting on the table since we emptied out the old wall unit a few months ago. I may actually be able to see the table top soon. Yay!
365 📷: 2016 202/366 – I don’t grill often, because I’m not great at it (last time the fire was so wimpy, I had to bring the food inside and finish the job on the stove top), but when I do it and it’s successful, it makes me very happy. The leftovers will get us through several meals ☺
365 📷: 2016 203/366 – I like our Ocean Grove day trips that don’t start until 5pm. I’m not one for laying out on the beach, soaking up the sun, but get me there late, when the hottest part of the day is over, and there’s a cool breeze coming off of the ocean, and I can be very happy. A nice little hour on the beach blanket? Followed by a good supper in town, and a stroll down the Asbury Park boardwalk after dark? Yes please! [Taken in Ocean Grove, NJ.]
365 📷: 2016 204/366 – I finally got my sewing machine set up again. I’ve been itching to make something for weeks! Yesterday I sewed a sleeveless top, and today, more of the same. I’ve got a few more things in me before I pack the machine back up. I’ll have a proper show-and-tell on the blog next week!
Thanks for taking a peek at this week’s photos! If you want to see this stuff as it happens, please feel free to follow me on Flickr and/or Instagram.
I may already have plans to blog about some of these things in greater detail over the coming week, but be sure to leave a comment if there’s something in particular you want to know about!
You know I like to keep it light on this blog. I tend to avoid posting things of a political nature, and I hardly ever make mention of things that may be happening in the world, no matter how prevalent they may be in my thoughts.
It’s not that world events don’t have an effect on me, it’s just that I like to keep Polka Dot Cottage as my happy little escape from the everyday.
Sometimes, though, it feels weird to me to go on cheerily chatting about fabric and knitting projects, and the like, when there are people in the world with Real Problems. Most of the time I shake it off, because I think that while the world needs to collectively come up with workable solutions to its many ills, the world also needs to provide places of retreat, where the photos of the day involve nothing more controversial than coffee cups and crocheted doilies.
The thing is, today I feel the need to briefly break my own rule for once.
I’ll never understand the gun culture in this country, and I will be the first to admit that I don’t have a good solution for how to keep people from shooting each other. The racially-charged gun violence this week, all of the recent shootings in the name of religion, and the domestic violence cases that turn deadly when there is a weapon within easy reach… I will never understand any of it.
I lost a close childhood friend to the latter this week, when her husband shot her, and then turned the gun on himself.
Like I said, I don’t have the answer, nor do I want to start a debate. I just want to put some of my later words and images for this week into perspective.
So. I’m with Neil this weekend at Readercon, though my heart isn’t really in it. We go to this conference with Neil every year, but this time it has moved to a new city. So far I’m not a fan, but that may not be Quincy, MA’s fault so much as the weight of all of this weekend’s heavy thoughts, and the fact that I miss some of my favorite things to do in the old city.
I’m having fun when I manage to be distracted for a while, so I think the trick is to stay distracted for the rest of the time we are here.
I’m having trouble coming up with a good segue here so…
It’s a roundup of the photos I shot for Project 365 (one image each day for all of 2016), plus some snapshots I posted on Instagram during the previous week.
Ready? Cast your mind back to this time last week…
Saturday
365 📷: 2016 184/366 – I sometimes find myself saying things like, “I wish we had such and such a type of flowering plant in our yard.” And for some reason, it has only recently occurred to me that I can do something about that. Duh. Now I just have to sweet talk Neil into planting them for me. He’s so much better at that kind of thing than I am ☺
365 📷: 2016 185/366 – Saw the family today, and since it’s almost the Fourth of July, my brother brought some sparkly stuff. [Taken at my parents’ house.]
365 📷: 2016 186/366 – What a knitty day it’s been! I haven’t devoted this kind of time to this particular project before. It’s taken me a few weeks to knit 13 inches. I’ve only got five more inches to go on the body now, and then I can start on the sleeves.
Tuesday
365 📷: 2016 187/366 – Ok, here’s something fun. I spent an evening with Photoshop, one of my polymer clay canes, and my most recent crochet pieces, and came up with this pattern, which I turned into fabric. (I’ll write a blog post soon to explain how all of those things fit together). When I can get my sewing machine out again, the fabric will become a summer tank top for me.
Wednesday
365 📷: 2016 188/366 – Laundrypalooza.
Thursday
365 📷: 2016 189/366 – I had some bad news about a friend this morning, and it haunted me for the whole 4.5-hour ride to Massachusetts today. While we were eating supper at the mall, I told the boys I could use some retail therapy, so we swung into Target on the way back to the hotel, and I bought two practical things at reasonable prices. Not particularly satisfying. I’m pretty sure retail therapy requires at least minor amounts of frivolity and extravagance, so I reserve the right to try again tomorrow. [Taken in Quincy, MA.]
365 📷: 2016 190/366 – So far, I have to say, I am not liking staying in Quincy as much as I have liked staying in Burlington in the previous years of this conference. I find the layout of the surrounding area to be so confusing that I am constantly using my phone’s GPS to get anywhere I want to go. Burlington was so straightforward by comparison. I’m missing some of my favorite Burlington destinations, too, like the big used book store. I’m probably just being overly cranky and sensitive. On the plus side, I had a nice time in Cambridge this morning. The shopping and my kids were a welcome distraction from my preoccupying thoughts. Also, our hotel sits on top of a hill, and there are some nifty views. This one is from the window near the bank of elevators. [Taken in Quincy, MA.]
Thanks for taking a peek at this week’s photos! If you want to see this stuff as it happens, please feel free to follow me on Flickr and/or Instagram.
I may already have plans to blog about some of these things in greater detail over the coming week, but be sure to leave a comment if there’s something in particular you want to know about!
So yesterday I shared with you my muddy forest adventure. How about today we take a look at the Jersey Shore in the rain?
Settle in, folks, because this is a photo-heavy post! I did put them into a couple of galleries, so you don’t have to sit through 50 full-size photos loading. (You can click on anything you want to see in more detail.)
A few weekends ago, we spent a handful of (not enough) days in Ocean City, as we do every mid-May. It rained at least a little bit every day, and a lot for two of them. I used my phone for the majority of my photography because it was easier, the phone is more waterproof than my DSLR, and the phone camera is actually pretty good, especially in the daylight.
Where I did take the fancy camera out was on our one beach day. I like using the 250mm lens so I can plop myself down on the blanket, and zoom in on everything from my comfy spot.
I did get up and walk around, too. I’m not that lazy 😜
And no trip to OC is complete without shots down the boardwalk from the hotel balcony… Our last night there was actually sunny and lovely, so the camera came out on our evening walk down the boardwalk, too.
So, we’ve been in Ocean City, NJ since last night. Yesterday was a beautiful day, but we missed most of it. Today started out simply cloudy, but it turned windy and rainy before lunch. It’s still raining and cold now, but I am cautiously optimistic that tomorrow will be less wet.
This is pretty much the same view as yesterday’s post (although there’s daylight in this one, and a lady with a cheery red umbrella), but that’s mainly because it’s pretty much been the same weather as yesterday. It’s too wet to do much of anything or to bring my camera anywhere.
So, the sun is setting on our little Ocean City getaway. Even with this one extra day we tacked on to our trip at the last minute, it still leaves us craving more. A long weekend is never enough!
So that’s our 10th Ocean City trip, in the bag. As always, we spend a lot of it daydreaming about someday being able to spend more time there. We did, in fact, tack an extra day onto our long weekend when the sun we had barely seen made an appearance as we were packing to leave. Sometimes you just have to blow off everything else for the sake of family togetherness on a sunny day!
BTW, I left my Instagram photos out of this because I already posted them as part of this TWiP and that TWiP 😃
