A Good (Long) Weekend

My mom arrived Wednesday night. We spent a bit of time in my sewing room on Thursday while I traced and cut out the muslin for my Simplicity 3990 blouse. Then we were off for my Football Mom errands. Home again for a couple hours, long enough to sew up the muslin and have a quick try-on, then off to the game. I snuck in some pattern alterations on Friday and that's the stage it's still in. I decided to go to Plan B for the family get-together outfit and not to stress over a blouse.



Mom and I left here Saturday around noon and arrived in plenty of time for the party start time of 3 PM. Follow the red line on the map above and that's where we went -- from the west coast of Florida, straight across Route 60 to the east coast. I saw cousins I haven't seen in over 10 years, aunts, uncles, and more. It was a fun time with great conversations and great food & drink. We went back to my cousin's house after the official party and partied some more. My family is nothing if not party animals, even the "old" folks. In fact, I think they may be the worst offenders! Most of my aunts/uncles and mom's cousins are nearer to my age than my mother's and we've always been close and now that my first cousins have grown up, there's not such a feeling of a huge age difference so I had lots of people to talk to and laugh with. But I can't believe my cousins are in (or close to) their 30s now, some with kids of their own. It's too bad that DH and my boys had to stay home. They were missed and they would've had a blast.

Apologies for the low-detail cellphone pics. I forgot my real camera in my suitcase.





My mom's cousin's husband Joe (did you follow that?) took 9 of us out on his boat (above pics) for a few hours on Sunday. The weather was perfect (I have a pink face and arms to prove it) and the boat ride was fantastic. The best part of the trip was all the dolphins in the water, who jumped and played and came up alongside the boat to race us. I've lived in Florida for over 16 years and this is the closest I've been to dolphins outside of Sea World. It was very cool!









Mom left a few hours ago, with my menfolk who are on their way to the Meadowlands in NJ to see the Red Hot Chili Peppers tomorrow night. DS#1 has been waiting his whole life for this concert. I'm home alone dogsitting, and I'm sure I'll squeeze in a few hours of sewing here and there. ;-) Although I didn't think it about since Friday, the blouse is starting to call to me again.

I also remembered to snap a pic of me and The Blouse That Would Not End while I was wearing it today and before I laid down for a quick nap to recharge after the weekend. Two months later is better than not at all, right? It's linen, it's wrinkled of course, and the color is off but there it is. It's a very comfortable blouse. I also had about 2 inches of my hair chopped off last week, which was perfect for the boat trip yesterday. It's a great cut ... those flippy ends do that all by themselves. The older I get, the less I want to waste time fiddling with hairstyles that my hair isn't made for. It's right up there on the list with comfortable shoes. Boy am I getting old or what!


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Just a little rant here ... While I've surprised myself by actually liking and continuing with this blogging stuff, I absolutely HATE the delays with Blogger when uploading pics. But I'm too cheap to pay for this stuff so I'll just clench my teeth and try to deal with it.