currents.

...yikes! it's way past time for this post. yes, I missed all of summer...and most of spring!! and I'm not going to talk about shopping, or cleaning, or packing or moving. nope. a reminder for me that life is much bigger than that!

the japanese maple in our front yard...nearly ready to turn.

celebrating a record fund-raising year for our 2-day walk; checks and matching gifts outstanding will put us over $3,100. we're blown away. and so very grateful to all our friends and family.

hoping it doesn't rain next weekend; we've had wonderful weather for the past five years and I can only hope it continues!

planning the final details for my dad's 75th birthday celebration in just two weeks. thinking it's all about the food, the cocktails, the games, the walks/runs (and the knitting :-)

practicing the breathing in my pilates. really paying attention to the inhale and the exhale and how those two match up with the movement. four months into it, I'm feeling just comfortable enough to be ready for more.

training for a half marathon next spring with a mix of fixed distance and fixed time runs. (feeling like I have a long way to go before I can run 13.1 miles.)

enjoying the park and cooler temperatures for our morning walks.

reading before I go to sleep, november's bookclub selection. "about" 54% through and totally hooked on the story.

knitting...not as much as I have been. have chaleur and abigail and my october charity hat on the needles. and right now, feeling like I'll be doing well to have all three done by the end of october.

watching boardwalk empire season 3. especially nice that marc and I have a show we watch together.

listening to mumford and sons (love the new album and thanks to katie for the heads up about the album exclusive cover of the boxer, with paul simon...I think I need to buy the album!) and of course since it's fall, I'm also listening to vivaldi's four seasons.

eating carrots and almonds and pretzels and popcorn. and hopefully something "prepared" this weekend.

drinking red wine (especially enjoying cab/shiraz blends). and thinking about the perfect manhattan recipe...

wearing shorts and a short-sleeved t-shirt. maybe for the last time? loved wearing jeans last week, but it's been warm this week.

shining. holly and I are regular fixtures at the thursday knitting group at the nursing home and I have a small group of names to move forward with the prayer shawl group at church. love how those goals have been/are being realized. way better than I ever imagined. (and this reminds me I am three months behind with one little word...I've done the work, just need to update my album...later!)

I love seeing these posts pop up every so often on the blogs I read. highly recommend the format. on a much more frequent that twice yearly basis!

wordless wednesday.

10 favorite pizza toppings.

...another yummy topic this week - pizza is one of my favorite foods. mostly because of the toppings. I took a look through my flickr feed (chock full of pizza as you'd probably imagine) and started making a list of my favorites. sounds harder than it really was. most of my favorites are topped with a combination of these ten ingredients. mix and match. one or two or five or seven. it's all good.

fig, blue cheese and arugula pizza

1. sliced tomatoes 

2. fresh greens (spinach, arugula, radicchio all work well)

3. fresh mozzarella

4. goat cheese

5. blue cheese (I love melted blue cheese!)

6. mushrooms (lately I've sauteed them first. less water = crisper crust = better pizza)

7. fresh basil

8. shrimp

9. melted onions (even better if you add a fennel bulb, thinly sliced)

10. figs

no, I didn't include prosciutto or fontina (both of which feature prominently in my favorite bistro vg pizza); I'm cutting back on pork and I'm pretty sure the spinach and melted onions would be delicious with any (or all) of the other three cheeses I've listed. 

can't wait to see what everyone else shared - wonder if I'll find a new top-10?!

click here to join the Ten on Tuesday fun!

multi-crafting.

before the ellipse even! a quick thank you to sara for getting me back here for real. she was right; I was only going through the motions these past few weeks with my formula posts. but I get so much out of this space. this medium. the community it inspires. this ... whatever it is. and I am glad to be back in a groove of posting more regularly. (and reading - and sometimes even commenting on! - others' blogs...somewhat more regularly). this past week, I've tried to remember the reason I'm here is to share my story. for myself. and my family. and maybe for a few others. but really, it is mostly for me and my girls. la mere et ses filles. thank you, sara (xxoo).

so with that, you'll notice a new banner. a tight crop of holly from the last photo of yesterday's walk. looking out. the best reminder I could find in my september photos-to-date to remind me (et mes filles) about what this new season holds for us. let's look out. let's challenge ourselves to look thoughtfully and carefully. and then with imagination and excitement to see the possibilities ...and like holly, to remember there is always a warm lap and a hug and a kiss...and love when we come home.

...

and now we're on to multi-crafting. I think it's official. I am a knitter. and I am a needlepointer. yes, I multi-craft.

I say that not only because I started - and finished! - more needlepoint projects (than knitting projects) this month, but also because I now have a supply of threads organized in ziplock bags. by color.

ha, what does it say about my first four projects that I have a bag of red, a bag of green, a bag of gold...and just a few other colors?

and I've started my 5th needlepoint project.

this is going to be a bangle bracelet; today I used black velvet to satin stitch the diamonds along the bottom border

and I wrote most of the stitch guide for this project (marci added two new stitches).

LOVE the colors and textures of all the threads!

...and I totally get how to do it!

yes it took me a year. but yes, I'm addicted. maybe because this is a craft I'm doing totally for me. and now I'm wondering about balancing the two (thank goodness there are only two...but as I type this I realize my project life "stuff" is a three...and maybe that's why I'm now four weeks behind?!)

...how do you balance multi-crafting?

sunday in the park.

entering the park from the "back gate", holly chooses which way we go; today, she chose clockwise

...it hit me hard as holly and I set off for the park this morning. this is one of our last walks there on a sunday (weather permitting, we have next week, and that will be it). it really caught me off guard. I'm going to miss many things about this home, and walking holly in hembree park, on a sunday, is for sure in the top 10.

looking back as we approach the big hill

I did a series of blog posts about our sunday walks last november and december. the colors, the seasons, the sounds or the quiet, the simple peace of walking that mile-long trail (despite holly's occasional barks at squirrels, or chipmunks, or birds). it anchors my week.

looking back (again)... a favorite spot to see the seasons change

the best part of the trail for shadows - sara and I have been here, too

so I was especially glad today's walk was one to remember. there was a slight chill in the air. the sky was bright blue. holly was full of energy (I only had to carry her a little bit). we had the place to ourselves. and enjoyed every minute of it.

working knit night.

...a few of the girls who work at the shop are taking time off this week. so I filled in at knit night last night. that's a 5 to 9 pm shift. in the two plus years I've worked at the shop, I think this is the first time I've been there that late. my alarm goes off at 4:30 am. I am not a night person by any stretch of the imagination!

but I popped over to starbucks around 6:30 for my tall bold with a splash of non-fat. that helped.

in between customers, diane and I worked on our shop samples. mine is the charcoal and melon array cowl (the yarn is fibre company's canopy fingering in obsidian and guava). I'm using one skein of each color instead of the pattern suggested two, so I only cast on half the stitches. the stitch pattern is very clever and results in columns of seed stitch in alternating colors. diane is working on a seed stitch cowl with the gold-orange bulky yarn. we thought we'd have time to browse the new pattern books...but of course we didn't!

the shop was full of knitters and stitchers. they kept us busy in a good way. like the two women who came in looking for a special skein of yarn for a knitting friend who just lost her son (they were going to the wake later in the evening). I showed them the dream in color september color club, juniper moon farm's  marlowe, claudia handpaints silk lace and the swan's island (all of which I blogged about earlier in the week). they chose the claudia in a beautiful deep purple for their friend and the dream in color and swan's island lace for themselves. thoughtful. lovely. perfect.

and entertained. diane's tuesday morning class showed up to keep her/us company and sat close by. so fun to get to know them better. hilarious family stories (one woman has twin girls in the first grade - funny stories abound!). east cobb restaurant recommendations and - of course! - cocktail recipes. knitter conversation at its best.

lydia and I have plans to attend knit night next week. can't wait!

wordless wednesday.

10 things I love to do on the weekend.

...ahh...weekends. Calls to mind that wonderful Maggie Smith line from Downton Abbey. it's clip 2, right around the 30 second mark.

Of course we know all about weekends. This week's topic is ten things we love about them; here are mine:

1. Time to catch up with Marc over early morning coffee. Monday through Friday he's out the door before 6am with a travel cup. Saturday and Sunday we sit together at the kitchen table and enjoy a leisurely cup or three.

2. Cooking. We eat mostly leftovers (and popcorn :-) during the week, but Saturday and Sunday nights almost always means "a real meal".

3. Sharing a fun bottle of wine.

4. A long walk in the park with my camera (haven't done this in months...maybe this weekend?)

5. Church on Sunday morning.

6. Zumba!! 8am on Saturday morning.

7. College football on TV (and knitting).

8. Golf on TV (and knitting).

9. Going out with friends for lunch or dinner. 

10. Seamless Sweater class on Sunday afternoon. Over the past 2-1/2 years, it's morphed into more of a bring-your-own project class, but it's still mostly sweaters. The conversation is always entertaining...and it definitely inspires my knitting!

...and now I can't wait til Saturday! Thanks for a fun topic, Carole!

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house 2.0.

...aka, the real reason why I've been neglecting my blog. and my knitting. and my google reader. and instagram. and twitter (darn, just when I was starting to get the hang of it!).

we're moving. in four weeks.

to a bigger house. yes, we're maybe the only empty nesters ever who decide they need more space! I've always wanted a bigger kitchen. and our family is growing. son(s)-in-law, hopefully grandchildren... we want a home that will accommodate everyone. funny - new house has six bedrooms and we're planning to use one as a gym and one for yarn...and marc said I'd need to give up both so we could sleep more people. I told him I'd give up the gym when that time came!

so I've been busy. picking out paint. looking for furniture. figuring out how everything we have in our current home fits. making lists. taking measurements. making new lists. and letting it sink in that we're moving (in four weeks - yes, I know I already said that!)...to our first new home in 27 years.

...but not spending time here. sara called me out on that last night and I promised to do better. starting today.

wordless wednesday.

four weeks from now.

...my sister karen and I will have completed our sixth 2-day walk together. that's 180 miles walking through the streets of atlanta to raise money to help those affected by breast cancer. this is the 10th anniversary of the walk and I am amazed by what it's the journey has accomplished in those ten years ($8 million dollars!!)...and so proud to be a part of it.

karen & I before the 12 mile walk (no "after" photo, but I promise we were still smiling!)

this past weekend we completed our last training walk. 12 miles. the longest one ever.

from RunTracker. love the app, but I need to remember to wear my glasses when I start it, so I choose the right options and can track the whole walk in one piece!

plenty of hills. a few bathroom breaks. lots of water. we felt pretty good at the end. (of course knowing we were done, and didn't have eight more miles that day, plus 10 the next day probably helped!) and more ready than we ever have been. not only because we've logged over 40 miles of training walks.

mostly because we've exceeded our fundraising minimum.

and when the matching gifts come through, we will have exceeded our fundraising goal. thanks entirely to the generous support of our family and friends. thank you all. we love you!!

wordless wednesday.

10 things I love about september.

"potential". here on flickr.

1. potential. this was the first word that came to mind when I thought about september. a new school year. a new season. everything seems new and full of possibilities...and then I saw the rhodie bud. potential.

2. getting back into a routine. now that I'm not running by the school calendar, it seems weird that so much does go on pause over the summer. I'm ready to start back!

3. cooler temperatures. I actually had goose bumps on my arms when I walked holly this morning. goose bumps. outside. smile.

4. figs.

5. red wine. I will drink it during the summer, but only if I'm someplace really cool. thanks to #3, that means just about anywhere come september.

6. college football. it's really the only sport I'll make plans to watch. and of course it's great for knitting.

7. baking. honestly, even turning on the oven is a big deal. I especially love baking with fall fruits. apple pie. pear crisp. plum coffeecake. (ooohh, and can you smell the cinnamon?!)

8. wearing jeans. it's just been too hot (those cute white denim capris aren't jeans... I mean the dark blue kind that goes all the way to the ground).

9. thinking about the holidays. what we'll cook. who hosts what. before we have to actually make real plans for any of it.

10. thinking about holiday knitting. I'd like to actually start doing some of it this month. but for now, just thinking about it is fun enough.

look forward to seeing what everyone else loves about september.  thank you, carole, for another fun topic!

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a look back at august.

...just a quick one:

see all my daily photos here

august saw sara home from england, and then moved into her own apartment...reading and knitting...a little bit of cooking (and plenty of eating and drinking)...the first signs of fall...and a beautiful new baby.

(I'll be back this evening with ten on tuesday and a look ahead at september.)