Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Design Wall/Window Sill



Ok, I know it's Tuesday, but better late than never! ;)

I finished the lime green block for my Boxed Rainbow quilt. Next up is the dark blue or maybe the red. I haven't decided yet. Sorry about the blurry picture.



I, also, have to make myself a new swimsuit. The elastic in the fabric is shot so that it's way too loose now. That's not surprising since I made the suit more than 3 years ago. I want to redesign it as well since the skirt gets annoying when I'm trying to do the water aerobics class. I think I'm going to cut it more like a long, slightly fitted t-shirt. Z.'s due for a new one as well. Her's has faded from a nice blue to almost silver and it's starting to get too small.

We took the kids swimming a few times last week and H. has finally learned to enjoy the water. He used to scream if you made him get in the pool but Sun. he didn't want to get out after more than an hour. It looks like after Ramadan we'll be spending lots of time at the pool.

We went to Six Flags on Thurs. which was fun despite the heat. The kids had earned free tickets for the Read to Succeed program, I got a free ticket as their teacher so that only left having to get a ticket for dh. We went in the afternoon and rarely encountered any lines. The nice part was that there were plenty of rides for my two little guys unlike Sea World where they were too small for most of the rides. We enjoyed so much that we're considering season passes for next year. It's less than an hour and a half from here. The only downside is that they don't allow you to bring any drinks into the park, which leaves buying bottled water at $3.50 a piece or using the one water fountain we found that provides warm water (not exactly refreshing on a hot summer day). I understand them not wanting you to bring things into the park but they could at least have a few more water fountains with cool/cold water.

Well, I'm off to get busy on my suit. Check out the other Design Walls at Judy's blog.

Wednesday, July 06, 2011

Patterns everywhere

Ok, I'm one of those people who sees patterns or pictures all over the place. I'll look at the leaves or bark of the tree and search for faces or forms. Have you ever tried that? Sometimes, you have to let your vision go a little blurry but most of the time, if you look closely enough you're sure to find some. It's kind of like the optical illusion pictures where you see an old woman or a young woman, two vases or two faces, etc.




I also tend to eat my M&Ms is color patterns. Ya know- green, orange, green or red, red, blue, red, red, blue. I'm weird, I know. Anyway, one day I had grabbed a handful of mini M&Ms and eaten a few without paying much attention. I set the rest down to type something, then looked back down and noticed that they fell into a perfect set of 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5, each in a different color. See? (Of course, I arranged them for the picture.)



BTW, finding the mini M&Ms in the bulk section of Wegman's grocery store probably has a lot to do with why I gained weight. Before I found them, I wasn't losing but at least I wasn't gaining either. But a girl's got to have her chocolate!

In part, because of hurting my foot on the treadmill, I went swimming for the first time in over a year and the same morning took my first ever water aerobics class. I had been swimming laps and doing some other exercises for a good 45 minutes and noticed that there were quite a few older people arriving as I was getting ready to go. One of the ladies, who had been in the pool about the same time as I had suggested that I stay for the class. Since dh was watching the kids and it was still kind of early in the morning, I changed my mind about leaving and decided to stick around. In my head, I was thinking that the class couldn't possibly too hard since most of the participants looked to be over 65, so doing the class on top of what I had already done would be no problem. Yeah! Apparently, you get out of if what you put into it and since you stay cool in the pool, you don't necessarily notice how hard you're working. That is until you get out! By the time the class was finished, my arms felt like spaghetti. By the end of the day, my whole body was sore. But, I found something I really enjoy doing and, at least for the next few weeks before Ramadan, I plan on hitting the early morning class on days when dh works from home.