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SNAP: Fall in Niagara-on-the-Lake

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Monday I wrote about our weekend in Niagara-on-the-Lake, but I like this collection of photos from the weekend. Since I'm thinking about putting all the SNAP collections from this year into a photo book, I want to document our travels as well as show four related photos for Helena's meme. One of the photos here is similar to one I posted on Monday, but the rest are new.

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Every fall there is a wonderful display of pumpkins and fall flowers arranged around this carriage near the golf course (upper left). The upper right photos is of the sailboats moored along the Niagara River. On Saturday, many of them were on the water both in the river and on Lake Ontario. I loved the colors of the tree against the bright blue sky (lower left), and the lower right photo shows the patio of the Lake House where we ate lunch on Saturday afternoon. 

Virginia’s View Focal Point Challenge

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I'm getting in just under the wire for Virginia's View Focal Point Challenge.

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I actually have two sets of cards ready for the challenge, but only time enough to post one of the them. I was inspired to make these cards by the beautiful fall card Alexandra posted a week or so ago.

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I used a Simon Says Stitched Circle die to cut a circle in a piece of Rustic Cream cardstock by PTI. The leaves are from Paptertrey's Leaf Print set. I stamped them with a variety of Distress Inks, and then spritzed them with a bit of water before stamping them on watercolor paper. I don't own the dies for this set so they were fussy cut by hand. The three-dimensional acorn is by Little B and was included in the October Simon Says Card Kit. The sentiment from Birthday Style (PTI) was stamped on Canyon Clay cardstock, and then I layered the Rustic Cream with leaves on top with dimensional tape. Three rainstones finished it off.

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Of course when I finished I had a circle of Rustic Cream, and it seemed a pity to let it go to waste.

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The only differences here are the cardstock (not sure where I got it) and a few splatters of Tim Holtz's Distress Mica Spray in bronze on the circle before I added the leaves which are stamped with the same process.

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The sentiment here is a partially inked one from Simon Says "You Matter" set which was sitting on my desk at the time. I edged the hand-cut banner with Chai Tea ink from Papertrey. Off to link up with the challenge before it closes!

Memorandum Monday

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Sneaking in at the very end of Monday for a wave to Sian and other memo keepers with a look at their weekends—and perhaps a bit of learning something new. We had a particularly lovely weekend in Niagara-on-the-Lake with our friends. The weather was truly amazing—almost summer-like, and we enjoyed every minute of it. 

On our way into town, we stopped at one of the local parks along the Niagara River, and I hopped out to take a few photos.

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I loved the door and the brick work on this house at the edge of the park.

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We arrived on Friday afternoon, and had tickets for an evening performance at the St. George Theater downtown.

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Typically we get tickets to the musical production. This year's was Sweeny Todd, and all of us had already seen it. It's a bit dark for a second take, so we decided on one of Shaw's plays, Mrs. Warren's Profession. Frankly, it had been quite a while since we'd seen one of his plays, and we'd forgotten that they can often be a polemic–which this one certainly was. We were hoping for a bit of humor, but none was to be had. The acting and sets were, as always, first rate, but we think we're done with Shaw as a playwright. 

Fortunately, Saturday held much better experiences. We visited a new winery, recommended by our bed and breakfast hosts, called Big Head. The wines are a little pricier that some, because they are made with the appassimento process of drying the grapes before pressing them. This is the second winery in the area to use this process. We discovered Foreign Affairs quite a few years ago. Both wineries produce wonderful wines, well worth the increase in price, especially since we save them for a special occasion. I love the logo for Big Head.

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We made a stop at Foreign Affairs as well to pick up two bottles of Sarah and Adam's favorite wine, and discovered something new in the front of the winery.

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The owners found this huge moose in a yard in northern Ontario, along with a whole collection of like-sized animals. The moose is one of the Canadian animals featured on their wine labels, so he found a new home.

Nearly every fall, I get a wonderful photo of grapes hanging on the vines. We didn't see any grapes on any vines at any of the wineries. Finally I asked, and discovered that because the summer had been so hot and dry, the harvest had just been completed. And yes, it was earlier than usual.

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Here you can see Lake Ontario beyond the vineyards. I liked the reflection of these same vineyards in the winery window.

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It was so warm, we were able to enjoy lunch on the patio at Lake House.

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And although we chose to eat inside, it was still warm enough at night to eat outside if you preferred.

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Regardless of the weather, and our satisfaction with the theater, we always have a wonderful time in Niagara-on-the-Lake. We've been going with our friends for over 15 years now, and we've yet to tire of it. 

 

 

 

SNAP: The Architecture River Cruise

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Tracy and I spent a long weekend in Chicago about seven years ago. Number 1 on our sightseeing list was to take the Chicago Architecture Foundation River Cruise. We purchased our tickets ahead of time, but it rained as hard as I can ever remember the day of our cruise. They sail rain or shine. The tour guide was wonderful, but the tour was a bit of a disappointment in terms of getting any photographs. This year we bought our tickets the night before, and it was a perfect day, sunny and warm enough to sit on the upper deck of the boat. Our tour guide from the Architecture Foundation, Harry, was exceptional. How anyone could remember all the dates, architectural firms, and history without ever referring to a note is beyond me! 

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I'm sure I have enough photos to make a small mini-book, but I'll probably just add a page of photos to the Project Life pages for last month. In the last seven years, new buildings have gone up, and if we take the tour again in another seven years, the skyline will have changed again. It's absolutely fascinating, and if you're ever in Chicago, don't pass up the opportunity to take the tour.

Memorandum Monday and September’s Five in Five

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There's a bit to report this Monday. We've done quite a bit of work on our house in 2016. All the bathrooms have been refurbished, and all of them received new plumbing. We've added a new chair to the living room, a new bed in the guest room, and a new sleeper sofa in the den. The last of the big projects was replacing our front sidewalk. It's been in the planning stage for several years, actually. At one time, we thought we'd relocate the front walk, but in the end, decided just to replace the cement sidewalk with a brick walk that would match the one on the side of the house which was there when we moved in 31 years ago.

Here's a look at the sidewalk in mid-September:

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Notice that my beautiful Korean pear tree is already dark brown. Sadly, it's not from the change in weather, but a fungal disease for which there is no effective treatment.

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About a year ago, Matt and Tracy pulled up the cement sidewalk that led to the kitchen door. At that time, we still planned to move the sidewalk toward the center of the yard. Tracy laid down pavers to get us through until the new sidewalk went in.

Last spring, Matt started his own landscape business, and he's doing all the work himself. It's very nice to have him around every day, and I have lots of photos of the process. For today, however, I'll stick with the photos I took this weekend.

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You'll notice the Korean Pear tree is now gone. If I were a crier, I would have cried the day it came down. We're not sure, but we think we'll replace it with a Kousa Dogwood in the spring. I had no idea what was involved in replacing the walk, but it was much more involved than I imagined. Matt is meticulous so everything was done very carefully.

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This week the lawn has to be regraded, and a new bed will be designed for the glider and the new tree if we choose to replace it. He's also going to resize the bed around the light pole. One thing I really wanted was to have some of the existing beds cleaned out and replanted with a lot fewer plants. Matt has two of them done, but there are still some hostas that need to be moved from the front of the house behind the holly. I love to look out my studio window (top left) and see the new sidewalk. It's a bit of a consolation for no longer being able to watch the birds in the pear tree.

On Saturday Matt and Betsy had an out-of-town wedding to attend, so we babysat for Skylar and Ella. Maddy went to her Aunt Pam's. We had a great time, and I took the opportunity to collect some photos for Sandi's 5 in 5 monthly meme. Here's Ella writing and drawing at 23 months old.

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Five photos in five minutes; it's a fun exercise and you can join in right at Sandi's blog, itchifingers.

SNAP: The Terracotta Warriors

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When we were in Chicago in May, we happened to see advertisements for a special exhibit at The Field Museum, China's First Emperor and His Terracotta Warriors. I've long been fascinated by this amazing creation, and we decided to make seeing it a priority on our next trip. We were not disappointed. China's first emperor commissioned the creation of an entire underground empire made from terracotta to guard his mausoleum. It is estimated that there are over 8,000 life size terracotta figures in the area surrounding his mausoleum. The Field Museum has a small collection of those warriors, archers, chariots, and horses on display with other artifacts from that time period (475-221 BC.)  I would love to see them in person, but that's highly unlikely, so I was delighted to have time to explore this exhibit. Emperor Qin Shihuan (247-221 BC) was also responsible for the building of the Great Wall of China. Should I ever visit China, those two sites would be high on my bucket list. Here's a peek at the exhibit.

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In the photo on the bottom left, behind the terracotta soldiers, you can see a photo of a part of the underground empire. I had no idea that the area that is open to visitors in China is just a fraction of the emperor's tomb. The actual tomb has yet to be excavated.

Afterwards, we spent over an hour in the Evolving Planet exhibit, but we just touched the surface of all there is to see in this fabulous museum.

This was one of many highlights of our week in Chicago. Sarah's Installation was one, of course, and so was my meeting with Alexandra from Art, Scrap, and More. I discovered Alexandra's blog through Sian at From High in the Sky. I love how bloggers connect with one another, and meeting Alexandra in person was such a delight! Next week I'll be sharing another highlight of our day in the Windy City for SNAP.

 

SNAP: Early Morning Walk

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Debbie and I usually meet at 7:30 in the morning at Schoen Place in Pittsford to begin our walk to Bushnell's Basin. It's about a 5 3/4 mile walk. Now that autumn has arrived, the sun's just coming up as we meet. The light last week was really lovely, so I thought a few photos (all taken at the beginning of our walk) would make a good SNAP collection. 

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I got the idea for the SNAP collection as I was sitting in my car waiting for Debbie to arrive. I looked across the parking lot and saw the sun coming up, and couldn't resist walking over to take a photo. The rest were taken right at the edge of the canal on the sidewalk near the shops and restaurants. The last one appears to be later than the others, but it's just a difference in light looking down the canal from the other direction. As soon as you leave the village, the path is no longer paved. Not much other than the amount of daylight to tell us that fall has arrived. It's just beginning to cool down, but we've still had a lot of very warm days.

Linking up with Helena and the other SNAP collectors!

Memorandum Monday

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Waving to Sian and MM fans this beautiful Monday in Chicago. We often make a visit to Sarah and Adam in the fall, but this year we came a month earlier than usual so we would be here for a very special event– Sarah's installation service as Associate Pastor for the Winnetka Congregational Church. Although she's worked there for nearly two years, she has been in an "acting associate" role, and it has been mutually agreed that it should be made official, and as the Head Pastor said, "settled."

I don't have many photos, although I hope to get some from the church eventually. Two of these were taken by Adam, and none of them show the beautiful stole the church gave her yesterday, hand-embroidered with branches of a tree. The cover of the bulletin for the service was also a tree (a symbol Sarah uses often,) and the choir sang, "The Tree of Life" by John Rutter as one of the anthems.

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I've attended many installation services over the years, and must say this was one of the most personal I've ever attended, probably because the congregation and staff know her so well. (You can see a bit of the lovely stole in this photo taken during the service.)

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After the ceremony there was a luncheon on the lawn—great sandwiches and delicious chocolate cake.

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At least one person started with dessert!

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It was a day to celebrate—and something new for Memorandum Monday!

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Papertrey Ink September 2016 Blog Hop Challenge

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As soon as I saw Nicole's inspiration piece for the PTI September Blog Hop, I knew I wanted to play along.

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Kraft, black, white, green, and twine—what's not to like about that? So, I set aside some time to play. I hoped to come up with one card for the hop, but ended up making three. Only one can be linked to the hop, but I'm sharing all of them here.

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The card on the left is the one I started out to create. When I was waiting for the white to dry on the pinecones, I came up with two other cards using tags as the focal point.

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I trimmed off the top edge of the kraft card, and layered a piece of True Black on the inside of the card. The wreath and sentiment are from "Rustic Wreath," and the pinecones came from Avery Elle's "Winter Wreath." Much to my surprise I could not find a pinecone in any of my PTI sets. A bow was tied to the wreath with Rustic Jute Button Twine (PTI.) 

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I used White Enamel Accents to add some "snow" to the pinecones, and used some clear foam tape to add some dimension to the wreath.

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I used Tag Sale #9 to cut two tags, one each from kraft and True Black cardstock to mimic the tags in the inspiration piece. The branch is from last year's "Spruce and Sprigs" stamped with Pinefeather ink. Once tied together with twine, I added the tags to the Select White cardstock and rounded one corner. The sentiment is from "Rustic Wreath."

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This card is essentially the same. I added a second pine bough cut from vellum to place behind the one stamped with Pinefeather, and used two AMuse black pearls instead of the pinecone. I'm posting this before church, but won't be able to link it up with the blog hop until afterwards. I'll be anxious to see all the other creations based on this inspiration. Glad, too, to have a few Christmas cards created!

FUSION Birthday Bash Challenge

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Although my goal of participating in a challenge every week has been only partially successful, the Fusion Challenge is one of my favorites. They offer up a sketch as well as an inspiration piece, and I combined aspects of both for this week's challenge.

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I took the circular design for the focal point, and used some of Maile Belle's Ombre Stripes paper from the inspiration piece as well as a few of the colors. I think there's enough elements from both the sketch and the inspiration piece to fit the challenge.

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All the elements of the focal point are from Papertrey Ink's "Scene It: Celebration" stamps and dies. I die cut the circle element three–once in Summer Sunrise, once in Summer Sunrise Patterned paper, and once in Hawaiian Shores and off set them. Celebrate was die cut with Tropical Teal paper.

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I love the layered look of the three die cuts, and appreciate how Papertrey Ink develops cardstocks that complement one another.

SNAP: The Birthday Party

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Skylar turns five today, and there'll be a dinner tonight with just family. On Saturday she hosted a birthday party for her friends and classmates (and their parents and younger siblings). It was a wonderful event, and everyone, including the birthday girl, had a great time. Coming up with a SNAP collection for Helena's meme was easy this week!

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Skylar greeting friends at the front door, the birthday girl getting her face painted, Ella and her dad with Ella's balloon "dolly," and blowing out the candles on the cake.

Of course, there had to be a special birthday card, and the September Simon Says Kit was just perfect for it. It arrived with scratch-off stickers, bright patterned papers from Doodlebug, and the perfect birthday balloons and sentiments in the "It's No Secret" stamp set.

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I totally forgot to take a photo before I added the scratch-off stickers, but under one it says "Love You" and under the other "You Rock." I colored the balloons with Copic markers and added glitter to each one with a Spectrum Noir Clear Sparkle pen. 

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The colorful sequins are also from a previous Simon Says Card Kit. Hope your week is going well; mine is going by much too quickly!

 

5 in 5 and Memorandum Monday

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I'm waving to Sian and her friends today. It was an incredibly busy weekend here filled with all kinds of new experiences. Tracy's high school class celebrated their 50th High School Reunion this weekend, and he was the chairperson of the event. He and the committee have been planning this event for the last several years, and I actually know more people in his graduating class than I would in my own. (Granted I only attended my that high school for two years.) There was a Friday night gathering at a local bar, a Saturday night dinner, and a Sunday picnic. In addition, we hosted breakfast for seven Saturday morning–friends who had arrived from Florida, England, New Mexico, and Illinois. I took almost no photos of the events since there were several people taking lots of photos. But here's a snapshot from the Saturday night dinner of the planning committee.

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I learned lots about his classmates over the course of the weekend, but nothing of great interest to share here.

Squeezed into Saturday was Skylar's fifth birthday party, and as always, Betsy planned a wonderful event with face painting, and balloon animals. I did take LOTS of photos there. Here are five in five minutes during the breaking of the pinata for Sandi's September 5 in 5 meme:

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You can see the amazing face (and arm) painting in this one. The woman who did these was a wonderful artist.

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There will be more birthday photos come Wednesday for SNAP! For now, I'm off to get my homework done for class, and wrap up some odds and ends that need to be finished this week.

 

 

SNAP: Wildlife on the Trails

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This week's SNAP collection is a series of photos snapped while I was walking. Three were taken on the Erie Canal Trail, and the last one was taken from the pedestrian bridge over the Genesee River on my way to class last week. So technically, it's not a trail.

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I was amazed at how long the deer in the upper right photo stood looking at me while I snapped away on my iPhone. The photo on the bottom left was a really lovely scene, and it was another time when I wished I had had my big camera with me. Evidently the new iPhone 7 will have a much improved zoom capability, but I'm not planning on upgrading my phone anytime soon. The day I saw the blue heron, there was also an egret and a "line" of ducks perched on a log. The egret was too far away to photograph, and none of the duck photos was as sharp as I would have wished. Another problem with the iPhone when you're trying to take a photo from a pretty good distance away.

Linking up with Helena and the other avid SNAPPERS.

Project Life: April 2016

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I decided I was going to finish pages in whatever order was easiest, so you'll be seeing my catch-up pages here out of order for sure. The April pages covered our trip to New Orleans and didn't need too much work to complete.

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I added the photo of the horse and carriage to the calendar card since that just epitomizes New Orleans for me. I love the Paislee Press template for six photos which was perfect for the shots of the street performers. The bottom left photo is of most of the family at the Jackson Brewery and is another Paislee Press template. The rest are Tracy Larsen's. I made the journaling card from our guide for the Garden District tour's business card and a couple of Jolee stickers.

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The reason for our trip was our niece's wedding. I didn't take my big camera to the wedding, so there aren't many good photos. The first three are from the amazing rehearsal dinner at Randy's parents' home. The wedding photos were taken at the reception, a gorgeous restaurant set into the trees along a river. I included one of many little items from the wedding on one of the journaling cards.

I've got so many projects going right now, it's hard to figure out what to do next! I'm taking a class that meets three days a week at the University of Rochester which requires quite a bit of reading, working on the Project Life catch-up, trying to get a few cards made, trying to maintain my workout schedule, and am enrolled in Liz Steel's newest Sketching Now class. My volunteer commitments don't start for another week, so I'm trying to make good use of my time now. I'm hoping blogging won't go by the wayside. 

SNAP: Stairs at the RISD Museum

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On our way home from Nantucket, we spent a day in Providence, Rhode Island. It had been nearly 40 years since we'd last been there, and we knew a lot had changed. We had a wonderful day, shopping on Hope Street, browsing on Thayer Street (the Brown University College Town), and spent two hours at the lovely Rhode Island School of Design Museum. It has a large permanent collection spanning from antiquity to contemporary art, and we enjoyed it all. As we walked from gallery to gallery, I was taken with the variety of staircases, and took photos of many of them with a SNAP collection in mind.

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Here are a couple more shots from Providence.

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They've done a beautiful job of restoring the waterfront.  I'd love to return some day to see the Waterfire display. Sadly, it wasn't scheduled for the Saturday evening we were there.

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Here you can see the braziers along each side of the river which are lit during Waterfire.

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This is the view of downtown Providence from Prospect Terrace Park.

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Providence is the capital of Rhode Island, and although I had another closer photo of the capital building, I preferred this view. 

Linking up with Helena and other SNAP enthusiasts.