Peaches!

We have a new family member. Peaches is a dwarf rabbit, only 2.9 pounds fully grown (compare her to the top of the Diet Coke can I set next to the cage for scale). Apparently someone put Peaches out on a major highway, and she was living in the culvert in the median. A nice couple spotted her and watched her for several weeks, stopping to feed her every day (my heroes; they're not even "rabbit people"). Then they set out a Havahart trap and captured her. They took her home and found her to be funny and affectionate, but they couldn't keep her because they have a very large dog who seemed to feel that Peaches was a little gift they'd brought him, and Peaches was terribly afraid of him. The mom works with one of my friends who knows about our buns, so she got us together and Peaches rode home with me on the commuter bus tonight.

She's settling in, so more pictures this weekend. She's as cute as can be, and very friendly and curious.

Savannah Goes to Washington

Savannah came to town in honor of the Sticky Buns project, on her way back from Sweden where she has appeared on Swedish television. She stopped by the law firm to opine on some weighty matters and to use the reference library. She said she was looking for evidence relating to Pink and Elvis' new family member.


After spending time in the library, we went out onto the roof deck to enjoy the view. Savannah poses with the Washington Monument in the background.


She said she might stop by the Federal Reserve tomorrow and make a deposit on their lawn.

In the distance is the U.S. Capitol. Below her is the Old Executive Office Building. She asked if we could see old executives and whether they had old buns.

Savannah says that it may appear that she is floating above the ground in these shots, but it is ok, because that is only an illusion. Savannah says that many things in Washington seem to be just an illusion. She has learned much here.

Soldiering On

Over the Hills and Far Away arrived, so yesterday I went to Fredericksburg to kit it up. It calls for DMC and 32 count fabric. I thought long and hard about doing the conversion to NPI, but decided not to; at $4 a skein, it would have been an $80 proposition and currently I have several silk projects going. I really miss using the silk though...so I'm trying to assess whether it's likely to turn me off the project halfway through to use the cotton. I had to stitch a little British soldier, just to see what it looks like. I notice the picture is not true to the DMC greens called for by the design, yet the other colors are correct--odd. Any significant work on this (or any other project) is going to have to wait now for me to finish Wendy's RR and get some major homework out of the way.


Oh, well--vacation coming up in two weeks. I have a few things on the two-week agenda which might yield some interesting photos. I'll be headed for the Cape for a few days (and visiting a stitching shop or two); I'll be expoxying the garage floor (maybe); I may hop one of those super-saver comfy coach buses to New York City ($15 each way--amazing, when you consider the shuttle is over $300, and even Amtrak is over $200) and indulge in a little shopping for work duds and perhaps a bit of museum-going; we may head to suburban Baltimore and visit the coolest-ever store that sells mid-century used furniture. I have my eye on this:

And these: 1920s Portuguese hospital cabinets. I'm thinking of getting one for the stitching room, if I like it in person.

In any case, I'm looking forward to getting out of the house--I've been housebound for months, it seems.
And watch this space; there may be a new family member arriving in the next week or two if all goes well.

"WHAT?!!!!!"

Anyone? Anyone?

I was disappointed not to have hit the sale at In Stitches in Alexandria yesterday morning; I had to go to the College Park campus extra early to get a parking spot near my class (and paid the $15 to do so) because Maryland was playing E. Michigan at home. The tailgaters ringed the big parking garage and were grilling the yummiest-smelling food. Since I got there a couple of hours early, I had the opportunity to wander the campus, eat at the campus McDonalds and then settle into a big comfy chair at the student center and stitch a while on this before my accounting class. I did make it finally to the needlework shop on the way home after class, but with only 1/2 hour to spare before they closed, I really didn't have time to kit up one of the new charts that have arrived from Attic Needlework or from England (and y'all completely decimated those charts--pretty slim pickings when I got there at 4:30--like a bunch of turkey buzzards over fresh road kill). I did pick up a few extra skeins of AVAS for this project--it EATS floss. I'd hate to run out, so I bought a few skeins of colors I'm using a lot of on this.

Pink, enjoying the New Yorker:

And Elvis' kissable lips. He sends you a big "mwah" for the week.

I finished my homework early today, so I'm off to cook something and read the NY Times with what's left of the day. As always, I'm hoping my dreamboat has a column today. In case you haven't read him, check out this column on love and economics:

Stem-and-Leaf

I've spent much of the week doing homework, alas, which is why there is so little progress on Dorothy's Garden. Much of what I've been doing has been tinkering with the software to produce charts for my business statistics class. I'm enjoying the class, although thank goodness I toiled last summer over all that advanced math; I'm going to need it. The software is an add-in to Excel. I've just started using Excel 2007 here at home, then added the stat software, and I've been entertaining myself with turning in my various assignments in purple-and-silver, rose-and-gray, pink-and-maroon for the various histograms and polygons. Today I worked on a stem-and-leaf chart (boring) assigment--not as pretty as it sounds. Here's a better stem and leaf:

Pink and Elvis like to lie down face to face with their noses smooshed together--what a hoot.

And I'm happy to note that Bunny Girl, Cadbury's mom, has come through the hurricane in Houston unscathed. BG, her husband, Cadbury and Pixel are all ok, and BG's superb camping skills are no doubt going to be much appreciated. There's only minor damage to their house, and she even was able to blog a bit today from a borrowed computer. I always look forward to BG's recipes on Sunday--bet she'll have some even more interesting ones, especially if she gets the "soda can" stove going. (Please tell us what a soda can stove is when you have a chance, BG!)

Have a good week, all!

Liquidity

Yesterday was the first day of school on the U. of Maryland Campus in College Park, which is roughly a 1.5-2 hour drive from here. Hanna apparently was registered in some courses there as well, because she followed me up the coast. It was quite the white-knuckled event, as I drove right into the teeth of the storm. Water, water everywhere, and cars spinning out every which way. Not a lot of traffic though; who drives in a tropical storm if they don't have to? We got about 6 inches of rain in these parts--the remaining ripe-ish tomatoes in the garden all split open on the vines because of all the water. The grass greened back up overnight though.

Some thoughts on U of MD: the campus is huge, but there's hardly anyone there on the weekend. Are they sleeping in or studying, or do all the students go somewhere else (home?) on the weekend. The approach to the main gates is on a seedy part of Rte. 1. Just before the gate is an enormous liquor store. What kind of message does that send? And how rich is that particular business owner? You terps think you got football weekends with fans in the stadium, tailgating and bad behavior everywhere (mostly on the part of the old folks who are the alumnae)? Go to the U.T. Knoxville campus during a football game. Now there's some bad behavior. Also, UT has the "Rocky Top" song. Try not singing that in your head for years after you've heard it played on someone's customized car horn.

Some thoughts on attending college in this century: more and more textbooks are coming as looseleaf volumes. Genius--you only need to carry the chapters you're working on, although you have to make sure you don't lose some pages. Also, I signed up for the wonderful notification of cancellation for weather and other emergencies via text to my cell phone. Note to MD: only useful if you actually cancel classes due to weather emergencies.

What we discussed in my intermediate accounting class: liquidity! Solvency and insolvency. Statements of cash flows. The difference between recording assets at cost vs. fair market. And my favorite of the day: that the accounting profession has not figured out what to do in terms of issuing a rule about gift cards--those things that people lose or forget they have, or don't use up completely. Companies carry those balances on the books as a liability. In some cases (think Best Buy) they're huge liabilities. Fascinating stuff--darn good reason to climb in the car and risk my life (kidding--really it was an interesting discussion and it reminded me that I have a $24 balance on my McCormick & Schmick gift card).

A couple more motifs on "Dorothy's Garden" (you're stuck with this until the mail arrives from Attic Needlework and The Sampler Company).


And a word from Pink: "Mom, there's some liquidity on the carpet in the corner. I didn't do it."

Over the Hills and Far Away

NOT over the hill--Over the Hills! Brenda Keyes of The Sampler Company has a new sampler, and I ordered it straight from the British website today (so easy--they take Paypal), the minute after I saw her other new sampler on The Scarlett House (go look if you haven't already--it's amazing and so is all of The Scarlett House's other samplers). It's called Red House Sampler. I struggled with the decision of which sampler to buy, I really did. But as gorgeous as Red House is, I'm already stitching two or three other sampler houses, and stitching a little different subject appealed to me and I wanted just one new chart (this week. Because who knows what will come up next week?) You may remember Brenda Keyes as the designer of, among other samplers, Plymouth Sampler, which I have in my WIP pile. And Church on the Hill, which I have in my acquired-chart stack but haven't started stitching. I like that Brenda Keyes' samplers all seem to use DMC floss.

In the meantime, I haven't been idle: lots of work on "Dorothy's Garden."

Hurricane--or Tropical Storm--Hanna's headed up the coast, and depending on whether it jogs a bit to the east or west, we'll get a bit of rain and wind or a lot, so Pink is checking to make sure the flashlight we keep clipped to the bed frame has batteries.