A time for friends

I've been spending a lot of time lately with friends.

It's pretty obvious because you can see I'm out and about.  See here for the post where I made these and 16 more signs, as well as a storage holder.

Here's a better look at this sign when I scanned it.

I was out and about with my friend Kathy, who was kicking up her heels after her back surgery.  Actually, she was showing off her very glitzy moccasins. She's a true shop-a-holic and picked them up the day before she visited me.

I had to laugh at the sign above our booth.

We always touch the stone outside the restaurant we ate at for good luck.  I was going to need luck if I wanted to keep up with Kathy.  She LOVES to shop!!

So it was off to Old Town, a renovated area downtown.

Then Kathy and I were off to shop till we dropped.

Kathy was hurrying, so she would have more time to shop.  Our destination was a local scrapbook/altered art shop.  It features names like Graphic 45 paper, Tim Holtz idea-ology items, and artwork supplies like pan pastels.

I couldn't believe it.  This is the first time someone hasn't had to look down on me (after all, I'm only 4'11'' tall).

I took NO photos of us shopping, but here is the one thing I purchased. 

Those of you familiar with my blog, know the macro focus (the little tulip) doesn't work on this very old camera, so I'm not sure you can see what I paid for this sheet of 12 X 12 scrapbook paper.  The price is $1.50 US dollars.  It is the one impulse buy that was not on sale, and the first thing I've purchased that I didn't absolutely need (unless it was on clearance or from a thrift store) this year.  And yet, I don't see a lot of my supplies being depleted.  In fact, I seem to be getting more and more goodies, as I will show next.

But first, I want to explain why I felt I got such a great deal with this purchase.  When Kathy showed it to me, I immediately thought of stencils.  Always looking for an inexpensive alternative to the higher priced piece, I knew I could afford this stencil.  The owner of the store, Joanie was teaching a class that day, and the gal who waited on me must have worked on commission.  She asked what I was going to do with it, and I told her honestly that I was going to use it as a stencil.  That was when she tried to steer me to the "real" stencils, the cheapest of which was a 6" X 6" and was marked $8.95.  The largest size they had, 8.5" X 11", was $14.95.  Let's see, $15 dollars versus less than $2 dollars?  Which do you think this gal was going to choose?  That's when she stopped following me around and found a real sucker in Kathy!!

That takes us to last Friday when I visited my friend Scott.  It was a glorious day, albeit very, very windy.  One of his displays, initially set up for Halloween and recently turned into a Thanksgiving display fell over from the wind as we sat on his front porch and watched.  It was like living in slow motion. 

Scott and I were both out of our seats as soon as the structure hit the ground.  I had contemplated taking a photo of the piece just prior to it falling.  Scott found his drill, while I took out my camera.  It's not often I get photos of Scott in a still position, but the only thing moving in these photos was the drill.

Scott gets in the weirdest positions when he works, and

he was on a mission to get this structure away from the parachute.  You can tell how windy it was from his hair.

It was about that time I offered to help.  I thought he might need it.

Next, he and I removed the laces holding the parachute to the structure.  When all of the forms had been moved, he and I packed the parachute.  He showed me how to do it, or I would never have known.

After several hours of conversation and me rummaging through his trashed wood bin, I finally came home, late that evening.

What a treat I had, too.  First, I had the awesome wood Scott gave me from his scrap pile, much of which I left in his scrap bin for another day, then I checked my mail and found

this incredibly thoughtful gift from BJ (whose blog I still can't leave comments on) .  She sent these lovely gifts to thank me for teaching the AB class.  How thoughtful of her.  Since I'm of British descent and was named for her Queen, I fell in love with all the British pieces she sent.  I only wish you could see the bows, ribbon, pin, and buttons that are British.  Of course that would mean having a camera that actually worked right.  And yes, I love all that ribbon you barely see sticking inside the plastic bag in the lower right.

Of course the THANK YOU gift was all about the Rocking Horses.  As I told BJ, I have rocking horse ribbon, rocking horse lace, rocking horse paper, but have never seen rocking horse buttons before.  I'm not just in awe, I'm in LOVE.  Thank you beyond belief, BJ.


This is day 16 of AEDM.  What have you done lately with friends?  Or did that friendship come in the form of snail mail?