An Awesome Vacation! Woohoo!

We left for vacation on March 24, and got back yesterday, April 17!  And we put 4, 187 miles on the car!  Whoa!

It was a fabulous vacation in every way!  The cruise, the visiting with relatives and friends, the golf, even the drive was great!  We saw some really beautiful parts of the country that we hadn't really checked out before.  And the weather was so perfect the entire time!  I think we lucked out in every way!

I've posted a few pics from the road, but here are the last of my vaca pics.

Besides driving around to find golf courses to play, we also hit several antique shops!  Yay!

I found this great 'yard long' military pic at the first shop we hit!  What luck!  Never did see any more along the way, so I was really glad I picked up this one to add to my collection.  Just above the pic is a little 6" wooden ruler.....old and very sweet!  And above that are darning eggs!  I've been collecting those for about 30 years.....and they are harder to find these days, but I managed to find 5 in one shop!  The mother lode!  lol  And a nice long spindle spool with wool attached, and a drawer from a treadle machine......these will make nice little display items in my antiquey house!  I also picked up 4 vintage booklets for tatting and one pot holder booklet.  I also collect vintage pot holders, and I've been thinking to make a few myself.....I just love 'em, but would never dare use my vintage ones.

We also managed to find a few thrift shops and I picked up 3 shirts for cutting up for quilts!  Woohoo!

And, of course, we stopped at Mary Jo's Fabric Store in NC.  The top of the pic shows my 6 yards of cheddar (Woot!) and some really great cotton candlewicking thread that I think would be perfect for some embellishment.  I got the colors that looked like they would go with my civil war repros......we'll see what happens.  I was very restrained while in the shop, and I'm kicking myself now......cuz each paddle of that thread was just 5 cents!  I should have bought the hold dang rack!  LOL  But again.......will I actually use it, hmmmmmm!  Maybe it's good I only bought ten paddles!  lol

As I said in my post from the road.......we turned this vacation into a Krispy Kreme road trip!  I ask you......is there anything better than seeing that red light on!?!

Holy cow.......I couldn't even wait to get a pic......HA!

It was so disheartening to learn that so many of the Krispy Kreme shops have closed!  There is only 1 in New England now, and that's at the Mohegan Sun Casino in Conneticut!  Sheesh!

When we were in VA,  the guy pumping our gas got so excited to see the box in the back seat....and asked where the heck we got them!  We had been in Greensboro, NC that morning, and he was so bummed, cuz they had closed the two shops that were near him.  Of course, we only had 2 left in the box, and there was NO WAY I was giving up either of those.  Is that greedy......yes!  But hey, we're talkin Krispy Kreme here folks!  I'll share just about anything, but not those!  lol

I'll tell ya, hubby was a real trooper this trip, cuz not only did he willingly stop at every antique, quilt or thrift shop I wanted to go into, but he also stayed awake the ENTIRE 4,000 miles of this vacation!  In case I haven't mentioned before, I do ALL the driving when we are together.  My hubby's driving scares the ba-jesus out of me!  So, rather than hear me freak out or whine about it, I just do all the driving.  Which is great, but hubby usually falls asleep the minute we leave the driveway!  Which made this vacation just that much sweeter......he stayed awake, he managed the gps the whole way, and we talked, and laughed, and noticed the scenery, and made plans for future drives, and had a wonderful time!  It was amazing!  And he's awesome!

When we got home yesterday, the first thing I saw was our 'crazy tulip'!  We call him crazy, cuz he is the first thing that pops out of the ground, usually while there is still a lot of snow!  And most years, there is no bloom, just leaves.  We never planted him, he just appeared one year......and has come back each year!  None of my other tulips have survived the gophers, but this little guy is still around!  And we caught him in bloom, too!  Yay!

And, of course, the first dang thing I wanted to do was sew.......but I just wanted to push fabric......nothing too mind-bending!  So I cut a bunch of 2" squares from my repros, and started sewing them up!  These will finish at 6" square, and I've cut enough for 9 of them......I'm thinking to put them on-point......but I'm not there yet.

Here are 2 finished, and 4 still needing the center seam.

I'll finish these up tonight, and tomorrow I'll be working on my jubilee quilt again.  The top is really at the nearly-finished stage......I just need to sew the blocks to the sashing, then the borders, and I'm done.  I'm pretty excited about getting it this far so quickly, and I can't wait to get to it tomorrow.

You know, vacations are awfully fun, but it really is good to be home again.  I love sleeping in my own bed, and having home-made soup for supper (it was sooooo good), and getting back into a real routine.  I spent today going through the tub of mail, balancing the checkbook, tons of laundry, grocery shopping, catching up on blogs, and playing the computer games that need more 'connection' than what the hotels can give you.  I even got to go thrifting today, and picked up several more shirts to cut up for quilts.  Yeah......it's good to be home!

Have a great day!

regan