WAAYYY cool day. . .

We were lucky enough to see space shuttle Endeavor pass over Monterey Bay yesterday on its piggy-backed trip from Cape Canaveral to its new home at the California Science Center in Los Angeles.

I cropped this photo to get a closer view.

 

Gary and I went up to the top of the hill by the water tower at Laguna Seca to watch it pass by along the Pacific Ocean coastline. It’s an “Almost Heaven” view don’t you think?

Since we have the LA channels on our full time RVing DirecTV package, after watching Endeavor till it was a tiny speck in the sky, we caught the activity as it flew into LAX.  It made many flyovers all along the route.  Needless to say we were glued to the TV and didn’t get much else done!

Photos taken of my TV screen.  Gosh, it was 97 degrees in Los Angeles, that’s a heat wave!!

As it taxied onto the tarmack upon landing at LAX someone appeared in the hatch waving the American flag.

 

I was in high school when Alan Shepard became the first American in space and, in February of 1962 remember being in the library at Minot State U. (Minot State Teachers College back then) when it was announced over the intercom that John Glenn had just became the first American to orbit the earth.  And yesterday to actually see the last space shuttle make its final journey I felt I had experienced an historical event from start to finish.

Yes, it was a WAY cool day!

Where have I been?

Well, I sure haven’t been writing in my blog have I?  I last posted on May 31st!?

How did the summer, and my time, fly by so quickly?  Let’s see:

• I have been sewing.  You know I am a full-time RVer and my home is a 36’ fifth wheel.  Most of the time this is my office but when I get my sewing machine out (it is stored in one of our outside hatches) my “office” becomes an office/sewing room.

My first project was a set of racing flags for my friend Dale.  The set I sewed for him ten years ago had worn out.  The solid flags (yellow, red and black and a white not shown) are pretty straight forward, the slippery surface (yellow and red stripes) and passing (blue with yellow diagonal stripe) are more challenging and the checkered flag is a real challenge.

Granddaughter Mary’s 10th birthday was May 30th.  She really wanted a fleece blanket which was hot pink on one side and zebra on the other.  I think I found the perfect fabrics!

Ten year old Mary with her throw and other “10” related presents from Grammie & Papa. The wooden box she is holding was a present from MY grandma to me when I was 10.

My biggest project involved re-doing the three cornices in our bedroom and one in the bathroom.  It was complicated by the fact that the day/night blinds are attached to the the cornice and so the entire setup had to be taken down in order to re-cover the cornice.

Cornice before picture.  I couldn’t believe how many staples they used when they installed it at the KZ RV factory!!

Two small cornices like this and another about twice the size.  The cords in the large day/night shade had broken so we had to re-string it before we could re-install the whole window covering.  Re-stringing wasn’t hard but it was a bit complicated – reading, and following the written instructions was definitely the order of the day. Definitely a DYI project which saved some money.

Bathroom cornice re-covered. 

Last on my list was sewing two soft and cushy throw pillows.

BUT, wait!  I have some scraps of ripstop fabric left from the racing flags!  I’ll make some racing scarves for Dulee!  I made him three flag scarves and continued on to make his Corgi/Terrier friend Oden a set. .  .

and a checkered flag scarf for another dog friend!  Here, Dulee models a checkered flag scarf.

• Of course, the racetrack here at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca has been busy so I’ve been  race marshaling.  Here I am at the Andretti Hairpin, turn 2, site of lots of racing activity.

• Stanley and Will spent a week with us with Mary joining us for the weekend. It was a busy, and fun-filled, week – going to the movies, the beach, playground, the beach again, tide pools, making & flying paper airplanes, watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy on DVD and school supply shopping.

• Walked up MANY steps up to tour Point Sur Lighthouse here on our Big Sur coastline.  This photo is a postcard I bought in the gift shop.

• Jorden “boomeranged” back home in July.

• We didn’t get out on the road in our 5th wheel this summer but did get in some traveling miles.  I’ll tell you later about our 10 day Alaskan Princess cruise.   Friends Danny & Debbi happened to be in San Francisco on our sailing day and took this photo of our cruise ship. Can you see us on our balcony?

So, you see, while I was ignoring my blog and you; I wasn’t just lying around eating bonbons!

I’m back.