Foto Finish: Warm

DD Age 3 Warms my Heart

Today's subject for Foto Finish over at Cat Patches is warm.  I started in one folder of pictures and made my way through about 7 years of pictures.  Warm?  Should I have a picture of a sweaty person?  A Whole Family?  Would someone or a pet curled up with a quilt be "warm"?  That's when I found this one in a folder titled Family Pictures and I simply had to share.  It's date stamped August 2008, so DD would have been a solid 3 years old at the time this was taken.  Sheesh, can you imagine being cuter at three?

Person in a swim suit?  Check.
Warm?  Surely check.
Warms my heart?  Double Check.

The house even looks clean, where did that momma go and can she please come to my house and clean here too?

I find at six she's just as heart warming...

Foto Finish: Something You Don't See Everyday

This weeks theme at Foto Finish was a bit harder, but I always seem to be to caught up to join in on Quilt-a-long days so I had to show something today.  I found some pictures that I thought you'd like, my DH cleaning the ceiling fan, DH ironing, DH knitting, and you know those just didn't seem quite right.  Then I found one with Sunny licking a spoon.  But I figured that would be a bit much first thing in the morning.
So instead, I'm showing you the one above when she is about 3 weeks old, she's a little bit older maybe two months in the one at the left.  My Tiny Girl just turned seven years old three days ago.  I know some of you have seen her and wonder where her name came from so now you know.  She was such a cute little scrap of a kitten.  Her ears would flick when she would drink from her bottle and I always loved it would she would make nursing motions in her sleep because her own momma abandoned her right after birth, so I always knew those blissful dreams were about me.

Happy Birthday my darling, to the baby I didn't want while I waited for my own, you are truly My Dear Sweet Princess Cat.

Foto Finish: Doors aka Quilter's Eyes

Entry Doors to Gaylord Palms Resort

Oh I adore Barbara of Cat Patches, for her theme today.  It's doors.  Digging through my pictures I found these. These are the entry doors to the Gaylord Palms Resort in Orlando.  Aren't they amazing?  This was the third and final hotel DH and I visited while on our honeymoon and we really loved our stay there in 2003.  We enjoyed our dinner at Villa de Flora that we ate there more than once and when these pictures were taken I was happily dragging my sister, a friend, and DD off to enjoy some of their food which is wonderfully seasonal and varies by day and the fruits (and veggies) of the season.  It was during that visit that my sister and I discovered our love for Sangria but that is a story for another day.  Besides trust me when I say the door and the Sangria is only the beginning of the wonder of this beautiful resort.  After all it is built with a 4.5 acre glass atrium in it's center.  Surely that means we can say it's always Florida weather somewhere in Florida.

Detail within door

It is so charming to see these pictures again, because while I like to reminisce I had completely forgotten about the beautiful Mariner's Compass set into the wood flooring within the center of the door.  Can you see it now?  Just think, I've grown Quilter's Eyes!

Foto Finish: Where you want to Live

Today the Foto Finish theme is Where you live, but the theme is optional so I thought I'd apply that to be "Where you want to live".  And thereby share a bit about my favorite place in the entire world.

This is the Belleview Biltmore located in Belleair, Florida.  It was built in 1897 from Florida Lighter Wood Heart Pine.  This lovely resort joined the U.S. National Register of Historical Places in 1979 and was given a historical preservation ordinance by the City of Belleair in 2005.  Yet this hotel is not safe.  It's very future is in the balance as the current owners have submitted a request for a demolition permit as they desire to tear it down and replace it with Condos, like Florida needs more empty condos.

Since our first visit to the Biltmore the night of our wedding, my DH and I have always talked about how great it would be to own this wonderful hotel.  It was always a far off and nebulous dream, but a dream all the same.  The thought that investors would be so callous as to destroy this wonderful soul fulfilling national landmark fills me with tears each time I read about its current state.

I have stood on those grounds, I have listened to the stories, and heard the echos of the past in those halls.  So you know what I say?  If I won the lottery I would buy this beautiful Lady of the Gulf, returning her to her former glory and give thanks everyday that this hotel could stand for future generations to love as I do.  To many people get caught up in the here and now.  If this hotel is razed it will never come back.  It will indeed be gone forever.  Yes, famous people have stayed here, but that isn't what it at stake.  If the Beautiful Belleview Biltmore is demolished, the community, state, country, and perhaps even the world will lose a piece of ourselves.  A piece we might never have known was there will be lost forever, leaving us with a void we can never fill.

So I stand up and say I love this Hotel, I love everything about it, be she bright and beautiful, or tired and worn desperate once again for a loving owner to fill the void left by a decade of loveless owners.  I love this place and I will do everything I can to keep her safe.  For more information please visit http://www.savethebiltmore.com/.

Foto Finish: Holiday Decor

Today's theme for Photo Finish is Holiday Decor.  I made during one of the 2010 Christmas Quilt-a-long days last year for my cousin Giovanna.  It took all day.  Inset lace, and all kinds of heirloom stuff.  It's not what I'd normally make but I made it because it spoke to me about who she was.  My husband built a handmade poplar box and lined it with felt to keep it in and then we mailed it off.  Boy oh boy did we hear about that, don't do that again - you spent to much to mail it.  And so on.  But still it warmed my heart because I knew we'd made that for her.  She passed away this past summer and I'm glad we made those things and gave them to her and her husband last year.

Foto Finish

This week's theme for Foto Finish is Spooky.  I had a really hard time finding a picture and in fact I wondered why I used up my Harvest Moon on you the other week.  Yet, in due digging I found this one.  This is a carving that my DH spotted back in the days before we were married, before the Housing Bubble burst when he was a Surveyor.

There where actually two of these, one a bony finger pointing the way and this one.  I would have posted them both for you but I only found this photo.  I think it is plenty Spooky.  Cat Patches is always talking about something interesting (though my pie didn't turn out as pretty as hers) so why not join us this Saturday, by finding a bit of Spooky in your life?

Foto Finish - Spider Lilies in the Moonlight

Today's theme at Cat Patches is Old, and while I was sorely tempted to post a picture of my mother-in-law...  I lamented why couldn't the theme be new or young, I could have really had fun with that.  Oh well.  My Image of the Day is a picture DH took that I call Spider Lilies in the Moonlight (aren't you glad I didn't name you?).  Why are blooming Spider Lilies old?  You see when we bought our house in back when this century was young, the house came furnished.  We kept somethings, donated others and to this day some compliments will yield "it came with the house" around here.  Well now, these Spider Lilies came with the house.  I'm certain they must have been planted by the original owners wife who had passed away long before he found a new lady friend and decided to sell our home to us, and thereby they count as old.  And if that's not good enough reason that awful Cactus grew taller than the house and was chopped down and out by DH this past summer.

Foto Finish - Autumn

This week's theme for Cat Patches Photo Finish is Autumn, and while this isn't the picture I was originally going to show I thought it was a more interesting choice from my collection (not to mention it wont make you hungry the way a picture of my house on pie day would have).  This is a harvest moon that my DH and I witnessed in 2005 from our yard.  What a beauty!

Foto Finish - Things on Four Legs

My new friend Dana at Stormy Days has a post about another blog called Cat Patches where they have a photo finish once a week.  The theme is different each week and this weeks theme is four legs.  I just had to join in so here's my four legged photo.  Now as sure as she's sitting there you're thinking she does not have four legs and that's true, but she's sitting on my sewing table that does have four legs.  So there.  And besides this saved you another Meerkat or real cat picture.  Hope everyone is having a good Labor Day Weekend.