Bulloch Hall 34th Quilt Show ... and more - part one

Time is moving so fast that I almost missed Bulloch Hall 34th Quilt Show "the Great American Cover-up Quilt Show."  Fortunately I read a notice about it in a newspaper, just in time.  This year the show was held between March 4 and 13, 2016.  It featured a special exhibit of quilts made by fiber artist Christine Cetrulo of Lexington, Kentucky - however photos were not allowed.  But it was OK to photograph this year's great variety of quilts, about 200 of them, displayed throughout the historic 1840 house museum.  We went on Tuesday, March 8, 2016, a beautiful sunny and warm day - 76 degrees F (24.4 C.)  It is always a pleasure to visit this imposing antebellum mansion in Roswell, Georgia.

My dear readers have seen several of my posts on Bulloch Hall quilt shows and at Christmas time, when the home is decorated for the Holidays.  This is our 4th year visiting the quilt show; chick here to see the 2013 show, here for the 2014 show, and here for the 2015 show.   Major Stephen Bulloch built this outstanding home for his wife Martha and their six children.  As I mentioned before, their daughter Millie married Theodore Roosevelt, Sr.  Subsequently Mittie and Thee's elder son, Theodore, became the 26th President of the United States.  The Bulloch's younger son, Elliott, was the father of Eleanor, who married Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the 32nd President of the United States.

As usual, we were greeted by large quilts hanging in the front hall.  (Please click on collage to enlarge.)

Below, my husband is reading the show brochure while seating in front of quilt no. 1 "Crazy Daisy" by Diane Knott, a local guild member.  This quilt is feature on the cover of Ms. Knott's book "Scrap Quilt Secrets."  More of her work is displayed in other areas of the house.

In the back of the front hall was a striking blue quilt, called "Trees in the Moonlight" by Wanda Rose Stewart next to "Stwabewies Peese" by Devon Pfeif that was inspired by her granddaughter.

Then we walked into the dining room.  By the fireplace was a quilt that looked like a portrait painting.  It was "Life Journey" a self-portrait by Devon Pfeif who says "Upon completion of a project there are always bits and pieces leftover.  Those are what make up this quilt.  They have traveled with me for 30 years and are my life's journey."

The warming room contained some intricate geometric designed quilts, a quilt on a table and a quilt showing some sweet dogs.

There was also a bright red quilt from Diane Knott's book.  A quilt placed on an easel, called "Caged Bird" by Joyce Daniels, had been inspired by Maya Angelou's book I know Why the Caged Bird Sings.  On the wall was hanging a large quilt made from a multitude of little squares.  It was called "Nationwide Swap" by Sharyl Dawes.  She explained that the squares were accumulated through a Facebook Group.  Each month they exchanged 20 different mini charms.

In the back hall quilt no. 52 "Santa Fe Arch" by Ann Quandee was machine appliqued, hand and machine embroidered.  It was inspired by photos from Santa Fe, New Mexico.

The "Wicked Challenge" quilts were hanging along the staircase.  The 20"x20" quilts were made of specially died green Cheerywood fabrics.  Up at the landing were a colorful owl "Ready for Carnival" and a fun "Night at the Circus" quilts.

I liked quilt no. 77 by Gail Oliver, called "Awakening Wicked."  She says "Elphaba decides to trust her beliefs and not judge right from wrong based on others' values."

My husband's favorite quilt was very large and pretty austere - white with blue border.  It is called "Welsh Beauty Celebrating Love" and was quilted by Karen Hallacy's mother to celebrate Karen's 25th wedding anniversary.

More lovely quilts were exhibited in the upstairs hall, and in the two bedrooms.  Quilt no. 108 below, near the chest of drawers, is called "Magnolia" and was made by Virginia Bradley, age 12, in Edgecomb County, North Carolina in 1863.  Virginia died a year later due to the diseases of the Civil War.

A guild volunteer was working on a quilt in one of the bedrooms.  She told me the pattern was called "stained glass window."  On the bed, a blanket had white applique designs - it is no. 91 called "Snowflakes" by Nancy Summa (top right below) who says "Since my husband is a retired Army, the use of his Army blanket makes the piece more meaningful."  I had never seen a plain wool blanket embellished like this.  It looked very pretty, indeed, for a rough Army blanket.  No. 84, in the center below, is "New Zealand Memories 2015" by Emily Wert.  She says "My husband surprised me with new wedding bands inscribed in Elvish on our 34th anniversary trip to NZ."  This quilt is made with fabric printed pictures and New Zealand fabric.

The quilt behind the bed is called "Kneeded Distraction" and was made by Shari Chastain of Kennesaw, Georgia (top right below.)  It is a play on word as she says that she stitched the blocks during recovery from two knee replacement surgeries.  Quilt no. 100, on the bed, is called "Swoon" by Jan Antranikian and is shown at the top of this post.

On a table in Mittie's bedroom was a sweet little quilted piece near the book "Mittie and Thee - An 1853 Roosevelt Romance."  The quilt is called "Les Coiffes Catalanes" by Jean Sands.  She says "Six vintage traditional head gear from the Pyrenees Orientales region of France were disassembled to make this wall hanging."  Below are two postcards of French ladies wearing the traditional costume from that area, next to a map of France showing Departement no. 66, the Pyrenees Orientales (bottom of map and filled in red.)  This French Departement is located near the Spanish border and the tiny nation of Andorra.

The pictures of the ladies on the little white quilt mentioned above are wearing Victorian clothes and go well with the lace and trim around them.  Even with an old-timey style this quilt has more the approach of a modern "improvisation" quilt because of the asymmetry of the background.

Most of the quilts exhibited at Bulloch Hall were of the traditional style, and they were gorgeous.  But I also like the artistry of modern quilting - the improvisations that show the personality of the quilter.  My blogging friend Ruth of the blog "Birds of the air quilts" is a creative modern quilter - below are two of her quilts: "Nancy's macarons" inspired by a painting of Paul Klee, and an urban modern garden improv from Virginia Woolf's book Mrs. Dalloway.

Another quilter, Cassandra of the blog "The [not so] Dramatic Life" quilted a vibrant mini improv quilt with scraps of lovely shades.  See below her "Blue Improvisation: Mini Quilt #6."

Both of these gifted ladies have a new approach to quilting that is original and innovative.  Their quilts are stunning and I thank them for letting me show their work on my blog.

Another quilt I liked very much was called "Raven Stealing the Sun" by Stella Lang.

Stella says that her quilt was inspired by legends from Indians of the northwestern United States.  But when I saw it, I immediately thought it was representative of Canada First Nations people, especially Coast Salish artists.  We went to Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada, three times and I bought several postcards of drawings made by Pacific Northwest Native people.  Some of these were drawn by artist Joe Wilson, born in Koksilah, near Duncan on Vancouver Island.  See examples below.  I love the great native art on Vancouver Island.

Now I still have photos from the quilts in the attic of Bulloch Hall, plus the sewing room and two rooms downstairs - they will be included in part 2 of this post.

Just a couple more drawings before I go - I saw these Native American cartoons by Ricardo Cate and could not resist showing them to you all.  Ricardo Cate, of native Kewa Pueblo heritage, is the only Native American cartoonist carried in daily mainstream newspapers.  (cartoons courtesy R. Cate.)

 More quilts to come ...

TV, music, old postcards and photos of Paris ... and more

This will be an eclectic post as it has been a busy time for me and I was unable to prepare a post.  I re-read the comments on my last post and thank you all heartily for your good wishes for my recovery.  I think the pneumonia is gone - I'm seeing the doctor next week for my 6-month check-up and feel sure that he will tell me I'm OK.  Even feeling weak in early January I made sure to watch the first episode of the final season of Downton Abbey on TV.  As my blogging friend, Shammickite, guessed, the ending photo on my last post was from a book on Downton Abbey.

I also read "Lady Catherine, the Earl, and the Real Downton Abbey" my second book by Fiona, the current Countess of Carnarvon.  I read it in two evenings as it brought to life such a fascinating look at the events in Highclere Castle during the 1920s and 1930s.  I was surprised to read on a French site that this show is not as popular in France as it is in England and here.  The article "Why the French don't like Downton Abbey" was in the news site 20 Minutes.  You can read the article here, if you speak French, or can use Goodle Translate if not.  The article explained that for the French, their modern history starts at their revolution of 1789 - when they guillotined a large number of the aristocracy as well as their queen, Marie-Antoinette, and her husband.  For fun though I checked French aristocracy on the web and was surprised to find out that there is a current head to the former Imperial House of France.  He's the great-great-great-grandnephew of Emperor Napoleon I of France, who had not direct heirs.  His name is Jean-Christophe, Prince Napoleon Bonaparte, and he is quite handsome (and not married yet...)

Jean-Christophe, Prince Napoleon Bonaparte, born July 11, 1986

Frankly, I had not heard of him before as the French have no interest in their aristocracy.  I found more information concerning him on British sites as Prince Napoleon Bonaparte was invited by the British in June 2015 to take part in the bicentennial celebration of the Battle of Waterloo (lost by Napoleon I.)  In top middle photo below you can see his tall figure at the battle ceremony (like his father, Jean-Christophe is tall, about 6 ft 6 (2 meters.)  On top left photo is Jean-Christophe next to his sister, Princess Caroline, and his mother, Princess Beatrice de Bourbon-Sicile.  On top right photo he is talking with King Philippe of Belgium and Queen Mathilde.  In bottom left photo Jean-Christophe is standing next to his grandmother, Princess Alix Bonaparte, at the Dome des Invalides in Paris (which contains Napoleon I's tomb.)  (Click on collage to enlarge.)

In early February we drove to Brentwood, TN, to celebrate my husband's birthday with our younger daughter and family.  Our daughter who had been in Paris and India with her family during the Christmas-New Year holidays was very upset to hear about my pneumonia.  She, and our son-in-law, insisted that we move to Nashville soon.  We did buy a house in Nashville a while back but thought we would rent it while we take our time to move there.  It will be difficult for me to clean out our house here (by myself,) in which we have lived in for 40 years, because of all our accumulation in it.  Our house in Nashville is a 1930 craftsman bungalow, in an historic district of Nashville, very close to Vanderbilt University, and a bit bigger than our current house in Georgia, but with a small yard (here we have an acre.)  It has fewer rooms than here but they are larger with 10-feet tall ceiling.  Here are some of the rooms below.

We won't move all at once, as this would be too hard.  We may move most of the furniture but keep some in Georgia and then live in both places for a while.  It won't be easy and it will be very time consuming.  This is the reason I can't visit blogs or write posts as often as I would like.  I'm sorry that in the last several weeks I have not checked my dear readers' blogs.  Taking care of my husband who needs help with all day living tasks because of his Alzheimer, as well as 24/7 supervision, is tiring and stressful.  His care is not difficult, it is just constant, with little free time.  We had a good visit in Tennessee and enjoyed the grandchildren.  I was given my Christmas gift of items bought in Paris - my current favorite perfume, Lancome's "La vie est belle" (which means life is beautiful) and a French Godiva box of chocolate (I say French because I found out that Godiva Belgian Chocolates (!) had been bought out by a Turkish corporation and that the chocolates were no longer made in Belgium but made in each country where sold, to the palate of that country's taste - in the US that means more milk, sugar and caramels and no liquor flavoring.)  My special French mustard was welcome as I use it often in my vinaigrette.

With the strain of being a care-giver, cleaning out the house toward a move is a challenge.  Some days I feel pushed to the limit, exhausted and a bit down.  I read that the emotional, physical and psychological toll on caregivers is soul destroying - but it won't destroy mine.  I am pleased that I have inherited the national French trait of "joie de vivre."  The French invented this expression which means joy of life.  "Happiness" is different from "Joy."  Happiness is something that is temporary and transitory.  One can be unhappy but still find moments of joys.  Joy is a belief, or attitude, which erases even the most sorrowful of situations.  Joy comes from within, it is something that lasts within you - joy is an inner, conscious belief.  Happiness is external.  It is not easy for me to explain it, so I call it my joie de vivre.  For me, joie de vivre, is a mindset that makes me look at my daily life events in a positive light - a victory over gloom, if you wish.  I enjoy living in the present, and finding some joyful moments in the present.  Because what is the alternative?  Being embittered and resentful of the past, complaining and being depressed of the present and anxious or scared of the future?  If one drags its past misfortunes and its future anxieties, it is too heavy - it become impossible to rejoice.  By coincidence I found out that the museum Palaix des Beaux-Arts in Lille (a town in northern France) just ended an exhibit entitled "Joie de Vivre."

Brochure of Joie de Vivre exhibit with Two women running on the beach by Picasso (1881-1973.)

One hundred and twenty works by Veronese, Boucher, Fragonard, Renoir, Rodin, Picasso and many other artists were selected because they showed the joyful pleasures of life - leisure, friendship, sun, family, party, laughter, play and anything that recalls the reasons we have to rejoice.  Because la joie de vivre is expressed through countless "small" transient pleasures it requires an acceptance of life, as it is, in the present.  I think, personally, that joie de vivre is simply to be happy "to be alive."  The sculpture below, by Richard MacDonald (American born in 1946) and entitled "Joie de Vivre" represents this sentiment very well; this feeling that sallies from within.

The Lille museum brochure explained "joie de vivre" thus - (I'll translate it below)

« la joie de vivre est la capacité à jouir du simple fait d’être au monde, d’apprécier certains instants agréables, qu’on les ait suscités ou qu’ils s’offrent à nous. La joie de vivre est vécue ici et maintenant. Elle peut être indépendante des conditions extérieures, et même s’éprouver au cœur de la plus terrible noirceur. Elle est plus attachée à l’être qu’à l’avoir, à l’être ensemble qu’à la possession ou la consommation de richesses.  »

"The joie de vivre (joy of life) is the ability to enjoy the simple fact of being alive in the world, to enjoy some pleasant moments, whether we made them happen or they came to us. The joie de vivre is to be lived here and now.  It can be independent of external conditions, and even be felt during times of most terrible darkness.  It is more committed to the notion of "to be" than "to have," to the total person than to the possession or consumption of wealth."  Below are some paintings from this exhibit illustrating la joie de vivre - joy of life.  Top left, Coco playing by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, French 1841-1919.  Below is La Nana jaune of Niki de Saint Phalle, French 1930-2002.  Top right is Repas de Noces by Albert Fourie, French 1854-1937.  Center is September evening by Maurice Denis, French 1870-1943 and Loisirs (leisure) is at the bottom, by Fernand Leger, French 1881-1955.

I'll give you some examples of joyful pleasures I have had in the last couple of weeks.  Our eldest daughter is moving to Pittsburgh, PA, and wished to pick-up her large desk from her former bedroom in our house.  This is an antique British roll-top desk, very large and heavy.  It took me about a week to clean up all the various items on it and in its drawers, and that was quite tiring.  When the desk was moved several CDs which had fallen behind it were found.  One was a CD I bought in 1999 by a French "musette" group called Les Primitifs du Futur.   Musette is the accordion genre music played in France.  I usually do not listen to that type of music often, but finding this CD after almost 17 years made me very joyful - it sounded like Paris.  I played it while cleaning the rest of the room and I was smiling, no longer tired.  I found one of the cuts on YouTube - here it is below.

      

Another unexpected joy was when I was almost finished cleaning up the floor to ceiling shelving cabinet in my daughter's room and saw a very large box.  I opened the box and to my surprise, oh joy, it contained hundreds of vintage postcards.  I must have placed it there, decades ago, at least in the late 1980s, before sorting them out, and totally forgot about it.  What a gift!

I spent two evenings happily looking at these postcards - the box even contained postcards sent to my grandpa during World War I.  Like these 3 postcards of the castle of Crevecoeur where his father and mother, my great-grand parents, lived for many years.

There was such a variety of postcards - landscapes, international cities, flowers, monuments, people, etc.  I selected several to give you an idea.  Click on the collages twice so you can read the titles on the postcards.

The only postcard without a title above, top right, is the Hotel St. Gellert Szallo in Budapest, in 1916-18.  I found a current photo of the hotel - which is still in business - on Wikipedia, see below.  It mentions that this hotel, built in the Art Nouveau style, and renovated in 1962 and 1973, is one of the most beautiful hotels in Budapest.

Some of the postcards have stamps and writing on their back, others are blank.  Speaking of hotels, one of the postcards is of Hotel Regina in Nice.  I was surprised to read on the back of the colored postcard below, top right, long loving phrases by a woman, covering the entire back of the postcard, writing to her lover I guess, and telling him to be careful around her husband and to make sure that he never finds out that she had slept with him (her lover) - at this hotel ... Oh la la!  The Excelsior Hotel Regina built at the top of Blvd de Cimiez in Nice on the Riviera, is a splendid Belle Epoque building.  It was especially built in 1897 so that Queen Victoria could stay there, in style, while in Nice.  She travelled with a staff of 100 and took over the whole west wing.  In 1912, a statue of the Queen was erected in front of the hotel.  It is now a luxurious and very upscale apartment building.

Some of the postcards were quite old, as far back as 1899.

The postcard on the left is a coffee seller in Zanzibar.

But one of the greatest joys happened last Friday, February 19th.  I have a French friend I have known since the late 1950s.  She now lives in Iowa and I see her once in a while when she visits Atlanta.  Last Friday I received several emails from her containing old photographs.  She said that she was looking at some old photos and thought I might like them.  I was totally speechless when I saw them.  They were photographs that I had never seen.  She had photos of the dining room of my parents' apartment in Paris.  I had no photograph of this room. This is the Paris apartment where I grew up and went back to until I was in my mid-thirties.  Just imagine if suddenly you saw a dining room of your former home - a room you had not seen in 45 years!  As you can see my father liked antiques and the furniture was too large for the room.

The photo below shows part of the piano in my room where my father played Chopin.  The armchair next to the piano was made of leather and not very comfortable.

This friend, Marika, sent me several emails with pictures.  The last ones delighted me the most - again, I had never seen these photographs, and here I was in Normandie in August 1971 with my eldest daughter, Celine, who was about 2 years old then.  Marika had visited us in France in the early 1970s when I went on vacation to my parents' summer home in Normandie.  Here are the photos below - some with my mother at the market in Dieppe, I think, or Mers-les-Bains.  I cannot describe the joy of looking at the pictures of my mother, photos that were unknown to me.

My philosophy of joie de vivre might sound a bit simplistic, but the little moments of joy in my life keep me optimistic and able to go through the moments that are more difficult and stressful.  I'll end this post with a painting from the exhibit in Lille, showing an example of joy - "The Laughing Boy" painted in 1625 by Frans Hals, Dutch, 1580-1660.  The artist has captured the wonderful sparkling eyes and cheerful smile of this boy - he radiates joy.

 Looking at him makes one feel good and able to understand the ...

-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-

Note: top photo was taken on the Alameda shore, California, in July 2015 with San Francisco in the background, and the last picture I took off the coast of Martinique.

January 2016 ... and the year ahead

January is almost over, already.  I hope you all had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year celebration.  Here, we had neither.  In my last post I mentioned that I had been battling what I thought was a strange "chest cold."  My primary care doctor was not available, so I made an appointment with someone else in his office, but that day, December 22, we decided to visit Bulloch Hall so I could take pictures for a post, and I cancelled the doctor appointment.  After the trip to Bulloch Hall and writing my post it was almost Christmas and by then I was even weaker and could not think of driving to another county, on the freeways, for a doctor's visit (my husband does not drive anymore.)  From then on I was in bed every day including Christmas.  The only decoration I saw was the embroidery on a holiday jacket that I wore in bed as I had severe chills.

On Christmas morning I did get up to make coffee and toast for my husband and me, but went back to bed.  For dinner every night my husband ate Chinese food delivered from a restaurant nearby and I ate Chinese noodle soup.  On New Year's Day I tried to watch the Pasadena Rose Parade on TV and did take a couple of pictures - one of the Armenian float and the other of the Downton Abbey float, but then had to go back to bed.  (Click on collage to enlarge.)

At first I had looked up my symptoms on the web and decided that I had acute bronchitis.  After that I did not look at the computer at all.  I would not mention my illness here as I know this is not a fun subject, but I am doing it to avoid someone making the same mistake as I did.  This last week I took my husband to his pulmonary/lung doctor for his sleep apnea check-up.  When the doctor asked me how I had been feeling, I told him I was in bed 3 weeks with bronchitis.  He asked me if this had been the diagnostic from my doctor - I answered that I had self-diagnosed with help from the web.  After listening to my symptoms he said that it sounded not like bronchitis but pneumonia.  He was not happy that I had not gone to a doctor.  He added that with complications it could have been very serious - to life threatening.  Frankly, I never thought about pneumonia, so I did not look it up.  So, if you cough almost continuously until you nearly lose your breath, with chest and abdominal pains and lungs feeling crushed, bloody mucus, difficulty breathing, shortness of breath, shaking chills, extreme weakness and fever, lack of appetite and nausea - that could be pneumonia and you better see your doctor.  Apart from being extremely weak and unable to sleep because of the noise from my lungs when I breathed, I was not upset about missing out on the holidays.  There was no one at Christmas time around here I could ask for help, so being optimistic I thought I'd get better soon.  Older daughter was in Pennsylvania and younger daughter was in Paris with her family.  She sent me photos on her cell phone.  I was happy to have Paris on my cell phone in bed with me.  Here are some of her photos (oldest grandson is in front of Notre Dame de Paris on Christmas Eve.)

After Paris they flew to Kochi, South India, to visit son-in-law's relatives.  It sounded like a great trip.  Then they came back through Sri Lanka, Rome and a stop in Venice.  They said that Venice had very few tourists - Piazza San Marco was almost empty.  Take note - the week after New Year is a good time to visit Venice, Italy.

I guess I was lucky that I became better by myself.  In a way if I had known I had pneumonia I might have become sicker, thinking about the consequences.  I think good and bad thoughts affect our health.  I never wish to lose control and always refuse to listen to the blues.  I do not like self-pity as it brings a lack of compassion toward others (as one is more into their own problems.)  I could not control being sick, but I certainly could control my response and attitude to it, don't you think?  In a way I felt lucky to have time to read some books.  One was about France after WWII (but it also included what had happened during the war as well.) Conditions had been terrible there for many people that, in comparison, the pain in my lungs did not seem hard to bear.  Because of his Alzheimer my husband was a bit confused.  He stayed in the kitchen watching TV, then when I came down at night to help him with his Chinese dinner, he always asked me why I coughed so much ... but he never complained about eating Chinese food for 3 weeks!   The cats kept him company but he did not enjoy staying inside alone for so long.

During the holidays the weather here had been warmer than usual - up to 78 degrees F on Christmas Day (25.5 C.)  Even though I could not get out, just looking at the sunshine pouring into my room made me happy.  That made me think of John Denver's song - do you remember?  "Sunshine on my shoulders, make me happy ... Sunshine in my eyes can make me cry ... Sunshine on the water looks so lovely ... Sunshine almost always makes me high."

Last year in January I had written in my post that the Cobb County Water Commission was going to cut many trees along the road including on our property.  See my post here.  They did start the process the second week of January.  I heard their heavy machinery chopping our trees down - it did hurt when another huge pine tree came down and shook the house.  I went out to take some last quick photos of the hemlock we had planted after Christmas so long ago, and the Oregon Ivy near it, that was already blooming.  I told the tree how sorry I was.

I cut some foliage from the hemlock tree and placed it into a vase.  Below is the vase shown in our back yard and inside the house.

The next day, our beloved hemlock was gone - it was about 40 years old.  I took some pictures of what was left.

We walked toward our neighbors' home - her beautiful magnolia was gone, too.  It was so sad looking at all these trees and branches on the ground.  It looked like a tree graveyard.

I tried to find remnants of our cedar tree, but I think it was under pine tree foliage and debris.

Then walking along the road, I did see the remains of our cedar, laying on a ridge.

After the cutting equipment was finished, the heavy machine that mulches trunks and branches came along and pulverized everything.  We watched as the machine came across our driveway - the work was noisy, quick and efficient.

The area looks quite bare now.

Unfortunately, they also cut our cable on Monday 18 January.  For almost a week we had no television or computer access.  We were surprised by the snow last Saturday since we had not watched the weather forecast for many days.  We did get the cable repaired just in time to watch Downton Abbey last Sunday January 24th.  (Actually I forgot to watch the show at 9:00 pm then remembered and watched the rerun that night from midnight to 1:00 am!)  Today is the first day I am back on the computer - have not looked at most blogs since mid-December... The pictures below are on the side and back of the house.  When the sun came up the snow melted rapidly.

My little grey Korat, Mitsuko, was pleased when my iPad worked again as she likes to watch bird videos on youtube.

Cody, our orange cat and Mitsuko were sleeping in an old box (it is warmer.)  I placed a new box next to them so one cat could move and be more comfortable.  But they both moved into the new box and left the old one alone.  They both have nice beds but for some reason they prefer boxes or bags ...

Taking pictures of cats is a special art (that I do not possess.)  There were lovely sun rays coming into the kitchen, but every time I tried to take a picture, the cats would move.  I took more than a dozen and only one is acceptable.

So January is almost over, and now we have to look at the year ahead - many exciting events are sure to come up ...