Dude..............

I gotta Dell!

WooHoo, my new laptop arrived on Thursday afternoon and I am loving it! I firmly believe that my old one was the very first one off of the assembly line (it is so old I cannot even remember when it arrived on the scene), and a lot of it was no longer operating. We decided to wait until the Microsoft Vista program came out to order my new laptop. (C has a desktop in his office and he seemed perfectly satisfied with it until Thursday evening, when suddenly he said that he thinks he also needs a new computer!!) Since I'm not the most computer literate person on the block, I cannot even begin to give you all of my new baby's stats, but suffice it to say that she is wonderful! She is so much lighter than my old one, which is a huge factor in that she travels with us back and forth to the condo on a weekly basis, up and down three flights of stairs.
Here she is opened up and ready to blog:

she is so very eager to please her Mama!! So, the only bad part about this new laptop is that she arrived on Thursday afternoon, and we were/are scheduled to host two back-to-back dinner parties here on Friday and Saturday nights. Thus, my alone time with her is severely limited...as is my time to blog! I cannot wait to discover all of the new ins and outs of Vista, but give me some time.

Last night we entertained our former neighbors who have moved to a retirement community "up the road" and another delightful couple from our church who live in the same community. They did not know each other well beforehand, but now I feel sure that they will become fast friends, not that either couple needs more friends - they are both very sociable. It was a nice, low-keyed evening: a roaring fire in the fireplace (baby, it's cold outside!), comfort foods (C's Mom's Ham loaf, butter peas, roasted sweet potatoes, tossed salad and molten chocolate cakes for dessert), and scintillating conversation. Tonight we are hosting the last of four dinners for our church's Foyers group. We have gotten to know and grown to love the other three couples in our group, and this will be a bittersweet meeting for us. I've made up a huge pot of chili and will put together a pan of cornbread and a salad later on. These are supposed to be uncomplicated meals with an emphasis on getting to know one another and not attempts at pretentiousness...easy for them to say! For dessert I've already whipped up some Cranberry Creme Brulees...all they need is a little torching and they're ready to serve. YUMMMM!

Now on to other matters. Here are a couple of pieces from my work sessions earlier this week:

This is a batiked silk sarong....another teaching model for my March class at Intown Quilters. You may notice the "Rayna signature" potato masher in there in a few places!! (oh Gerrie, I'm green with envy that you're going to have a week with Rayna!!) By the way, huge congrats are in order to Intown Quilters, as my favorite quilt shop has been chosen as one of the 10 featured quilt shops in this Springs Better Homes and Gardens Quilt Sampler magazine! WooHoo!! Way to go Sarah and the rest of the gang!!! You'll be able to pick up a copy in a local quilt shop in early May. I'm sure I'll be reminding you.

Below is a piece that I've been playing with. Actually, it is a stonewashed silk scarf, but the technique is a bit different, in that I'm using water soluble gold resist, but really diluting it. The gold remains, and only a hint of the resist....let the dyes do their thing! It's fun.

OK, I'm off to reset the table and do a bit of picking up.

Have a terrific day!