Update on Venetian Piece

     On Thursday and Friday, I spent quite a few hours on this section of the wallhanging. This gondolier is now pretty much completed except for his face. The details of his jacket will be stitched in later. As to the face, that's a problem I will deal with later. (Note to self: in the future select photos where the people are viewed from behind!!!) I had another perfectly fine Venice photo with a gondola and its passengers passing under a bridge viewed from behind which would have made an excellent subject, but I chose this one instead. Besides not having to deal with faces, the other photo would not have had all these skinny little railings. Still, challenging though it may be, I'm happy with what I have done so far. Next I need to work on the other side which features another gondolier waiting patiently in his gondola for business. Here's a photo from an earlier posting in case you haven't been following along.

I had been planned to spend a few hours on Saturday afternoon working on the piece before a group of friends and I were to take another friend for a celebratory birthday dinner. Unfortunately, she was still feeling a bit under the weather, so we'll take her out at a later date. Instead of working on this piece, in the afternoon I joined three friends on a fabric field trip to Acton. I had originally decided not to go, but it was such a grey, rainy dark day that at the last moment I changed my mind and went along. We visited Quilter's Way and a tiny shop a mile down the road from it, Daley by the Yard. The sum total of my purchases: a quarter yard of a shiny black interestingly patterned fabric to use for the gondola. That's all I bought. My friends, however, did an outstanding job of helping the economy. All that fabric shopping makes one hungry and since our original plans for dinner were cancelled, we stopped to eat at Bella Famiglia which was also just about a mile further down the road. The food was absolutely delicious. I was home in time to settle in and watch the Patriots beat the Colts in the big game.

      Last night I went to another friend's home for dinner. My friend and her husband had met a couple from Italy when they were on vacation in Hawaii. This couple was visiting Boston for a few days before heading on to New York, so she invited them to her home for dinner along with some other friends. Three of us meet regularly with another friend to practice "Italian conversation." It was challenging since the visiting couple did not speak much English. They were lovely, and between us all, we were able to keep a conversation going. Italian speakers and non Italian speakers all had un tempo meraviglioso, a wonderful time.