What I Did On My Summer Vacation

Remember doing those summer vacation reports in grade school? Me neither.

I'm doing this more for me than for you. I'll be writing more detailed posts on my various blogs. This is functioning as my Table of Contents and link center (adding links as posts are written). You're welcome to come along for the ride!

LAX - BOS
I mended (until I dropped my seam ripper under my seat) and sketched.

Getting from Boston to Providence was an adventure. More on that later.

Providence
A short and wonderful visit with Patucci and Mark, including perusing the Repair and Design Futures at the RISD Museum [museum link] (closes 6/30/19)
My long post about it link.

View this post on Instagram

RISD Museum: Repair and Design Futures through 6/30/19 This is text from the exhibition. #mendingmatters #slowsewing #slowstitching #mending #mendingasmetaphor

A post shared by anne m bray (@annembray) on Jun 13, 2019 at 1:57am PDT

A few tense moments chasing the box of art, which I picked up at the Post Office as I was leaving town:

Vermont
Rendezvoused with Annie at her sweet cabin.

Finished customizing the tiaras for our 45th high school reunion parade.
Covered a random princess (on Annie) and Hello Kitty (on me) with our school's founder, Emma Willard

Got the art out of the box and affixed to foam core for display at the reunion.
More on the art on the On the Edge blog.

Troy, NY
As mentioned, 45th reunion. A small, yet mighty gathering of the class of '74

Ready for the Parade of Classes [photo by Liz Westbrook '75]

Severo showed up Saturday night and he joined us for the Class Dinner:

Barneveld, NY
A few days at Mom's, plus museum visits.

Meetup with Shelbee and Sons at The Adirondack Experience!
Writeup link here.

Tiffany exhibit at the Munson Williams Proctor Institute (through September 8, 2019)

It seemed that every time we were in transit, it rained. The drive from Barneveld to Newark was especially harrowing -- Severo almost hit a deer on US17, a six lane highway.

NYC
William Greenberg Desserts, the Met, shopping -- an ideal day in the city.

Met Camp exhibition (through September 8, 2019) for her:

Richard Quinn AW18-19

Met Play It Loud exhibition (through October 1, 2019) for him:

Posing with Lennon's Rickenbacker

Gluttony East link
Dessert Gluttony link

EWR-LAX
Aerial views and Procreate patterns:

Have a vacation planned? Summer at home? Link!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Linking up with
Patti's Visible Monday
Shelbee's Spread the Kindness
Catherine's #ShareAllLinkup
Ageless Style Linkup

A Cloudy Day at the Beach, Hunting Island, SC

Last week Severo and I flew East to visit my mom on Fripp Island in South Carolina.
Despite my clumsy falling-and-spraining-my-knee episode, we had a great time.
[I think I have eaten my fill of shrimp for a few months!]

Here is our visit to Hunting Island, the next Island north of Fripp (which is a gated, private resort).
Hunting Island is one of the few South Carolina State Parks with beach access and camping.
It was hard hit by Hurricane Matthew in 2016, and the park was closed for a long time, much to the consternation of all who like to visit. There are still a lot of fallen trees and riff-raff on the beach and throughout the island. Slowly, the state is getting it cleaned up, and rebuilding demolished structures.

Severo, me, Mom

Mom and Severo survey the beach.

Beach vista. The "foam" on the sand is soap suds. I don't know why.

Beach feet.

How to dress in an uncoordinated manner, plus cane.
A non-fashion comfort statement!

Driving around to the lagoon, rustic road!

At the lagoon, with tilting palms -- result of the hurricane.

Waterlogue (digital watercolor) of the lagoon.

The Hunting Island lighthouse, as seen through one of the display shed's windows.

The lighthouse, which one can climb for a $2 admission fee. We didn't.

Unintentional selfie outtake, as one does when everyone is 60+.
The tilted horizon adds to the whole effect.

Linking up with
Patti's Visible Monday
Catherine's #iwillwearwhatilike
Shelbee's Spread the Kindness
Judith's (April) Hat Attack

#tbt Spring Break: Fripp Island, SC #MBsociallydriven

SPONSORED/ UNPAID 

My mom takes an ultimate Spring Break -- every January, she leaves the "Lake Effect" Snow Belt of central upstate NY and "snowbirds" on Fripp Island, South Carolina until Easter-time.

-- You know it's coming... my 9 second #MBsociallydriven slide show:

Want to create your own mini slide show? It's made from geotagged Instagram images, US locations.

Click on THIS LINK while on your smart device, enter your zip code, choose five images from Instagram, et voila. 

I've had the pleasure of visiting Fripp a couple of times. Mom has a villa with beautiful wide sandy beach almost directly out her back door. Oh how I yearn to live with a view of the ocean!

If I had the time and energy, I'd add the time-lapse from this view. Maybe later...

Transport me here NOW!
Linking up with Shelbee's On the Edge of the Week linkup
and Catherine's #SaturdayShareLinkup

You're never too old for a Spring Break! Where do you want to be right now?
Link and tell!

Summer Travel -- Packing Light

Last week I bombarded my Instagram with my week-long whirlwind adventure on the East Coast.

Fun times! 

I did not want to pay for inflight checked luggage, was traveling by various modes of transportation (plane, ferry, bus, subway, train), and needed to keep my load streamlined. I required a range of garments to take me from the city (Providence and Manhattan) to casual 4th of July activities (and inactivity) at my Mom's. Not to mention a Smithereens concert in the Hamptons. 

All packed and ready to go, with a Züca roll-aboard and Fabletics tote.
This is before I realized that I could use the tote's yoga mat straps to anchor my pillow.

For packing, I've been using an ever-changing Excel doc for years.

Both a hand-written list and my Excel chart. 

The Monday before I left, I came up with a perfect travel outfit:

I added black modal lounge pants and clogs and wore this on three (maybe four) days of my trip, including my day in Manhattan with Ally (see Ally's writeup here). Perfect fabrications for summer in the East (cotton, rayon modal) and the knits gave comfortable stretch.

The Züca roll-aboard comes with a set of six zippered pouches, which helps compartmentalize one's packing.
Here are the socks that I packed:

I only wore the two pairs in the foreground. The weather was too hot.

Another item that I didn't wear was what I call my "Paris" tunic,
so called because the print reminds me of a 50's French illustration style:

I just wasn't feeling it.

To be more efficient, I now save my packing charts and notate which garments did not get worn. This can save me from packing them again. With the above tunic, I remember thinking "If only this were 4" longer." I have more of the fabric, so it has been sent to the Sewing Mountain for rehab.

Linking up with My Refined Style
and
Patti's Visible Monday

Do you ever pack the same thing over and over and never wear it?

My Dream Suitcase

When you read this, I will be far far away from home and on vacation. Woohoo!

As I prepared for my trip, I envisioned my dream suitcase:

• It had those modern roll-in-all-directions wheels.

• It had a telescoping handle that operated as smooth as silk.

• It was hard, and exactly the shape and size of my mom's fifties train case from her honeymoon suitcase set that I took on sleepovers with my cousin. (It was ideal for storing the Barbies).

Source

How about taking said case and frankensteining on the other two parts? THAT is my dream suitcase: small enough to fit under the plane seat and sturdy enough to rest my feet on.

These daydreams transpired because last January, during a harried "Amazing Race" type sprint between gates, I gave myself bursitis in my left shoulder from carrying an overloaded tote and clutching my laptop with a death grip. My right side isn't allowed to carry anything (thanks lymphedema). In March, I experimented with using a small rollaboard for the electronics. It worked OK, but I had my boyfriend along to do the heavy lifting, and the handle does not retract well.

So I daydreamed... and in passing, mentioned my pipe dream to my co-worker. She said "There's a rolling suitcase the skater girls use that they can sit on to put on their skates." (Her son plays hockey). OMG! How genius! A roll-aboard that can be sat on during all that standing around and waiting. THIS I had to track down!

Meet the Züca!

Source

Here is a video of the Züca in action:

I tried to get 18 days of outfits into mine, but was thwarted by the beach towel and, well, a few other things.

FBFF - Vacation!

Ah, vacation... where are you? The old Go-Gos song comes to mind:
"Vacation
All I ever wanted
Vacation
Had to get away"

My summer semester has just started, so I must wait until August. I'll be joining Severo on some East coast gigs (Smithereens in Springfield, MA 8/9 and Circle Line Cruise of NYC harbor 8/10). There is the annual family gathering on Martha's Vineyard starting 8/21. In between, I'll be bumming around, crashing with friends, just like a teenager!

In my mind, I am already packing... 

Huipils to endure the humidity

My favorite plastic sandals

The Pink Shawl for travel and chilly nights

Assorted scarves

Those are the first things that come to mind.
I'll be using my virtual packing vacation board on Go Chic or Go Home to plot it all out.
Plus my handy excel list.

This is a Fashion Beauty Friend Friday post on the theme Vacation. Created by Katy of Modly Chic, FBFF is a lively group of bloggers. This week's contributions can be seen here.

Friend Friday: vacation!

photo by my mom, Martha's Vineyard, 8/07

Friend Friday. This is an opportunity for fashion and beauty bloggers to share their thoughts on a specific topic and read what others have to say on it. Here are my answers to this week's 5 questions on the subject of packing for vacation.

Click here on Modly Chic to read all the responses.

When it comes to packing for vacation what’s your mantra? 
comfort, style, comfort

What are your must packs?
huipils (that's one in photo above), 
hat (just got a new one), chinese plastic sandals, camera (aged Nikon Coolpix 995), sketchbook

What are you happy to leave behind? 

the clutter!

Any packing secrets that help you get everything into one 
suitcase?
wear the large bulky objects if it's winter
. leave the jeans home.

Beach reading… what are you taking with you to read in the sand?
I'm thinking Robinson Crusoe