End of July Vacation

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I am just tying up some loose ends with this post. I blogged my whole vacation except the last day on our way home. We left New York City and headed back to the same hotel that we stayed at on the way there. in Grove City PA because we liked it. It checked off all the boxes that I look for in a hotel. Comfy beds, a good breakfast that comes with the room. Easy to get to, plenty of parking, plenty of restaurants to choose from and the topper….it was clean and smelled good. I love Holiday Inn Express breakfast…..the abundant cinnamon rolls do it for me. Then Grove City had that outlet mall with that cute donut shop…click here for a review of that….I picked up six and had a hard time choosing, they were all cute. The donuts were small, but very, very tasty and were all the same flavor, it was the frosting that made them all different. They were a bit pricey but she had to pay for that building. The packaging was cute too. It’s gets and A plus.

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The restaurant we ate at was a microbrew place and it was right across the parking lot of our hotel. We both got the fish sandwich and look at this honker! It was good and it also gets and A plus.

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One happy man having a beer and eating his fish sandwich.

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We are leaving NYC, driving down all the streets, heading toward the Lincoln Tunnel, that will take us into New Jersey. The Subway sign on the corner is not the Subway Sandwich Shop, it’s the stairway going down to get underneath the city. It is mind boggling what all is working underneath these streets! When I would see these signs I would think the sandwich shop because that is what I am used to but these are all over. I don’t know if we used this one or not to get somewhere, but I wouldn’t be surprised.

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Of course the Macy’s of the Miracle on 34th Street. I didn’t go in Macy’s though we did walk by it many times. We have a Macy’s here in Fort Wayne that I love to shop at, so no need to fight the crowd.

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I believe we were on 5th Avenue here, showing the shops and especially the big pretty pots of flowers. I saw nothing here that we didn’t have access to at home, either in Fort Wayne or Indianapolis.

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Again the pretty pots in a different shape then before. I liked the bus lane which I thought was good, because having the buses stop in your lane really held up the traffic. This street just had a different atmosphere then some of the others that we were on.

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Just lots of people, stores, you can see the street sign where we were at. We feel like since we have driven the streets of NYC we can drive anywhere, it was empowering! I loved seeing the buildings and the history that we have heard and seen so much about. I loved our neighborhood that our hotel was in back in Long Island City. We never felt uneasy even at midnight and eating breakfast at the delis and watching everyone walking to get to the train to go to work. I loved New York Harbor, ground zero, Hyde Park and Sagamore Hill,. Oyster Bay and of course the Billy Joel Concert at MSG! I was perplexed by the no eye contact when walking down the street and in the subway. So different from the midwest. I really disliked using the Lincoln Tunnel, I was very uneasy. There were so many stones left unturned, but I would be surprised if we ever go back because we just got enough of a taste of it. Two regrets, not stopping at St. Patricks Cathedral and also finding Billy Martins Grave but life will go on. Next July we will be making a trip to Maine and Acadia National Park. Thanks for going on vacation with me.

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Serenity

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This is the largest canvas that I have worked on and I am thoroughly enjoying it. This painting makes my heart sing. I just love color so much. It will be a challenge to get it all scanned in and put together but I will be offering prints of it in my Etsy store.

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Sophie is looking out on my inspiration, through a dirty window. I am going to get out there today and clean it. The last rain a few days ago really did the dirty number on it. Sophie really doesn’t seem to mind though.

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A sneak peek of my next painting. I guarantee it will have much more color on it. That tabletop easel was a great investment of $10.00. It was half off one day at Michaels Crafts and works perfect for the smaller canvases. My 13 year old niece was with me that day. She is an aspiring artist and thought that was a pretty neat buy and she picked one up also. She bought some canvas and some wonderfully bright paints. I am looking forward to seeing what she made with them. The 3 neighbor kids stopped by yesterday to bring over garden goods. Nice red potatoes this time. I love it when they stop because they look for all the cats, see what is in process in my studio, we talk about what has been going on in their lives. One approved of this piece….that is really artistic, you are using all kinds of things like the newspaper and words, thats really good. You cannot get any better approval than that!

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I have a tendency to start using using ALL the colors I like, but I decided to use a little co-ordination on this painting. I think it was working for me. Glad I pulled it out. Hey, thanks for stopping by!