I hope you had a nice long holiday weekend in America! Although the weather was pretty ghastly here, again on a Saturday, the day was very special for those of us in Baltimore. As I mentioned the other day, I was attending the re-dedication of the Washington Monument, the first built to honour George Washington, pre-dating the one in Washington, DC by several decades. Although it was chucking down rain, nearly 1,000 people showed up for the dedication ceremony.
We had tried to get downtown for the naturalization ceremony for 39 new US citizens, including one of my dear friends, whom I have known since she arrived on these shores from the UK, many years ago. They moved the ceremony to the elegant Garrett-Jacobs Mansion because of the rain, so we missed it.
With the generosity of our friends at Hotel Indigo, the entire square was draped in beautiful red, white and blue bunting and it looked terrific!
This included the stunning Peabody Library, one of the most beautiful buildings in Baltimore.
There were soldiers in the streets, 
I love this picture of our friend Faith Millspaugh, the Vice President of the Mount Vernon Conservancy, opening the door to the Monument to welcome visitors for the first time in many years.
Faith and another friend, Lance Humphries, 
If you look closely, you will see a Scalamandré red zebras umbrella and two people huddled under it!
It was a lovely event, and I am so proud of my friends who made it happen through lots and lots of hard work and persistence. As the day wound down, the Monument was lit with its new lighting scheme, which shows off its beautiful and elegant shape.
To top off the day, we headed out to a lovely dinner in a friend’s meadow and celebrated the birth of our nation!
Thanks to friends Wesley, Curtis and Martin for “lending” me their pictures!
Meg what a memorable and historic weekend for you and your friends!
ReplyDeleteBeautiful images in spite of the weather!
xoxo
Karena
The Arts by Karena
what a glorious weekend + wonderful story of your friend from UK. xxpeggybraswelldesign.com
ReplyDeleteYes indeed. All your industry for the sale and then an opportunity to savor the industry of others at a celebration of music and tradition. Good Job! Now, Meg I ask advice of you. As I frequent tag sales of late, colorful tea towels seem to shout buy me, buy me. I am drawn to textiles. and the tea towels some folks no longer appreciate --as they seem to have sat folded up in a draw( lucky me) and now I want to use them/enjoy them. Having visited a tea towel manufacturing web site I now realize that these are no doubt a dime a dozen-- granted I haven't seen dozens through the years . Maybe because I actually look for them in the pile of linens on the bed or tucked away in a closet. Anyway-- How do you approach using your tea towels?. For example, my current dish towels are jammed into a drawer with other kitchen paraphernalia and I can't bear to treat these tea towels in that manner. Is there ceremony and decorum afforded your colorful tea towels ? A drawer dedicated to their storage a laundry cycle allotted to them only? Pressing with scented water. Should I expect shrinkage only wash in cold water? A tea towel treatment treatise would be appreciated, thank you.
ReplyDeleteBUY THEM! USE THEM! It takes me a few months to go through a roll of paper towels. And now that Connor's gone, even longer. I use linen - and only linen - tea towels for cleaning up everything. I keep them rolled up in a basket in the kitchen and just grab one to use. Then i chuck them down the stairs to the basement where they lie in a heap until I am doing laundry again. Wash and line dry if possible. Every so often, I soak them in Oxyclean for a few hours, but it's really not necessary. And if you line dry them, you can just fold them up and they will have a crispness to them that you don't get when you tumble dry them. And if you do tumble dry them, DON'T use any fabric softener. It coats them and they won't dry as well (same applies to terrycloth towels).
DeleteNew towels will have sizing on them and will need to be washed a few times to loosen up. They will last FOREVER! (Think mummies!) I pick them up when I find them in thrift shops and at yard sales. In fact, we had a bunch at the barn sale a few weeks ago, but i kept my paws off them. I probably have 30+ towels that I use.
I've written about these towels several times:
http://pigtown-design.blogspot.com/2008/06/tea-towels.html
http://pigtown-design.blogspot.com/2012/05/weekend-update-may.html