A Drive for Ice Cream and Cross-Stitch Obsession

We'd been promising the boys a drive to Cascade Locks to the "Penguin place" for ice cream so yesterday was the day.  The neon sign has a little penguin on it holding a huge ice cream cone - the place is called the East Wind Drive-in.  They have a drive-thru window, the walk up window is closed due to Covid-19.  There were 10 cars in line ahead of us but we decided it was worth the wait and this is the view from the car.  Dayle walked Mocha in a big grassy area while we creeped along.  :-)

And yes.. it WAS worth it!  :-)

A closer view of the sign.

After we got our cones I drove to our favorite viewpoint, the parking area for the boat marina of Cascade Locks Marine Park.  This is the Columbia River Gorge looking east, that is Stevenson, Washington across the river. 

The river heading west to eventually arrive at the Pacific Ocean.

We moored our sailboat Stargazer in the yacht marina here for several years, it was amazing to sail here.

The boys went down to explore the rocky beach.  During the summer they have a LOT of small sailboat races here and the beach will have boats lined up all down it.

I snapped this photo of the Sternwheeler Columbia Gorge which we've sailed upon many times.

A drive down to the boat launch for a good view of the Bridge of the Gods.  Just around the bend is the Bonneville Dam which is the last dam on the river so it flows free from here to the ocean.  The boys were picked up yesterday by Kristi and today they are heading to the beach for an overnighter with their aunt and uncle.  Lucky boys!

Dayle brought these two zucchini in yesterday.  We just finished off the zucchini bread he made a few days ago and he's going to make a new loaf today.  My recipe calls for Mapleine and it's DELISH.

In other news - I bought this package of wool blend felt on Amazon to use to make the pages in my needle book.  I googled which is the best quality felt and "flic-flac" was supposed to be the best.  Question for you - I was thinking of making the "pages" white or ivory, but then wondered about using red and blue.. what would you do?

I should never need to buy felt again.  LOL!

This is where I am with my flag project.

I am really enjoying this.

I found a free program online where you can design your own cross stitch so I did this for my needle case cover.  What do you think?

I have this Alicia Paulson project to do in the future.

And I found THIS on Etsy.  It arrived yesterday and I ordered the floss and linen online last evening.  Ohhh.. I love this one.  I wonder if I should make the house red?  

Thank you so much to those who reached out to me to offer support after I shared that I was dealing with some sadness on my last post.  I am having to separate myself from some negativity that was affecting my sense of well-being.  I've lost sleep and am still depressed somewhat but I will return to an even keel soon.  Love you all!  ((hugs)), Teresa :-)