The Beaches Are Very Quiet & IBOL

Today was the first day of school can you tell?? LW and I decided we would spend the day on Stone Island. Which isn't an island but a peninsula :) Monday is always a good day to go because families are at work and school. There are no cruise ships in port on Mondays so that the beaches aren't hip to hip with very pale skinned visitors. One of the reasons we tend to go on Mondays and especially in late August and September is to provide a bit of business to the little palapa restaurants. The next 6-8 weeks can easily be the demise of any business but most especially the little family run ones. Besides the lack of tourists & customers this is the months of really high tides. The tides will come clear up to the kitchens in the back of the palapas. These high tides can really cause a loss of business. The tide was really HIGH today with the full moon.

This little ceviche cart is sitting even with the beach chairs we are sitting in, under Rudi's palapa. :) It was about 1:00pm and the tide was going out. It had been clear back behind LW so that it was lapping against the back of the restaurants. Which if you look at the bottom of the V, the two awnings form there is the top of a pinkish building. See it??? That is the back of the palapas!!

As you can see Charli and Rubi are always up for a day at the beach. It's the only place to really take a siesta :)

There is a little fishing village on Stone Island and that's about it. The peninsula sits right across from the Mazatlan Port. This is LW Charli and me headed back to the little ferry pangas. I must confess that this is not a picture from today. This was a trip before little Rubi came to live with us. But there are not to many pictures that both of us are in :)

Okay time to get just a wee bit serious. But we can still have fun!! What you may ask is IBOL in the title??? "Iraqi Bundles of Love". There is a group of military service people who have organized an awesome collection project. They have put the request out for fabric and sewing notions to be sent to Iraq. They will distribute them to the Muslim women in their area to make quilts etc. with. :) Now I know that you ALL have stashes of fabric , you know I'm right!! :) This doesn't have to be huge yardage pieces. Heck I bet somewhere in your stash piles is an unfinished project or two Send it, surly it will make pieces. How about those spools of thread that will never be used again because you'll never get them matched. Or I bet if you look there are white, black and navy color spools multiplying in your thread box :)

How about packaging up a nice little Just Because I Care parcel and sending it off to a Kindred Sister!!?? You can use their button to get to their blog. All the detail you need are there. If you look over on the right side bar at the top there is a list of items. The FAQ has how to, where to, and even what to mail. Take a minute and read through it. There is a deadline and it's coming right up. They need to have the parcels postmarked by the 7th of September. This will give them enough time to distribute them before the end of the Holy season of Ramadan.

Wouldn't be sooooooooooooooo awesome to have a warehouse full of love for these guys to distribute?? Well we could do it. :) On August 16 the first parcels started to arrive.

Today's arrivals placed the count up to 100!!!!!!! :) Oh and look there are no huge bundles they are all small, no one will miss that out of their stashes. So how about 1) Take a trip over to the IBOL blog and decide to get involved. 2) Grab their button (you can grab it off of mine or grab the one on their blog), post it on your side bar 3) Blog about it spread the word the 7th of September is only days away!!! 4) Put together your Just Because I Care parcel, leave a comment on the IBOL blog and they will give you the current address to mail your parcel to.

There now it's as easy as 1-2-3-4 and think how darn good you will feel. A cleaned out stash pile and a small gift to a kindred sister. Sometimes just one little artist CAN make a difference :)

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow depending on where in the world you are ;)