POOF! It's gone

And just like that...........my energy is gone.  There really wasn't that much on my to do list for today.  What was there is not time sensitive and can be moved to tomorrow.  After all, I am not going anywhere anytime soon.  

Hubby had to go to the allergist today to get his allergy injection.  Since he was out and about, he volunteered to stop off at the store and pick up the 7 items on our grocery list.  He was able to obtain everything other than corn tortillas.  He said the store was not crowded at all which was nice although, unusual for Walmart.

After lunch today, I decided to sit on the front porch for a while to enjoy some fresh air.

I saw many people out riding their bikes, enjoying the beautiful day we are having.  It is around 80 outside and is supposed to get real close to 90 by Thursday.  The high thin clouds keeps the sun from beating down intensely.  There was a gentle breeze also.

While sitting outside, I did notice spring had hit our front yard.

Our Mexican Bird of Paradise is busting out with all sorts of new life.  By the time it starts blooming it will stand almost 6-7 feet tall.  Each fall we cut it back as close to the ground as we can.  This insures it will be thick and full the next time it blooms.

With my audio book going and my knitting in my lap, I enjoyed a lovely 90 minutes out there.

The fresh air was such a joy.  Seeing people out enjoying the day was a boost also.  

Tonight we will be ordering take out from our local mom and pop Italian restaurant.  They are offering a buy one get one free on their lasagna this week.  It is the BEST lasagna ever.  I will take my home made bread and make garlic bread out of it and serve it along with the lasagna.  We are trying to help keep these small businesses in business.   Who knows how long it will be before these places can open their doors again for customers to come inside.

Hubby spoke with our Texas son today.  He said he is starting to feel a little better.  This would be day 11 of his illness.  He said everyone in his house is keeping a 20 ft distance from him.  LOL  I don't blame them.  Hopefully, no one else there gets it.

There is progress being made on my Feather and Fan shawl.  The stay at home order is so good for my knitting time.  Hopefully my mojo doesn't disappear like my get up and go did.

Until next time..................happy crafting!

It Happened

It finally happened.  Our governor just issued a stay at home order to go into effect on Tuesday, March 31 at 5pm MST.   Hubby and I were pretty sure this was going to happen eventually.  That gives everyone another chance to panic shop for the next 36 hours.  Thank goodness, we are good on everything we need for the next couple of weeks.  

In other news...............Our daughter and her hubby came over last night.  We fed them dinner and enjoyed a little time spent together as family.  I laughed at the son in law.  When he was leaving he looked at me and said "sorry, there will not be hugs tonight.  Love you!"  What a great guy.

This morning I woke up with renewed energy.  I did 2 loads of laundry and then did 2 more loads of DOG laundry.  Their blankets and beds were a bit nasty.  After the dog laundry was done, I had to clean out the washer and dryer to get rid of all that dog hair.  What a mess.

While laundry was going I made a loaf of banana bread for our son.  I changed up the recipe a bit as the last loaf was too dry.  I think this one will be much better.  He said he would let me know after he cut into it tomorrow.  (I delivered it after lunch.  Felt good to be out of the house)

Hubby cleaned the family room today while I was doing all the other stuff.  When he was finished he watered all our outdoor plants and then sprayed all the weed AGAIN!

We will be having leftovers for dinner tonight.  One thing we have learned is, throwing food out these days is NOT allowed.  We have leftover smoked brisket (from last night) and tater tot casserole from Thursday.  Cooking will commence tomorrow night.

Tonight, I am going to work on my pink shawl and see how far I can go on it.  I did 4 pattern repeats last night after our daughter left.   It is a very relaxing knit.  Perfect for my mood right now.

Oh, I talked to our TX family yesterday.  Sounds like our son may have the virus.  He went to the ER but was not tested.  He has all the symptoms other than a fever.  His symptoms are not horrible other than the fatigue.  His cough is mild but he has horrible chest pain in his lung area.  The ER did a chest xray, EKG and blood work and nothing came back abnormal.  Yet to not check him for the flu or covid19?  Oh well.  They did tell him to go home and quarantine for 8 days.  So he has put his whole household on quarantine as a precaution.  

Our daughter brought us a little gift last night.

Have any of you heard or seen these?  Twinings cold infuse for water bottles.  She brought us a variety to try.  Hubby tried one last night and enjoyed it.  I put one in my Contigo water bottle this morning.  I am on my third refill of my Contigo and still getting lots of flavor from the infusion bag.  Thinking this may go on my shopping list for next time.  We drink a lot of water everyday and this is a nice change of pace.

How is your Monday treating you?  Are you all staying well?

Until next time...................happy crafting!

WEEK 40 OF MY 9TH YEAR

Hello everyone.  Are you all doing ok?  We are all fine here, maybe a little bored but doing fine just the same. I woke up super early again today and feel very motivated to get something done around the house.  Don't you just love it when that motivation comes in spurts?  I don't know what I will do yet, but am sure it will be something in the way of decluttering.  Look out house!

It was a good week for knitting.  I have a couple of FO's to show.

Dishcloth #7 has been completed and added to the pile.  Our Daughter and her hubby are coming by today so I am going to give her the cloths I have completed just in case we go on full out governor ordered quarantine.  If I get more completed, I can always mail them to her.  She was hoping for 12 for a wedding gift.  Not even sure she can go to the wedding since we are limiting groups to a total of 10 people.  

Here is the other FO

The Rose City Roller socks are completed. The day after I took them off the needles, I went to grab them so I could photograph them and couldn't find them.  I asked hubby where they were.  He gets this sly grin on his face, kicks off his shoes, pulls up his pant legs and BAM!  There they were already on his feet.  Yup, he loves hand knit socks.

Since he loves them so much, it inspired me to pull the Scatterby socks out and do a little work on them this week.

The bright pink dot on the left sock is where I started this week.  It isn't much but these are not a great TV sock as there are, slip with yarn in front stitches, as well as stitches where you wrap the needle twice when knitting a stitch.  Each row varies as to where those special stitches get placed.  They are best for either listening to a book or music.  I still have about 2 -3 inches to go before I do the ribbing for the cuff.

Since you can see the High Effects Feather and Fan shawl behind the socks, here is where I am now.

It is just about half way done.  See how much yarn is left?  I did fine the ball band and it is:

I never thought I would buy a skein of yarn with 1200 yards in it.  That is a lot of yarn.  

The white sea glass marker (thanks Liz) is where I started this week.  This one I do while watching TV even though I have to be able to count to 6 while doing the lace row.  Otherwise it is knit two rows and purl one row.  Pretty simple.

On Thursday I worked on the Cabled Rosary Prayer Shawl.

It is quite long as you can see.  I can not even pull it open to it's full length on the cables.  This one is NOT TV knit worthy.  It is an 8 row repeat and each row has a little quirk in it that forces me to pay attention to where I am at.  I did manage to get 3 pattern repeats done on it this week.  I am thinking, when this is done it will be more of the size of a lapghan than a shawl.  That is OK too.  We use both in our ministry.  

I do like the openness of the pattern.  Since it is made from Cascade Cotton Club yarn (a discontinued yarn), it will be perfect for year round use.  

I did get most of my new yarn wound up this week.  There are a couple of skeins still waiting.  One of them I can wind at any time as I know it is for socks.  The other skein is being looked at and just might become a shawl for moi.  I have been handling a few skeins of superwash wool (the super soft kind) and it does not seem to be bothering my skin.  I do have one skein of SW destined to become a lovely shawl for me.  If that one does not irritate my skin, then the last skein will also become a shawl.  Fingers crossed!

Last night, we had the son of hubby's, dearly departed best friend, over for dinner.  He was so thankful for a home cooked meal.  He has been surviving on TV dinners and sandwiches since Thanksgiving.  I just might make him a nice pasta casserole and take that over to him.  It would give him meals for several days.  I would also include a nice loaf of my homemade bread to go with it.  That would give me something to do this coming week!

My local son text me yesterday, wanting to know if there were anymore bananas at my house that were in need of going into banana bread.  He also wanted to know if I would have time to make said banana bread.  LOL  Why yes, there are 2 bananas sitting on my counter waiting for me to make them into bread.  I wonder how he knew that.  Guess I will make some banana bread either today or tomorrow.  Seeing they bought me 5 pounds of wheat flour and that is what I use in the bread.  I am such a nice mom, right?

I need to make a loaf of regular bread today.  We went through half of the loaf I made yesterday,  last night with dinner.  Dinner is the only time hubby and I eat bread but with the extra mouth it really made the bread disappear.  Fine with me.  Better to see it eaten then for it to mold!

Our Daughter and her husband are coming over today to pick up their eggs and vinegar that was purchased for them during 'operation family shopping' day.  We will also feed them dinner.  Hubby is putting a brisket on the smoker in a few hours.  Once again we will have homemade bread with it as well as baked beans or maybe a pasta salad.  I haven't decided which one yet.  They are also picking up our cooking pans that got replaced this week.  It will be good to see them again.  Most of February and the first week of March, they both were sick.  They are very conscientious when the don't feel good and will not go to anyone's house during that time.  They have both been well now, for over 2 weeks so they figured they would come to our side of town to see us for a little bit.   

I have managed to stay home since our grocery spree on Wednesday.  Our cases of the virus here has really escalated.  I have no desire to go anywhere at this point. Although,  I may venture to my son's house to deliver the bread and that would be it.  He works from home and his daughter is doing online school.  His wife does work out of the house at a Podiatrist's office but she is the biggest OCD Germ-a-phobe ever.  I figure their house is one of the safest places to be.  Plus, I miss petting their crazy dog.

Doesn't he look like he needs some MiMi loving? 

I will leave you with a little funny I saw the other day.

Until Next Time.....................Happy Crafting!!!!!!!!!!  STAY WELL!

Brighter Day

Another fun day here at Casa de Noce.  Friday's are the day I water my indoor plants and wind my antique mantle clock.  Routine is good at times like this.  The dishwasher got emptied and all the 'winter' coats were hung up and put away until next winter.  I also took the bandage off Luna's foot.  It looks so much better.  Now to try and keep her from licking every chance she gets.  The vet even called to check on her today.  How nice was that!

Hubby ran to the water and ice shop to fill our 2 gallon water bottles.  That keeps our water cooler happy for at least 2 weeks.  He also filled his car with gas (it was $2.09!) and then dropped off Clorox wipes and hand sanitizer at our son's house.  There was a package of wheat flour waiting there for him too.  He is back home now and watching the movie "Pearl Harbor".

Our big adventure today has been making our own hand sanitizer.  We were very lucky to find 91% rubbing alcohol and aloe vera gel in our last shopping excursion.   We will be able to make quite a bit of it with the amount we bought.  It was kind of fun making it.  It starts out looking very runny, but as it sits, it gels up perfectly.  Because of the hand sanitizing we are doing (washing hands and using the sanitizer) we are also using quite a bit of lotion to keep our skin from drying out.  Since our humidity here in the desert is non existent...........Yup, lotion is a biggie for us.    

I was going to sit outside today for a while but it is not very nice out.  Super windy and very cloudy.  Yesterday, I did manage to sit outside for almost 1/2 an hour before the sun decided to go behind the clouds and the wind came up.  It got a bit chilly.  Here are some photos from yesterday's outside knitting.

Enrique came out and joined me for the entire time I stayed out there.  He really is attached to me.

Luna came out but only stayed for about 15 minutes.  She is not as much of an outdoor dog as Enrique.  She prefers the soft couch in the temperature controlled house.  

The sky was so blue when I first went out.  It was amazing.

My view just before I went in.   It will be another 3 months before the pool will be warm enough to get in.  It is nice to sit and look at though.

One of the other bright spots of my day was talking to my lovely friend in Las Vegas.  They are self isolating there too.  She is my knitting buddy that introduced me to a wonderful LYS there in Vegas.  (Sin CIty Knits)  She is always so perky on the phone and can make me smile every time.  Thanks for the chit chat, Patricia!

I am also checking on one of my other best friends.  She is immune compromised and works full time at a Veterinarian's office.  She just told me they have had 4 people there come down with all the symptoms.  Only 1 of them is getting tested.  (Not everyone in AZ is being tested who has symptoms.  How weird is that?)  So they will know something in 3-5 days.  Until then she and I are praying she doesn't get it.  Anytime she gets sick it goes straight to her lungs.  Very scary, right?

Guess what I managed to do yesterday.  I worked on 2 of my WIP's!  Today, I want to concentrate on the High Effect Feather and Fan shawl.  It is about half completed.  That shawl is probably the easiest of my WIP's to work on while watching TV.  The other 2 shawls and hubby's socks all require me watching them closely.  

Tonight is meatless Lenten Friday.  The meal tonight will be Tex-Mex Migas.  I have never made it before but it sounds pretty good and fairly easy.

OK. I am signing off until Sunday when I do my Year of Projects update.  I hope and pray you are all well.  

Until next time......................happy crafting!