WEEK 16

 

Another week gone another week in review blog post coming to you today.

Sunday - After I blogged last Sunday I baked a cake, did some laundry and worked on my SIL's RCR socks.

Monday - My daughter was on my side of town so we spent the day together.  I took her to Mulqueens.  It is a HUGE fabric store geared towards quilters.  The fabric in there is only the type you would use for quilt tops.  We also went to Bath and Body Works so I could pick up some lovely scented hand soap for my house.  After that we stopped and grabbed a bite of lunch.  Onwards we went, after lunch, to the Mall to look at shoes.  Daughter found a pair that were both comfy and could be worn with skirts/dresses as well as pants.  She is substitute teaching and so needs comfy/nice shoes.  I finished one of the RCR socks and got to work on the second sock again.  There were more sourdough crackers made too.

Tuesday - Hubby cleaned house while I ran and did errands.  I went to UPS, USPS, Sam's Club, Banfield Pet Clinic and the Water Store.  I spent the rest of the day working on the puzzle I started a couple of weeks ago.

I finished it only to discover there was one piece missing.  So frustrating since this was a brand new puzzle!

Wednesday - The cleaning of all the counter tops happened today as well as getting ALL the laundry completed.  I normally do the counter tops when hubby does the floors but since I was out and about yesterday, I got to it today.  I also did some straightening up of 'my area' of the family room.  It is all nice and neat now.  I tried so hard to finish up the second RCR sock today.  I stayed up until 1AM working on it.  

Thursday - I did it!  I finished the second sock and now have a pair of socks for my SIL.  Just in time too as her birthday is this coming Friday!

I finally got to the fun part of the sock when I hit the toe.  You can tell that the blue was a gradient also.  It just did not show up while I was working on them.  Took my TX DIL to her Dr appt to get her cast removed.  Her incision is all healed up with a nice scab on it.  She was so relieved!  Then we went to lunch to celebrate her transition into a walking boot.  I ended up taking a 1.5 hour 'nap' after all of this.  It was NEEDED!

Friday - Hubby and I put together my new 'over the sink' dish drainer.  Even though I have a dishwasher, I still have many pots and pans that are hand wash only.  The drainer next to the sink takes up so much real-estate, I wanted something else so I could have that area back.

I love it!  It opened up my sink area so much.  I am now able to actually work uninhibited in the kitchen.  Wish I had taken a before photo, drat!  We went over to Josie's house that evening for dinner and games.  It was so nice to have some fun with everyone.

Saturday - Hubby and I did our normal food pick up for our food pantry at church.  We had lunch with one of the priest we have become friends with.  After lunch hubby and I went and did some shoe shopping for ourselves.  We each found a very comfy pair of shoes to purchase.  With my arthritic feet, that is no small task.  "Hey Dude" shoes for the win!  Extremely lightweight and stretchy.  After shopping we went to Mass at our priest friend' parish.  To cap off the evening we had dinner with our TX son and DIL.  I think I need to come up with better names for the TX family since they live close to us in AZ now.  Any suggestions?

That brings us to Sunday again.  I have no plans what so ever for today.  There is nothing on my needles or hooks.  I have been like that for 3 days now.  Nothing is inspiring me at the moment.  Maybe I will work on my cross stitch for a while until inspiration strikes.

We are still fairly warm here.  In the high 90's most days.  The mornings are lovely though, so I know cooler temps will be here soon.  Maybe that is why my inspiration is waning.  Anyways.........

Until Next Time.............................Happy Crafting!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WEEK 15

 

This has not been a very productive week craft wise.  Let me just give you a 'quick' synopsis of my week in review.

Sunday (after my update) - I made bread, changed the sheets on the bed, stocked our beverage refrigerator, trimmed my basil plant (it died the next day!) and gave my new sourdough starter it's first feeding.

Monday - A glorious cool morning so I took a walk around the neighborhood.  While on that walk I saw this:

It actually made me jump a bit.  Click on the photo to see how real that child looks!  When I got home I tackled a job I had been putting off for a few weeks.  Transplanting three pots of Christmas Cactus into a larger pot.  It is completed and so far they all seem to be thriving in their new home.

This pot is HUGE.  It took 65 quarts of potting soil to get it full.  As I water it more and more I am sure I will be needing to add more soil because it will compact down some.

Tuesday -  Picked up DIL for a 7:30 medical procedure.  It was canceled due to some issues with her blood pressure and pulse.  So, I came home and baked a cake.

Wednesday - Once again picked up DIL for another Dr appointment to find out what was up with her blood pressure and pulse.  Spent over 2 hours at the Dr office getting tests done.  While there, I got my flu shot. Pretty much killed my day.  Josie came over in the evening and had dinner and we sat and talked for quite a while.  I love it when the Grandkids just pop over!

Thursday - I finally got to do laundry and work on some of my crafts.  The sock grew a bit.

The lone DPN is where I was last week. *sigh*  I am not enjoying these socks at all.  Way too boring for my liking.  But I will march on.  I also worked on my cross stitch:

I finished up the pink and blue and am now into the dreaded whites and greys.  No, I am not complaining about it.  It is just hard to see progress when the floss almost matches the cloth.  This project is giving me the most joy right now.  Even though it is slow going, I love doing it.

Friday - Hubby and I did our weekly grocery shopping.  We enjoy doing this together and have lots of laughs while doing it.  I spent some time working on the puzzle, I laid out a few weeks ago.  I find it so relaxing.

Saturday - We picked up food for our church's food bank and delivered it to the church's community center.  Grabbed breakfast burritos from our local mexican food place.  Took a bit of a nap.  Went to Mass and then to our friend's house for a lovely dinner.

Today - I woke up early only to discover my sourdough starter got extra active overnight.  I had starter all over my stove top (thank goodness it is a glass stove top and easy to clean).  It had glued the lid on the crock and was not easy to open it back up.  I got the stove cleaned up and decided to make some crackers with this lovely starter.  Then I put the remaining starter in a clean crock and gave it a feeding (not too much this time).  Crackers are done and I am finished with my week in review.

This coming week looks to be a bit quieter.   In fact, my planner has nothing written on it....Yet.  I know there are a couple of Dr appts I will be taking DIL to.  I am enjoying my time with her.  This gives me the opportunity to get to know her much better.  I am so glad they moved here!

Nothing new on Josh.  Keep up the prayers please!

Until Next Time............................Happy Crafting!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WEEK 14

 There was not a bunch of crafting going on this week.  So, this will not be a very long post (for a change).

I worked on the Madonna and Child cross stitch.

It is very slow going.  Someday I will have the bottom half of this done and will be able to move to the top half.  Then it might look like something other than waves of color LOL.  I plan on working on this quite a bit today.  Hubby has a meeting at church and will be gone for several hours.  That means quiet time at home for me.

I also worked on more dishcloths.

These are all from the same skein of yarn.  I love how the colors move from one to the other.  There are 5 completed and #6 is on the needles.  I am not sure I will have enough to complete #6 but if not, there is plenty more cotton yarn in my stash to complete it.

And that my friends is all for crafting.  However, I am happy to report, there does not seem to be any 100 degree temps in our immediate forecast.

The next few days are looking grand to be outside.  The end of the week will be lovely in the morning hours.  Perfect for a walk around the neighborhood.

Nothing new on Josh.  He has another consultation on October 16th with the Chief scientific officer/director of neurosurgical oncology at Barrow's Neurological Institute.  He has been waiting for this to happen before he makes any final decisions as to who he will have giving him care and what coarse of action he wants to take.  

That is a wrap for this week.  Hopefully next week I will have something more to most about.

Until Next Time.......................Happy Crafting!!!!!!!!!!

WEEK 13

 

Hello again.  So glad you took the time to drop by.  Let me show you what happened this past week.

On Monday I finished another dishcloth.  It looks just like the ones I showed you last week so no reason to post another photo.  After that was completed I did not have any desire to cast anything else on.  So, I started this:

I have not done a puzzle in quite a while.  I am trying to work on this for about an hour a day.  It is very detailed with a lot of GREEN everywhere in it.

Tuesday I did laundry and other household chores.  

Wednesday I was ready to work with yarn again.  I started on another 'To The Point' shawl.  Now that I have culled out my excess yarn it is easy to find what I want to work with.  Hubby and I also cleaned the house this day.  It was his last day home for the week and he wanted everything all nice and clean before he left.  To help keep it clean we went out to our favorite Mom and Pop Italian restaurant.

It was so nice outside we were able to eat on their patio.  Yes, our temps have gotten much better this past week.  No 100's all week.  We will have a few more days of 100's this week but then back down into the 90's.

Thursday I drove hubby to the airport.  When I got home I sat down and finished the 'To The Point' shawl.

I love the red!  This color made me very happy.  Hopefully the recipient will feel happiness too when she wears it.

Friday I started hemming up my Grand Daughter, Jaxon's, dress she is wearing to a wedding next month.  I also made another run to the airport rental car place to pick up my youngest son.   My daughter came over that night and we had a lovely sleepover.

Saturday morning my daughter and I went and did the food pick up for our church's food pantry.  Then we went out for breakfast burritos.  Jaxon came over so I could double check the hem before I did the final cut and sew.  Good thing she did as the under skirt was a tad longer than the outer dress.  Then Josh (the middle son and Josie's dad) called and asked me to join them at the restaurant where Josie works for dinner and drinks.  It was so nice to be with them and their friends. I also picked up my cross stitch and put a few more X's on it.

It is slow going but I really enjoy working on it.  The thing with this is, I can not just pick it up and work on it for just a few minutes.  My goal is to be able to spend at least half an hour when I do work on it.  Not to mention, I can not watch TV while I am working on it.  Too many color changes too often to be distracted.

Today I got up early and went to Mass.  Afterwards, I stopped and picked up a few groceries.  I am now doing a load of towels and watching a movie while typing this.  In just a few hours I will be heading to the airport again to pick up hubby from his trip.

And that my friends is my week in review.  Still no new info on Josh's brain 'lesion'.  We are still waiting for the 2nd opinion and more testing.  Thank you all for you concern, thoughts and prayers.

Until Next Time................................Happy Crafting!!!!!!!!!!!!

WEEK 12 + LIFE NEWS

 

I have much to tell you this week so let's jump right into it.

More FO's this week!

Hubby's socks are finally finished!  The yarn was a dream to work with.  It was Malabrigo in the colorway Atomic.  The pattern is Car Socks by Beverly Johnson and is a free pattern.  I made a FLK heel on these but that is the only change to the pattern I made.  If you look closely, you can see that the right sock's cuff is much darker than the left sock.  I had no idea this yarn was going to be a gradient from dark to light.  But it is fine.  No one is going to see that part of the sock anyway.  As for the contrasting heels and toes.............I am not sure of the colorway but I do know it is also Malabrigo SW wool.

When those were completed, I picked up my SIL socks and worked on one of them.

The lone DPN is where I was last week.  These are so boring.  They do change colors but it is a very long way between changes.  I don't even know if I will get to the exciting part of the skein before the toe.  Not to mention, the yarn is quite scratchy.  I am told it will soften up after a good wash.  I hope so!

Since the RCR sock was driving me a bit batty, I decided to put it aside and work on palette cleansers.

Dishcloths to the rescue.  I have two completed and.......................

One more at the halfway point.  I love the yarn I am using.  It is Sugarwheel Cotton from Hobby Lobby.  I use a size 7 (4.50mm) needle to make these.  This is so soft yet wears quite well.  One skein makes 5 - 6 full cloths.  I will go ahead and use up the skein before I go back to the RCR socks.

I did something else with yarn this week.

I culled out my yarn stash.  There was one more of the large white bags done after this photo was taken.  I separated them into  worsted, bulky, fingering and DK.  These bags were given to the Prayer Shawl ministry group.  It was ridiculous how much yarn I had accumulated and knew I would never live long enough to use it all.  My family already had instructions to donate all yarn to the ministry, upon my demise, so I just took it upon myself to give them a head start. My husband panicked when he saw how much yarn was leaving.  I assured him there was plenty more in my craftroom to keep me busy for years to come.  This was all acrylic yarn and I have plenty of acrylic yarn left in my stash to make more prayer shawls to donate.  It felt wonderful to finally wheedle my stash down to a manageable size.

In case you did not know:

My goal this past week was to keep myself as busy as possible.  Dwelling on the 'what ifs' for my son was not healthy for me or those around me.  I am normally a very 'glass half full' type of person but worrying about every little thing and was making me a 'glass half empty' person.  So, I kicked myself in the bum and decided to find other things to occupy my mind.

FIrst thing I did was clean out my fridge.  And I mean CLEAN it out!  I removed everything from inside of it.  All the shelves were removed and given a good scrub.  Then I cut my plastic shelf liner...............................

And lined each shelf with it to make cleaning easier.

The idea came from a fellow blogger I follow.  She used vinyl placemats in hers.  I did notice, after installing the liner, it shrunk up a tish because of the cold temps.  That doesn't bother me.  At least the main part of the shelf is covered.  Removing the liner and washing it will be much easier than taking the entire shelf out to wash.  I even took everything out of the door baskets and got those cleaned and reorganized so it is much easier to find items.  That took me all day on Monday to do.

Tuesday I cleaned out my free standing pantry.  I love this thing but for some reason, things just get tossed in there and finding items is horrid.  The only shelf that is always organized is my 'baking' shelf.  So, I took out everything and got it all organized, labeled my plastic containers so I knew what was in what, threw out expired items and wiped down the shelves.  It is now a joy to open and grab what I need to make my meals.  I also know I do not need another can of soup for the rest of the coming winter LOL.

Wednesday I picked up Thor from Josh's house and took him to the vet.  The poor dog has terrible allergies not to mention his toenails were longer than most ladies artificial nails.  The vet we met with was fantastic.  He answered all my questions and gave Thor an excellent physical.  He gave me info for over the counter meds to help Thor with his allergies.  They even were able to cut his toenails.  Thor sounded like they were killing him when they did his nails.  He is not a fan of that procedure.  But, he survived and was very glad when we got out of the Vet's office.

This is also the day we were told Joe's car was going to be in the shop until the middle of October.....at the earliest!  (Gotta love having a foreign made car)  So we went out to  the dealership and picked up a loaner for him to drive. That was Blessing #1  On the way home, the windshield go hit by a rock and now there is a 22 inch spidered line in it.  We are waiting for a new windshield but...........it is a brand new car so it has to be ordered and guess what................the windshields are on back order! (yup, another foreign car)  It is still drivable though so that is a blessing.  Not to mention, we have full glass coverage with our car insurance so that is blessing #2!

Thursday and Friday was cleaning the craftroom and culling the yarn.  But the best thing that happened on Friday was this!

We were informed we were Great Grandparents again!  Blessing #3!  Actually she was born on Thursday but we got the news Friday morning.  Welcome to the world, Sophia.  She was 3 weeks early but weighed in at 6lbs 2oz and is 19" long.  She and mommy are doing fine.  They went home yesterday.  Not sure when we will get to see her in person since she lives in Texas.  But hopefully it won't be long.

We also did our grocery shopping on Friday.  Why does it wipe a person out to grocery shop one day a week?  I was so tired by Friday night.  Good thing we had leftovers in the CLEAN fridge for dinner.

There is no more news on Josh.  He had his MRI's done this past week and we have the reports but there is still not a real conclusion as to what is going on with his brain lesion/tumor.  Not to mention the medical jargon was so dang confusing!  He is still hoping to get a second opinion from the other neuro center here in town before he makes any final decision as to what course of action to take.  So, please keep those prayers going.  He seems to be handling things much better now and is at the point where he just wants answers and action.

How many of you are old enough to find the humor in this?

And that, my friends concludes this addition of today's blog post!

Until Next Time......................Happy Crafting!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Week 11 Of YOP 13

 Sitting here, watching my dog sleep/snore.  It is nice and quiet in my house.  I love a quiet early morning.  It won't last long, though.  Hubby has a meeting at church this morning, one of our Granddaughters is coming over to have me hem her formal dress for a wedding and then hang out to study for her insurance license test.  There is quite a bit of kitchen work I need to get to today too.  So, I will enjoy this bit of respite time and use it to update my blog.

I have a finish this week!

A Wee Sherlock sweater is completed.  It is a size 3-6 month.  It will be going to Texas for our Great Granddaughter who should be here in the next few weeks.  This is still my favorite pattern to make for all my special babies.

Of course there is a baby beanie to match.  There were so many different patterns tried for this hat. (four actually)  I finally settled on one that had the garter bottom that matched the sweater's bottom.  I added the cable on it so it would truly match the sweater.  Both of these FO's plus last weeks baby blanket FO will be heading to Texas as soon as I receive the address where they want them sent.  They are moving shortly and asked for the package to be sent to her parents home.

With those completed, it was time to decide what to work on next.

I grabbed hubby's sock and decided I wanted to get it going again so he would have a whole pair shortly.  There were only 10 rows put on it last night.  This will be my main project until it is completed.  Then I will move on to my SIL's socks and get those done and in the mail.

I have no other major plans for knitting at the moment.  My biggest plan is go go through all my yarn and thin it out.  I have yarn in there from YEARS gone by and will never use it.  The prayer shawl ministry, at church, is always looking for free yarn. (Especially acrylic)  I will be bagging it up this week and taking it them next Saturday.  This is not an excuse to purchase more yarn, though.  I will still have plenty left to play with.  

There were treasures in the mail this week too.

I finally broke down and ordered a set of QSnaps for my cross stitching.  Hoops are nice but do not hold the fabric taunt enough for my liking. I had used these years ago when I was cross stitching all the time.  Then, when my hands got so inflamed, I thought I would never cross stitch again and got rid of ALL of my floss, QSnaps, hoops, cloth and pattern books.  Who knew I would be able to take the craft up again 15 years later!

My 2024 Hobonichi Techno Weeks planner also arrived this week.  The planner itself is dark navy.  The cover is what gives it the interesting little art clips.  As soon as these planners go on the market, I grab one.  They sell out very quickly each year.  This has been my planner going on 3 years now.  Karen from Pumpkin Sunrise blog fame, is the one who introduced me to them.

News on my son, Josh.  He has had his consultations with the neuro's at Mayo Clinic.  There are more tests to be done.  He already had an EEG completed this past week.  We are now waiting for 2 more MRI's to be done before they decide what they will do next.  He is also hoping to get into Barrow's Neurological Institute for a second opinion. The waiting game is hard.  The not knowing what is going on in his brain is hard.  Being his mom and not being able to kiss it and make it better is the hardest.

We are keeping the faith and praying.  All of us are trying to stay strong for him and his family.  We have our moments, in private, when we break down too.  We are trying to continue living our normal lives.  It is not easy but we are trying.

I leave you with a photo taken last weekend.  This is Josh and Josie at the Metallica concert they went to last week. This was also 3 days after we were told there was a brain tumor.  

Memories in the making! 

Until Next Time...........................Happy Crafting!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WEEK 10 Prayers needed!!!!!

Hey there!  Want to see what I did this week?

TA-DA!

 The Baby Blanket for our Great Granddaughter is completed!  I am so glad to have that off my lap.  It is a very warm blanket.  It is made with Pipsqueak yarn from Bernat.  So soft and squishy too.

Immediately, I cast on the next GGD knit.

Wee Sherlock is in progress.  This is usually a quick knit for me.  Unfortunately I have not had as much time to work on it as I would have liked.  Read on below to find out why.

On Wednesday I received a frantic call from Josie's mom.  She needed me to get over to their house ASAP.  I flew out the door and got the their house in record time.  My son had just received the results from his MRI and was totally freaking out.  Seems he has a brain tumor!  Not at all what any of us thought was going to show up.  So, now things start to get crazy.  I spent several hours with him as we waited for his wife and daughter to get home.  He was in a total state of shock as were most of us. Nothing could have been further from our minds, last Friday, when he went to get an MRI!.

Thursday we got the good news that Josie's car finally got fixed.  It was still under warranty so the repair was done for free!  I took Josh out to pick up the car which was 35 miles (one way) across town.  It was nice to have a one on one time with him so we could discuss his diagnosis and what he was planning on doing next.  

Friday I got another call from Josh (this is the one with the brain tumor) that he needed me to come and take him to pick up his MRI disc and get it to the Mayo clinic as he has an appointment on the 5th with the neuro-oncologist and also the neurosurgeon.  This was another 60 mile trip (one way).

We are blessed to have two excellent neurological centers here in the Phoenix area..  We have the Mayo Clinic and also Barrows Neurological Institute.  The Doctors at these two facilities are some of the best in the world.  Yes, we are blessed.

We would appreciate all prayers for Josh. Our other son (Jay) and his family are going through medical things too that I am helping out with.   With all that is going on, I do not know how often I will be with blogging. I will try and keep y'all updated as we are.  Not to mention, this blog is a wonderful outlet for me to express myself.

Until Next Time.................Happy Crafting!!!!!!!!!!!!