WEEK 45 UPDATE

I hesitated using the above header this week.  Since there was snow in several places of our world, I kind of felt bad.  Yet, I did go swimming this week in our backyard pool.  It was quite lovely and invigorating.  Unfortunately, our weather is dropping about 10 degrees this week so the water may cool off too much for it to be feasible for me to go into it again for a couple of weeks.  Drat! 

Here is what I did this week in the crafting area.

 I finished the hummingbird cross stitch.  It was a very enjoyable project.  So thankful I tried my hand at this art once again.  

I picked up another stitching project.  This one is quite different from cross stitch.

This is a Jim Shore nativity scene.  It is one where you sew on sequins.  See all those black dots?  Everyone of those will have a sequin sewn on when I am finished.  You can see I have started with the green sequins on the boarder as well as one of the wise men's yokes.  This is perfect TV watching fun.

The only knitting I did this week was on the High Effects Feather and Fan shawl.

Another 6 inches completed.

That is a 3 ft ruler next to the shawl.  It is almost 5 feet long and that is totally relaxed.  I still have about 1/4 of the skein left.  I am figuring this will be between 7 and 8 feet long when done.

I finally took the time to lay out my Victorian Lace squares.  There will be 2 lapghans made with them.

I will be using black yarn to connect them and have decided on the flat braid join.  Pardon the cruddy shots but I did not want to take them outside to photograph and my bedroom has poor lighting in it.

Since it is going to be a bit cooler this week (91-93F), it will be a good time for me to work with this and try and get it completed.  That will give me 4 items to turn into the prayer shawl group.  I still have another item on my needles but have been ignoring it for a while.  oops

I did receive a sweet Mother's Day gift from my daughter this past week.

A Harry Potter Bookmark!  This one will be fun as it uses some stitches other than just plain cross stitch.  I may start that this week too.  

My other activity this week has been making new headers for our YOP group to use on their blogs each week.  I may have gotten carried away as I have made 24 of them.  They are so much fun to do.  If you want to try your hand at it, go here.  You do not need to make an account to use it.  The trick is using their 'free' items.  It took me a while to figure out all the nuances of the site but once I did.......................well, 24 blog headers have been made.

Today is Mother's Day in the USA.  Even though we are still to be distancing from others we still have made some plans for the day.  

We will watch Mass at 9 on the TV, get cleaned up and head to our church around 11 where they will be distributing communion (with 6 feet distance between members and masks on) for those of us who watched the Mass.  Then home to eat the leftovers from last nights Italian dinner from our local mom and pop restaurant.  Once that is finished we will get ready to head to our son's home for a little (5 of us total) get together to celebrate Mother's Day.  There will be grilling of hamburgers and hot dogs, card games and lots of love and laughter.

I am wishing all of the Mothers, Aunts, single Dads, Grandparents and anyone else who has helped raise a child, a very happy Mother's Day.  You are all so very important in the life of children.

Until Next Time..................Happy Crafting & Stay Safe!!!!!!

LAST ONE AGAIN

I woke up this morning thinking it was Saturday.  Don't ask me why, I just did.  When I realized it was Friday I was both disappointed and happy.  Happy because I had not missed the day I water my plants or wind my clock. Disappointed because I am looking forward to Mother's Day dinner LOL.  This will be my last post until Sunday's YOP update.

The photos I culled through, are in their individual mailers, addressed, letter written and enclosed and ready to go out the door to the post office.  Hubby is going to go refill our RO water jugs today so will have him take them with him.  No need for both of us to venture out.

I have been spending a lot of time on https://www.fotor.com/ Our Year of Project group is nearing the end of this 'year'.  I wanted to get a head start on making blog heading graphics for the coming year.  It will be the 10th year I have been involved with the group.  I may be the last original member still involved.  What a great group of people from all over the world.  

Last night, hubs and I finished up "The Hunger Games" series of movies.  That had up watching TV until after midnight.  The last two had to be watched back to back.  Otherwise, I would not have slept well.  I really enjoyed the movies, even though they were sci-fy.  I had never read the books, which might have been a good thing.  I find books and movies do not always compliment each other.  Harry Potter was a great example of this.  The Horse Whisperer was another one.

Since we went to bed so late, we slept in until 8 this morning.  Now it is noon and I still have lots of to do's to get done today.  Lunch will be first and then on to the rest of my list.  

Have you seen any really good movies lately?  Something we can get on demand or Disney+?  We do not have Netflix so don't give me one from there.

Until next time.................happy crafting & stay well!

Bloomin' Thursday

Happy Thursday, everyone.  Did you miss me?  I got busy yesterday and by the time I was ready to blog, it was a bit late and I was tired.  

The boxes of photos have been completed and most of them are now put into envelopes and are just waiting to be addressed and mailed out.  One of them will need to hang around my house for a little while longer.  The recipient is not in his home because of the virus.  He is in another state waiting for his state to open up so he and his wife can head back home.  

The cross stitch I was working on is also completed and I got it pressed and in it's frame today.  

It was so much fun to do.  I have started another stitching project.

This project is just sewing sequins and beads in the designated spots.  It says I could use craft glue but I prefer to sew the items.  With the heat we have here, I am afraid the glue would not last long since my Christmas decor is stored in an outside shed.

Last night, hubs and I went to our BFF's house.  They left this morning to take their Daughter In Law to TX to be with her husband.  Those young newly weds have been apart for 6 months, thanks to the virus.  He is in the Army and has not been allowed to be further than 100 miles from his base.  We went over to tell her goodbye and I also gave her 6 dishcloths.  She was so happy to have them.  She said she always envied the cloths I made for my BFF.  It was nice to see her but so hard to say goodbye.  

Today I have been busy in the kitchen.  I cleaned out the fridge.  Found a few science experiments in the back of it.  Then I cleaned up all the fresh veggies we had in there so we could have them at the ready for snacks.  There was also ground beef and deli meats that got vacuum sealed and frozen.

I am now trying to decide what join to use on the Victorian lace squares.  I am leaning towards the flat braid join.  Will try it out yet today and see how it looks.

I need to show you this:

This is the peace lily I received when we had the celebration of life for my mom.  It is now 2 years old.  It has 8 blooms on it and stands 3 feet tall.  It has more than doubled in size since I got it from my dear friend.  It sits in a north window and gets watered once a week.  I trim off the dead leaves and blooms as needed.  Other than that, I have not messed with it since I transplanted it over a year ago.  

Hubby just informed me the pool is 84F.  That is where I finally will get into it.  I will be going in there this afternoon.  But first.................I need to find the sunscreen.  Getting sunburned is not on my to do list today LOL.

I got a hold of my hair dresser this week.  Since salons are supposed to be able to open on Friday (tomorrow) I was trying to find out what the new procedure would be.  I am glad I talked to her.  They will not be opening until next week.  Possibly on Wednesday.  They have not totally worked out all the bugs yet, so I am on standby.  

Dine in restaurants and coffee shops are supposedly going to open starting tomorrow.  Hubby and I do not see any reason to dine in anywhere yet.  We have been quite happy with calling for our food to be take out.  In fact, we are going to do that for Mother's Day.  Our local owned Italian restaurant has a special running for Mother's Day and I asked for that for my meal that day.  Hubby had no problem agreeing to that LOL.  

Time to publish this and get my sunscreen on.

Until next time...............happy crafting & stay well!

  

ROUND TUIT

How many times have I said this......When I get 'round tuit.  Well, today is the day I finally got 'round tuit on a much needed decluttering/cleaning project.  I have been putting it off since the death of my mom.  There was always some crazy excuse.  Today, the excuses ran out.  Here is what I am doing.

This tub was overflowing when I started to get 'round tuit.

This tub is now being worked on.

First bag of trash from the first tub.

There are going to be some very surprised people very soon.  Each of these stacks goes to a different person.  There are 9 stacks.  Once I have gone through all the photos, I will be finding boxes and envelopes to put everyone's photos in and then they are going to be mailed to them.  The tubs took up room under my sewing machine for about 2 years.  Then I moved them to the guest room closet for the past year.  I figured if I couldn't see them, they didn't exist.  

You might wonder why there is such a large bag of trash from photos.  Let me explain this.  Four of the 9 people have had more than one marriage.  All of those marriages did not end on very friendly terms.  Rather than hanging onto unhappy memories, they are being tossed out with the trash.  Also, there are quite a few photos of people no longer living that bring back some unhappy memories.  Those too are being cleared out.  For the most part, going through the photos brought a big smile to my face.  So many memories of good times.

I should be able to finish it up tomorrow.  I spent 3 hours on it today and figure I have another 2 hours to go.  It will be nice to have that completed.  Once the photos are sent to their respective owners, it then becomes their issue.  

Other than that, I really have not done too much else today.  Hubby when to Costco and Sam's today to pick up the few bulk items we needed.  I still need to vacuum seal up some lunch meat and ground beef.  I am putting that on the to do list for tomorrow.  For the rest of the day I am going to work on some stitchery and knitting.  

Do you have any 'round tuit' items in your house?  

Until next time......................happy crafting & stay well!

FINISHED PROJECT.....NOT MINE

As I was telling you yesterday, this weekend, hubby and I spent most of our days at our son's house helping him make a focal point wall in his family room.  I finally got completed about lunch time Sunday.  Here are a couple of photos from the process.

How many men does it take to put tile on a wall?  At least three.  These guys worked nonstop.  My husband got the joy of using a wet saw for cutting the tiles.  My son (the one on the ladder) and his Father in Law (the one in the white shirt) mortared and placed the tiles.  It was great team work.

The finished product.  It really does give a focal point to the room.  My son even cut holes in the wall so he could snake the wires through.  No more ugly cords hanging down from the TV.

I am playing catch up today.  There has been 2 loads of laundry completed, dishes cleaned up, a run to the veggie store, and..............................

Working on the shawl as well as reading up on sourdough.  The starter is still doing ok.  It is not foaming up like most of them seem to but it is bubbling each day and smells very yeasty. (I did not add any yeast to the starter either)  I have about 5 more days and it should be ready to use for bread or something made from sourdough.  

Do any of you change your screens on you phone each month?  I never used to until I found out Knit Picks offers a free calendar screen as well as a 'plain' screen saver.  Here are the ones for this month.

Aren't they pretty?  A fiber addicts dream!  You can find them at knit picks.  This is the first month I found a plain wallpaper (without the calendar on it).  I use the calendar for my lock screen and the other for my main screen.

Time to get back to the knitting.

Until next time......................happy crafting & stay well! 

WEEK 44

Hello and happy Sunday to you all.  It is another 'warm' and sunny day here.  My pool is ready for me to hop into it.  Yet, today will not be that day.  Too much going on and I will not really be at home much today anyway.

Let's talk about my progress this week. 

I continue to work on the High Effects Feather and Fan shawl.  

Slowly but surely it continues to grow.  This is probably my favorite item to work on while watching TV.  Other than the fact it is getting a little warm to sit under.  The little gray/blue owl is where I was last Sunday.  

I still have this much yarn to go.  I have used well past half of the skein.  This will be a long shawl when I complete it.  It will not matter to me though.  There have been times when I wished I had a longer shawl so I could wrap myself in it more.  This will be that shawl.

Of course there were hubby's socks to work on this week too.

The markers show where I was last Sunday.  I need about 1 inch more before I start the heels.  Trying to decide if I want to take these with me today or not.  Oh the choices I have.

I think I am done with my Victorian Squares.

I now have 40 squares which will make 2 laghans for the prayer shawl ministry.  I only have enough yarn to make 3 mores square anyway.  Now I need to decided how I want to attach these together.  I will be using black yarn to attach them.  Any suggestions on what you think would be the best way to attach them?  Please let me know.  It has been YEARS since I have done squares.  That means I am way out of practice on attaching.

Then my newest/oldest craft.

Cross stitch.  The bird on the right still needs some more color added.  After that, I will be doing a daisy stitch on the flowers for their stamens and then it will be all black from there to finish up the birds and do back stitching.  Not sure I will have it completed by next week, but it could happen.

I was hoping to get a lot of knitting done yesterday and yet, I never picked up my needles.  We got a call from our son asking for some home improvement help.  We went over about 1 with the thoughts we would only be there for a few hours.  By the time we got home it was 9pm!  We did have a nice dinner there but my poor husband.  They are laying stone tiles on a wall.  They ran out of mortar just shy of half way up. Of course, all the hardware stores were closed by that time.  So we will be back over there today to help finish it up.  Today, I will take a project along to work on though.

What?  You want to know about the social isolation?  Well, we have all been pretty much apart for 6 weeks.  My husband is the only one who has shown any signs of illness and that ended over 2 weeks ago.  None of us hugged or even touched for the entire day (which was really hard for this lady).  There comes a time when a person can only take so much of being away from her family.  I have reached that point.  Yes, I have dropped over to my son's house a few times in the past month, but have never gotten closer than 6 feet and have always sanitized hands upon walking out the door.  

Now, if we are heading out into public, we have our masks on as well as a bottle of hand sanitizer in my purse or pocket.  We are not completely crazy LOL.  Our Governor has also started to open a few things up in our state.  Hair salons are still on the 'stay closed' list, darn it!  How about where you live?  Have any of the restrictions been eased up a bit yet?  Costco has put into effect the " you must wear a face mask", starting May 4th, to shop there.  There are so many people screaming about that and wanting to know if Costco is going to supply the masks.  Really?  Just because a restaurant requires shirt and shoes to enter does not mean they will supply those items.  Costco already is sanitizing every cart after use. (most of our stores are doing that now)  I figure, using a mask for a bit while doing my shopping is not going to hurt me.  I have done one thing though.  I now carry a ziploc bag in my purse and as soon as I am done with my shopping, I put my mask in there.  When I get home, I put hot water in the bag as well as a bit of soap.  I let it sit for 20 minutes and then rinse it again in hot water.  The mask then goes in the laundry room to be added to a load of laundry to finish it up.  Good think hubby and I have 5 masks each!

In other news, we lost another friend this past week.  He was shot by his wife and died 10 days later.  Needless to say, hubby and I were totally shocked.  We had no idea there were domestic problems in their lives.  Whenever we were with them, they seemed totally devoted to each other.  WOW!  What goes on behind closed doors.......one never knows.

I hope all of you are doing well. 

Until Next Time................Happy Crafting & Stay Well and Safe!

Friday Flash

This will be my last post until Sunday.  The day off from blogging gives me a chance to get some major crafting done.  Hubby finished up the house cleaning today.  That means he can take tomorrow off too.  Since we really can not go anywhere..........BAM!  Extra crafting time.

Yesterday, I told you we were having Tinga Chicken for dinner.  OH GOODNESS!  It was so good.  We had left overs.  So, for today's lunch, I cut 4 corn tortillas into strips and fried them up a bit then added the left over Tinga.  When that was pretty well warmed up I added 4 eggs and scrambled them into the mix.  Just before the eggs were set I added shredded cheddar cheese for extra flavor.  So yummy!  Last night, we just made tacos with the Tinga and that was perfect too.  It was a bit spicy, which is ok with us.  We love spice.

I also showed you my production line of making face masks.  I am happy to say, I completed them all around 4pm yesterday and delivered them to my son's house straightway.  It felt good to have them out of the house.  Now my sewing table is all nice and cleaned off.  

Tonight I am making Tango Chicken salad from my Mr Food Cooking for 2 cookbook.  I have already mixed up the chicken with all the 'dressing' and it is in the fridge to make sure the flavors mingle.  We will put that on top of lettuce and throw 1/2 an avocado on top of that.  Super easy but so good during this hot weather.

While hubby was busy cleaning, I was busy stitching.  It is going so much faster than I believed it would.  The back stitching will take as long as the cross stitching did.  That's fine with me.  Back stitching really makes the piece pop.

Also, while hubby was cleaning, I had a little girl dog want to know when he was going to be done.

Poor old girl.  Luna is not a fan of the vacuum, mop or swifter duster.  She came and kept me company in our bedroom while I watched an old Disney flick.  She is one of the best dogs we have ever had.  It is hard for me to acknowledge she is almost 15 years old.

I am just waiting for the towels to finish drying.  Then it will be time to fold them and put them away.  I also went through my closet again today.  I got rid of a bunch of items I had not worn for the past year and do not see myself wearing in the future.  While doing that, I discovered 3 pair of capris I forgot I had.  How nice to find those.  I even have a pair on right now.  Capris are my main summer wear.  This lady does not do shorts.  Too scary for the public to see that much white leg.

Once the towels are all done, that will signal time for me to pick up a WIP and work on it until dinner time.  It is so nice to get all the daily items done before noon each day.  

Until next time.......................happy crafting & stay well!