New blog

There is a new blog in town by Anna Scott, the editor of a well known magazine. I just checked it out, and it is beautiful!

Just a little giddy

I have been waiting to post this until I took some new pictures, but I cannot find my camera. I looked for it yesterday from 2 PM until supper time. I got a lot of cleaning done, but I did not find my camera, so this post will be pictureless.

The Homewood Embroiderer's Guild will be participating in the Hearts 'n Hands Quilt Show on October 6 and 7 as a guest! This is working out really well for our guild. (You are all invited to the show. It will be at Columbia Central School at 94 Richton Road in Steger, Illinois.)

I was looking in my FUPpie (Finished Unframed Projects) drawer for things I could prepare for the show... and I had quite a stack. (I was going to show you the stack...) I also had quite a stack of coupons from Joann Fabrics, and I thought... this might work. DD2 and I went to Joann's, and the frames were all 60% off! I got 6 frames for $60; the most expensive one was $24. (My daughter says my Dutch is showing.)

I haven't started pulling them apart yet, but it won't take long to frame 6 of the pieces from my fuppie pile.

We have close to 150 pieces to display at the show... come out and see us!

Iowa pictures

Here are the pictures I promised from Iowa. This is my dad (in the middle) with his two brothers.



From left to right this is me, my mom, my aunt (dad's sister) and her husband. This was taken in a steak house that had very good steaks.



My dad wanted to show me the Middleburg Cemetery, where his parents, aunts, and baby sister are buried. It was a lovely day, and a very beautiful setting; very peaceful and quiet.



Here's my grandparents' gravestone. The date of my grandfather's death is 1935. My dad hardly remembers him... even though he does have a memory of being in that place during the funeral.



Here's the gravestone of his baby sister. She only lived for a month. Even after 80 years that was very sad. There were several gravestones with little lambs on them, all of infants.



Here is a picture of the bustling metropolis of Middleburg (or should I say smallville?); picture taken from the cemetary. There was a store there when my dad was young, a couple of churches, and maybe 1/2 dozen houses.



I was a little surprised that I didn't remember how beautiful NW Iowa is; rolling hills and "fruited plains." On our way there and back we went through windmill farms:



(The box on the top of this windmill is as big as a car!)

The family was very happy we were back. Here's P modeling a Halloween ensemble, a witches hat, a spider bracelet, and a self-propelled broom.



He greeted me with a litany of disasters that happened while I was gone: P & C and momma got locked out of the garage and were late to school (that one was my fault); math homework was a bear one night (it took two adults and a boy to solve the story problem); and "someone" dropped the toothpaste in the toilet. Hopefully everything will be better now I am back. It is nice to be missed.

OT--NW Iowa

Thank you for the kind thoughts and the messages. I really appreciated it. Now, for something completely different! I am in NW Iowa with my parents. I came along to do much of the driving, and I am having a wonderful time. My dad's 2 brothers, sister and BIL all live in the area, along with bunches of my cousins, most of whom I haven't seen in 20 years. Dad is having a fine time visiting with his brothers, we are staying at my aunt's house, and we are enjoying ourselves. The first night we were here, one of my cousins and his wife stopped by, and we had a nice visit. On Tuesday we had dinner at my uncle's house (he cooked!) and a different two of my cousins came by after supper and we had a nice visit. We talked for 3 or 4 hours! Yesterday we hit the dollar store and the thrift store in the morning and then went to a different cousin's house for tea, and her sister was also there. If you are counting, that is 5 of the ones that live in the area. Of course, there are more cousins that live farther away. Today we looked at some of my dad's childhood haunts and the cemetery where my grandparents and great-grandparents are buried. I did espy a quilting/needlework shop and picked up a DOW (days of the week) embroidery iron-on and a set of "feed sack" dish towels to embroider them on. Then we went to see the egg "factory" my uncle started, which is now run by his son and grandson. That always fascinates me. Tonight I hope to see my college room mate! A week full of renewing relationships. Pictures to follow.

What's been going on

I finally admitted yesterday (to myself) that I am depressed. It is not a severe depression, just more of a persistent case of the blues, but it has been here for some time. When I mentioned it to my family, they all said, "Duh!" I wish they had told me, I would have started doing something about it sooner. Yesterday I went for a walk, and I hope to get some exercise in today too; that is the main thing to do to get over a depression. Of course, when you are depressed it is hard to get going too. I hope that working on this will help me get back to my stitching. I miss stitching temari so much, but when I think of picking up a needle I just get faced with a big wall of blank, and I can't do it. I will be okay, but thank you for listening.

Other knitting going on

I have done a couple of things besides baby blankets this summer. Here is a scarf knit with a novelty yarn. It took less than an hour to make. Here is the yarn:

You can see the yarn at the bottom, with the black thread, which is what you actually knit. The funny thing is that you knit it lengthwise: cast on 90 stitches, knit back once, then bind off. Guess who loves it?

More than a week ago a friend and I went to Stitches Midwest, a knitting show in Schaumburg, IL. We had a lot of fun! We both had budgets to stick to, and I managed to keep to mine, except for lunch. I didn't really want to spend my yarn budget on food! I got a kit to make a necklace out of a ribbon i-cord that should turn out pretty cool. We saw a demonstration of making a necklace from a crochet chain with beads added; I have been working on that one. And we both fell in love with a very simple shawl knit in garter stitch with a very fine mohair on big needles. Carol bought yarn for it. I had some mohair, but it is not fine... so we shall see. I got a couple of needles that I "needed" and some notions. We had a wonderful time!

I also knit up the skirt kit I got at the Midwest Fiber Festival. I stitched it on to a t-shirt, because it seemed like it was going to be too short... then the back stretched out. I am going to take it off the t-shirt and put it on an elastic waistband. Hopefully we can get it to stretch out all the way around. I think it will be cute, if we can manage that.

Work on the 3rd baby blanket is progressing. I was kicking myself, because I hadn't ordered enough yarn, and then I couldn't remember where I had ordered from. I was prepared for a horrible difference in dye lots (it was my own fault) but when the new yarn arrived, it was the same dye lot! I guess some times you are just lucky. Pictures will be coming soon.

Tomorrow is the first day of school. C starts first grade, and P is going into 5th. There are some extra nerves because of starting a new school, but we got a tour of the school last Friday. C saw her classroom, and P even got to meet his teacher. We figured out what door to go in, how to drive around the school for drop off and pick-up, and we have 95% of the supplies packed in the school bags. We still need some markers, some erasers, and a couple of dry erase black markers... hopefully it will be Walgreens to the rescue.

Last week we spent a day in Michigan. My folks have sold their condo and are moving into a retirement home... mom is tired of cooking, and they will get their main meal in the dining room each day. Of course, since they are giving up their house, they are distributing a lot of their treasures. I got 3 teacups from my mom's china, used when we were growing up. I got 2 crocheted bedspreads and a queen sized quilt that I had made for her... a crystal bowl, and a vase from Bariloche, Argentina, that was a treasure growing up. (We vacationed there several times.) DD1 and DD2 also received some nice heirlooms. It is not necessarily a happy transition, but mom and dad are excited; I am pleased they are wise enough to make this change on their own.
I wrote this post last week, but didn't get pictures until today. I need to get back into my blog routine!

The Last Hurrah of Summer

We had a lot of fun this summer, mostly close to home. We participated in the summer program at our church. C was in the "fun and games" workshop: water balloons, sidewalk chalk art, tag, etc. She was nicely exhausted when she got home. P participated in the carpentry workshop, and got to use a chain saw! =:-O This is a picture of him receiving prizes at then end, tools for his own tool box, a screwdriver, a tape measure, and several other things. After this presentation we all went outside and watched them launch the rockets they had made. He had a grand time. I am having computer issues. My own computer will not link to the Internet at the moment, while every other machine in the house is linking with no problems. So I am using DH's older computer, which has its own issues; one of which is that I cannot edit my pictures. Please pardon all the extraneous background. Also, I am having trouble editing this post; I hope it makes sense. Munster Memorial Park This park as a small memorial for each of the wars the US participated in in the 20th century. I was a little shocked by how many there were. Here is C posing with the lady representing "the home front" during WW II. I liked this view of the helicopter: it almost looks like it is taking off from a swampy jungle area. Here is P posing with a map of Vietnam. He was quite interested in all the exhbits; it was a nice place to visit. Again, I apologize for the way this looks!