Monthly Archives: May 2016
Into the city
After some necessary shopping for some small items this morning, we headed into the “big city”, Seattle. Our son lives right across the street from Pike’s Place Market which is a big shopping area for tourists and locals. It is a place where farmers and artists rent stalls to sell their products.
After meeting up with our son, we decided to have lunch. We were amused by the name of this building, “The Sanitary Market”. It just had a 100th birthday this spring. Apparently being built when horses were still big on the street, they wanted it known that it was a “cleaner” place. We had a wonderful Mexican lunch there. The menu has both regular and vegan offerings.
Son has a condo near the top of the building and these are some of the sights out his floor to ceiling windows. The back wall is all cupboards and refrigerator covered to look like a solid wall.
Just in time
While out running errands, my husband was taken by all these signs on this car.’
I finished all the chores I set for myself yesterday and today and had 5 minutes to knit before going to the airport. And yes, I’m tired, but it’s so nice to see my brother again. I am going to bed early tonight. I have no idea what tomorrow will bring as my brother has not yet decided.
Do any of you know what this bush is?
Bed, bath and Beyond trip
A threadbare sheet which has been replaced
with a set of this color (actual color is more champagne). I do not like buying sheets, so until they give up, we keep using them. When they give up, they get repurposed.
Why is it when one finishes off rooms, they just don’t get totally finished. At least this happens at our house. So today, we purchased switch covers for 3 rooms. It really does make the rooms look better. We were short these 2 screws, which we intend to pick up tomorrow.
This is a lamp my father made in the late 1930s. Somehow, the finial was lost in moves
so today, that was replaced and it is once again a working lamp.
I like to wipe my feet right before getting into bed (maybe because there is always dust or sand or ??). So I purchased a small rug to go on either side of the guest bed.
And a nice little waste basket to complete the basic furnishings of this room.
Then there was a little matter of towels and a rug for the bathroom. Again I used blue. Ewalda, I’m ready for you with your favorite color – blue.
No we did not get to everything on the list done. We did retrieve the sewing machine and with my birthday coupon, I got 3 packages of needles, which I can always use. The big garden was fertilized, but the greenhouse did not get my attention except to pick a large bowl of greens. They are crisping now and tomorrow morning, I will clean them again. Parsley, cantaloupe, and sweet Williams were put in the seed starting tray.
The chairs will be picked up Friday as we have to go over there for an eye exam, the alpacas are going back to the 4H area tomorrow, and I will mop the entertainment room/kitchen floor. I should have time to fertilize and water the hoop house. Then I have a dinner to put together and cleaning the kitchen after I make the food. Mid afternoon, it is off to the airport to get my brother who will be visiting from Florida for 2 days. However, sewing will have to wait until Wednesday, or Thursday or Friday, after he leaves.
Yes, we did Yoga this morning and walked my 10,000 daily steps as well. So I should sleep well tonight.
Sock yarn leftovers
It was one of those crazy days where I don’t feel a lot was accomplished and yet it was. There is just a lot more to do. So let’s start with explaining about the socks.
In the photo at the left, you can see I loop the new yarn around the needle and knit it into the next stitch.
Then the next 5 or 6 stitches, I knit with both pieces of the new yarn. When finished, I weave in the yarn that I dropped when changing yarns. This is just my made up way to do it. I don’t know how the professionals do it.
See where each loop is – there are three. Those are places where I changed yarns. I hope that makes it a bit clearer.
We spent the morning putting up curtains and taking many of the excess items out of the new guest room. These are the fleeces that have been repackaged and are ready for me to make some decisions on what I will do with them. At least they are sorted and in one pile instead of overflowing the closet and the corners.
And the drapes are now up and the shade is working. Tomorrow, I will get the rugs and trash can. I ran out of energy today.
I decided to hang this on the screen to cut the view of my very messy table that at times is used for potting plants and other times to trim quilts.
And this is the end of the hall. Now, it looks a bit more like a home instead of just a basement.
I did get the binding cut for the circus quilt. Now to find time to quilt it.
I wonder how people get their houses to stay clean. We use the entire house and there are always areas that could use “spring cleaning”. Tomorrow my list includes yoga, getting the rugs for the guest room and it’s bathroom, sheets for our bed, picking up my sewing machine from the “hospital”, picking and cleaning maybe 6 gallons of greens, fertilizing the hoop house (DH will do the big garden) and watering, mopping the floors downstairs, cleaning the wall the dogs wiped their coats on last winter, and then do a tidy up job on the shelves in the bathroom and cleaning it. I will ask DH to pick up the chairs that are at the chair “hospital” And you know what, it won’t all get done, but it is on my list. Maybe that’s why it seems I’m always playing “catch-up”. Oh, and if/when all that is done, there is a circus quilt waiting to be quilted.
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A pink day
This little 36″ square quilt is now quilted and bound. It will hang it in our room for a bit before a baby gets it as DH likes it. And it’s nice to be appreciated. Several of my readers also liked it. It’s a strange thing – one never knows what someone will like – this is not one of my favorites.
This morning I decided to dye two shirts that I really like, but are a bit tired. However I forgot to check the fiber content and because they had 40% poly, they didn’t take the dye. So I popped some fleece into the kettle in three increments so that I will get a heathered affect. It is dry now and sometime in the future, will get combed and spun. It is off my first female Cormo sheep so will be soft.
Then there was a matter of someone needing a large patch and this is what I found for her.
Sometimes one just needs a dessert and we still have 6 packages of frozen strawberries in the freezer, so shortcake was made.
And because my brother is coming in Tuesday evening and I don’t want to look totally unprepared, we ran off to Lowe’s and purchased a shade and a curtain rod, both will be put up on Sunday. I still would like to get a rug and may do that on Sunday as well.
Scrap knitting
Summer is coming in with a bang and I don’t have enough pairs of short socks, but I do have plenty of leftovers from previous pairs of knitted socks. Since the foot is in the shoe, most of the sock doesn’t show. So I have decided to knit with somewhat similar balls of left over yarn. I do one inch of knit 2, purl 2 on 64 stitches and then the heel flap. Here I am ready to turn the heel and pick up the instep stitches. Somewhere in there, I will be moving on to the next balls of yarn. This will indeed be interesting.
Circus Critters flimsy finished
I am so happy to get this top finished as there was so much applique. It is one technique with which I’m not very good. I’m not ready to quilt it just yet.
This morning, I picked and washed leaf lettuce, kale, endive, romaine, and Chinese cabbage for a wonderful salad. There were three gallon bags full.
This is hummus that I made this morning. The basic recipe is
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1 can (I used a home canned pint) garbanzo beans
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1/2 teas garlic salt
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3 T lemon juice
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1 t Braggs liquid aminos
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enough liquid to be able to blend it.
Today I added roasted peppers and hot sauce which made it redder. You could add various other ingredients to personalize it.
I love walking past the table and seeing the flowers and cards. I know the flowers won’t last long, but I’ll keep them here as long as possible, and then I’ll still have the memories.
When your best isn’t good enough
Sometimes even when you do your best, it just isn’t good enough and that was today. One of the baby sheep, managed to get through a fence and get her leg caught. We found her in time and she will be okay, but we missed a cut she got from the wire. It is infected and is now being treated. It’s bad enough when it’s your own animals, but when you are caring for someone else’s livestock, it seems worse. I hate these kinds of occurrences!
Lacey thought it was too warm today, so tried to swim in the small pool. I didn’t bother to tell her that it will be warmer the rest of the week. I think she’d be a bit happier in the pond.
The sewing machine didn’t cooperate either – so it went to the hospital. Tomorrow will be better.
Labeled and gone
