Fascinatin'

The moon..................................Venus

Fascinatin'

So "fascinatin' ", I almost drove off the road because I was transfixed.

Fascinatin'

The "technical/astronomical " term when the moon and a planet are together like this is called a conjunction. Read more about it here

Totally Fascinatin' that I was able to take this picture with MY 5 year old Fuji Digital camera - (it rocks!)

If'n it wasn't so dang cold out, I'd pull up a chair on the back porch and just cogitate on the whole situation.

Fascinatin'

We've been able to see pairing of the moon and Venus a bunch recently because the sky has been clear at nights. It's like being given a gift each time I see it.

Fascinatin', just fascinatin'

Yup, they've got whims, alright...

more funny pictures of cats here

What do you mean, IT"S SNOWING!!!

For Pete's sake, it is the 25th of February - our snow should be done for by now. But just after lunch it kind of started to hail, then it really started to snow, and by 4:00 when I checked with The Shepherd by radio he said it was coming down pretty hard in the North county and he would call me when he got home. (both companies we work for have the Nextel phones, so I can "beep" him during the day if need be - cool huh?)

At about 4:45, he called - "I think you'd better start home," he said.

I normally work until 6:00 p.m., but we were nearing white out conditions by that time and he feared for my safety - the Jelly Bean is not really the most reliable snow car, and, lets face it folks, we here in Western Washington are a bunch of weenies when it comes to snow.


So I got my stuff together, and started home. One of the fellows I work with helped brush the snow off my car - it was pretty much all covered in a thick layer by then.


Now,I grew up in Eastern Washington, where, in "the old days" we used to get a foot or two of snow every winter. I learned how to drive in the snow. But, it's a "different" snow over there - dryer and not so slippery - and the people who drive in it are not IDIOTS like they are here on the West side.











My normal 20 minute trip took about 40 minutes and it was just about as slippery as I can remember driving in. In fact, even though I had slowed down to about 10 miles per hour when I got close to our road, the knothead that was behind me was following so close that I couldn't brake to turn, it was so slippery - so I had to keep going down the road and come in the back way which involves going up one hill and down another - by this time, I was driving (spinning out) in a white out. Yikes.


Finally got to our driveway - The Shepherd was pacing back and forth - he had shoveled a path from where I park my car to the back door - (I wear Crocs, which inconveniently, at this time of the year, have holes in them....) He is such a nice guy!


Anyhow, all these pictures were taken just after I got home - it had snowed this much in an hour, and I was REALLY glad that I was home before dark, I am pretty sure that, as slippery as it was out there, that I would have ended up in the ditch if I had waited that extra hour to head home.







One thing that The Shepherd rescued off the front porch was my book order from Barnes and Noble - bought with the gift card that my younger sister gave me for Christmas.

I got three books -

#1 "The Crochet Dude's Designs for Guys" by Drew Emborsky - It has some pretty cool patterns in it and two that The Shepherd approved of - looks like I'll be busy, busy, busy -




The second book I got was Sys Freden's new book "Contemporary Crochet, 27 European Designs" -
Oh, man, this one makes me drool. Very, very cool stuff. I think it is going to make me get very serious about making something for myself.



I also got a new paperback, "Firefly Lane" by a local author (and a NY Times Bestseller) Kristin Hannah. I have always enjoyed her books - but it looks like it will be a while before I'm sitting on the front porch to read...

Well, I'm off to finish my church newsletter, and tomorrow night is payroll - so I'll be busy for the next few days. Have a great weekend.

Scarves for Troops

Sometime last fall while I was our "surfin' the web" I stumbled on a website called CitizenSAM, or Citizen Support America's Military.

They have a program where you can make helmet liners (must be knitted and I don't knit) or scarves - (can be crocheted - bingo!). It has to be WOOL, as that #1 - is inherently nonflamable and #2 - a good insulator, even when wet. The items can only be black, charcoal, brown, tan, or combinations of these colors - and I figured that Regina's wool was basically, tan.

I had already spun up about 450 yards of "Regina yarn" when The Shepherd decided that he wanted to ply the Regina and Anna Dee wool. OK, I just set those skeins aside and started on the new stuff, so I figured I'd have enough to make a scarf.


So, here it is. 12" x 42" per the instructions and single crochet so there are no "holes" in it (I guess they don't want it to look like lace???)

I have emailed the lady in charge of the scarf program and am "awaiting my orders" - I hope it is OK. I also hope that they will allow me to put a little note in with the scarf explaining that it is handspun yarn from our own sheep, and that it was made with love and respect for the soldier that will receive it.

I'll keep you all posted.

Hi, my name is Tina and I'll be your waitress today...

Who's that lady? Where's The Shepherd?

"Pearl, do you know where he is???"

"I think I heard him say something to her about going to a far away place called Salem, Oregon. Something to do with church, what ever that is."




"He told me she'd take good care of us. I think I remember her from before. Do you think we can talk her into extra kibbles?"

Don't even think about it girls. I'm wise to your ways. You and the boys will get the same great service from me that you get from The Shepherd.




Yup, I'm the Stand-in Shepherd this weekend. The Real One has gone off for our church Annual General Meeting and some R&R -

And I get to stay home and putter around. I have a long list of things I need to get done.

But I had a few minutes to sit with the girls tonight after feeding was over. Do you remember Violet? We brought her home from our friend Nancy's last fall. She is such a sweet little peanut.


And just look at her wool...

I call dibs.....





Look out Black Sheep Gathering - here comes another first place fleece!


Hmmm - think I'll go make that shrimp salad I've been thinking about all afternoon. Yum.

A few random thoughts -

*****I'm tired -It's 1:30 and I still have my blog to update!

*****Tonight was church choir night - I rush home as quickly as I can from work - generally get here between 6:15 & 6:30 - snarf something down (tonight it was popcorn!) and then we have to leave by 7:00 to get to Blaine by 7:30.

Our choir has been shrinking. 10 years ago we had about 16 or 17 members - it is the only choir I've ever been in where there were more basses than sopranos! But we are down to 9 members! We have lost all our basses except for The Shepherd (who is our director) - one of our tenorettes has a broken arm so she's out for the rest of the year - (two retired sisters are tenors so we call them the tenorettes) one of the altos had another meeting conflict and one of our two remaining sopranos is sick, AND our accompanist (92 year old Reah) is just back from being ill with the flu since Christmas! We have a good time though. Tonight we worked on some songs that we haven't sung for a while and we didn't sound half bad.

We are starting to do more things a capella to make it easier on Reah - We have a choir service in March and Easter and Mother's Day coming up too. It is going to be an interesting spring.

*****I get emails from Sunset magazine with recipes, ideas for garden plans, etc. Today it was recipes - 25 reasons to love Bacon. Like I need another reason to love bacon.....

*****On the whole, I am not a very politically "active" person - I AM a card carrying Demo - but all they got from me was $25 - so it wasn't a real big deal - they still sent me an inauguration photo of President Obama (doesn't that have a nice ring to it??) amd a nice letter from VP Biden - I think I may write back to him. It seems to me that the Stimulus money would go a lot farther if they suspend the Davis/Bacon/prevailing wage act. They could put two or three times as many people to work if they would do that, and still pay decent wages.

*****I decided when we got home at 9:30 that I needed to wash two more skeins of the "Regina" yarn that I spun last fall. I'm using it to make the Scarves for Soldiers Scarf (yes, I'll tell you more about that soon) but I ran out just before I got to the required length and didn't get the edging finished either, so one more skein to go. Might as well wash both the skeins that I have left, so I put them in a sink full of hot soapy water and came back to the computer to work on my NO NAIS WA letters to my state representatives and senator. A group of concerned people have gotten bills before BOTH our state House and Senate Agriculture committees to make NAIS VOLUNTARY in Washington state.

I don't think is is possible to stop NAIS - it is already part and parcel of the USDA - BUT they have given the states the option to make it a voluntary program - seems to me the best way to go. I hope that the efforts of these people come to fruition. Anyhow - copy & pasting all those (25) letters into emails took me over an hour or more - remember I had those two skeins of yarn in hot water? Well, it wasn't too hot after all that time - so I just finished rinsing it and hung it to dry. I think it will be OK.

*****During Joys & Concerns on Sunday, someone told of the death of a one year old baby in the community, from complications of croup - a virus that is characterized by a barking type of cough. It seems terribly sad to me that in a country as rich as ours that children can die of a simple childhood disease. Terribly sad.

So, I'm off to bed I guess. My eyelids are so heavy that just about every time I blink I fall asleep - yup, better get to bed.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Nothing says love any better than a big pot of pretty primroses on the back porch. I see it every morning on the way to work, and every night when I come home. I am one lucky woman.

Looking Back Sunday - The Eighth day of April 2007

Looking for pictures taken on the 8th day of the month I found April 8, 2007 -

Sinda was out playing on the lawn -







This is Regina (of the wool I am using for the Scarf for soldiers) - That is Luna and her brother, I think.

This year's lambs will be her soon - we are scheduled for shearing on the 3rd of March. So, look for the weather in the PNW to turn cold (it always does the week after we shear).




Tulips and pansys - what a beautiful flower pot The Shepherd put together that year.

Michelle at Boulderneigh gave me an award last week, so I'll go fetch it, and I have joined Franna in paying it forward. I can't show you what's "Off the Hook" yet, because it hasn't been delivered, but my Soldier Scarf is coming right along. I'll get to it next week too.

Cheers! And have a great week out there!

Off the Wheel -

Here is another picture of some of the yarn from Regina. I found a web site where you can make scarves for soldiers in Iraq & Afghanistan. The scarf can only be made of wool and only in certain colors and one of them is tan - I think this looks pretty "tan" - don't you?








At Christmas time, the ladies in our office (there are only 7 of us) exchange names and do a gift exchange. The young gal whose name I got is also a crocheter - so I thought what a better gift than to spin her up some yarn.

She really likes pink - and Nancy at NW Handspun Yarns had a big basket of balls of "potluck roving" from Kathy Green, a local processer, and one of them was, ta da, this pretty rose color. Since I hadn't had time to spin up the yarn before Christmas, I just gave her the bump of roving in a Christmas bag, with the promise that I would spin it up for her. She was really delighted, because the friends that she crochets/knits with are all self proclaimed "Yarn Snobs" but none of them spin, so she'll really have something special to work with. It ended up spinning out to about 300 yards and was surprisingly soft. Last night I wound it up into three little yarn cakes and took it to her today at work. She was very pleased.

On the Wheel

I thought I'd show you what I've been working on lately.

This is shettland wool from Regina (one of the girls that we gave to a new home last fall) - I think she was registered as fawn, but her wool spins up to be a very pretty carmel color.






I had probably 3 or 400 yards spun up before The Shepherd decided he wanted something a little different.


I will be plying it with brown from Anna Dee and our friend Denise will take it and knit The Shepherd a sweater vest. She knitted up a sample and it really looks pretty - sort of heathery. We figure that she'll need somewhere in the range of 1000 to 1200 yards - if I can do 200 yards a week I will be happy, (I generally try to spin for about an hour before I go to bed every night) but it may take me longer than that. I have some shetland/alpaca blend that is, as the old saying goes, "burnin' a hole in my pocket", but I kind of promised that I would finish the sweater vest yarn before I start anything else....

Next - off the wheel, on and off the "hook" - as I crochet, I don't knit!

Looking back.....

Hens & chickens that needed to have some of their winter detritus cleaned off was one of the pictures I took a year ago today.

There were lots of pictures of Neelix in that file too, but, even after six months, I am still too sad to include them here.

Hope you had a good weekend.

Comparing apples ... to apples...

Every year at Christmas time my Grandmother used to make applesauce cake - oh, she would make it other times of the year too (it was always my requested birthday cake if she was visiting during January) but at Christmas, she would “beef it up” a little - dates instead of raisins, candied fruit, more nuts. When I was in college she would send me some sometimes. It still is one of my favorite cakes, and it is one of those cakes that the longer it sits, the better it gets. The first time I made it, I was sure there was a typo - no eggs! A frantic call to my Grandma assured me that no, there were no eggs in this cake. So if you have someone who is allergic to eggs, you could make it for them.

I used to make it this time of the year to give to friends as a “New Year’s Cake” - somehow the last couple of years the applesauce just hasn’t gotten made - and like my minister, Rev. Nan, I buy the nuts and the butter in anticipation of making these treats and end up at the end of the month with a freezer full of nuts and butter,

But a few weeks ago, I actually bought the apples that I would need for this precious cake - Jonagolds for texture - they cook up firm and sweet, some Pink Lady apples - they smelled so “appley” in the store, guessing that they would cook up “saucy” and of course I had to throw in a couple of Granny Smiths for their tart flavor. The apples had been sitting the kitchen counter since we brought them home - I decided the other evening that I’d better cook them up before they started to get mushy.

As I was peeling these apples, it occurred to me how much they could be likened to the people in our lives - I’m sure you know someone who stays “firm” under pressure - or someone who is just a little bit “saucy” - Oh, and I forgot, I added in the neglected Galas that had been languishing in the fruit drawer. Do you have any friends you haven’t talked to lately? Are they “languishing in your fruit drawers”?
And of course, the colors of the apples intrigued me as well - there must be every shade from green to yellow to pink to deep reds - how dull it would be if they were all the same color. Hmm - sort of like real life, these apples are, don’t you think?

So, I got the applesauce made and put into the fridge, and we had pork chops the next night, - can’t have pork chops without applesauce, then The Shepherd decided that it made a pretty good snack (and good for him since I hadn’t added any sugar to it) Before I knew it, the applesauce was almost all gone – well, heck. Last night we got more apples and this afternoon, more applesauce was made – but this time, I didn’t let the opportunity get away. You have to be careful when you try a bite of it right out of the oven because the raisins are hot, hot, hot. ( I speak from experience – ha, ha) Here’s the recipe – make sure your applesauce is fresh and hot

Grandma Billie’s Applesauce Cake

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, grease & flour a 9x13 pan. Get a couple of pounds of your favorite cooking apples to make (at least) three cups – big chunks of apple are OK.

Mix in a large bowl:
2 cups (or if not juicy, add an extra 1/2 – 3/4 cup or so) fresh applesauce.
(have hot) Add:
1 cup (2 sticks) butter, cut into small chunks so it will melt
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1 tsp salt
2 tsp vanilla

In a smaller bowl, sift together:
4 cups flour
2 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp pumpkin pie spice or 1 tsp each cloves & nutmeg

After your butter is melted in the hot applesauce, add about ¾ of the dry ingredients to the applesauce mix and blend – with the last ¼ of the dry ingredients, add 2 cups of raisins and 2 cups of chopped walnuts.

Mixture will be very thick – pour into 9x13 baking dish and bake at 350 degrees for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick or bamboo skewer comes out clean. Cool –

Very moist and rich cake, doesn’t need frosting. Better in slices (like banana bread..) rather than big chunks. It gets better as it sits – keep in refrigerator or freezer.

I'll take one of each, please........

more LOL cats

No you won't says The Shepherd!

Just letting you know that I'll be busy on the church newsletter this week, so I won't be posting much.

URGENT - Puppy mill ring busted in Western Washington

After I finished my previous post about my Christmas Caps, I decided to check out more info about this puppy mill thing that has been going on for the past week south of here. I know that many of my readers are animal lovers and felt that I needed to let you know about this.

The situation has snowballed and gotten progressively worse with each day. It is a very sad story - no arrests have been made, but I sure hope that some will be. Because one man was brave enought to turn in his friend, many many animals will be saved from a horrific life. Please read on.... (but, don't forget to take time to check out the pretty hats I made for my family for Christmas)....

As of Saturday, January 24, over 600 puppies and pregnant dogs have been seized from a puppy mill ring here in Western Washington.

These dogs were living in unimaginable filth and are now being taken care of at the Everett Humane Society, with most being cared for at the Skagit County Fairgrounds by the volunteers for an organization called "S.P.O.T." - (Saving Pets One at a Time). Many of the dogs are ill with parasites and other problems from the crowding and deplorable conditions they were living in. Many puppies had never been out of their crates.

They estimate that 80% of these dogs are pregnant and that the number of puppies expected to be born over the next few weeks could reach 1500! They are hoping that as the puppies are born, the females can be spayed, and that students from the veternary schools in the state can step in and assist with the surgeries.

Please check out these web sites for more information on how you can help the folks that are taking care of these (mostly) itty bitty dogs:

PuppyJustice.com and
Saving Pets One at a Time (S.P.O.T.)

Finally -

Finally the Christmas caps have been delivered, so I can show them to you.

This hat and scarf was made for my niece Jennifer and she said it fit perfectly. The hat is kind of slouchy/buckety looking affair with a flower stuck on the side - but it looked good on my co-worker, who acted as my model while I was making them, as I have a rather "grande sized head" that is too big to fit a standard ladies sized hat.

It is a wool/mohair/firestar blend from Dawn's Custom Carding that I picked up at Black Sheep Gathering last summer, and the yarn that I got the blue ribbon on at the NW Washington Fair last August. The fiber I got from Dawn's was really nice and so easy to spin. I will definately be stopping by that booth at next summer's BSG.

This one is called (appropriately) The Bobble Hat. I think it was my favorite one to make & I really love how it looks. The good news was that it fit my niece Sarah. (yeah~)

It is made out of Superwash Merino and hand combed colored mohair locks that were spun in closely the same color-way as the merino and plied with some white coreydale. I wasn't sure if there would be enough of the merino yarn to make the hat, and I was right, there wouldn't have been enough. I had never spun superwashed merino before (it came in one of those tightly braided hanks) and did not draft it down very well, so it was kind of a thick-thin yarn - Oh, that's right, that is called "novelty yarn" - yeah, that's the ticket.

The pattern for this hat was fairly straight forward until I got to the "bobble row" - when it plainly said "Make bobble" - no instructions on how or what a bobble was. Luckily I've been "shopping" on the Crafter's Choice Book Club and have all these wonderful new crochet "How-To" books, and luckily they had instructions on how to make a bobble. - It is actually made from the wrong side with five half/double crochets.
A bobble, up close.

This little beauty was made from the crocheted hat pattern from the fall "Spin-Off" magazine. They rarely have crochet patterns, and this one was really cute. I used it for Emma's hat and for her Grandmom's hat (My sister) - unfortunately Wisten's hat is a bit too small. We are hoping that she can size it by washing it. -




This was a wool, mohair blend that reminded me of my sister the minute I saw it. If you click on the picture to "biggify" it, you can see all the colors in this wool - navy, almost a green, a bit of black, turquoise, and some flecks of gold. I hope she can size it up so it fits her.




These are the "Cougar Caps" in Burgandy and Grey for my nephew Chris and his dad. I have heard that Glenn's hat is too small - It is pretty tightly crocheted - I don't know if my sis will be able to size it up or not. I haven't heard if Chris's fit or not.

The burgandy was some misc. wool that I got at BSG and I picked up the grey at our Spinner Guild "spin-in" last fall. I can't remember what it was, but it sure spun up nice.


Chris's wife Jennifer (both nephews married Jennifers!) had told me that she didn't get along with wool too well - it makes her very itchy - so I got some cotton yarn at my LYS - it has bits of green, gold and blue in it - very pretty and fun to crochet. This was supposed to be a newsboy style hat with a brim, but somehow, the brim never happened, so I turned it into a beret. I thought it was really cute. hopefully it fits.

I have two skeins of the yarn left so maybe I'll make her a scarf to go with it.

I guess I forgot to take a picture of the hat I made for Jake - it was the same style as the one for his brother Chris and their dad - but it was in Red & Black superwashed merino. He is a baseball and football coach at Ritzville High School in Eastern Washington and black & red are the school colors.

I'm really seeing the need to make a little book of the yarn that I am spinning - reminding myself of what went wrong and what went right...and what the yarn was composed of. I got a nice little blank book for Christmas - maybe that would be a good use for it.

Yes, it was a great day -

With one small disappointment -

Yesterday morning I got up "early" - in time to watch the "pre-festivities" - awesome to see all those people on the Mall - everyone looked to happy and excited.

Set up the VCR (yes, some of us still have VCR's) on the bedroom TV so I could record the events of the day for The Shepherd.

Watched the ceremony, puttered around a bit - went in and checked the VCR - Shut it off, because it was just TV guys blabbering - Rewound it to see how the recording looked - puttered around some more - by this time, the parade was on and decided that The Shepherd might like to see some of the parade - so I went back into the bedroom and hit "Record" (keep in mind that I had rewound it a bit....)
I made a nice dinner of baked salmon and potato rounds and made Inauguration Cobbler for dessert. We sat and watched the video of ALL the "whobodies" coming out onto the ceremony platform and just as Diane Feinstein said - "And now may I introduce Aretha Franklin to sing "America the Beautiful" - my video recording flipped over to the parade. I had recorded over THE WHOLE CEREMONY - I can't tell you how disappointed I am (and how disappointed the Shepherd was - I found bits and pieces on-line, but he wouldn't watch them). So that pretty much ended our evening - but here is the recipe for "Inauguration Cobbler"

INAUGURATION COBBLER
Makes 6 - 8 servings
For the filling:
8 cups frozen fruit - I used a bag of peaches, a bag of mixed fruit - strawberries, raspberries, blueberries and blackberries and a couple cups of frozen cherries - thawed and drained into a colander
1 cup granulated sugar plus 2 or 3 tablespoons to shake over the crust before baking
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
3/4 tsp Pampered Chef Cinnamon Plus (you could use Pumpkin Pie spice)
1/4 cup apricot jam mixed with 1/2 cup hot water (to melt it) - or if there is enough juice from your frozen fruit use that - but my fruit was not very juicy
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, cut into small pieces

For the crust:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup Crisco shortening
1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, cut into small pieces
1/3 to 1/2 cup ice water
1. Heat the oven to 375 degrees. Lightly coat a 9-by-13-inch baking pan with cooking spray.
2. To make the filling, arrange the fruit in an even layer in the prepared baking pan. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, whisk together the granulated sugar, brown sugar, flour, and cinnamon plus. Whisk in the water mixed with the apricot jam (or peach juice) until smooth. Pour the mixture over the peaches. Sprinkle the butter over the top. Set aside.
4. To make the crust, in a medium bowl, whisk together the flour and salt. Add the shortening and butter, then use a pastry blender or gloved hands to work them into the dry ingredients until the mixture forms pea-sized lumps.
5. Slowly add the water, adding enough and mixing only until the dough holds together. Do not over mix.
6. Place the dough between 2 sheets of parchment paper. Roll out the dough into a rectangle slightly large than the baking pan and about 1/4 inch thick.
7. Remove the top sheet of parchment paper. The dough then can be cut into strips and woven into a crust over the cobbler or for an easier crust, invert the crust onto the baking pan and carefully peel off the parchment paper. Trim the crust to fit just inside the edge of the pan and make a couple of slits in the top. Sprinkle with 2 or 3 tablespoons of sugar.
9. Bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour, or until the crust is golden brown. Let stand 10 minutes before serving.

Recipe adapted from the Dixie Kitchen and Bait Shop in Chicago where Barack Obama had some in 2001 and proclaimed it very tasty.

The next time, I will use just peaches or just cherries - The Shepherd said it had "too many fruit flavors" for him. Oh, well. It was pretty.

A GREAT Day for America!

President Barack Obama

I am so excited. I knew I would be too distracted by the events of the day to be effective at my work so I have actually taken today off so I can sit, with my box of tissues (my sisters call it my "Lassie moments") and watch the inauguration in real time.

If you haven't already heard it, go to Oprah.com and listen to David Foster's new music - "America's Song".

And if I can figure out where I stashed the recipe (and IF I can find some frozen peaches at the store) I'll make President Obama's favorite Peach Cobbler for dessert tomorrow.

And I'll be singing:

This land is your land, this land is my land,
From California to the New York Island
From the redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters,
This land was made for you and me.

As I was walking that ribbon of highway, I saw above me the endless skyway
I saw below me that golden valley, This land was made for you and me.

I've roamed and rambled and I followed my footsteps,
To the sparkling sands of her diamond deserts
And all around me, a voice was sounding, This land was made for you and me.

When the sun came shining and I was strolling
And the wheat fields waving and the dust clouds rolling
As the fog was lifting, a foice was calling,
This land was made for you and me.

This land is your land, this land is my land,
From California to the New York Island
From the redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters,
This land was made for you and me.

Woodie Guthrie, copyright 1956

And every night, I say this prayer- "God, please keep our new president and his family safe from harm, amen."

Unexpected Pleasures ~ and six degrees of separation

A phone call from our neighbor earlier in the week - -
"We're having a little get together Saturday evening hope you'll come - Mike and Ellen are coming, and so are Nancy and Jim"

(Ellen is in my spinner guild - her husband is an awesome bluegrass musician - Nancy - you read about her on New Years...)

When we get there - the living rroom is filled with music -



And these are not your every day, garden variety musicians, I quickly realized - Our neighbor used to be in a bluegrass band, so one of his old band members was there - plus I have heard of, but never personally heard Laurel Bliss - who plays the dobro guitar like an angel - (see the spirit circle above her head? These little balls of light appear occasionally on my pictures - but not randomly - they appear on pictures of special events - lamb births, special people - I first thought that they were just dust spots, but then I realized that these spots were not on any other pictures in the batch - they just seem to appear on "special pictures" so The Shepherd and I finally decided that they could only be spirit circles)

I love to sing.

I love to sing harmony.

Mostly this freaks people out. They stop singing what they were singing - and try to sing "with" me - Drives me nuts. But not tonight - Bluegrass doesn't exist without some harmony - and mine was welcome. IT WAS WONDERFUL!





Oh, and the six degrees of separation?

When I had my 50th birthday party we invited many friends and neighbors - John & Wendy are neighbors, but Wendy and I have know each other for many years earlier as members of the Bellingham Unitarian Fellowship - Our friends Nancy and Jim came to my birthday party and discovered that Jim & Wendy's husband John were old friends, having gone to grade school together - but had lost touch with one another.

Then, there was Ellen, from my spinner guild. Last year at Nancy's New Year's party, Mike and Ellen came, as did John & Wendy - Turns out John and Mike knew each other from playing bluegrass music together. And the wife of the fellow playing banjo tonight and I looked at each other and went "HI?" - Oh, my gosh - we took spinning class together last spring.

And then, there was another neighbor there tonight - when she & The Shepherd were talking about our sheep and when the next lambs were due, they got to talking about professions and turns out that her husband (who was there playing guitar) is on the board of the local Food Co-op -

In his other life as "The Landscaper", The Shepherd just finished the landscaping at the new Food Co-Op location here in town.

And the other great thing? Those of us who weren't holding a musical instrument in our laps? We were holding knitting needles, crochet hooks, or embroidery hoops. What an evening....


And did you notice these?

Go back up and look at all the windows in the other pictures. Our friend Wendy makes these beautiful decorations - they are kind of like doilies, but have beads crocheted into them and they are hooked onto a metal frame to make a sort of a "sun catcher" - and get this - (which drives me nuts - I can barely make a granny square) - she crochets them "free hand" ie. she doesn't use a pattern! How does she do that?

Unexpected Treasurers

Life is back to normal for most of us here in the county after our recent floods.

My birthday was an interesting day - I'll have to write about it later though because I have to go get ready to go to our neighbors for a little bluegrass sing-a-long - but here is a little story about an unexpected treasure that I got in the mail last month.

Oh, look, the postman left a package on the front porch.


What on earth could it be? I haven't ordered anything from amazon.com lately....










Actually this surprise present came just before Christmas, but with the snow and everything, the idea of showing it to you got set aside.
Wrapped in luxurious gold paper with a beautiful satin ribbon - what could it be???












This beautiful book was a gift from our frend Donna and I have all that new shetland/alpaca wool to spin up - doesn't that sould like it would be perfect for crocheted lace?

I have gotten "more than several" books for Christmas and over the past month. I need to sit down and make a plan- when to read, when to crochet and when to spin. Oh, my, way too many things to do.

Here's thinking of you, kids

This is our friends Kathy and Ralph from Sheep Thrills farm in Arizona. Please hold them in your thoughts today, as Ralph is having surgery on his spleen.

God speed to his surgeon and speedy recovery to you Ralph! (then you can go see that new grandbaby)

Love, Tina & The Shepherd (and the sheep and the cat, etc, etc.)