Happy Groundhogs Day

If the sun shines on Groundhog Day;

Half the fuel and half the hay.

Living in Pennsylvania, Groundhog Day is a huge deal.  And as you know by now Punxsutawney Phil has predicted six more weeks of winter.  And if this winter continues to be like this…..

BRING ON SIX MORE WEEKS!  The kids are even excited for more winter because they have not used a single snow day.  As it stands now, barring no use of snow days, they will get an extended Easter vacation and every Friday off in May.  A whole month of four day school week!  Hell I would have loved that as a kid too.

So what has been happening….

my little puppy (all 163# of him ) had a tumor on his leg so he was left at the vets Thursday night.  Having never been alone he was very stressed out.  Friday morning found him in surgery which went great.  I took him back in for them to check on it on Monday and he has to return on 2/9 for stitch removal and we will find out the pathology results.  

While he was in surgery I was taking #2 son to the Doctor.  He had a sinus infection and an ear infection.  

Sunday we went to see #1 daughter, Sir T and Baby O.  I did not have a sniffle before I left but while there my nose was like a broken faucet.  We left early and my sickness continues.  The sinus part has now lowered it sites on my throat and chest. Yippee!!!  But I can finally breathe through my nose again so I am not complaining!

#2 son turned 16 on Tuesday.  He is my baby and it is so hard to believe he is 200 pounds and over 6 foot.  We are holding off the cake and ice cream until this weekend when #1 & Sir T are here to attend. #2 daughter will be doing the cake decorating as she has been learning how in foods class.

While being sick I haven’t had the urge to knit or spin.  I have been reading though.and organizing seeds. Groundhog day is usually the day I have the seed orders in by.  This year I went through my saved seeds and older packages and I didn’t place an order.  My local feed store offers seeds from most of the catalogues I get including the heirlooms.  So I am saving on shipping and using the stash. 

Take a left on Memory Lane

Nothing is more memorable than a smell.  One scent can be unexpected, momentary and fleeting, yet conjure up a childhood summer beside a lake in the mountains; another, a moonlit beach; a third, a family dinner of pot roast and sweet potatoes during a myrtle-mad August in a Midwestern town.  Smells detonate softly in our memory like poignant land mines hidden under the weedy mass of years.  Hit a tripwire of smell and memories explode all at once.  A complex vision leaps out of the undergrowth.  ~Diane Ackerman, A Natural History of the Senses

There are certain smells that will transport me back in time.  Oddly enough Liquid Gold is one of them.  I grew up living in a trailer.  Every Thanksgiving we went to a friends house but Christmas was when people came to ours and mom went to work cleaning.  Since the walls were all paneling, everything got a coating of Liquid Gold.  So in my mind Liquid Gold is forever connected to Christmas.

Well today it was not a smell but the sight of something that took me on a trip back in time.  I have been trashing things left and right recently.  Today I found a box of magazines which were my aunts.  Inside of a 1972 Flower and Garden was a picture of Goats Beard. 

So what you say…well my neighbors Lou Lou and Pop Pop, who were like grandparents to me promised me if I passed first grade they would take me on a cross country ride to Montana to see an Indian pow-wow.  And I did.  Now I was six at the time.  I know it was a yearly celebration but don’t know why they decided to take the trip.  I remember we were gone for weeks.  I can remember coming down the mountain road and  in the valley on the right was were the pow-wow was with the tee-pees all set up.  I can remember the cabin we stayed in was on the left of the gravel “main” street and there was an unmowed hillside behind the cabin.  We ate across the street in a building with saloon doors (and I have always loved them since).  The proprietor gave me a watch when we left which I had until high school.  I have a glass swan I bought my mom .  I got to see the guy heat up an old glass bottle and make it.  But one thing I don’t have any more is a flower.  Lou Lou and I walked up the hillside and picked these giant dandelions and spray painted them. 

Very carefully we toted them home where my mom displayed them until they were falling apart.  I have never seen a dandelion that big since…. and today I find they were not dandelions but goats beard.  Which explains a lot!

Mom, Lou Lou and Pop Pop are all long gone but finding that article “stalking the wild goats beard..an arranger’s prize” triggered a wonderful trip down memory lane.  Not a bad way to spend an afternoon.

Snow is in the forecast

"A speculator is a man who observes the future, and acts before it occurs." Bernard Baruch 

And since they are calling for 3-6 inches of snow the stores  were busy with everyone going for milk and bread.  I don’t like to shop on a normal day so you know I wasn’t there.   It has been such an unbelievably warm and snow free winter that I am looking forward to it.  It wont last long anyhow since it is suppose to be in the 40's on Monday.

I have been knitting.  I finally finished the vest I started for Baby O.   I hope it fits him.

Then I decided I needed a long pair of fingerless mitts.  I wear Walmart gloves to the barn because I have more dexterity with them.  However, they are short and my wrists get cold.  I like a coat without the knit cuffs so after I raise my arms I don’t have to tug the sleeves down.  This pair of fingerless mitts is just k2p2 so were done in no time with some old handspun dye experiment yarn. 

Then I received an email stating my name was mentioned on Pinterest.  I go to check it out and there is a leprechaun ski hat for Baby O with instructions from his mother to make it for him.  There was no pattern so I just winged it and came up with this… 

The “belt” should have been wider but it was done in a day.

Now to just finish this cowl…

It should have been done in a solid color to show the detail but I was watching a show with the man and that yarn was sitting close by.  While the snow is falling and the kids are involved with their friends that are spending the weekend I will be knitting and spinning....and maybe a snowball fight if it is good packing snow.

And just to note...I sold my Ashford Traddy.  She came east  many years ago with her previous owner but will be heading to Arizona soon.  I wish her and her new owner many hours of enjoyment.

Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

 “Cold? I'm freezing my royal Rastafarian nay-nays off! “  ~ Sanka Coffie in Cool Runnings

This morning it was a brisk 2 degrees on the thermometer on the side of the house.  It is cold but it isn’t going to last that long.  In fact, midnight tonight we are suppose to be above freezing.  So unlike last year which was such a nonstop damp cold that you felt like you would never be warm again.

During its brief visit the cold has taken the water and turned it into something beautiful…well in my eyes….

Stay warm

Anniversary

An  anniversary is a time to celebrate the joys of today, the memories of yesterday and the hopes of tomorrow. ~ Author Unknown

While the man and I were married four years on New Year’s Eve, the blog and I have had a much longer relationship.  

We have been going steady for seven years today!

Seven… as in seven days of the week, seven continents, seven colors in the rainbow, lucky number seven.

And what is a proper seventh anniversary gift?.... copper and WOOL!!!!  Now to get the blog to pay to process all my wool!  Oh well …seven and wool….it still seems like 2012 is going to be a really good year!

Even the sheep to shawl was awesome this year.  The winning shawl was gorgeous. All of this years shawls were unbelievable.   Pictures of the PA Farm Shows sheep to shawl and fleece to shawl can be found here.  http://www.farmshow.state.pa.us/EventPhotos2012.aspx?AID=741  and

http://yarnymarni.com/

The man said I am going next year so monies are getting stashed away.

Mr. Bluebird

Mr Bluebird's on my shoulder 
It's the truth, it's actual 
Everything is satisfactual 

Zip-a-dee-doo-dah 
Zip-a-dee-eh 
Wonderful feeling 
Wonderful day 

Yes sir 
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah 
Zip-a-dee-eh 
My oh my what a wonderful day 
Oh plenty of sunshine in my way 
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah 
Zip-a-dee-eh  ~ Disney

On the walk back from the barn what did I spy…yup! A bluebird.   And how can you look at a bluebird and not be happy?

It is a horrible picture but my camera batteries did not like the cold so I was only able to get one shot of him/her before they died.  But they served me well prior to that as I got some shots of the animals which have not made an appearance on here in some time…

Bozo says “ I hope you remembered the apples”  Sure did!

Tomorrow will find me glued to the tv as the PA Farm Shows Sheep to Shawl is televised.  Yearly enjoyment to which I had hoped to go but the truck decided the monies should be spent on it.  As much as I hate the truck it really hasn’t cost much in up keep so I can’t complain because it needs new tires to pass inspection.  There is always next year.

Useful or Beautiful

Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to beautiful. ~ William Morris

When I took the everyday things off the mantel for Christmas, it sat empty for two days until I put the Christmas things up.  During this period I was talking to my daughter and said I was liking the minimalistic view…which brought a snort from my daughter who thinks I have too much stuff. 

I do admit I have “stuff” which is not useful (even in my loose terms) and in some instances it isn’t even beautiful but it belonged to people who are no longer with us so I keep it.

But I have started to minimize my stuff.  So far I have gone through the acrylic yarn which I have either bought or most of which I have inherited from one person or another.  It has it’s uses but even after keeping some, I have a 50 gallon trash bag full of yarn to go to the Salvation Army.  My handspun wool all stays period.  I also decided to stop talking about it and try to sell two spinning wheels.  I am going to sell my Ashford Traditional because my woolie winder doesn’t fit on it and my Babe Pinkie.  My daughter would tell me I can sell more but I am going to keep the Babe electric, Traveler and CPW.

Obviously can’t take things out without bringing things in because a friend gifted me 6 cases of pint jars, 3 cases of quart jars and a bag of flats and rims -which means I need to get looking in the seed magazines to grow something to fill those jars.  And oddly enough while walking back from the barn I stopped at one of my gardens and for shit and giggles I pushed some of the leaves that never got raked aside and there were daffodils coming up already! 

2012 is still looking pretty good.