Wacky Wednesday

Boy did I have a strange day! I felt very, um... discombobulated {?} all day today. I just could not gather my thought or finish a project without really having to force myself to focus. I am not usually like that. I even had trouble remembering what our work phone number was at one point when I was leaving a voice mail message for someone. That was a little embarrassing!! I have worked there for eight months now, I would think I could remember the phone number! But not today! I have to say I am glad it is almost over.

Here is a fun thing that happened. I went to lunch today with Sammy at Cosi. It was so good! I had never eaten there and had actually never even heard of it. I had the Chicken Ceasar sandwich, oh heavens! It was delicious. The serving was large enough that we could have split it, but we didn't! We took some home with us.

The weather was amazing today. Quite a log of rain. I do love the way the sky looks in the spingtime here in Oklahoma. You get quite a bit of variety in the weather, sometimes all in one hour! It rained a lot while we were in Cosi eating. I found this fun sign.... well, I confess I cropped it to make it say what I wanted it to. So I will end my post today with a shout out to my peeps, the SMORs!

Monday Mania!

If Friday is my favorite day of the week, then Monday is the worst! I am so thankful it is over! I don't have much to say today. I worked most of the day yesterday on another felting project (#3), and I have started the #4 project now, even though #3 is not really finished yet. I will wait to post pictures until they are complete. I guess I need to figure out what to do with them now. I suppose I will stock pile them for gifts. But now that i have shown everyone {all 4 of my friends and family} what they look like, there would be no surprise factor if I gave you one as a gift. Oh well, I won't worry about that. They are fun to make, and there are endless possiblities of how to make them. You just won't know what color or design you will be getting! Soon I will get bored and make something else.

Have a happy Tuesday!

Because I FELT like it!!

Sorry, I know that was a silly pun for the title of my post today. I just wanted to share my latest project with you. Yes, once again I am felting. Another change purse. Still purple. I did manage to sneak off to Michaels last night to use my 40% off coupon and got a very reasonable price on a skein of leaf green wool to trim my purse with. I also used one of my new buttons, thanks to Grams and Aunt Mary. This time I used velcro instead of a zipper. Here are the results.

I may decide to add a swirl of green on the back of the purse too. I am undecided. What do you think? I am a little unhappy with a few things. I followed the pattern carefully and it did not quite felt to the right size. So I adjusted the size so that credit cards can slide in sideways. It was too narrow for them to fit lengthwise. Also, I had not used the blanket stitch around the edge in a while, so it starts off sort of rough. The bottom side (in the picture right above this paragraph) is where I started, and I finished at the top. The finishing stitches are much more even and uniform than the beginning stitches. I took it out and started over once, and I am debating weather I should do that again. Of course it will never be perfect (same as me), but I would like for it to look nice. I have not decided what to do with this one yet. The first one was a gift for a relative.

So that is my latest project. All in all I like the first pattern better. I think next I will try to make another purse from the first pattern, but with varying green and purple stripes. I am kind of excited to start that. I have everything I need, except another blasted purple zipper!

Work, work, work!

Today was a busy day at the Farm. I don't especially know why, but tonight I am very tired. The phone rang off the hook. You might think that would be a good thing, but it seems it was ringing with nothing but busy work.



I got roped into a lengthy discussion on life insurance right before it was time to leave tonight. If you know me at all, you know that I LOVE to talk about life insurance. Yes, I know, that makes me a freak. I am trying to help a couple who are almost at retirement age deal with a term policy that is about to expire... Monday. They have to make a decision TOMORROW. This discussion began about 6 weeks ago. So there will most likely be nothing in it for me, since it probably won't involve a new application, but nevertheless, I really, really, really enjoy helping this couple find a plan that will get them throught the next 20 years.



So, I am sure you are about asleep by now, if you have even gotten this far into my post, but here comes the creative part.... I am going to felt something again tonight! So excited about that. I just wish it was in a different color. I like the purple wool, but I want to do another color now. It always comes down to the same problem, budget. Ugh! I so want to go to Loops tomorrow and get some of that delicious yarn!!! It will not happen this week. Maybe next week. I wonder if I can convince anyone to go with me when it is time??? Maybe you?

Ford Fever

My baby {Jacob} has Ford Fever. He is officially 15 1/2 now and he is so ready to find an old Ford truck to call his own. This is a picture of a Ford that he spotted Saturday while we were on Route 66 in Vinita. He has a few requirements. It needs to be a 4 wheel drive. It has to be the right price, cheap, and perferably it will be a Ford. He gets that Ford thing from his father. I like them too, but I am not quite as fanatical as Kim. He would be willing to settle for a Dodge or maybe a Jeep International.


Everywhere we go, every thing we do, and everything he says revolves around the truck and the arrangements to buy the truck. His plan is to sell his four wheeler and use the money from it to buy the truck, so he won't be spending much money on it to start with, but then he will work this summer mowing yards and make enough money to fix it up. He does not want a pretty truck. He wants a rugged rough truck that he can take off road mudding, fishing, and just go where he wants without worrying about how good his truck looks. So if you know of such a truck, you know where to find us! Please rescue us from Ford Fever!

Rewind

OK, so I posted about my fabulous family Route 66 trip. It was totally awesome. I didn't even tell you half of the fun we had or show you all the cool pictures. But that will save for another day. I need to rewind to Friday.


Friday is my favorite day of the week. Even though I normally have to work till 5:30, to me it is the beginning of the weekend. So I try to do something fun every Friday night! Kim went to work early, so Jacob and I started on our Friday adventure. I had been wanting to go to a fun yarn shop I had heard about in Utica Square. I had heard of it, but was not really sure where it was. We had to pick my cousins little boy, Seth up first since we were meeting his Grandma for dinner later.


We headed to 21st & Utica. The shop closed at 8, and by the time we got close to the Square it was 7:30. So we started circling the Square looking for the address. We finally figured it out and there it was, Loops. So far I have only shopped for yarn at stores like Wal-Mart, Michaels, Hobby-Lobby and JoAnns. I am not saying anything bad about those stores, they are great for simple projects, but this place had so many beautiful colors and types of yarn. It was amazing. I am really easy to impress where yarn is concerned, though, so this might not be a big deal for a real knitter. They have comfy seats so you can bring your knitting and sit there and knit and visit with other knitters.


I was mostly interested in the yarn that I could use for felting. For my first and only {to date} felting project, I had a very small selection of wool yarn, from the previously mentioned stores. They just did not have much in the way of color. I wanted bright vibrant color for my project. Jewel tones or at least deep color. Well, Loops has that covered, and then some! They had such beautiful colors of wool! I did not buy any yarn Friday, but I did get some fun ideas for future projects. I will head back that way to bring some of that beautiful stuff home, as soon as my budget will allow! Why, oh why, am I cursed with yarn budget restrictions? That is so wrong!

After dinner we went to my Grandma's house where my Aunt and Grams let me sort through some of their old buttons so I could bring some home. I want to start using buttons on some of my felting projects, and I just don't have any. Grams had several big tubs. Most were very ordinary, but I found some fun ones. I am not the button expert that my friend Amy is, or even as knowledgable as Gigi, but I can appreciate fun as well as any one! Buttons are FUN!

Rt 66...Family Style!

Today we had a family day. We decided to take a trip North East on old Route 66. I have driven part of this before, so the scenery was familiar, but this is the first time that the trip was just for the pleasure of the trip!
We started with breakfast/lunch at Tally's. I checked the bathroom for my prior grafetti efforts, and it was there. I tried to take a picture, but it did not turn out. You will have to go look at it yourself, if you want to see it.

We made our first stop at a flea market in Chelsea. It was not so great. We looked around and I took this cool picture of Jacob. What a great kid to let us drag him along through all the flea markets. I think he likes it too, but he won't admit it!

Next we stopped to check out what appeared to be a tunnel that ran under Route 66. It was a tunnel. We did not go through it, but Jacob and Kim went down the stairs. It looked kind of spooky to me. Very damp and creepy! On the way out, Kim said, "Wouldn't it be cool if I found a arrowhead?" He bent down and picked something up and Jacob asked what is was. Kim laughed and said, "Uh, I think it's an arrowhead." As it turned out, it was not an arrowhead. It was shaped like one, but it was just a piece of cement. We all laughed about that!

So we loaded back into the Taurus and headed east. We barely got our seat belts buckled when we saw the sign for another stop. Antiques! Of course we went in. It was so cool. I took tons of pix. We did not buy anything, but I could have spent a lot of money there! I took tons of pictures. The best part was that there was another store right next door. So we got to go in two shops. They were both quite large and we really spent a lot of time browsing through. We got back in the car and headed towards Vinita. As we were leaving town, there was another shop!! This time we were past it before we really saw it, so we decided not to go back.

Vinita had three antique stores, all quite large. One was more of a furniture type place. We got to talking to the man who owned it and as it turns out he is a preacher for the church of Christ in Afton. We talked more, and we discovered that he used to be a house parent a the children's home I lived at when I was a girl. After he said his name, I remembered him. His last name is Bunch. I have a vague memory of that family. I bet my siblings remember them better. I was really young during the time he was there.

At his store there was an awesome street sign in the window. It had two intersecting streets. As you can see, it is the streets Bret and Neal. I thought that was awesome, because my SMOR friend Gigi's husband is Brett, and her maiden name is.... NEAL!!! How cool?? I think he said it was $60, Geeg. Right in Vinita, next to the movie theatre.

The next stop was another shop down the street. At that point it started pouring rain. It rained so hard it flooded the store we were in. We stayed for a while looking at all the cool stuff. They had a ton of 'ladies head vases', but none were as nice as mine. :o)

After we left there, we had to wade to the car. It had stopped raining and hailing, but the water was ankle deep at the curbs. Kim had to climb across the hood of the car to avoid gettin his shoes wet! We headed to Afton, which has nothing in it, but it was a nice drive anyway. The old Buffalo Ranch was closed. So we headed back to Tulsa. What a great day!

Thursday...almost Friday

Today was a good day. The office was quite and I got my work done. Well, most of it. There are a few items that I have been putting off for way, way too long. Tomorrow they must be done!
Here is a picture of the magical beverage that gets me through the day at work. I only allow myself one each day. Mmmm! Good!!

On a crafty note, I am trying to figure out a way to make a coin purse shaped like a semi-circle. There are a bunch of cute shapes here:

http://www.creationnepal.com/categories.php?cat_id=105





But I can't quite wrap my mind around how to make the shapes. I tried several times tonight. Love all of these, though. The white "half circle" is the shape that I want to try next. I need some new wool yarn, but my budget it shot for now. No more wool for at least a week, so I have purple to work with for now. So, I guess I am loving the purple! Have a good Friday!

Tuesday...

Slightly better than Monday. My eyes and face were better today. I did not have to wear the dreaded glasses. That was a good start. After work today, Jacob and I played basketball. It was a nice day to be outside for a few minutes. Jacob beat me in a fierce game of HORSE. Just by one point though. He usually does win, but now and then I can sneak in a win.

The sky was nice and blue and the sun was shining. Too bad I was stuck at my desk for the best part of the day! Hopefully tomorrow will be another beautiful day!

Blue Monday

Ok, so it will come as no surprise to you that Monday is my least favorite day of the week. Ugh! What is there to like about Monday? OK, so yes, "This IS the day that the Lord has made..." So there must be something good about it, but I was just not seeing it today. Maybe because I woke up with my eyes almost swollen shut? I must have had a allergic reaction to my new eye shadow or mascara. This is a fairly common occurrence for me. It happens about 3 times per year. But it is so frustrating. So I had to wear my ugly glasses. I have a headache from wearing them because the prescription is old. I was going to take a picture of me in my glasses, but I decided I look too ugly, so I called in a substitute.

She looks better in them than I do. Probably because she can wear eye makeup! Besides my eyes, I have a funky scaly rash on my cheek. So this was not a good day, appearance-wise.

On a more positive note, I am trying to decide what my next felting project will be. I kind of want to make a larger bag this time. Maybe a purse. I am looking for some fun patterns to choose from. Of course, I will share when I am done or maybe even before I get started.

Jacob is spending the week in detention You will never believe why... He was in the hallway at lunch time, tapping on the wall or a cabinet or something. It was that annoying rhythmic tapping that kids all do these days. The teacher told him to quit and he did. Then about 5 minutes later he got distracted and started doing it again. So she wrote him up and he got called in to see the counselor who told him that because he was written up 2 weeks ago for being disruptive in his Oklahoma History class that he will now have to spend 4 days in ISI, which is detention. All the school day he will be out of class and sitting in a special class where he has to work on homework. Personally. I think that is ridiculous. 4 full days for tapping? Seems a little out of line. Back in the "olden" days when I was in school, you know when we had horses and buggies? Yes, well we would get an hour of detention if we annoyed a teacher. But a full 4 days??? He is missing out on classroom instruction while this is happening. I think this is really bogus. To be honest, I think they should have given him swats or something. He needs to be in the classroom!

Easter Weekend!

The weekend started off with great weather. I took this picture of the sky on Saturday, which I am so loving. I really think it looks like a painting. Clouds are awesome! Saturday was busy, I cleaned house all day. I did not dare to let myself turn the computer on. If I had, I never would have managed to get any work done. So I cleaned and cleaned. Jacob and Kim went fishing, which is very typical for them in the Spring on Saturdays. The only thing I did not get done was my grocery shopping. Oh well!

Easter was a nice day. The weather was terrible, but the company I enjoyed and the food was great. I got to hold baby Booker and I snapped this cute picture of his big sister Bella in church this morning. She has such a beautiful, expressive face, I just can't resist taking her picture when she will allow it. What a cutie!

After church we went to lunch with the Hayes' and the Stewarts. We ate at Napoli's Italian restaurant. Our family had eaten there once before and we had suggested that everyone go there, since Jacob and Abbey had been wanting Italian food. It seemed like everyone enjoyed it, and I even have some left overs for tomorrow. Yum!

After lunch we went to my Grandmas for some desert and to see the family. Everyone seemed to be having a good day. If only weekends would last a bit longer. Well this one is almost over, so I better say good night.

Stormy Thursday!

What a day! I love the way the sky looks as a thunder storm rolls in! I noticed at around 4:00 that the sky got really dark. Our office is surrounded by windows, floor to ceiling on 2 sides facing North and West. Around 4:30, my boss said we could go home early. He seemed to think maybe we could beat the storm home. Well that did not happen. I stepped out the door and took this picture before dashing to the car, just as it started pouring rain. As I drove north down Harvard from 81st street towards 21st it poured rain and hailed on and off. The largest hail was probably marble size and most of it was only pea sized, so it was not too bad. The traffic was terrible, though and it took forever to get home.


By the time I was close to the house the sky had cleared and it looked like this.















While I watched I finished up my felted coin purse. I installed the zipper. It was a little tricky. After two tries I finally got it right, or as close to right as it will ever be. Here it is. Finished. Now that it is done, I am anxious to try something else. I hope you were not too bored with my project. It was exciting for me, but I am totally enraptured by knitting and felting!

Project Day!

So the project is has begun. I am going to show you how I knitted and felted an adorable little change purse with a zipper on the top {gasp!}. Yes, that is right an actual zipper. To be honest the zipper bothers me more than any part fo the project!

I bought the yarn and started knitting on Saturday. I could hardly wait to start! It looks kind of blue in these pictures, but it is a beautiful shade of purple. I finished the knitting part of the project late Sunday night. I just could not stop till I was done. I was so tired I was nodding off while I knitted, but I managed to finish just before midnight. I am not too much of a night owl, so that was late for me.

I was surprised at how large it was. I know the idea is that it will shrink or felt, but it was hard to imagine how much it would change. I also had to knit this adorable little 'bobble', it will be attached to the zipper pull as an embellishment. Fun!

When the knitting was done I forced myself to stop for the night with plans to felt the project Monday evening. Monday, I went back to my directions and re-read the felting guidlines carefully. The water in your top-load washer has to be very hot. So I started the washer, and dropped it in as directed as soon as the washer started agitating.

I checked it along the way, at first nothing was happening, then... excitement! It started transforming! I checked it several times and when I was satisfied I took it, and the bobble out and rinsed them in the sink in cold water. This stops the felting process. As I reshaped it, I noticed two problems. First, that it was not as small as I was expecting it to be, so I suspect I stopped too soon. Then I saw that one of the side seams had pulled loose. I think it looks fine and fun as far as the texture, but I am not satisfied with the size. So, my plan is that tonight I will fix the side seam and put it back in the washer for another round. If it felts further, I will finish it as directed, if not, I may cut it down to size and re-sew it. I have some interesting ideas about that too.

There are just so many directions I could take this tiny little bag. I had so much fun with this that I can't wait to finish it and try again! Maybe something larger next time! Of course I still have to conquer the zipper closure and attach the bobble. I will post a final picture of the completed project in a day or two when it is complete, but I could not wait until then to share.

I think the whole process is very interesting. It seems almost scientific! I can't believe I just figured this out. Where in the world has my mind been for the past 10 years? How did I function without my knitting and now felting?

Sunday fun!

Ok, so I did not post yesterday, but it was a full day, so here it is, on a 24 hour delay. After church there was an all church potluck lunch. Yum! Then after we got home, Jacob and I went to run a few errands. On the way back to the house we drove down 11th street because Jacob has truck-fever. He is almost 16 and is ready to get his learners permit and start driving soon. So he is working on getting some money together so he can buy a truck. This one caught his eye, so we stopped to look at it. It looks pretty rough to me, but that is what he wants. He wants a Ford if possible, and he wants it to be a 4 wheel drive. Something that he can get really cheap and fix up himself.

We also stopped at the antique store at 11th & Yale near Tally's. I have been in there many times and they always have some fun things. I found this awesome little sewing machine. I think it is really cool. I did not even look at the price, because we were not there to buy, just to look.

A little further down the aisle we saw this nifty old banjo. I have never, even in my wildest dreams, thought I would see Jacob holding a banjo, but here he is. Yes, heavy metal Jacob is holding a banjo and he did it voluntarily. Looks pretty cool to me. He even strummed a few chords.

The day was moving along, so we had to do the same. We went home, and I started my felting project, but that will be a topic for tomorrow! So excited to show you what is happening! We ended up having dinner last night with our friends, John, Sheena and their adorable son Gray. Dinner was a lot of fun. John let us browse through his Aunt's house that is just across the street from his. She passed away recently and they are having an estate sale soon. The house is amazing and she had some very interesting treasures. I could have stayed there for hours looking through all the beautiful furniture and interesting nick-nacks she accquired over the years. So that was my Sunday-Funday. Tomorrow....felting for dummies!

Happy Day!

I love Fridays! This was a good one too. Nothing extra special about it, just a great day. Work went smoothly. I have these guys on my desk, thanks to my friend Amy, and now they have a cupcake to snack on. No, that is really a lip gloss that smells like vanilla in that cupcake. The ducks like it! These ducks are sometimes the only thing that make me smile at work on a rough day. Fortunately today was not one of those days.


Tonight was another fun event. Yes, the first Friday of the month is here again. Bunko night! Once again I did not win anything. Sometimes I wonder why I like it so much since I am always just mediocre on my scores. Mary won the "most wins" prize tonight. That means she cleared $15. She actually won $20, but it cost $5 to play.


The weather was beautiful today too, and tomorrow sounds even better. Kim and Jacob are already planning a fishing trip for tomorrow. They said they are planning to fish at Mohawk. I don't know if I will be invited along or if this will be a "guy trip". Either way is fine, they do need some guy time now and then, just like I need some girl time!


However it works out, I am sure I will have a great day, like today, because there is always something that I can do on my own. For example, I plan to do something about my "April Goal" this weekend. I think I will shop for a really nice color of wool to felt myself a small bag. I can hardly wait! I need to find a really good set of felting instructions for a beginner, and a nice simple pattern. Sigh, I love to plan a crafty project!

Enjoy your weekend!

April Goal

I want to learn to felt a knitted project this month. If you are not familiar with the process, here is what I have learned. You start with a wool yarn. You knit your project. Much larger than the finished project will be. When you finish, you wash the project. Wool shrinks and is then considered felted. It has a awesome thick texture that I love. Of course this is a simplified version of the process. But you get the idea.

If you click on this link you can see an example of how it works.

http://notanartist.blogspot.com/2006/04/andrea-bag-pattern.html

I think when I decide to do something, I will start small. The hard part is the washing process. I guess you need to use a special soap and you have to monitor the progress.

When I finally do it, my promise is that I will document my project and post an entry to share it with you. I think it sounds like a great Friday night project. I wish I knew how to post a picture here from the web. Since I don't, you will have to see for yourself....

Goodnight!