Wordless Wednesday - A Day in The Sun, And Girls He Cooks Too

Wordless Wednesday - An Autumn Day in the Yard

More B's Eye View Photography

Beverly's been at it again with the camera.

Apparently her Banana Chocolate Chip muffin for breakfast impressed her enough to need to snap a pic of it.

Our weird guard-dog cat, D.O.G., was keeping the last 2 Mountain Dew cans safe for us, and she thought that picture-worthy also.


She snapped a nice shot of her big brother Josiah. Isn't he cute? When he isn't tormenting her, he is darling.

Like when he is sleeping.

And we must have one of Mommy, walking through the house. The lampshade perspective is especially artistic.

In our living room, we have an old Army trunk that I got for $5 once at a yard sale. We used to keep videos in it, but now it's just empty. I do have a really nice, glass-topped, metal-sculpture-bottomed coffee table.

But since my older sons have managed to break like 3 other heavy-glass-topped coffee tables, I like the old trunk. You can put your feet on it, fold laundry on it, and spill your can of soda on it, and not worry about damaging it. Perfect.

B must think so too, as she was inspired to snap a photograph. Notice the extraneous coaster.

One more, a Cheesy self-portrait. Thank you, B, for cheering up our lives with your smiling face. And thank you for allowing us a glimpse into your little world, through your pictures!

Now, a couple pics of me own...

My parents were over to visit for the day on Saturday. This is my mom, Judith, holding Beverly for her nap.

My parents HATE our having kids, and every time since my 2nd, that I have told them I am having another baby, my mom has said, "Oh NO!!," like I told her I had cancer or something. When I am pregnant, my dad takes every opportunity to tell me that I need another kid like I need a hole in my head.

I don't really understand this, because we don't ask them to help us support the kids, and we don't get welfare of any kind. And, once the kids are here, they seem to like them ok.

Here is Beverly explaining football to my dad, Jim. Or maybe I should say James, since he gets ticked off if we shorten Beverly's name to the affectionate Betsy. So maybe NOBODY should be allowed to have a nickname? It's a thought.

The Dr. Pepper-Hoodie big-box store anomaly was gone today, but we found a little-girls' doll fail.

This is one of the reasons my girls don't play with Barbie types, yo!

Oh, Alpacas!

Today the kids and I went to the alpaca farm. I should say, the kids and Richard and I, and Des and her 2 kids, and my BIL and niece Dana.

We were greeted by Max, the VERY old Great Pyrenees hound. He did his best to keep up as we went around the farm. Here he is being petted by grandbaby Jeremiah.
We got to see the Expecting Ladies (there are 23 in this pic!). Half of these are due soon, and half due in the Fall. It takes alpacas 11.5 months to have a baby. As things stand, I have spent 5 1/2 years of my life being pregnant. SOOOooo glad I am not an alpaca!


There was a pen for the nursing babies. One mom had been shorn for breeding, and her baby too. We have had warm weather, in the 70's! And now this week it has been COLD, in the 40s at night. Today was overcast and windy, in the mid-50s. We all needed sweatshirts. That mom and baby were shivering today!

There was also a pen for the weaned babies. She said she tries to halter break the babies before they wean, so they don't associate the halter with being deprived of Mama. ONE of the babies in this pen is not weaned, so its mama is in with it. But Sherry said Next Week, LoL! Better enjoy that last little bit of milk, baby!

She had 2 pens just for the "boys"... one for "teenagers," which are about 2 years old and of market age if she is of a mind to sell them. One pen just for Grownup boys... 4 years old, and she said actually a little old for selling. Good for breeding tho! And then there was a pen for her stud... a gorgeous all-black alpaca. He had 4 ladies in with him. She said they come into heat a few days after being put in his pen and get to stay about a month or so, to make sure the pregnancy takes. We didn't get pics of all the boys, sorry. I heard someone say he wished he were an alpaca! (No names here!)

Sherry let the kids all pet a couple babies. Just above on the Right you see Jeremiah, Josiah and Artemas petting a Huacaya baby, the youngest on the farm. They have a deep, downy, nappy coat like a sheep (only softer!). Here to the Left you see Diantha holding grandbaby Hannah down to pet a Suri baby. They have a stringy, slightly oily coat that is also incredibly soft. In the foreground is my niece Dana's head.

Not to be outdone, Beverly had to pet something too. Here I am holding her down to touch the Suri baby. (I am not kidding when I say my hair is colored purple, LoL!)

We had a good time talking to Sherry, and the older girls and I are invited back in a little while to spend some time spinning. We are looking forward to it! And then...

When we got back to the house, we had sandwiches that we had taken along for a picnic but TOO cold! Then we did some spinning and Des did some knitting on her shrug. For Christmas I bought her various batts of red Merino wool and others that had black in them, and bamboo, etc. She spun up a gorgeous set of yarn skeins and is knitting this without a pattern. When she is done, she is going to edge the neck/shoulder/back edge with handspun black Merino. Bravo, Des!

While all the kids were having fun, running around and discovering earthworms in the moist dirt, Veronica didn't feel very well. She endured the trip stoically, then went to bed at home. Where I went to lay with her and sing to her and fell flat out of her TALL antique-frame bed. She said I was funny. Sometimes I feel funny, all right. Downright Stinkin' Hilarious. I managed to make it through the song on the 2nd attempt, without gravity getting the best of me.

And one last, happy note. Remember my kidney stone attack from 2 months ago? And that I posted I have been in almost constant, dull pain from it? Well on Sunday the pain became acute. Today all that pain paid off. Yes folks, that is a 7 mm kidney stone. A .5 mm (that is half mm) stone would put most people in the hospital on IV pain meds. That pic on the left was taken on Sunday, with a house full of company and a stone stabbing me. Do I look like I can scarcely believe it? Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. You saw it here.

Hunka Hunka Burnin' Love, or Somethin'

My husband colors his hair. (SHHH! He doesn't want people to know!) He has black faccial hair but doesn't want his hair colored black because it looks too fake. So I use Ash Brown on him and that works. He started coloring it about 30 years ago, when he was only in his mid-30s and went gray. Said the gray made him look and feel old. Now he keeps on, because he doesn't want people to think the kids are his grandkids. That doesn't help but still.

And, he has been sick for like 2 weeks with some sort of flu or cold. He was on vacation for part of that, and last week was a sort of short week with Thanksgiving and all, but he still ended up working Friday and Saturday, calling in sick on Sunday (the last day of their work week) and again Monday, so he could finish lying around.

Monday afternoon he says, "Would you color my hair?" I looked at him and thought, sure, anything to help it look better. He wears it long but it is thin, and different lengths some places cause it breaks easily from all the color-treatments. Two weeks of lying around as much as possible did nothing to enhance the style, without all the white poking through. So he went and got the haircolor without looking at it, and I mixed it up and put it on his hair without so much as a glance at the box. I might add that my hair is naturally very black, but I have it colored (lightened just slightly) purple right now. I had bought black hair color for when the color mutates, I can go back to "normal." Whatever that is.

He got out of the shower and says, "Why is it black?" I said, "It isnt' black, it's Ash Brown. Must be something wrong with your eyes!" Then I looked at him. My husband, the Elder Goth. Tonto. Elvis. You get the idea.

I had made a pot of bean soup for supper, but he said he needed protein. Since I was out rounding up kids, I brought home hamburgers. He had been lying on the couch keeping the madness to a minimum with the younger ones while I was gone, so he just sat up and I sat beside him, eating burgers. I was using the laptop and watching TV, but I kept seeing him out of my peripheral vision. Finally, I turned to him and said,

"Can you sing like Wayne Newton?"

ROFLOL! A few minutes later, I said, "Oh, come on, sing Donke Schoen just once for me!"

He didn't really think it was funny. It was all I could do to keep from laughing so hard I was crying! I told him if people at work say anything about it, just tell them your wife wanted some strange so she colored your hair like a Goth.

Later that night, he was heading for bed in flannel shirt and sleeping pants, looking kinda bedraggled. I said, "I gotta tell ya, Elvis, you don't look so much like A Hunka Hunka Burning Love to me right now."

Man I am having a good time with this.

Last night he went to kiss me goodnight, and I said, "Only if you sing Donke Schoen for me."

I don't know how long this will take to fade, but I can see having a little fun with it for at least a few weeks to come. LoL.

Kid-Friendly Gingerbread Houses!

Today we will make Kid-Friendly Gingerbread Houses!

You will need:

16-oz. (pint) milk, cream, half'n'half, juice or other cardboard carton, rinsed out and dried

square of sturdy cardboard, roughly 8"

aluminum foil

masking or packing tape

plastic baggies

assorted colorful candies, cereals, pretzels, crackers

plain graham crackers (not cinnamon-coated, the frosting won't stick very well on those)

Additionally for the frosting you will need:

Powdered sugar

water, cream, or milk

vanilla, if you want it

meringue powder or an egg white
(Note: the egg white or meringue powder gives the frosting a glossier look and makes it dry stiff to the touch)
(Note 2: most people no longer consider it safe to eat raw egg white. If small children or other people who will lick their fingers a lot are going to do this project, you may want to buy meringue powder. Or also if you intend to eat these after they are made.)

Preparation

Prepare the frosting: put powdered sugar and 2 teaspoons meringue powder in a mixer. If you like vanilla, add about 1/2 teaspoon. I like it, but your frosting will not be as glowing white with it. I also add a pinch of salt. While mixer is on low speed, add enough liquid of choice (water, milk, or cream) to make a relatively thick frosting.

For ease of application, put about 1/3 cup frosting into a plastic baggie. This will be easier if you tuck a corner of the plastic baggie into a jar. Twist-tie firmly shut just above the frosting. When it is time to use the frosting, snip a small tip off the baggie and away you go!

Cover the squares of cardboard with foil, taping it down on the back. Tape the cardboard carton to the top of the foil-covered square.

If working with very small children, you will want to cut the crackers. Older children can probably do it. They cut easily if you use a serrated-edge table knife (doesn't have to be sharp) to score them, then break along the score line.

You will want to have the following pieces:

4 whole crackers with about 1" cut off of them

2, half-cracker squares

1, half-cracker square cut diagonally into 2 right triangles (for house gables).

To Assemble House:

Using frosting as "glue," stick a whole, trimmed cracker to each side of the carton. You will have a little margin down each side that the cracker doesn't cover. Don't worry about it! You can fill the gap in with frosting and candies or whatever, later on.

Put frosting in a line at the top and bottom of one side of one of the squares, and stick them on the sloping sides of the carton at the top for the roof. They may overlap a little at the top.

Stick each triangle at each end of the carton roof "peak" as the gable.

Decorate with candies!

Pretzels make great doors and windows.

Square checkered cereals make great roof tiles or paving stones for a sidewalk! Or stand them on end for flower-bed edging.

Graham-cracker bears make good "people"

Sugar Cone ice cream cones covered with green frosting and red rope licorice make great Christmas Trees!

Go wild!

When your houses are dry, take a picture (put the picture in an ornament frame with the date, to hang on the tree!). Then eat them! You can make a whole village if you want... or get together with friends and let all the kids do houses at once!

Below is a picture of our houses. From left to right: Betsy's house made my mommy (me), niece Dana's (5) house, grandson Jeremiah's (3) house, Josiah's (8) house, and Veronica's (10) house. Yum!

Who the HECK is Squanto anyway?

My latest yarn series is Squanto and The First Thanksgiving. Why would I choose that? I have some GREAT ideas for yarn series for Christmas... why not go on and get those up? Some reasons:

I LOVE Autumn! For those of us who are Olfactory learners, it is a Smell-O-Rama!

I LOVE Thanksgiving. Not only is it a uniquely American holiday, but how can you go wrong with an entire holiday devoted to eating? Break out the Maternity pants and pass the yams with marshmallows, I say!

I LOVE the idea behind Thanksgiving. Most of us aren't NEARLY thankful enough. No, let me rephrase that. Most of us don't give a minute of thought to anything we have to be thankful for. In fact I would venture to bet there are a lot of us out there who think we don't really have anything to be thankful for.

It irks me that our Major Retailers skip right from Halloween (news flash, not all of us "do" hell-oween) to that Major Moneymaker, Christmas.

Every one of my kids so far has loved the book Squanto and The First Thanksgiving.

So who was Squanto anyway? He was an Pawtuxet Indian brave (hey, I know the Politically Correct term is Native American, but as a partial Native American, I don't take offense to the term I grew up with, Indian. Besides, you expect a woman with 7 kids to be politically correct? HA!) under the leadership of Samoset. Their tribe befriended our totally discombobulated Pilgrim ancestors and kept them from starving... teaching them to hunt like snipers, plant a dead fish in with their corn and bean seeds to fertilize them, showing them how to survive the drastic climate changes of our Northern Atlantic coast. (For more info, visit http://www.nativeamericans.com/Squanto.htm )

Because of these, some of my yarns are called:

Squanto - a lovely wool in self-striping reds, oranges, and tans

Venison - earthy tan and brown wpp;cashmere/acrylic

Planting Fish with Corn and Beans - pale gray wool hand dyed with yellow and green

Cornucopia - deep rich colors!

Log Cabin - deep red, tan, brown, black in 100% rustic silk

Johnnycake - looks like homemade bread! A nice thick chunky yarn.

and Pumpkin...

Well what can I say? Pumpkin is a very fine 80% wool/20% nylon yarn in pumpkin tweed with slubs of cream, tan, and blue. The entire sweater this came from weighed a mere 204 grams... not even 7 oz. At 800 yards to a 100 gram skein, this would make great lace or the softest socks. I said to Richie (my dh, who for years went by Dick, until one of our pastors' wife couldn't bring herself to say it), "Shall I hand dye this yarn?"
" No, honey... it looks great just like that. "

And I tried to listen to him. Really. In fact most of the time I do listen to him. No REALLY! But after being up several days, poor lil' Pumpkin has no one to heart it. So today my itchy fingers, that haven't had a good coat of dye in a week, got hold of Pumpkin. I overdyed some areas a nice earthy olive green, and some areas a nice dirty brown. Now Pumpkin will be Pumpkin On The Vine, and I think it is much happier.

Speaking of pumpkin, I have a funny story. We built a scarecrow with a Cashmere sweater (don't gasp, someone partially felted it so I can't unravel it) for a head, a flannel shirt, my old jeans, and my dh's ancient boots that he wore on a 22,000 mile motorcycle trip. No really. We set him (the scarecrow, not my dh) up on a haybale with some pots of begonias and some pumpkins, out under this totally ridiculous shelter that some previous owner of our house built out near the road.

I came home from my daily walk escape a day later to find the scarecrow lying on the haybale with his "head" on a pumpkin, a newspaper as a blanket and his boots off and setting next to the haybale like he took them off for a little nap. I figured the Neighborhood Vandals got to him. But no, one of my kids said to me, "Mom, the scarecrow kept falling over so I gave him a little rest." Hmmm. My kid is the Neighborhood Vandal.

Tomorrow is busy... I have handmade double-pointed knitting needles to mail, my daily walk, three of us have quilty objects to finish for a challenge, by Wednesday. School for the kids, two more yarns to unravel/dye/put up in the shop and I have some merino batts I am nearly dying to try to spin. But finally I got a chanceto take a picture to share, of the scarecrow.