Category: Family

Life’s Joys amidst stress

The state of the world right now is at the least stressful as we watch a world bully attack civilians without regard to anyone but his own ego. You can’t ignore what is going on, can’t escape the barrage of disconcerting news.

All I can do is focus on more positive things. This weekend, we are enjoying two of our grandkids, spending the weekend with us so their Mom can have a weekend away with friends. They are 10 and 15 and both really great kiddos. We did the usual Saturday morning breakfast out, egg delivery, then took them by their house to pick up a couple of missed items, then off to do a couple of errands. After that, with no complaint, they shared our walk, a 2.7ish miles. This evening, we will prepare dinner together, using it to help granddaughter study fractions as she has a test on them on Tuesday, then we will take them out for ice cream, even though it is the middle of winter and cold out, but a request that was made in front of their Mom last night.

Also a distraction has been knitting bulky yarn hats this week. So far, 3 have been made and added to the shop.

And of course, spinning with my spindles. As I am going to be offering a class at the local rec center in spindle spinning this spring, I ordered a basic top whorl spindle to use for demo purposes. It came with a second smaller one that I can make available to a grandchild or to someone in the class that comes without one.

I need spring time so I can get out in the garden. The seed came today. The granddaughter that is here is the one I help with her garden, so I think we will spend some time working on her garden plan this weekend as well.

Thank goodness for the joy of having family.

Our Day

Some people don’t like Valentine’s Day, a related contact on social media posts a meme of Cupid face down with an arrow in his/her back every year. I love Valentine’s Day, the day my love and I married 44 years ago. He picked the date, 6 short weeks after our engagement. Over the years, we have gone out for nice dinners at some fine restaurants. When the kids were small, my parents or a babysitter if it was a weekend would take over their duties so we could go out. Sometimes when it worked out, we would stay overnight in a hotel to extend the evening. Later when the kids were grown, we would often go to a B&B for the weekend closest to our anniversary.

Four years ago, we took a cruise to the south Caribbean, swam with dolphins and skates, took a tour of Belize City, another of Tulum, and rode horses on the beach in Honduras. We did the Chef’s tour on the ship one night and ate all of the tiny portions they kept bringing out until we were miserably stuffed and then were treated to an anniversary dessert.

Last year because of COVID restrictions, we bought BBQ dinners from a local restaurant and ate them from Styrofoam boxes in the car sitting by the river. Tonight we will go to a local, nicer restaurant that is limiting seating to 50% and eat out, something we haven’t been doing much lately. And my love gave me a gorgeous new spindle as a gift.

It is a special day in our lives and I hope there will be many more.

Yesterday, I made two batches of soap that is saponifying in the utility room window.

The little dish on top was extra from one batch and will be used as a travel bar if travel is every on our agenda again. Later today, they will be unmolded and cut into bars to cure. One batch is for a friend to have part of, the other, my go/to bath/shampoo bar.

Last night, during the Super Bowl, I sat and wound the 4 ounces of wool that hubby gave me for Christmas into a ply ball, then plied it on my wheel so it would be one nice gradient skein instead of 4 smaller ones that I would have to have to ply on my spindles. It ended up a fine 18 WPI yarn before it is bathed. My experience with this breed is that is doesn’t bloom too much, so a light lacy scarf pattern will be selected once I wind it off and see how many yards I am working with.

The spin started with the dark end of the gradient and ended with the lighter end, so it plied in reverse with the darkest part on the outside of the bobbin. It is a perfect color of wines and should make a pretty scarf.

There are more fibers to spin, several spindles to spin on, now 3 gifts from the man I love who indulges my hobbies.

Happy Valentine’s Day to the lovebirds out there. May you have many, many more happy years together.

It didn’t happen the way we planned

Son 1 left for his dwelling and job at 6:40 this morning, arrived there on the bus, train, and his bike and let us know he made it back. Son 2, who owns his on medical transport business ended up on an ambulance today due to employees calling out in the snow/ice storm the coast of Virginia received, so they couldn’t come.

While Daughter, Son 1 and grands were here on Friday for lunch, they taught me to use Zoom so I could join in the Zoom session that my Jenkins spinning challenge group does on Saturday afternoons and I did join them for about 35 or 40 minutes yesterday. It was delightful to see live faces and real voices of people that I have communicated with online for the past couple years. There were only 16 of us but one was in Germany, two in the Netherlands that are “neighbors” close enough to walk to each other’s homes, and from one coast to the other in the US. Such fun, I will try to join them more often at least for a while each Saturday.

We took another cold walk on the Huckleberry as it is the only route we usually do that isn’t still covered in ice, and snow flurries are supposed to happen tonight for a couple hours, but I doubt it will amount to anything. I can’t remember the last time snow and ice was still on the ground a week after it fell here. After our walk, I followed through with the plan to bake bread and make soup that was to be for a dozen or more, but just made less, and Daughter and her two came over to share the meal with us. Hot Herb and Onion bread, fresh cornbread, and a pot of delicious soup for a cold winter evening. We sent them home with the extra milk and juice purchased in anticipation of more family here, and one of the two loaves of Herb and Onion bread. There is still a part of a loaf and part of the cornbread for us to enjoy over the next couple of days.

I continue to work on the dark wine colored fiber that hubby gave me for Christmas. By spinning it on the spindles, I can enjoy it for longer, make a finer yarn, thus more yardage and then enjoy it again as I make myself something warm to wear and enjoy. The January challenge as I mentioned before, changes every couple of days and today and the next two are just to spin at least 2 grams a day and take a photo. While bread rose, then baked, and soup simmered, I sat in a sunny spot in the dining room and spun my bit for the day.

It isn’t quite as dark as it appears, but I waited until dark to take the photo.

There is some babysitting in our plan later in the week, first at their house, then bringing them to ours for a couple of days. Last time I did this, the kids and I got snowed in for a day. I hope I didn’t just jinx us.