happy birthday, to my husband

new bed

 Shaddow has a new bed!

  My husband built it for her this afternoon.  It's solid, very.  And wonderfully green.

Ain't it sweet?

more "project~to~be"s

 In the last entry, I'd said that I'm partial to vines and leaves and autumnal colors.  Here are some of the combinations that I especially like.  My favorite color is green, particularly darker shades.  In this top picture, I have some darker green fabrics.  One is reminiscent of ferns.  One is a plush pattern with dark dark green and an even darker green.  The other is a wonderful weight, tightly woven.

If you want to view any of these fabrics in more detail, simply click on the picture.  It will show the patterns featured in the picture.  You can also get a feel for the type of fabric, the print, the weave, and the weight.

Pictured here is one of the top two favorites I have in this batch.  I love, Love, LOVE  this leafy print!  I hope to make a case to carry my laptop, both fabrics are heavy~weight and I'll reinforce the layers with plastic canvas inserts between the layers and lining.

This fabric is more on the bluish side than strictly green.  I really like this combination.  This features the other of the two favorite fabrics in the batch.

I especially love that there are several different types of leaves in this print.  Oh!  And see how nicely it matches the paint {"peppermint tea"} my husband and I have chosen for our home to be finished in?  *winks*

projects to be

In the last post, the shot of the entire bed top, which is covered in projects; you may note that there is FORTY feet of folded pressed brown paper.  I plan to use that paper for tracing and making patterns for my sewing projects, namely the totes.  Now where did I get the forty friggen feet of brown paper?  Glad you asked!  When amazon.com sent us Sophie's pet~zoom {a grassy looking potty pad contraption}, they sent it in a huge box, cushioned by forty feet of brown paper.  Shipping was free, which is a good thing, because I doubt that it was necessary to pack a plastic tray that was nestled inside of another plastic tray which was inside of one inch high box...inside of a box that was several feet long and high and wide.  However, it was awesome that amazon.com sent me pattern~making paper!  Wadn't thet nice of them?!?

Also pictured here are three combinations of material with tote patterns.  Our local furniture plant, FlexxSteel, sells the remnants and remaining bolts of discontinued and discarded upholstery grade material at the warehouse on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays.  So I got each one of these sixteen several~yard swatches of heavy and mid~weight fabric for less than fifty cents each {I paid about ten bucks plus tax}.

Some of these patterns are free online, which I converted to word~docs and printed.  Others are patterns that a friend let me borrow.  She taught a class a few years ago on making purses/totes.  So I recently got in touch with her so that I could have some refresher lessons on what to do, cuz I want to make some large totes with various compartments so that I can put each crochet project, skeins of yarn, hooks, etc in its own tote.  That way, I'm not continually rearranging things, tangling yarn, dropping and unraveling stitches, and forgetting which hook I was using with which project.

I love the combinations that I've picked with several materials.  Normally, I'm not a huge print person, but several of these are so gorgeous that I can't wait to see the finished product!   I especially like the prints that feature leaves, vines, and autumnal colors.

bedful of projects

Here is my current project~cue.  A few of these are crochet, most of the future ones are sewing totes to hold crochet projects that are being worked on at that time.  Some of the stuff in the foreground is part of the package including the flowery afghan pictured in a few of the other previous entries.  The little round things with frosty white are actually scrubbies, good for dishes, non~stick pots/pans, sinks/tubs, etc.  They're made using the smallest round loom, acrylic red~heart yarn, and netting.  The stacks of hexagons are to be incorporated in the flowery afghan.  There is also a wine bottle sleeve {or it could be used to carry a water bottle, which is what this dudette always is toting} and there are several hot~pads, done in cotton.  The colors of the cotton pads are the same as the colors in the afghan, as well as the claret scrubbies and end rows for the afghan.

Two babies

My husband turns 56 tomorrow!  Seen here, he is cuddling Sophie, our almost six month old chiweenie.  Poppy is her favorite!  She loves him bestest.  nodding solemnly.

project status: about one~fourth

This is the back of the flowery project I'm currently working on.  The afghan will be made entirely of hexagons which are mostly double~crochet stitches.  There will be four rows of flowers like what is pictured here.  In between the rows of flowers will be rows of the light sage filling the spaces in between the flowers.  The both the left and right edges of the afghan will have a solid row of claret, as seen here.  All told, there will be seventeen rows of sixteen hexagons, or about 275 hexagons.  This will be for my husband's middle child/daughter.

*Warning* not meant for folks who are easily offended

You had to read it anyway, right?  snicker

I'm not sure why I thought of this, but this morning while brushing my teeth, I remembered my husband telling me about a marquee on what had been a local movie theater, which is no longer in business.  I moved to this area in January 2002, well, ok, actually it was between Christmas 2001 and New Year 2002; but at any rate, this incident happened before I moved here, in 2000.

There had been a small movie theater near the campus {Mississippi State~~go bulldogs!} which ended up going out of business shortly after a mega~complex set up on the other side of town.  But the writing had been on the wall, or marquee, prior to the closing of the three screen theater.  My husband found it so hilarious, he took a picture of the sign which listed which movies were now showing:

My Dog, Skip
Screwed
Eric Brockovich

I'm not sure how long that stayed up before there were enough complaints that management rearranged the sign.  I'm fairly certain they didn't go with "Eric Brockovich", "Screwed", "My Dog, Skip".  Yeah, that's the way we roll in Starkville, MS.

SooooOOOOooo not.

project status: about one~eighth

Sophie's Surgery

Our sweet Sophie is now mature enough at this point to have lady surgery.  So this morning, she visited the vet.  She's now home from her spayed procedure.  She's resting.

shshshshshshshshshshshsh....

She's resting.

next new project

These are hexagons, using the double crochet stitch.  I'm following a traditional quilt pattern, grandma's country garden.  It will feature sixteen flowers, with cornmeal centers, surrounded by six petals done in carrot.  The flowers will rest in a field of light sage.  All told, it will be hundreds of hexagons, each measures four and a half inches on the short~width and about five point to point.  The assembled afghan will be about six foot squared, then with trim {finished off}, it should be good for a nice sized bed, eh?

project status: all but done {just need to trim it}

he's a simple kind of man

and that's one of the many reasons I love him.  {many muhwahZ, baby!}

My husband will go to the casinos from time to time, so he receives various promo offers on a monthly basis.  A few weeks back, he reserved free tickets for us to see Lynyrd Skynyrd at the new arena at the Golden Moon casino.  The show was Saturday night.  It was awesome!

I haven't listened to them for awhile, so I'd forgotten how many songs of theirs I really did know.  So I was extra delighted when I recognized as many as I did.  "Simple Man", "Gimme Three Steps", "Gimme Back My Bullets", "Tuesdays Gone", "Don't Ask Me No Questions", "Saturday Night Special", "What's Your Name", "That Smell", "Travelin' Man", and {of course}, the ever popular "Sweet Home Alabama" and "Free Bird" were all featured.

They prove again that they don't just rock, they rule.

if i'm laying on it, it's mine

My husband just sent me a copy of these rules:

the dachshund property laws:
if i like it, its mine
if its in my mouth, its mine
if i had it a little while ago, its mine
if i want it back, its mine
if its mine, it must never be yours
if i can take it from you, its mine
if it even looks like mine, its mine
if i saw it first, its mine
if i can eat it, its mine
if you put it down, its mine
if i am chewing on it, all the pieces are mine
if its on the floor, its mine
if i don't want it anymore, its yours

This is the old mattress, with both air mattresses deflated.  As you can see, it is still damn big!  It sets a good foot plus off the floor.  And...it takes up our entire kitchen floor, which is a nice size room.  But, it's the only real option of places to put it for the night until the dude comes to get it.  I can't prop it against a wall somewhere, cuz with the deflated air mattresses, it lacks the firmness to set upright.

Sophie was climbing around on it.  Look!  A mountain!  In the Kitchen!  Look!

taking it to the mattresses

When I met my husband, my own mattress was a queen sized snuggle zone.  I love being able to sprawl and twist and turn and find the just right cozy spot.  When I moved it over to my husband's house, I set it up in one of the spare rooms, cuz we were using my husband's bed.

It's huge.  It's king sized, yes.  Put I practically have to pole~vault my way into it.  I say "into" because once I'm in it, I tend to sink a bit and then I have to struggle to get out.  It's one of those special sorts of beds where you have two air mattresses with lots of foam cushioning around them and it's all zipped into one king sized bag.  Well, the thing is, all that foam shifts around and then the two air mattresses sorta get all sloopy and we end up repositioning things.  Often.

Finally, my husband noticed one day that the zipper was coming apart and then the stuff was just sorta splitting wide and spilling out.  Then, he noticed that I struggle to get out of bed.  Then he noticed that he was struggling to get into bed.  And finally he said, "let's just get a new damn bed."  Well, I thought that sounded peachy.

So we now have a memory foam mattress from WalMart {yes, they have mattresses, my gawd, what does this store not have??} that was delivered today.  It came in a box, all compressed, rolled, folded, stapled, spindled, and mutilated.  No, not really.  It wasn't stapled.  Or mutilated.  But it was compressed, rolled, folded, and spindled.  Not many things are spindled anymore.  Ok, so it wasn't spindled either.

But after we pulled it out of the box, split the outer fibrous bag, unrolled, unfolded, and then removed the inner plastic bag, well then our king sized mattress just sorta puffed up from the severe compression packing techniques into a magical glorious bed {cue the angelic choir of ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhs}.  It sets on top the boxed springs we had on the other bed, all eight inches of memory foam.

Which is about two feet shorter than the mattress we just removed. Yes, I said, "two feet".  And on this, I shit you not, my friends.

I'm looking forward to getting out of bed with some ease {hopefully}, instead of flopping myself over to the edge and then slithering my hips over the edge until my feet touch the floor.  I'm not a short woman, not at all.  But the bed had been sitting right at my belly~button height.  That's friggin high for a bed!

I'll let ya know how it goes with this new bed.  New height.  New material {memory foam, dudes!}.  And this new bed?  It sits low enough that the lil chiweenie, Sophie, can hop up onto it with ease.  {oh, by the way, Sophie is now eleven pounds at five months}

Progress?

A little over two weeks ago, I started to work on this afghan.  Pictured here are ten of the fourteen rows the afghan will be.  I'm still making the granny~squares to complete the last four rows.  So far, I've completed 150 of the 196 squares needed.  After all the rows are connected, then I will replace the thread with yarn to connect the squares in the columns.  It'll be easier to see and understand after the entire piece is completed, I promise! 

This past week, I've been slower than usual, due to having my wisdom teeth removed.  Apparently, the speed of healing is pretty fast, which means that the itching of healing tissue is driving me insane!  But I'm glad that my mouth is healing so nicely and know that this too shall pass.

too smart for my own good

Well, today I had my wisdom teeth removed.  That IV drip to sedate me worked wonders, perhaps too well, as now I've been kinda groggy, even after a nap.  The multiple local shots are slow to wear off, I still can't move my lower lip and it feels all rubbery, but my tongue is now tingly instead of an immovable slug.  And the prescription meds hopefully will do their job once all this other stuff wears off.  I've reread the care instruction sheet multiple times cuz my retention rate at the moment is not so good.  We got lots of puddings, some soups, and smooth ice cream and sherberts.  I tried to have some pudding when I first got home and it was about as effective as feeding a squirming two month old, since I couldn't feel my lower lip or tongue, I'd do that "up against the upper lip motion" to empty the spoon, and then check the corners of my mouth and lower lip for spillage.  Yes, I am that much fun!!

afghan

So here is the project I've been working on for the past ten days or so.  It's made of four colors that represent the favorite colors of four family members {a mother, father, son, and daughter}.  It's laid out in the traditional log cabin quilt design.  Each granny square is made using the double crochet stitch.  Until all the rows are connected, thread is connecting individual squares in each row, such that when the entire thing is down {all rows joined using claret yarn as these six are}, then the columns will be joined with claret as well...replacing the thread with yarn~~the seams are done in a slip stitch.  I'll post more pix as the project progresses.

new chair

My husband has been needing a good recliner for quite some time.  Something that will last and be sturdy.  So we'd stopped by Woodlawn a few times to get a few idears of what might work.  Woodlawn's school system merged with another a couple few years back, freeing up the campus.  Woodlawn Furniture, a large wholesale/retail facility, set up shop in the five or ten buildings.  Next to the main office is a large wooden board that most likely had been where the school posted announcements for the public.  Woodlawn Furniture's map is the entire board.  And you do need the map, cuz things are pretty well organized, but it is a large area to browse.  So we went to building five, where the recliners are, and took a look~see.  Twice, in the past six months.

This morning, my husband suggested going to a factory outlet here in Starkville.  I'd heard of this place, but had never been.  Flexsteel makes a variety of products, and some of their items end up a little off of perfect, but are still functional and in pretty good condition.  This chair was in the warehouse space they use for those items and also for bolts of upholstery {heavy material in a huge variety of patterns}.  For the price, comfort, durability, I'd say we got a good thing here!

Now that I know where the store is, I'll return.  There are a few bins of remnants, marked at a dollar.  These are very suitable for tote bags, purses, and other items.  I have a few projects in mind, so some Thursday, Friday, or Saturday, I will visit this place again.

My mother will probably come to visit in March.  She asked what project I'd like to work on, as there are a few areas in the house still unpainted {like the master suite}~~which is what her major present to us had been for our wedding.  I said that I thought a non~working visit might be nice.  She and I had picked up some material last October for me to make a slip cover for my sofa and also I had bought enough so that I can redo the seats of our dining chairs.  She suggested that we work on that project, which would be very nice, as my mom is a seamstress and I am not.  I could probably do it, but I'd rather have her input, as that is one area of her expertise!

Kitty in a doggy~suit

Our Sophie truly is a kitty in a doggie suit!  She loves to curl up atop the chairs' backs, just like a kitty.  I have never known another dog to do this, tho I'm sure there are.  Sophie is such a cuddle bug.  She makes do with me, but is truly a poppy's girl.  My husband comes home, she meets him at the door, begs to be picked up and snuggled, and then spends the evening in his lap while he watches the TV.  When we go to bed, she slips under the covers, by his legs.  I wake during the night, to find her curled around his head, burrowed into the pillow with him.  In the morning, after he leaves, she shuffles over, so that she is tucked into me.  All day, she is my baby, but as soon as my husband appears, Sophie is alllllllllllllllllllll about him!  That's more than ok, cuz I am too.

uhm

Earlier today, my husband and I went to town to run a few errands and we'd stopped at Chili's to have lunch.  I saw one of their signs for a margarita special and ordered one.  The waitress asked for my ID.  I stared at her for a moment, in disbelief.  She just carded me.  Because my husband was driving his GMC pickmeup, I didn't bring my purse with my license.  I was sure she was joking, so I told her that I appreciated the compliment, but really, I'm forty.  Then she did a double take and said, "uhm, noooOOOooo....you're not.  And I can't serve you, unless I can see your ID."

Honestly folks, this face might not look forty per se, but it sure as hell doesn't look under 21!

Puppy love

It's been a little while since I posted anything about Sophie, our almost twenty week chiweenie.  She romps about in bed when we first lay down.  Then she settles, usually under the covers between us, or by our legs.  As the night goes on, she gets a little too warm, and wriggles her way partially out.  So that she ends up in this position, as shown, with her head and upper arms out of the covers and her lower body still covered:  just like her humans!  It's just way too cute and I know that I have an unreasonably deep affection for her.  We spoil her and hold her and cuddle her and she just has this complete trust that she is the center of our world and that her safety is secure.

Even Shaddow indulges Sophie's play.  There are times when Shaddow is not up for messing with Sophie, esp when Shaddow is tired and wants to rest.  She gives a warning growl and then a nip in Sophie's direction if not heeded.  But every evening, the two canines romp about, mouthing each other.  Sophie fearlessly tugs on Shaddow's lips,  even putting her head inside Shaddow's mouth.  It's strange to see Shaddow let her do that!

Scuppernongs

So this is the project I started yesterday.  I drew up the graph, planned it out, and then started to crochet it.  I finished it about half an hour ago.  What's left for me to do, is to frame it, or finish it for hanging.  Or I can make an afghan, featuring this piece.  Options, options, options.

Bill's wall~hanging

Our best~man, Bill, has a nautical room in his remodeled home.  So, my husband picked out the subject {ship's navigation wheel} and the shades {Bill's favorite colors are blue and brown}.  I graphed out a design {which took about two hours} and started to crochet it this afternoon.  Here it is, half done.

Project Status: DONE

 So about a month ago, I started this afghan.  It's now finished.  It's king sized, and then some!  I finished the second side at about the stroke of midnight, tucked in all the loose ends, rolled it out, and took some pix.  On to the next project, an afghan for our wedding's best man and his wife, whom we will be visiting in April.

Snow, in Mississippi {again}

Well, late this afternoon, it began to flurry and then those flurries added up to a few inches of snow.  I've been living here ten years, and this is the most snow we've ever gotten.  And twice!  In one winter, wow.  I know that to you who are not this far south, ya'll are probably thinking, "what's the big fuckin' deal?!?"  And to that I got one word....

Mississippi.

project status: one side completed

 This afghan is folded up so that it makes it a tad easier for me to maneuver it while working on it.  What you see here is what would normally drape over the side of the bed.  I have a feeling that this afghan no longer is for a queen sized mattress, but has now grown to king size.  I mean, this is placed diagonally on the queen and still flopped over the ends!



This features a rendition of my husband's eldest son's artist's stamp.  An artist's stamp is what you'd see on the bottom of most potters' pieces.  It's a signature of sorts that shows creatorship.


Here you can see the stylized Ws.  It's actually the center gold marking.  I just replicated the stamp across the width of the afghan {actually the length of the side}.  It's a diamond with hash marks, but is actually W's {the family surname}.


So, I have one side left on this afghan and then this piece will be completed!

New bed

My Shaddow Lane has had her own sofa since she was a puppy over nine years ago.  The one she'd had out on the farm for the first few years of her life was given away at one point to people who needed it more than she did {wasn't that nice of her to give it up?  yeah, I thought so too}.  Since last year, she's been sleeping one an over~stuffed nice number.  I usually make it up with sheets and then when those sheets need it, I change them out.  I've got quite a few set aside for her, cuz they are for one reason or the other not good for human guest use, but fine for her!

But Shaddow is over nine now, and she is getting slower in some ways and stiffer and it hurts her sometimes to climb up on the sofa.  So my husband built her a lower bed.  We moved the sofa off to the side and one of my husband's children is going to pick it up when she moves into her new place this month.

The new bed seemed strange to Shaddow at first and it took some time for her to give it a try, but eventually she stepped up on it and circled about and got comfy.  Now she loves it.  It actually gives her move room to stretch out than the sofa did!  It's a bit wider too, so she can lie in a few different positions that she couldn't manage with the sofa.

When Shaddow was not having much to do with the new bed, she tried to fit herself onto Sophie's bed.  Sophie then hopped up onto Shaddow's new bed as though she were showing Shaddow that this is what ya do!  The other night, they were both curled up on the new bed, cuz they are getting along much better more often now.





Awwww, ain't thet kah~YUTE~ah?

sharing the snicks

This pic and several different versions of the story are circulating again thru eMail.  I'm guessing it's due to the amount of snow falling over much of the country and how very tired folks are of the whole situation.  So if humor can be found, yea!!

Hope you find it as humorous as my husband and I did.

project status: psi symbol completed

 The Psi~symbol has been completed!  Yea!!  Compare to the symbol found online pictured in the last entry.

 ...next up, sides!  I have to first graph and plan them before working on them.  They will be based on my husband's eldest son's artist's stamp.  His pottery stamp is a stylized set of "W"s that sort of resembles a diamond shape with hash~marks.  I think.  I mean, when we examined our pottery pieces, that's what both my husband and I came up with.  I'm fairly certain that he {the eldest son} doesn't read my blog and if he does {HI!} then I guess the surprise has been spoiled.  But that's the main reason why I don't just say, "hey, yeah, I was wondering, would you draw your artist's stamp out for me, thanks!"