First Sweater

In the last year and a half or so, I've gotten into knitting. I learned when I was a little kid, and absolutely hated knitting. I tried picking it up again as a teenager and didn't like it much better, though I did manage to finish a sweater. The sweater ended up fitting my brother not me, so of course that sort of put me off knitting again for a long time.

I picked up the knitting needles again when I was pregnant with one of my children. I don't remember which one, that's all been years ago. But I do remember knitting slippers for everyone. Ugly slippers, but warm. And then because knitting goes so slowly for me, I gave it up again and took up with my first love- crochet.

Then Darling Daughter #1 came home from college wanting help with the scarf she was learning to knit. So I sat down and knitted a scarf with her. And promptly gave up knitting again.

Fast forward a couple years and for whatever reason, I got inspired to make another scarf, and suddenly all the pieces fell into place and I was knitting and it was fun. The first sweater I made doesn't look great, but it's warm and I wear it a lot. It's worsted weight cotton yarn that has worn quite well. I wear it nearly all year long except in July and August. Of course it is made in my very favorite color. :)

Beads and Baubles

I finally got the big tree put up. Of course "big" is a relative term in our house. We have a living room so tiny a tree barely fits and I was tripping over my husband all afternoon Saturday while I decorated it.

It would seem that over the last couple years I've accumulated quite a few purple ornaments. And I put every last one of them, plus some gold ones on the tree. Decided not to put anything on there but the purple and gold balls and I'm happy with the way it turned out.

Of course that means I have a huge box full of icicles, and gold and white themed ornaments.

The tree itself has a little story. My dear step-daughter wanted a Christmas tree. Her father, being the less than enthusiastic Christmas sort of person (ok, let's be honest and call him the Grinch) bought the cheapest artificial tree he could find.

A year later when I came on the scene, I said, "Next year we're getting a nicer tree."

And next year we had the same old tree because I couldn't afford a nicer one. And the next year I was unemployed and so on..........

So, last year as I dragged out the scraggly little thing

again. I decided, it's got too many memories now to

get rid of it. I just challenge myself to fluff and assemble

and decorate the puny little thing so you don't realize

how sad the tree is. It's sort of like Charlie Brown's

Christmas tree.

And it's been very fun accumulating those purple

and lavender decorations. Some of them came from

the thrift store I always shop at. The clear lavender

ones were an after Christmas clearence when I was

shopping with my daughter. And this fall, that same kid

who wanted the tree in the first place mailed me a

package that contained a dozen great big ornaments

all in shades of lavender and purple.

Vintage t2t

This little picture frame, about 5x7 around the outside, was this weeks craft project. I've had it in mind for quite some time. Last weekend I went thru some boxes and culled some ugly, old or broken jewelry for this.

Originally I had intended to totally cover the picture frame, but I ran out of gold stuff to cover it with. Anything I would have added next to those big brooches on the two corners would have detracted from them. And I really like the goldish wood showing thru.

Kibble..... and uhm, Christmas decorations

So, I get home from work last night and decide, I'm gonig to do it. I'm going to quit procrastinating, climb the ladder and get the rest of my Christmas decorations out of the attic. So, I climbed the weebly wobbly ladder and pulled the boxes down out of the attic. I was impressed with myself. I didn't drop anything on my head.

There are all the boxes, spread around the kitchen floor. Did I mention the attic door is over top of my kitchen table? What were they thinking???? I opened the box that has assorted Christmas do-dads and nic nacs in it and start dispersing those around the house when I came across this white poinsettia topiary.

This little thing has seen its better days. I threw it together a few years ago with odds and ends left from a different project. The whole top-heavy thing sits in a clay pot filled with rocks because that's all I had the night I made it.

At least I thought it was a pot full of rocks. The thing fell apart when I took it out of the box. Sure, there were rocks in the bottom of the pot, but on top of the rocks was..........dog food??????? What the??????????

I have no idea how it got there. Was I desperate for more ballast in the pot at one point? Did one of the kids slip it in there for a joke a year or two ago? I'm completely baffled. And to add to the mystery, it's not even a type of dog food we buy. It had to have been at least three years ago or more that we had a sack of that type of dog food.

I'm getting ready to set up the tree this afternoon. I'm wondering what other odd surprises I have in store.

Tagged and Another Tree

I've been tagged by Needless to Say over at http://justbecauseyoudontneedit.blogspot.com/
The whole idea I guess is to share 7 random or wierd facts about me and tag 7 other people.

1.) I'm left-handed. I don't think that's weird, but about 90% of other folks do.

2.)All things mechanical fascinate me. I love finding out how things work. I'm the only woman I know who knows, cares and understands how an internal combustion engine works.

3.) I do all my own home repairs. I own power tools (lots of them) and know how to use them. I don't think this is weird, but my neighbor ladies do.

4.) I collect vintage jewelry.

5.) I'd collect cars if I could afford to.

6.) I have three daughters and they've all totalled a vehicle. I find that disturbingly odd.

7.) I hate curtains, drapes and blinds. If it were up to me, my windows would all be naked. I want to let all the light in and I want to be able to see out! I lived in a basement apartment once and it nearly drove me bananas because I couldn't see out.

Now I know I'm supposed to tag 7 other folks, but I don't know 7 other folks much less 7 who haven't done this recently, so I'll just tag one.

Debi (What's Cook'n in Junk)



And now for the promised tree photo. I got my second Christmas tree up today. It looks a little sad and dilapidated in the picture, but it was sure pretty when I came home after dark this evening. It's in the front porch where everything looks sad and dilapidated, so it fits. Usually I have a coffee can or vase full of drying flowers sitting in that spot.

Hmmm. Guess I'm not adding any pictures to this tonight. Not sure what's going on, but the pics won't load, so maybe tomorrow.

Deck the Halls

I was off to a good start with decking the halls, but after getting a tree outdoors lit and a little tree up in the kitchen, I've realized that any other Christmas decorating requires some housecleaning first. And I'd rather do anything than clean house! I hate shopping during December, but I even went and stayed with my daughter this weekend and went shopping rather than clean house. I had this morning off from work and it's been much more fun to sit here and catch up on my e-mail and everyone's blog than it would have been to clean house.

So, here's a couple pictures of my kitchen tree, or the jewelry tree as I'm calling it. I didn't have near enough aqua colored ornaments for it, so I just started adding rhinestone jewelry to it. I really like the way it turned out. After it was all done I found some satin ribbon that would have worked better than the ric rack, but I'm not redoing it.