Finished Rugs and Other Projects

September is just around the corner. It is time to put away summer things and turn my mind to fall. Which means, I have to stop the procrastinating and get my summer projects finished so I can move on to fall.

Here is some of the rugs that this weekend I will be binding. I want to start fall rugs but I just can't let myself do it until these are all completely finished.

This is one of my favorites. Emilie asked if she could have it for her house. That is another reason to finish it so it can go to a new home.

 

I got this pattern out of one of my old copies of the Wool Street Journal. The rug pattern was designed by Robin at Bird in Hand Primitives. It was a fun little project but it took me way longer than it should have.

 

I made this little mat again. My grandson took the first one home. I liked this pattern so much. It was fun to hook and it has all of the elements I love. The pattern was done by Cathy at The Orange Sink.

 

I did this one again. I still like it so much. I think I spent so many years staring at this pattern. I would wish I was a rug hooker so I keep doing it over and over.  It has all of the elements I love and looks so old fashioned and nice on my bench. Well, it will after this weekend when it is finally finished.

Freebie offered by Primitive Hare

Pineberry Lane

Pineberry Lane

One the days when it is just too hot to hold the rugs, I would do these counted cross stitch designs I hope to finish them up as well this weekend.

I am also working on my penny rugs. They are so much fun. I just wish it was colder so I could sit in front of a fire.

Both kits designed by Cee at Diary of a Rug Maker.

We will see how the guilt meter goes, as my flowerbeds really do need to be cleaned and my flowers need to be dead headed. I know that Labor Day weekend is a holiday, but Ron and I always thought it meant work until you drop as a way of getting ready for winter. I have been on the computer and he is of course outside working.

Have a wonderful holiday weekend, I hope where ever you are it is beautiful,

See you in September.
~Kim~

 

" Misery is when you heard on the radio that the neighborhood you live in is a slum but you always thought it was home."
---Black Misery, Langston Hughes, 1969

" We never knew we were poor, even though we were in a farm labor camp, we thought it was the people next door."
---My Dad--
On Reflecting on the Sunset Labor Camp in Weedpatch, made famous by John Steinbeck

Days of Summer

 

Have you noticed how much the sun has changed? The light has become golden and warm in a sleepy kind of way. It is still warm, but  fall seems to be stealing in bit by bit, little by little. The trees are growing tired and longing for a rest. I am starting to see migrating birds flying though. I saw some kind of a scissor tail last night. A few flocks of geese have started flying in the evening and early mornings. The crickets sound half hearted  in their fiddling.

 

My flowerbeds look like they are weed beds. The weeds have won and  I  plan on doing some Labor Day yard work. My Mums look very good and I know as soon as a bit of cold weather comes in they will look so pretty.

 

With school starting, it feels good to be back in some sort of routine. Getting dinner cooked on time, coffee in the afternoons with the kids. One of my favorite things is listening to every adventure and funny stories. It is cooler so baking is nice again. I was thinking about daily life and I have come to the conclusion that it is the little daily routines that make up a joyful life.

 

I am so glad to get back to walking in the morning. It is so different from last year. When I walked last year, a stick would become a snake, or a pile of leaves was a skunk. People could walk right up to me before I saw them. I always felt off balance. Walking this week, it was so nice to be aware of my surroundings and see sticks that were sticks and leaves were leaves. It made my mind go off on a tangent. I thought about gratitude and trials. I think that when John Newton wrote Amazing Grace, it was a prayer from his heart. He had lived such a terrible life of his own choices. Once he realized what he gained when He returned to God, the grace he felt daily was over whelming. My favorite verse now of that song, " I once was blind and now I see." As I walk and think about being able to see, that song for me has so many levels for me.

 

I have an old picture of one of my great-great-grandmothers. She went blind about my age. I wonder if she had what I had and if she had lived now, would she have been been able to see?  In the photo she is sitting on a porch in a rocking chair, with her hair pulled back in a severe bun,  but her dress is very nice. I wonder if it was hard to have to give up her handwork and reading. My grandmothers were all great readers. They might have been poor but the greatest treasures they passed on was their love of  books.

I thought about how grateful I am for the trials that have come and gone. I am thankful that they don't last forever and that there is always something to be thankful for and to fill my life with joy.

Have a wonderful day,
~Kim~

" People don't care how much you know,
They just need to know you CARE."

---Barbara Johnson, " I'm So Glad You Told Me
What I Didn't Wanna Hear."

A New Week

 

Here we are to a new week, and dare I say it the last week of August. ( Yay!) We will still have hot weather in September, but I know we are on the down side of that. We had a going away party for my niece this weekend. We fixed up a place in the yard. I think it turned out really cute.

 

 We have all kinds of plans for it. We have the fire pit down there and it makes the best place for a party.
There were a bunch of young people down there and you can't even tell it. We would have done more but our tractor had to go to the tractor shop for a tune up.

 

I think I need to go learn out to be a tractor mechanic. We should get it back this next week sometime and then we can start doing some real work.

 

We had my son, Ben and Megan the the boys over for dinner on Saturday. He has been going hunting when he gets the chance. We wanted to hear all about his hunting trips. He told us one, and  I sat and cried the whole time. I thought I would share a bit of it.
He and his hunting buddy were driving back in the hills. A dirt road, with ruts and rocks and steep inclines. They were in a four wheel jeep. As they were going down this road, up ahead, Ben said he could see dirt like from another car. After a while they caught up to it and it was a little two wheel SUV. They went to pass it when they could and as they got up next to it, Ben said he saw that the hands on the steering wheel were lined and old, then he saw that the woman driving had a oxygen tank.

 

He knew then that they were lost. I kept thinking of the poor man and lady as this jeep pulls up and there are these hunter looking guys with guns and other things in the jeep and how scared they must have been.
Ben said, they rolled down the window and he said that he asked them where they were going, and they thought they were going to a resort area the total opposite direction from where they were.

 

Ben said that the husband had had a stroke so he couldn't drive and the lady who was 86 was shaking like a leaf. He asked them, " Would they like to follow them out and back to town or would they like him to drive?"
The lady jumped in the back seat quick as a wink, and Ben got in and drove them back down the mountain to safety. When they got into a area with cell service he called their son and told them what happened. The lady started giving him money and he told her" that they didn't need anything money," and she said, " Oh yes you do so take it." He said that he and his buddy had dinner and as it was too late for hunting went on back home.

 

You know how you read stories all of the time how people just end up dying and they find them days later. I guess I never imagined how they got there. As he told the story,  I was was so proud of Ben and what a wonderful man he is and you know how I am proud of my kids, Ben works hard and supports his family and then instead of going on down the road stopped and helped that old couple.

 

I love this stage of my life. I love seeing what kind of people they are and how incredibly  blessed I am to be their mother. I do feel like the richest woman in the whole wide world. I talked to my grand son yesterday on the phone. He is such a sweet little kid and when he was here over the summer we had lots of talks. He took one of my rugs home with him and yesterday he said, " Grandma you know that rug you made me? Well, I sleep with it every night." " I said oh you do?" He said, " Yes, I sleep with it in my arms so I can dream of you  Next time I come, I am spending a month."  ( He is seven years old.)

No matter how crazy the world gets, and how hard life sometimes is, there are moments that come into my daily life that show me how fairy tales do come true and how it is just a wonderful life.

Happy Monday,

~Kim~

O God, thou art my God, early will I seek thee: My soul thirsteth for thee,
my flesh longeth for thee,
In a dry and thirsty land, where no water is.
Psalm 63:1
( A Psalm of David, when he was in the wilderness of Judah.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Computer Woes

Do you ever think about how simple life was before computers? Do you ever look back on days when there wasn't the fear in your life of Windows XP vs Windows 8? I have an old computer. In fact, I always have the old, hand me down computers, because I am not the one who does anything really serious on it. Which is fine. I like that.

When Microsoft decided that they were no longer going to support XP I had to get busy and find a new virus software to run. I did, now the one I have is like having a crazy parent standing over my shoulder shouting at me. I can be on Pinterest just quietly looking and bells start clanging and a screen pops up with " GET OUT OF THERE RIGHT NOW!!! Could be a harmful site!!! So I press escape. I always run a scan and then it makes a happy sound that says, " Your computer is fine there are no viruses found."

On Wednesday, Microsoft who isn't supporting XP anymore, will on occasion send a update. Which they did this week. Only now, what it did was updated something now my camera won't down load pictures to my computer. It worked fine until they fixed something that I didn't wanted fixed. Now I have to do voodoo, the camera still works but now I have to download pictures to Ron's computer and  then send them to myself.

Now you can't see this as I am complaining about computers and software and hardware. My sentences are underlined with red. (It fixed itself when I spelled Microsoft correct.)

Back to the virus software. It just sent me a message, short and sweet. The note sounds exasperated with me, it sounds like a professor clearing his throat, " Hey you! Yes you! Looser!! You need to update these programs ASAP" They have these little messages by each one that says, " IGNORED!"
They are programs if I did down load them, they are ones I don't use and I don't want and they would slow down my very slow computer.
Every morning, when I turn my computer on I have to wait until it does its thing. I didn't realize how bad it was until this morning when Ron was trying to fix something for me, and I started feeling like I was going to cry because he didn't understand. I said, " Oh no, you can touch it right now," He looks at me like I might have gone around the bend. I said, " Well you see if you push any keys until it is ready it will hang and then you have to restart, just let it get ready and then it will work." So we both sat here until the bells stopped clanging and the virus software said, " Now that your computer has been updated, have a nice day." Which means, " I will keep my eyes on you and you had better not do or go anywhere that I don't like."

 

 So I do think my life was much more simpler without computers. I am tired of appliances too. The repair man finally showed up to fix my oven. Yes, my oven will for some reason turn the broiler on and won't turn off, so I have to turn the breaker off. This has been going on now for awhile. Did it do it for the repairman?
Nope, just acted like a good little oven. You know what I am thinking? Maybe Microsoft has taken over my whole house. 

Have a lovely weekend, computers or not, I am so excited for Fall. I saw some leaves fall today that were yellow. It could be the heat, but I just smiled and said, " Fall is on its way."

~Kim~

" One doesn't contradict a hungry tiger."
---My Father's Dragon, Ruth Stiles Gannett, 1948

A Bit of Shopping

One of the things we had planned to do while Ron was on vacation, was go antiquing. We didn't because we did so many other things. On Saturday though, Megan was having a show at our fairgrounds. We went to see her and it is always a good idea to buy her lovely soap. She has some new gift bags I thought were just lovely.

 

Her deodorants and her new fragrances are just lovely. Here is her link Bumblewood 
Since Ron got me out of the house we decided to go to the antique stores downtown. We found one that opened in April and it was just lovely. These buildings downtown are just so huge. Sweet people run it and we enjoyed ourselves.( I never remember my camera)
The first thing I found, was a cigar box. It was in really nice condition and do you know how much I kick myself for not saving them from when I was a kid.

 

I lined it with old paper and put some things in it but I don't think it is going to stay that way. Do you remember in the beginning of the movie To Kill A Mockingbird? I love that box and I was thinking of looking around and putting some old marbles ( I collect old marbles) a old pocket watch, some old crayons and see if I can carve a boy and girl. I think there is a liberty head dime in there and a buffalo penny. I have those too.
I will have to watch the movie again and see what I missed. It  was  the things in that old knot hole that Jem found. Things that Boo Radley left.

 

I put some old things in it to make it look like it was an old treasure box which was fun.  I like things that tell stories.
I also found a spindle. I have been looking for one of these forever. I was so happy to find one.

 

I found a blue canning jar with a bale handle. As my grandmother used to say, " These things are getting as scarce as hens teeth."

 

 We went to a couple of antique stores and this one was in the best condition and the cheapest.
I have some old Coca Crates and my brother has a bunch out in his old shed, and some of them were for sale for 30 or 40 dollars. I thought I need to bring mine in the house.  Oh, and when I worked in the grocery store we would get our watermelons in these wooden crates. We saw one for 50 dollars. The box boys would just break them up and throw them away.

 

I have been looking for a washboard for a long time. But just not any washboard. One that told a story.
When  I found this one, I was so happy. You can see how this one was really used. The label is gone the wood has had so much lye on it, that it is bleached white and the wood isn't like wood anymore. There is a spot of white paint on it that made me think of a housewife, painting and taking care of her home and family.
When I was  kid my Mom wanted one for her laundry room. I remember how my great grandmother and my other grandmothers would scoff at her and say, " Why in the world would you want one of those?"

 

Even though this is not an antique I wanted to share it. One of my friends has been dyeing and selling the loveliest counted cross stitch fabric. It just has the nicest feel to it. I can wait to sew on it. Her blog is Dixie Sampler. She runs a group I am in on Face Book called The Prim Stitchers Society.

 

I would like to go explore some antique stores that I didn't make it too. Ron and I had such fun, and he really is a good spotter. I just tell him what I am looking for and he finds it after I have already walked by.
I hope you have a lovely day. The news keeps talking about all of the fires we have around us. It really is disheartening sometimes. The air is filled with smoke all of the time it seems. Our kids were at the campground in July where the one on the news kept showing the people evacuating. They said, it was so dry then. I know how dry it is here. In all of my life I have never seen it as bad as it is here now. Maybe the rains will come this year.

Have a great Thursday,
~Kim~

" Trees are very nice.
They fill up the sky.
---A Tree is Nice, Janice May Udry, 1956

Today is a New Day

Yesterday was Monday, it was a blur for me. It didn't start out that way. I decided that I would get back to my walking routine again. As I walked by the pumpkin patch, I remembered that we had two empty green trash cans. As I looked at the pumpkin patch, and the pumpkins that needed to be harvested. I decided I was the crazy woman for the job. I knew I had only a limited time before the trash men came.

I grabbed my gloves, a trash can, a wheel barrow and clippers. ( Not all at once, there were trips up and back to the shed and out to the road to make sure the trash men hadn't come early.)

 

I began my race and for 3 1/2 hours, I pulled vines, cut pumpkins and stuffed trash cans. Then I would pull them to the road and then take a wheel barrow in the yard. I dumped the pumpkins on the grass so that I could wash them. That last trip as I put my tools away, I thought to myself, I think I might of over did it just a bit.

 

I left the sunflowers. The birds are very happy. I came out here late last evening and it looked like a flock of tiny chickens there were so many doves.

 

I have two of these wash tubs full of the tiny ones. These about did me in because I picked up and picked up and almost but not quite, wondered what on earth was I thinking planting so many of these.

 

Once I washed off the ones I picked I came in the house to start my Monday work. I managed to get laundry done but that was it. I had the thought, " Can you die, from picking pumpkins?" I took a shower and went to bed. Isn't that terrible. I slept for a bit and then managed to walk and get laundry done and dinner cooked. Today, I hope to get the work I didn't get done yesterday done today. I did pick tomatoes this morning.

 

One thing I am very thankful for, is that I can work that hard, I can push myself to my limit. Go to bed and wake up in the morning ready to do that again. It really is a gift I am very thankful for but I don't think I will be doing it for a while. I will wait until after the first frost to take out the gourds. With help.

Have a wonderful Tuesday.
~Kim~

 

" For it isn't normal to always be good---
I don't think you'd want to, and don't think
you should;
Just as food tastes better with a shake of salt,
A small bit of mischief is hardly a fault.
And life would be boring, and life would be grim,
If children were all goody-goody and prim."

---Beastly Boys and Ghastly Girls, William Cole, 1964