Donkey's Tail Gets a Trim

I have this cute flamingo planter in which I have a "Donkey's Tail" plant. I think that I originally purchased the plant, much smaller in size, as a "mercy buy" from Walmart. I always feel so sad for those plants because no one seems to be taking very good care of them.

This plant has done unbelievable well in the spot where it sits in the kitchen. The problem is that the "tails" get a bit unruly at times and then I end of with a bunch of little broken off pieces all over the floor. So, it had to have a "hair cut". You can see that I cut a bunch off. I'm sure by the end of the summer, the tails will be quite long again.

I just wish I had another pot to throw the cut pieces into or something. hmmm...wait...maybe I do...I'll have to check that out.

Last Minute Gift.....complete!

I know this isn't a great photo, but it is dark out and I wanted to get this gift wrapped...so I did the best that I could -- because I also wanted to post a pic of this on my blog. I just decided, today, to make this hat for my brother for Christmas. I am on the e-mail list for Lion Brand Yarn and they send out e-mails maybe once a week or something like that....and they almost always include some sort of pattern. The e-mail I received on Sunday had this pattern. They said it was a fash-finish gift, which was true! I crocheted the hat this evening, very quickly, and I don't actually crochet all that quickly. I think it turned out nice enough.

The Newest Addition to the Family

This is Smokey (or Smokee, depending on the sex), the newest addition to our family. We weren't in the market for a new cat, it just happened. Tim was working at the fire department last night and there was a fire at a local groomers. She also happens to board pets. In addition to the boarding, she keeps other animals, trying to find them homes before they have to be sent to rescue shelters. The fire department managed to save maybe 8 dogs (there were a few others that sadly, did not survive), a couple of birds, and this kitten. My darling husband told the groomer and the animal control that if the kitten needed a home, we would take it. He checked back earlier today, and the kitten did need a home. So, $31 (so far) and a bath later, this is how Smokey looks. We think he/she is maybe 4 to 5 weeks old. Smokey is very affectionate and easy going with his/her motor almost constantly running. We'll see how it goes.

Goodies

Last week, I was lucky enough to win some goodies from Sammye Jo over at 62 Cards. The goodies arrived today.... a cute little Santa tin, filled with a handful of those cute little Santa tags like the one in the photo. Sammye Jo also included a couple of cards and envelopes to go with them! The photo above is just one of the cards. Thanks so much, Sammye Jo! I was delighted to win.

I'm In Love....

with this new blanket I bought from Kohl's during the Black Friday sales. The photo does not do justice to the blanket in any way. It is called a supersoft plush blanket. Are we lacking blankets at our house? No, absolutely not. In fact, we certainly have more than our fair share and definitely more than we need. My mom just bought us a really nice plush blanket for Christmas last year. Yet, when I saw this blanket advertised, I decided to check it out. It was soooooo soft and cuddly, I just couldn't resist...and it was only $19.99 even for the king size. Our bed is not king size, but we have one of those pillow-top mattresses and we have a regular box springs, too, which means our bed is really high and a lot of blankets do not cover the bed to my satisfaction. I took my new blanket out last night to try and instantly fell in love. I seriously could just wrap up in this blanket, in the recliner, and stay there all day. It's definitely love.

Craftiness for Christmas

Tim had to work a 24 hour shift at the fire dept. starting at 6 a.m this morning, so I promised myself that I would spend the day being crafty, working on some Christmas gifts. I managed to finish off the dishcloth that I started the othe day (pic. 1), crochet another dishcloth in a different design (pic. 2), and make these Patchwork Kitchen Towels. I think everything turned out great. The difficult part will be actually giving away items that I like so much and want to keep for myself!

Benni Has Other Ideas....

After loading some magazines into my new undercover crate and setting it next to the recliner, I went into the kitchen to do some project clean-up. Tim called me into the family room to see this. Apparently, Benni had taken up residence.

Undercover Crate

This is my new Undercover Crate. I was surfing around the other day, following some links from Jen's blog (at least I think that's how it happened...) and stumbled across the tutorial for the Undercover Crate. Then, I made a trip to a quilt store near my house and found this great Amy Butler Fabric to use in the making of the crate cover. What is nice about this fabric is that it is a bit heavier than normal, which I liked. I also used the Button Brad Tutorial from the same website as the crate tutorial. I found both tutorials to be well written and easy to follow. If you have some crates that you want to jazz up a bit, I would recommend trying this. I thought I was going to use the crate in my car to keep things under control... But, I like this so much, I might use it in the house to keep magazines under control.

Amy's Accents

This is a shameless plug for Amy's Accents. Amy is a long time friend of mine and former roommate. She makes these wonderful hand poured soy candles. Yesterday, she was participating in an open house type thing with a bunch of other businesses. I mainly went because I wanted to buy more of Amy's candles.

She has so many scents all they all smell wonderful! Yesterday, I purchased a Cranberry scented tart to try. Within 10 minutes of me burning it in the living room, Tim walked in and said, "What smells so nice in here?" He must have commented two or three more times throughout the evening that the tart smelled really nice.

Some of my favorite scents are hot apple pie (mmmm....), Celtic Moonspice, Lemongrass, Banana Nut Bread, Mexican Vanilla (and I don't EVER like vanilla scented candles), Fresh Apple... I really could go on and on. I have a whole list of scents that I am going to try after I burn through the ones I currently have.

Anyway, if you are looking for some wonderfully scented candles that also burn cleanly, you should give Amy's Accents a try! You won't be disappointed! And, not to forget, they are very reasonably priced, too!

Benni Has Chosen a "Spot"

Benni has finally chosen her "spot" in the house. Unfortunately for us, the spot is on top of our DVR box next to the television. Tim kept seeing her up there and taking her down. She would just head right back up there. He finally said, "I give up!" I think she likes it for a bunch of reasons. It is high (on top of a large, old speaker), it is warm, and it seems to vibrate a bit.

Another Baby Blanket....

I was just talking to Tim on the phone and I mentioned that I was about to finish another baby blanket. Tim asked, "Who's it for?" Well, I don't really know.

My friend, Jenny, had made a nearly similar style blanket and posted on her blog about it. Her post inspired me to try making my own version. I believe that her blanket only had one layer of flannel, while I made mine two layers. That's the difference between living in California versus Illinois, I suppose. Anyway, it turned out not bad for my first try with this style. What you can't see from the photo is that one side is wider than the other (I only noticed this when I tried to fold it up).

The funky shape made me realize that should I want to continue to make this style of blankets, I will have to make some changes, or should I say purchase a couple of items. The top two things on the list being a larger cutting mat for my rotary cutter and a longer "ruler" for my rotary cutter. I *think* that would help me out.

A Vegetarian Niece

Tim's brother-in-law and our niece have been visiting from California since Thursday. They flew in to attend a wedding. Anyway, our niece is vegetarian. This is fine, however it is not how we typically cook in our house.

Over the summer I had seen a recipe in one of my magazines for Black Bean Burgers. At the time I thought that it wouldn't mind trying them and that I should try them whenever our niece is in town.

On Saturday, before they left for the wedding, Tim cooked burgers on the grill. I quick mixed up the burger portion of this recipe. I did eat one. They turned out to be rather tasty, I might add. If you are ever looking for an alternative to meat, I would recommend them. I guess I should have taken a photo of them or something, too.

Bunny Killer and a Baby Blanket

For those of you in the know, we have a Siberian Husky named Jager (Tim picked the name). She really is a very pretty dog. However, she tends to go through phases where she will make mischief. Her mischief includes, but is not limited to, digging holes in our yard, ripping up nice new $40 rugs, tearing to pieces any stray laundry that might be left in her "room" (a.k.a. the laundry room). Admittedly, except for the digging, she hasn't done most of the other things in a while. Yesterday morning, I was getting ready for work and I happened to glance out the back door (keep in mind I don't have my glasses on yet, so I can see, but not so much). I can tell the dog has something she is preparing to rip to shreds and I thought it was a dish towel or some old shirt that had been inadvertenly left outside by Tim. I walk up to the door, the better to see with, and figure out that the dog had a bunny :-( I don't know how she got it, since the bunnies usually avoid our yard like the plague and with good reason, obviously. So, we now have a bunny killer.

Tomorrow, I am attending a baby shower for Tim's nephew and his wife. This will be my third "great" nephew/niece. So, I have to bring a gift. I decided to make the requisite baby blanket. That is, as I was growing up, my mom and aunt always made these baby blankets to give as shower gifts. It is simply flannel (with a baby print, of course) with satin blanket binding. A lot of people love them because they are a bit bigger than the normal baby blanket. I will do some add-ons, too. But, I do have to say that it is not really cheap to make one-but they are worth it, I think. It costs anywhere from $3.99-$6.99 per yard, typically, for the fabric and the blanket uses two yards. Then, the binding is something like $5.99. So, that brings the price for the materials up to anywhere from $14 to $20. How much is time worth? Tomorrow morning, I will be off to find the add-ons. Not the best photo in the world, but I wanted to add it anyway.

Geeksquad...Customer Service, Not So Much....

So, tonight, I FINALLY picked up our computer from the Geeksquad. On, Sept. 30, in the evening, it just seemed to "crash and burn." It was acting weird and I tried a virus scan (which I do regularly, anyway). In trying to deal with an issue it brought up, I tried to log out and log back in. Wasn't able to log back in and I kept getting this frozen blue screen with some message in white text. So, since I know nothing about fixing any sort of computer stuff, I sent the computer off with Tim on Wed., Oct. 1, to be dropped off to the Geeksquad at Best Buy. The ticket they gave him had an estimated completion date of Oct. 4th, although they verbally told him a week. Well, after a week goes by Tim calls them. Now mind you, Tim uses the computer for his business...I have a work laptop that is as slow as molasses...I am not comfortable letting him use it to do all of his online banking and such b/c I heard that they told another employee when they issues her a laptop, "now this isn't for your personal use at your home..." So, Tim had to make arrangements to go to either his brother's or sister's house to do some of his work. I also had to installer our printer drivers on the laptop so that I could print some things I had made up for school. Back to the story.... Tim calls them after the week and they are "running diagnostics now..." I think they call him on Wed. the 8th and say that they just need to "restore" the computer and it will go quicker if we drop off our restoration cd's. So, on Thurs. morning Tim drops off the cd's and PAYS for the service. They say, it should be done by Friday (keep in mind they are already beyond the week at this point...) or first thing Sat. morning. Tim does not hear from them and so he calls on Sat. morning. They say, "Oh, we don't know why this isn't done yet, we'll start it right now, it should be done today and could be picked up tomorrow at 10 a.m." So, I call them this morning, first thing. STILL NOT DONE. I tried to nicely explain the timeline to they guy on the phone and that it is extremely poor customer service/business to tell people that work will be completed by a certain time and then it's not! I mean, if you don't know how long it will take, say that. Don't tell us it will be ready X day and then it's not...and then change it on us two more times and have no reason for it, either.


I asked to speak to a manager when I picked it up. Conveniently, the manager was already gone. Did it have something to do with the fact that when I talked to the guy on the phone this morning I said that I would be there at 7:30 p.m. this evening to pick it up and that I WOULD be asking to speak to a manager??????? Possibly. And, the manager won't be back until Tuesday. I left Tim's name and number since he was the one that dealt with them most. We'll see if he calls.


As an added twist, I also think that they sent the computer back to use with different side panels. Our computer has a grey/silver/black front and I am reasonably certain that it also had grey/silver sides...and now they are white? We have a Dell computer, and the panels do say Dell...but the white struck me as not being the original sides. So, we'll see what they have to say about that, too.

I also decided that I am going to put Best Buy (since they are the source for Geeksquad) on the "only purchase from them when I have not other choice" list. I invite you to join me.

Thinking ahead....

I am trying to think ahead and get started on my Christmas gifts. This year (although I say this a lot of years) I would like to try to make a bunch of gifts. I like to be crafty and I think a handmade gift is more personal.

I saw these towels on a blog, and I thought that they would make a cute gift for my sisters-in-law. I already went to IKEA to check out their dishtowels with the weave design. They are a nice size AND you can buy a 4-pack for $2.99! That's less than $1 before you add the other fabric to it. Not a bad deal, I don't think. I was also thinking that they towels could be made with different types of holiday fabric, too -- for Thanksgiving, Halloween, Christmas, etc. I think a project like this would go quickly and most people can always use dishtowels!

I also bought a crochet book with patterns for crocheting dishcloths and I will be attempting to crochet some of those, too!

We'll see how it goes. I will be sure to post photos of any completed projects.

"Bachelorette" for the Weekend

I am a "bachelorette" for the weekend. Tim is in Springfield for a car show with his buddies. There are no girls "invited", but frankly, I wouldn't want to go, anyway. I have plenty of things to do though: housework, scrapbooking, housework, out to dinner, housework, hook up the new t.v., etc.

I definitely miss Tim, from the moment that he is gone, but it is nice to have the peace and quiet and the house all to myself, too. I will attempt to work on that housework and if not, I will undoubtedly be doing some crocheting or some rubber stamping. I want to work on some Halloween cards.

Sick (AGAIN) and Miserable

It seems that I am coming down with another cold. I had one three weeks ago, while I was doing jury duty. Now, it seems I am getting another. I was trying to figure out why. Then, I remembered. On Monday, a student sneezed on me! I guess I must not have washed up well enough after that! My throat hurts, my nose is stuffed...I'm miserable.

The Cats.

Tim called me to the living room the other day so that I could see the cats laying together like this....

My Dad's Garden

My dad likes to grow a huge garden. We visited my family over Labor Day weekend and stayed at my dad's house. He also likes to plant lots of flowers along the edge of his garden. There were also lots of butterflies. Unfortunately, most of them would not sit still long enough to be photographed....or else they kept their wings closed. I did manage to catch one of them, though. I was really intrigued by the flowers and some of their parts, how they are shaped and such.

Baby Afghan Number Two

This is a photo of the new baby afghan that I just started crocheting last night. I made one other afghan for a baby, but it is blue. No one I know has had a baby boy since I finished it.



I received the pattern for this one in an interesting way. Recently, some of you know, I had jury duty. Well, while I was wasting away in the jury duty room, just waiting to be called (which never happened), I started talking to some of the other potential jurors. Actually, I had seen this lady crocheting earlier in the week. On this particular day, I went to talk to her to see what she was actually making. She nicely offered to send me that pattern. And now, I am working on a new afghan--never mind that I have several other unfinished crochet projects going. At least I used yarn that I already had in my stash!

More Garden Photos....

I have a very small garden. The tiny end portion of the garden area did not seem very "hospitable", but I went ahead and planted some muskmelon plants there anyway. All summer the vines seemed to be growing and flowering, but I never saw any fruit growing. Last week, Tim pointed out to me that he had found a couple muskmelons. I was very excited. This is just a photo of one of them.

My Abs and Bottom Had Better be Shaping Up!

So I'm taking this class the fitness center. It is called TEAM Fitness. The purpose of the class is to build lean muscle mass and reduce body fat. It runs for 12 weeks and we are in week 9 this week. Well, I guess the exercises that Jenna (the trainer for the class) made us do the other night were a little bit different because my high abs are super sore and so is my bottom, right where it is attached to my legs. Consequently, every time I move around to do something I feel the soreness and I am not very happy--even though it means that I should be shaping up.

First Harvest from My Garden

So I have had this blog site for a while, but haven't actually written anything on here. I decided it was about time. I am adding a photo of the first harvest from my very own first official garden. We don't have a huge yard, so I had to section off a little piece of ground next to the garden -- the only spot in the yard that I felt got enough sun to support it. I planted tomatoes, several types of peppers, cabbage, green beans, carrots and muskmelon. The green beans aren't doing so well...mostly because the dog decided to dig in that little area of the garden! *sigh*