Extra Large Cowl

I made an extra large cowl......it wasn't my plan.  I had started out with writing out the plan for what size I wanted, and how many ends I'd have, how wide and how long.  Got that all down on paper.
Then I started winding the yarn.  The yarn spoke to me and I ended up with something twice as wide as I'd planned on.
That's ok.  I go with my gut when I'm weaving.  I'm not a very structured person....in anything I do.  So this was fun.
I wound my warp.  I tried several different yarns in the weft.  I ended up using the same yarn as the warp and I'm really glad I did.  I LOVE this piece.

I probably should have worn a contrasting shirt in the photos so it's easier to see.  Oh well.....

The warp was 120" long.  I tied it on and left 29" at the front end before weaving.  This is so that I can weave the front end, into the back end when I get done weaving the actual body of the fabric. 
One slight problem with that.....the loom is not 29" from the front beam to the beater bar, which is the space I need to weave back in.  But I didn't THINK about that before I started.....
Everything works out for a reason.  The opening that is toward my waist, is larger than the opening near my neck.  That works - if the opening near my waist was NOT as wide as it is, it would not FIT me down there and I'd have a LOT of fabric up around my neck - and I don't have much of a neck....

So the fact that I could not weave in all 21" of warp into the body actually worked out for the best. The fringe is all braided (6 hours) and then done in a trellis braid.  I love the fringe..........

The color is off in this photo because I was in the sun, and squinting.  But I can put the fringe part in the front of my body, and wear this as a hood.  There is plenty of fabric and it covers well.

This is also large enough for me to wear over a thin coat.  Not that I have a thin coat that matches.....

I do love this tho, and it will remain MINE!

Today I have a lot to do.  I have laundry, and I need to bathe Gabbi, brush her out, blow dry her, clip her nails and do her anals (ew).  I need to brush Evan out as he's blowing coat everywhere!  His nails will get done also.  I am hoping that I receive a schedule for volunteering at the hospital with him for November....we need to get back to that.

I'm hoping to get another project warped on the Baby Wolf today, and I need to get photos taken of my Nilus Leclerc as I'm going to sell her.  I really like the Baby Wolf much better.  I'd like to get a Mighty Wolf (36" weaving width) as the Baby Wolf is only 26".  I'd also like a Wolf Pup eventually - for the narrower projects.  We'll see..........one thing at a time.  Get the Leclerc sold, and I can hopefully get a MW to replace her.

Off to get on with my day.  Gonna be a busy one to get everything done that I want to get done!

I've been busy!

I have been busy - I made 2 more baby quilts.  The first one I love the Moda squares, but I made it too big.  The second one I don't love (the Moda squares) but, I found some fabric in my stash and I thought it went pretty well, so I had fun quilting it.  And it's smaller, much better for baby right now.

Front of too large baby quilt

Back of too large baby quilt

Free motion quilting - gone wild!

Above is the first baby quilt that is too large.  But I LOVE the colors.  :-)  It'll come in handy one day....I hope!  Meanwhile, dear daughter wanted a smaller one for baby....

Front of smaller quilt

Back of smaller quilt (it's actually green)

More free motion gone wild quilting!

I like the above quilt because it's smaller.  This is my first attempt at stitch in the ditch with a darning foot - boy was it tricky!

 I also wove a scarf, Saori style, with wool - which I don't usually wear.  This is so wild and out there, and it's not that itchy. lol.  It's pretty wide - wide enough to throw over your head if you have to.

Saori Mobius scarf

Long enough to wrap around me twice and throw up over my head!

This was fun to make.  I have many ideas for the next one - it won't be wool, and it won't be as wide, and it won't be as long, but not much shorter than this either.  Then there will be another wide one I think....just to play with the way it hangs, etc.  Someone showed me a scarf that also had a hood attached.  I liked that idea also.

Today I've been busy also.  The horse vet came at 9 this morning for Fall shots (boosters).  Before he even arrived, I was able to chat on IM with my friend in Australia.  It was really great to chat with her.  Good ole Facebook chat.  Ha ha.

After the horse vet, I came in and got Gabbi and Evan outside to groom them.  Evan got a good brushing - some day his undercoat is going to get spun and woven into something - when I learn to spin!  Gabbi needed a hair cut and it doesn't look too awful.  She hates going to the groomer.  Last time, I picked her up and she was panting and shaking and was clinging to my arm all the way home.  I felt awful.  Neither of us likes me doing it, but at least she doesn't stress as much as at the groomer!  Besides, I save myself $50 every time I do it......so that's incentive enough for me.  
 

Gabbi on the left, Evan in front, and Leo in back.

Evan is never too happy about Leo taking over the dog beds during the day, but he did sit there and pose like the diva he is!  lol.  At night, Leo gets kicked outta the room because he attacks feet and sleeps on the bed. 

When I got Evan, he was allowed to sleep on the bed.  But he always pushed his legs against me at night - very uncomfortable.  When we got Gabbi a year later, we tried to let them both sleep on the bed.  Dear Hubby would wake up during the night, and Gabbi would be snuggled under the blankets, underneath HIM.  We were both afraid he'd squish her!  Eventually, they both were told they had to sleep on the floor. Sometimes ya just gotta be tough.  Yes, we have a king size bed.  No, it wasn't enough room - and really too dangerous for Gabbi. 
The other thing she would do is jump off the bed and she already has badly luxating patellas on her back legs.  If you don't know what this is, here is a link.  We had steps we bought to put at the foot of the bed, and she'd use them to get ON the bed, but she would jump off.  So, in order to save our sanity and her legs, they get to sleep in those 4 dogs beds, that reside under a shelf in a cutout in the wall.  Above them is the shelf that holds the tv.   It boils down to the fact that I need my sleep and when I don't have it.....I'm not a happy person!

I was supposed to go upstairs and unweave something I started about 6 weeks ago on the large loom, but I haven't had the motivation to go do it.  I also need to wind a warp for another scarf, and I have towels I want to get started (Christmas is coming!).  I know that's going to be a LONG warp and was planning on doing it on Lulu (the big loom) but there is a really LONG blue 5/2 warp on there (the one that needs to be unwoven and something new started with it).  I'm just having an issue with exactly what I want to do with the blue warp - I'm NOT taking it off and wasting it!  Cotton is too expensive!!!   I had a plan when I put it on....it's just that I don't like what it is, so gotta change it.  I have some ideas so when I decide, I can get moving on that. 

I've actually found something interesting.  I like using my large loom - but it's a lotta work to actually weave on it. I love HOW it weaves and I love that I can put a long warp (which for me has been up to 15 yards) and it's not hard, and I can get up close to thread the heddles.  I like the way my Baby Wolf weaves tho - it's so EASY.  I'm not crazy about some of how it's put together tho.....it's not as heavy duty, and I've had issues with the tension because my dowel on the front wasn't tied on evenly.  I think my ties are waaaaayyyyy too long, but I'm afraid of cutting them.  I think the wise idea will be to get some texsolve cord, and I can try that without damaging my current ties.  The BW is so easy to weave on tho.....not so easy to thread (it's the older model that the back beam doesn't come off).  I think I just need to keep working with the BW and get used to it.

OK, well, I've not been blogging for awhile and now, I've dumped everything in one blog.  Prolly not the wisest decision.  Oh well.  I was in the mood to do this today.  Believe it or not, I actually have more to talk about, but I think that's it for today. 
Have a wonderful day!

I've been MIA

 There has been a lot going on in my life.  I have a surgery planned for 12 Sept.  I'm not going into detail, but let's just say, I hope that when it's all said and done, everything will be A.O.K.

I have been messing around with weaving but not really being gung-ho about it.  I did get this little gem done on the new-to-me Baby Wolf (BW for short from now on).

 This is my first mobius cowl scarf.  It didn't turn out quite like it was supposed to, but I do like how it turned out.  This is one way to wear it.

 This is another way to wear it

And this is another view so that you can see the variations in the weaving.
The BW had the treadles already tied up, so when I started weaving, I decided to do plain weave most of the way thru, but I also wanted to throw in some interest in the pattern.  I decided to just play around with the treadling on the other tie ups and see what I got.  It was fun, and it adds some dimension to the plain weave.


I have never worked with Rayon Chenille before.  I don't know that I'll work with it again.  I have some left and it may be mixed in with some other yarns at some point, but I don't really know how it'll turn out if I do that. 
This is very soft after washing and drying.  I had really long fringe on it but after washing and drying, the fringe had tangled with each other and it was a mess.  So I sat for another 2 hours and untangled and cut and shortened and tied off again.  Now the fringe is very short as you can see in photo number 2.
The color is lovely.  I can't wait for it to get cooler out (yes, I like cooler weather) and I can start wearing it.

I have wound a warp 25" wide in dark blue 5/2 cotton.  I will be making a blanket for myself using various yarns, all in blues.  I haven't quite decided if I'll use all sizes, or if I'll just use 5/2 and/or possibly 8/2. I have some variegated 8/2 but I don't think it's enough for the blanket, so I will see how it works out.  I think I can mix and match but then the width will change during the weaving and I'm not quite sure I want to do that.  I don't plan ahead sometimes and I have to play around to see what will turn out best.  Hey, I"m a beginner and I am allowed to play - no one is paying me to do it a certain way! :-)

This is labor day weekend, and we don't do anything special.  We don't want to get on the interstate (hey, it's a zoo) and we never get invited anywhere.  I miss my grand baby (and yes, my baby too) but we just can't handle the traffic.

I've been having some issues with really high anxiety (over this upcoming surgery) and I've been trying to work with that.  Patience is short, and DH is trying his best to deal with me.

I hope to get some weaving done this week, because once I have the surgery, I'm not sure how long it'll be till I can get back to it.  Hopefully only a few weeks.  If I'm smart, I'll have a couple of warps wound, and put up, so I can play around right away when I'm able.  Meantime, I plan on doing some sewing, and I have to do some horse beads which I haven't done in forever.  I can do that while just sitting and recuperating. 

That's about it for me.  I hope everyone enjoys their weekend and has lots of fun.  I may, or may not, be back before the surgery.  Depends on my mood.....
Weavin Happy
Martha

Thankful Thursdays, Earthquakes, & Storms

It seems this is the only time I'm posting.  I haven't really felt very positive lately, so posting isn't something I feel is a good thing to do if I can't be positive.
I AM glad I'm doing Thankful Thursdays.  Keeps me on track knowing that I really DO have a lot to be thankful for!
Today, I'm thankful for

1.  That we had the money to have a whole-house filter put on the well pump, so we have clean water.
2.  That the quake didn't do any damage to our home or it's inhabitants.
3.  That my friends and family survived the recent weather unscathed.
4.  That my husband is staying sane, no matter how insane I get.
5.  That I have friends I can talk to and depend on.
6.  For all the good things in my life.

We were hit by the earthquake earlier this week.  We live about 30 miles from the epicenter.  I was actually in my car, in Culpeper, next to the hospital.  I thought that something was wrong with the car.  Actually, first, I thought I'd driven thru some really big dips in the road, but when I looked in my mirror, there weren't any dips in the road.  Then I thought there was something wrong with the car.  When I started pulling over and slowing down, everything was ok.  So I drove into the hospital parking lot with my dog Evan in the back seat.  We got out of the car, and I noticed a lot of hospital personnel milling around outside.  Many of them were really glad to see Evan.  After all, he's a therapy dog!  They told me it had been an earthquake.  Since I wasn't inside, I missed a lot of what others felt.  I got on the phone (cell would not go thru so used the hospital phone) and got hold of hubby.  He said he grabbed the little pup, Gabbi, and ran outside. Amazingly, he said the horses didn't even care - they just kept eating.  Hmmm.  Others that I know with horses have told m the horses go nuts!  How cool that ours don't really care the earth is shaking!  At least everyone at home was safe.  So I hung around the hospital.  The Pink Lady and myself and Evan took the stairway up to the next floor to start visiting the patients. So many of the hospital staff wanted to pet Evan and be distracted by him.  It felt like I was in the right place at the right time.  Unfortunately, during the time we were there, we got a phone call just as we started the visitations of patients, and we were told all volunteers were to leave the hospital.
I'd been having some tummy troubles off and on.  I have chalked it up to the fact that I'm pretty nervous about an upcoming surgery, and the pre-surgery prep involved.  On top of that, we had the earthquake, and on top of that, the evening of the earthquake, our water started turning dark - you could literally see the silt floating in the water.  It got really disgusting - like MUD.  I put a HELP out on Facebook, and I got an answer back that made sense.  Call the water company in town.  We are on well water, and a couple of people told us the stream our well comes from got stirred up - which makes perfect sense.  Earthquakes usually cause a tsunami so that's what happened to our stream underground - it got all shook up.  We had to pay $500 for a whole-house water filter to be put on the well pump, but hey, I'd been asking for one of those for 6 years.  So I was ok with that! 

Evan and I came home and we checked to see if anything was out of place.  Nothing really serious - a few things had shuffled, but that was it.

My friend who just moved into her new house had all her screens pop off.  She also had some things fall off the walls. 

Today we just got thru with a pretty severe thunderstorm.

And Saturday we have Hurricane Irene to look forward to.  Although, I think, according to the projected path, we will luck out and not get a lot of wind or rain or damage.  We are praying.  They are saying the worst of it will hit East of I95, and we are West.  So keeping our fingers crossed!

Weaving:  I finally got a warp wound, and was trying to put it on the loom.  I made a lot of mistakes, and I ended up dumping that warp.  Luckily it wasn't expensive yarn.  Less than $10 I think.  I will try it again but have to find those colors again.  Or not. I do have a variegated with all the colors in it, and I could use that for warp and weft although it's not what I wanted........it would be the easy way out.  LoL

I then picked up the very overly-expensive gold rayon chenille that I had bought for another project but didn't use due to some advice I'd gotten about mixing the chenille with boucle' and how it might not hold and might worm.  So I picked it up and wound a warp about 120" long, and 12 inches wide.  I'm using a 10 dent reed.  I got it wound and threaded thru the reed, trying to double and triple check my work.  Then I got it threaded thru the heddles (my NEW shiney heddles that are nice and clean) and then got the thing wound on the loom.  I'm having some issue with the ratchet and pawl when moving the warp onto the cloth beam.  Other than that the little Baby Wolf is doing well! 

Oh, the lady had forgotten to give me the bars that tie onto the the beams.  They are flat.  So I bought dowels to do it with.  I'm thinking my dowels might be a bit big....but it seemed to work ok. 

So I'm weaving away on Baby.  I'm sitting in my office chair that swivels and changes heights, but I don't think it's high enough as my shoulder muscles in my back are bothering me some.  I have the bench from Lulu (the Nilus Leclerc loom I have) but I dislike sitting on that bench.  I think I'll be looking (again) for an office chair that can sit up a bit higher than the one I have.   I have a very short body, but longer legs, and the position just isn't that great for me. 

But I am enjoying weaving on the Baby, who doesn't have a name yet.....Lulu told me her name right away.  Baby isn't being as forth coming.........she belonged to her previous owner for 14 years, so maybe she's just homesick or being shy.

We are ready for anything else that happens, I hope.  This has been a rough summer for us.  Not only weather, but unforeseen situations that have cost more money than we wanted to spend, and now me having surgery in September.  Not a good year......

Weavin Happy
Martha

Two Projects Finished

So, here are the two projects.  Hubby took photos of them on me, outside.  I hate the photos (because I hate my size).  They both look so much better on Mrs (the manikin) so I'm letting her model them.

This is the shawl for the exchange.  Its really soft, and long and it's really comfy.  I almost hate to give it up.










This is what I made from the leftover - but I wish I'd made it thinner and longer.  Oh well, live and learn.  (Can you tell I'm in a mood?)  I used fun yarn in it and it's soft and fun!





I enjoyed doing both.  They are both plain weave.  Boucle' - 800 yards to the pound, using a 6 dent reed.  Really loosely woven.  Just fun and easy.

The previously referred to "forever white warp" has been washed. I need to go take it from the washer and dry it.  I washed it on warm water.  I hope the cotton fulls up nicely.  I am going to try to make a top from the blue cotton crochet thread I used.  I have a feeling I might not have enough tho.  I hate being so heavy and I'm not doing anything to change it.

Today is cloudy and dull out.  It's trying to rain, but not succeeding yet.  We had some rain yesterday and it was gratefully received.  If we get more today it also would be welcomed.  We were starting to have very dry, crunchy grass!  It's greening up nicely now.

When it's cloudy out, my mood totally changes.  I get cranky.  So hopefully I'll get thru THIS day without getting any crankier.  I'm thinking of taking a nap.  Two nights in a row, I stayed up too late watching t.v.  Then I had trouble falling asleep.


OH, I read a book by Jon Katz, called "Rose in a Storm" and OMG, it was a book I could NOT put down - read  it in one day.  It helped that it was in large print. LoL.  My eye muscles hurt when I was done, but it was so mesmerizing.  I almost cried several times.  I hate books that do that to me.  The author did an amazing job with writing this book.  If you love dogs, read it.  Seriously - but keep the tissues close by..........it's fiction, but it doesn't seem like it.  GOOD book!  :-)

That's about it from me.  I'm trying to decide now if I want to go wind a warp for another scarf.  Someone gave me directions for a mobius scarf and how to weave the beginning fringe into the ending fringe and make it really neat.  I just can't decide what yarn I want to play with next!  :-)

Have yourself a great day. 
Martha

Sunday

 Weaving Update:
As I wrote yesterday, I got the reed threaded, so today I went up and I threaded the heddles.  It was pretty easy considering there were only 156 ends.  Thick yarn.  My favorite!


I got it all threaded, triple checked it, had hubby help me put it on - the warp was wide, and I wanted really good tension.  Not having worked with boucle' before, I wanted to make sure it went on well.  It was great having help!  I wound a bobbin of the gold tencel I had bought online, and wove 3 strands to get the warp spread evenly.  I hated the gold!  It stood out way too much.  Luckily, I had a burgundy tencel sitting on the shelf, and I wound a bobbin of that, tried it, and loved it.  That is what my weft is - burgundy.  It's turning out well.  I had to experiment with my weaving.....I threw the shuttle, beat very gently as had been recommended by someone that gave me some advice on how to use boucle' and tencel, and I was beating with the shed open.  That was leaving really loose ends.  I didn't like it.  Then I tried beating harder, but I didn't like that the warp yarn, the boucle', got lost in the weft.  I tried the loose beating but on a closed shed, and that made a huge difference.  So after weaving about 2 or 3 inches of what I didn't like, I was able to keep weaving with the last choice, and it turned out well.  I'm about half way thru, but it got too warm up there. 


From this point on, it's just stuff about life, friends, and sadness, so if you don't wanna read, that's ok, I understand.


Today started out with thunder and rain.  I got up in a very cranky mood.  Not quite sure why, other than I haven't been sleeping well.  I think our bed, which isn't very old, is very uncomfortable.  I wake up because my body hurts.  Of course, if I didn't weigh what I do, then I wouldn't feel so crappy.  But that's my own fault so I won't whine about it here!


I finally rolled out of bed.  Made my tea, turned on my computer, missing my friends chatter in the morning on IM.  The same friend that moved this weekend.  No, she's not too far away but further than up the road.  I think I'm feeling lonely already.


I still didn't feel "right" so I decided that I'd call my friend.  I just felt like something was just so NOT right....I called and asked how she was doing.  She said, "I've been better."  I thought the move was rougher than she thought it would be, but no, she went on to tell me that she had to put one of her dogs down last night.  Sigh.  Her father passed away on Friday in Australia and then she had to put one of her dogs to sleep last night.  How rough can life get for one person?  The last 6 years or so have been really bad for my dear friend.  About 7 years ago I think it was, she got divorced.  Then she buried her mum in Oz.  Then she met and married a man.  He got sick and died 1.5 years ago.  Then she had to put her best dog down, one she chose herself as a pup.  That dog was her heart dog.  The log home she built with her second husband was on the market 2 + years and finally sold.  She was supposed to go to Oz to be with her dad, put off that trip while she moved, then he passed away.  She's now moved into her new home, lock, stock and barrel.  She will leave for Oz on Weds, to come home in 2 weeks time, and will be coming home to a new house, and only one dog and her cat. 


On a good note, I'm sitting here and I'm watching two hummingbirds flying around the feeder outside, and playing.  That makes me smile.  It's a sad smile as it's hard to shake the feelings I have of sadness for my friend. 


My daughter may be getting a new home.  They saw one they really liked.  I hope and pray the offer is approved if this is the house they really want.  They work so hard, and deserve so much.  My granddaughter deserves a larger home too.  The condo is SO tiny.  They do well in it, but, they need more space.  So I'm praying for things to go well for them.  Meanwhile, my daughter is working, taking care of the baby, and her hubby has to travel - he was gone last week Monday thru Friday, will be gone this week Monday thru Friday, and my have to go away the next two weeks also.  It's a tough life.  The move, if it happens, will be stressful as the house is further away from where they both work. I know I had to do almost everything alone when my kids were small.  Hubby was in the Army, and I was in charge of the kids, the house, the yard work, and I did work part of the time before they went to school.  It ain't easy.


The rest of my day:


I came downstairs after being upstairs weaving and it got too warm, and I decided to have some ice cream.....yeah, I know, that doesn't help my weight.  Ya don't have to tell me.


I watched a little t.v. and then sat down to read some blogs, and write my own post.


I have a whole chicken in the oven, which has about an hour and 40 minutes left to bake, so I think I'll go back upstairs and work a little more on the shawl.  It'll be finished either tonight, or tomorrow for sure.
Since I'm still tired, I don't know if I'll want to finish it tonight.  I may just sit and read the paper. LoL


I've hugged my doggies a lot today.  I know how much I love my pups.  It's so sad to think that my friend's life has been turned so upside down lately.  You never know when something is going to happen!


Weavin' happy

WIPs

Works In Progress.  I'm a work in progress.  My relationships are always a work in progress.  Life, is a work in progress!  

Right now, I'm trying to get the "never-ending" warp to not be a WIP !  It's getting there.  I'm hoping I can finish it off tomorrow.

Here are some photos of what it looks like....but since these photos, I've done more. Just no photos ~ yet.....

 

White on white. 

   
This is two yards of white Sugar and Cream weft in the white 8/2 cotton warp.

 

 Clasped Weft

This is my first try at clasped weft.  It was fun, it's creative, but it's SLOW going.  And hard on my left arm.  I like the outcome.  When I ran out of the bobbins that the solid yarns were on, I just did a bunch of plain weave with some of the solid and some of the variegated.  It is an interesting piece, and one of my first "free form" pieces.  I just did what felt right and came to me.

Below is the cloth I cut off this warp at the beginning.  I want to make a shirt out of it but I have to wash it first, and wanted to wash the entire ten yard warp together.  Hopefully none of my colors will run since I have plain white in there too.

Cloth that hopefully will become a shirt

I love this shot.  I love all my colorful yarns!  This is my "stash."  It's not much, but its mine and it's beautiful!

This (below) is the little basket that has a handle (look on the right of the basket).  The handle fits perfectly on the open end of my bench.  I can place the bobbins in there that hold the yarn, that I used in the clasped weft above.  How cool is that???  LoL                    

That's it for me.  I have 2 more pieces of this warp that I have woven on.  I'm finishing it off with pink cotton 5/2.  I'm hoping it comes out really soft.....for a special use. :-)  

More later!  (can't give away ALL the info, now can I?)

Martha

Project 1 - done!

I finally finished the first of the cloth on Lulu.  It was fun.  I took my time, I didn't tend to get antsy about finishing, I didn't have a lot of time to work on it at one time so the work was spread out over weeks.  I think that was smart.  I got better as it went along, my selvages were so much better at the end, than at the beginning.

Four towels.  Nice size, love the 5/2 I wove them with.   

This is what it looked like, fresh off the loom:

This is what they look like finished:

I also did 2 table mats - patriotic themed, for an exchange.  I like them both. This is the striped table mat.

And this is the table mat I did with red and blue on a double shuttle, first time using it:

 I had a couple of other pieces I did also, one was yellow, it was a mistake in threading, but I liked it anyway and finished it off so that I can use it and remember that I made a mistake, but it looked nice anyway.  
The other was brown thread, 8/2, that I tried to see how it would come out.  The contrast of the brown and white was really pretty, but the 8/2 weft really drew in on the 5/2 warp.  I don't have photos of these two items, yet.  I'll get those and hopefully upload them at some point.



I am working on my rigid heddle loom now.  I have had it warped with Sugar and Cream cotton for a couple of months, but had messed up the warp, and it needed repair before I could start weaving.  Yesterday I fixed the issues, and started weaving it last night.  It's so bright and cheery and fun!  I am going to make a bag/purse type deal out of it.  I'll line it with something fun and pretty and put pockets in it, and use a stabilizer to help it hold it's shape.  It'll be the first time I make anything where I will have to cut and sew my own woven cloth.  Scary!


I have to decide what I want to weave on Lulu next.  I am taking a weaving class next Friday, we'll be learning Summer and Winter, and learning some techniques and tricks and short cuts, hopefully.  That's my plan anyway.  The part I'm not too excited about is that Friday is Good Friday, the Friday before Easter.  Around here, some of the kids are on Spring Break the week before Easter, and some are on Spring Break the week after Easter.  Traffic is always horrible, especially on I95.  We'll be taking a back way home, staying off the interstate because I do NOT want to spend 3 hours on a drive that should take 1.5 hours.  That's bad enough!  


I've gotten to spend some great time with my Grand Daughter, Jia.  She's SO stinkin cute, she is learning so fast, and she's becoming more adorable every time I see her.  She changes SO much in a week, it's totally amazing to me.  She sits in her jungle jumpy seat, and her little bobo seat on the floor, and plays and giggles and watches tv.  I know, they aren't supposed to watch t.v. this early.  But she LOVES Mickey Mouse club and she watches that screen like she knows what's going on!  She's only 4 months old.  Just amazing!

Isn't that the most adorable face you've ever seen?  Look at those cheeks!  She is too cute.  I lover her SO much!


That's about it from me this week.  I'm trying to be better about posting.  I don't think too many people actually read my blog anymore.  But that's ok, it's here for me when I feel the desire to post about my progress.  It's just that my progress is a bit slow sometimes.


Thanks for reading!
Martha