Cool Morning

It was 71 degrees when we woke up this morning in south Mississippi.  I am grateful for the break in the weather.  The garden has gone wild, given over to the insects and weeds for now.  I canned 20 quarts of tomato sauce this past weekend.

This is my sock yarn blanket that I have been using what is left from my skeins of socks I have made in the past. My daughter has her eye on this one.  She likes boho decorating.  It is coming along slowly and will be put away for a while when I start on my Christmas projects.  

Now I know this looks like a stick but I purchased the L hook from Shady Groves on Etsy.  I have been contemplating making my own someday but I like to buy unique hooks from other people.  My husband brought me tree branch, more like a small log, and said "Here, I got you a crochet hook". He's a funny guy.  I am not using this to make this blanket, I am hoping to use a heavier yarn with this.  It is a beautiful hook.

Have a great day!

And Yet My Hooks And Needles Go On

I posted previously about Ravelry's new policy in my last post .  What this has unleashed is amazing.  Prominent podcasters and enthusiasts are calling for proof!  Where do you buy your yarn from?  Whose patterns are you buying?  We have lists!  You don't like the new policy?  Well, that must be your white fragility showing or you must be a white supremacist!  Political segregation is all this is.  Call it what you like.  We won't go after you quiet conservatives as long as you stay quiet. If you are a gay man who calls for diversity, well, we will rip you apart over an instagram post calling for it and harass you until all social media is pulled. In a quote from a avid Ravelry user "This is how we fight back!".  SO on Ravelry, please celebrate your love of yarn but act as judge and jury against everyone else.  Exaggerating?  Gregory Patrick is a gay conservative.  He is known as Mad Man Knitting.  He was issued a threat.  This is his response:

Bravo!  Gregory is a nice southern gentleman, I wouldn't piss him off.  It's sad really.
As I stated in my last post, I read blogs, follow people and listen to podcasts that do not share my views.  I have for years.  Not everyone has to share my views, feel the way I do about issues nor vote the way I do.  The overall content has always been there for me to be a fan, the same way you may be reading this blog and do not agree with what I have to say.  After witnessing the yarn community turning into a police state,  I have quietly unsubscribed, unfollowed and unliked many pages, some of whom I followed for years. It has lightened my load and pinpointed my focus in my yarn crafts so I guess I should be grateful for that. The call for proof and receipts can be chalked up to money talks and bullshit walks.
Well, my money is walking and my bullshit will stay on my blog.

Just off the needles:

Made my husband his first pair of toe up socks.  He likes them.  It is coming time to weed out his drawer of starter socks that I have made.  The ones that look like a tube sock with a little bit of a heel.  He has been a good sport.
Thanks for reading and have a great day!

Ravelry's No Trump Policy

Ravelry's No Trump Policy   There is also a good article posted by The Federalist.  

Ravelry is a knit/crochet site with 8 million members.  I had been a member since 2008.  I get political on my blog from time to time and on my personal Facebook page.  I use my sewing, and other fiber art pursuits as a neutral place.  I listen to podcasts on these subjects and have had to unsubscribe to a few that have crossed the line.  I am an adult, I do not expect people to share  my point of view on things.  I politely listen and pay attention to the content that is relevant to me and move on.  
This new policy started with someone posting a pattern for a Trump 2020 cowl.  It's acceptable to buy a pink pussy hat pattern or a fuck Trump pattern.  If you are going to ban one political stance then ban all of them.  I was on several groups where this debate was getting heated.  Normally I am quiet but I posted this part of the Ravelry policy in the debates :  

• Do not weaponize this policy by entrapping people who do support the Trump administration into voicing their support.
• Similarly, antagonizing conservative members for their unstated positions is not acceptable.

I was called a racist by one group owner.  I just left the groups.  Ravelry adapted this policy from a RPG group.  Here is the thread.  They have no problem telling users if you don't like it, get the fuck out.

There has also been suggestions that admins go the extra mile and track member activity on other social media avenues to expel members.  This idea has not been entertained.  One popular response is to call people racists and the battle cry of  "this is how we fight back".  

It is sad, but hey, Ravelry is getting national attention. So my attention and money will go where I feel it needs to go.

Time of the Year

This is the time of the year where everyone is anxiously awaiting spring.  I have been struggling with blueberry bushes, do I want to add more and knuckle down?  What plants are going in the garden this year?  I am late with starting seedlings.  Now is also the time to start planning crafted Christmas gifts, I am already taking stock of yarn and various other materials.  I have been saving bits of yarn from socks and hats and have started a large granny square blanket. 

Not large enough yet but it will get there. 
We have also been toying with buying land but have decided to put that on the back burner for now.  The only land cheap enough are in flood zones and with a proposed casino in the works our land prices will go up.  Timing is everything.
So it's Monday, and I always love the question about what I did during the weekend.  My answer is usually, I planned the weekly menu, baked two loaves of bread, sewed some clothes and worked with some yarn.  Pretty exciting stuff for the twenty and thirty somethings lol. The flu and sinus infections are running rampant here, please take care. 

Getting a Little Nippy

It has been a little nippy down here on the coast.  It dips, gets warm, dips again, then it's winter at some point.  Leaves are dropping like crazy, we do not get the beautiful fall colors that neighbors to the north (or more north of us) have. 
We survived another homecoming week.  Our house was rolled three nights in a row and the last night someone had drawn male anatomy on the back window of my van.  Thankfully it was washable.  Unfortunately everyone heading out to church Sunday morning got a gander at my back van window as they drove by.  It was my daughter's first homecoming and middle son's second.  Boys are way cheaper than girls.  Everyone made it home safe and a good time was had by all.

I had a request for a crochet bird so here is my crochet bird:

He's a chunky thing, crochet in Lion Brand's Hometown USA yarn which I believe is a 6 in yarn weight so it is super chunky.  After stuffing him I'm sure he could cause injury if thrown hard enough lol.

I was browsing the Internet looking at scarves, I don't know why.  I stumbled across a site for Dr. Who scarves.  It seems that not only is there a cult following for Dr. Who but also a sub-cult if you will, of followers of the scarves worn.  I found the official BBC directions to knit or crochet the scarf, which let me to a group of Dr. Who scarf knitters, and decided to give a Dr. Who style scarf a shot.  I say style because I am not accurate on the colors and am doing a modified version of the scarf which will measure around 9ft instead of 12.....I think.  Knitting is the supreme act of patience for me.  I fly with a crochet hook but as time goes on, I am gaining speed with needles and haven't dropped a stitch yet.  It also helps that it is only knit stitch, here it is so far:

 

It's about a foot and a half long so far.

The crock pot has been getting a workout also.  I wanted to justify requesting a new crock pot and cookbooks for my birthday last year and one of the cookbooks I like came out with a part 2 and I wanted to cook more from the first one before I dive into the second. I will post more on this soon.

 

Ready for Fall Weather

I know I have a couple of months before we have fall weather, but I am ready.  School has been in full swing for over a month now and there have been all sorts of fundraisers, parent meetings, and whatever else.  Furlough was cut short by six weeks with an ominous side note as to how much expenses will be next fiscal year if we do not have a budget set in place. 
It was a wonderful day to find Vladimir Putin giving advice on democracy,  and the President at a meeting with cabinet members actually said that they had to return to figuring out a budget and something to the effect of improving customer satisfaction.  Comparing Americans to customers doesn't make a lot of sense to me.  Can we shop somewhere else??  I guess if we wanted to be Ex-pats we could. 


I am still crocheting away and here is my new favorite hat:

 

 

 

This uses a self patterning sock yarn.  I am working on scarves and hats for the homeless at the moment.  I sent the shawl off to my pen pal and now she is having warm weather.  I also have to start on blankets for the winter.   Hope all is well!

 

 

Where the Hell Have I Been?

No where really.  I had a nice two week visit from my son, he left, furlough started, and I am getting the rest of the children ready to go back to school.  The powers that be are alluding that the furlough will last longer than 11 weeks.  We have income and that is a bonus, compared to an article I read here:   Signs of Declining Economic Security.
Sheila Jackson Lee (D) Texas wants to limit federal funding to states with stand your ground laws and have neighborhood watches register with the police department.  So you would have to run and hide and not have the right to look out for your neighbor unless you are registered.  The Congressional Black Caucus is recommending Sheila Jackson Lee for Homeland Security Secretary. 
Is everyone tired of hearing about Anthony Weiner or is it just me?  I don't think his biggest fear should be his ever shrinking campaign, I think that since his wife is a top aide to Clinton, his fear should be taking a dirt nap.  If the Clinton campaign is going to try to minimize Benghazi, they certainly do not want to be done in by Weinergate.
Lawmakers in the South and on the East Coast have blocked further rate hikes of the 2012 reform of the Nation Flood Insurance.  It had unintended consequences......yes it did, people, like my neighbor, have lost their homes.  I was disgusted by a Mississippi representative who said that people will walk into banks and hand over their keys, when it has already happened.  While too late for some, maybe it will help others. 

I have been baking, crocheting and playing around with the dehydrator.
 
Small bag of carrots:

This is in a sandwich bag.

Ten pounds of potatoes in a gallon freezer bag:

Hash browns!  I will be doing more but I was mainly concentrating on things that I use a little bit of and will go bad by the time I use it up.  Carrots and large bags of potatoes fit into this category.  I am trying to eliminate food waste as much as I can.

I have been crocheting quite a bit, another coping mechanism.  Having a lot of yarn that doesn't add up for a big project, such as blankets, has been put to use in making hats, mittens, etc., for the homeless. Soon everything in the house will be covered in crochet.  The loop on the lock remote for my van broke so it could not hang on the key chain, I was not about to order another so here was my fix:

As you can see not even the van is immune to the crochet hook!
 

News Fast

Yes, I've taken a little bit of a news fast this week.  I turned it on this morning to hear yet another rant about Snowden.  Yeah, we spy on them they spy on us.  I turned it off.  Right now Obamacare is what is bothering me the most, that and the big F (furlough) that starts in a week.  It seems that my insurance company and it's underwriters or whatever, are in renegotiation with a lot of it's doctors, I am only assuming it for the upcoming changes in January.  So, my dermatologist, is one of those doctors, and I am due for my cancer screening.  She is a great doctor (remember when Obama said you can keep your doctor?), well either I go as out of provider and try to recoup some of the cost or I wait six months to see if maybe they worked it all out.  Why don't I try another doctor?  Most of the ones in my area are in renegotiation, I have already had skin cancer, and did I mention previously my doctor is great?   As long as the children's doctor is o.k. that is all that matters right now. 

I have been busy crocheting, my youngest likes bears:

I made the one on the right first and so much fun with it I made the one on the left.  Now they hang out together.  The pattern is from http://www.lalylala.com/.  I bought it a while ago and finally sat down to make them.  Small hooks are starting to get to my hands and I might have to buy the ergonomic hooks.   

Previously I did a rant on writing more letters.   I read an article not too long ago about a 22 year old man having to have his grandmother's diaries translated.  Not because they were in a foreign language, but because they were written in cursive.  Did I not hear a blurb about a witness in the Treyvon Martin case signing a statement and couldn't read it because it was in cursive?   I have a pen pal in Australia, a lovely woman in her 70's that I write to.  She sent me this chalk picture that I have to have framed:

I love it.  It is winter there so I am working on a shawl for her:

This pattern if from Ravelry and it's called Anna's Shawl.  It is a free pattern and easy to do.  I am 95% finished with it but unfortunately I did not pick up enough yarn, it takes 4 skeins and I had to go up two hook sizes because I crochet too tight, I am hoping the dye lot won't be too far off when I pick up another skein.  I hope she likes it, you can't see it too clearly in my picture but if you click on the link you will see how nice it really is.  I also plan on doing more crochet for charity, which I will share in a future post.

Also, my pen pal is looking for other pen pals in their 60's and 70's to write to.  She asks that they are born again.  Now her handwriting is a little rough but she really is a lovely woman.  If interested let me know. 

On to food,  I am mixed up mutt of nationalities which makes me an American, that means if I wanted to experiment with foods from all of those nationalities, I would never run out of new things to try.  Italian food makes my heart sing.  My husband jokes that if I don't have sauce (and it is sauce not gravy), I go through withdrawal.  Growing up on Italian food and cooking it, I rarely look at Italian recipes.  One morning I saw this young Italian guy cooking on T.V. and thought I'm buying that book.  So here he is:

I have tried a couple of recipes and I like them and hope to make more.  Fabio Viviani is proof that the American Dream is still alive.  He is young, cocky and works hard.

My oldest is here from New York, we actually got him here without having to drive to another state to pick him up unlike last year.  That is the main reason why I haven't been posting lately.  Week one of his visit is over and we are starting on week two.  So far so good, he hasn't been bored enough to run screaming.  

Hope all is well with everyone, try to stay cool!