Reading night...

My daughter and I have reading night, I'm reading Tumtum and Nutmeg to her and she's reading Sisters Grimm to me. We read a chapter each and usually end up reading more. I crochet while she's reading to me, so peaceful. BTW, I only have two more rows to do on my checkerboard afghan and bought the ribbon to border my ripple, which I'll do after finishing this one.

Manassas Battlefield Park...

I have some cool photos a friend said I could post. I want to go there and also to Gettysburg, counties have made battlefields into beautiful parks and it's amazing the peace now with all the turmoil that happened in them before. I've not been to this one, but have been to others and you think about alot of things in all the beauty and peace. Hard to imagine what occurred when you see the beautiful open fields now.

Here's their facebook page... https://www.facebook.com/manassasbattlefield

Update July 12th: Here are some photos of the Stonebridge with the flooding that occurred last night...

Mug cover...

Playing around with ideas, I've seen the mug covers and all you do is just fit it to your mug as you go around. I had no set pattern, it's easy and mugs are shaped differently. Oh, I love braids, you could add little beads or flowers to ribbon, braids, or whatever you want. I used bells, because this will be a Christmas cover.

1950's Potholder....

 I finished it today. I did it in the yellow and mint colors of the 1950's and I'm going to make them in various colors. I love the pattern. 

Below is before I joined the front and back and made the border flowers... 

Here's an old pattern from my 1950's crochet book I'm working on. I'm using yellow for the flowers and a light mint green, because it makes it look more vintage and colors of that time period. I'll show pics as I finish one. To see the image bigger when you click on it you have to right click and click view.It's amazing whoever figured out how to make the flowers in this pattern, and we'll probably never know who made it. I've always loved it and was going to try and figure it out myself, after having the book and working the flowers, no way I could have and I've been crocheting for years. Amazing...

 

Briar Rose Runner

This crochet filet graph is called Briar Rose Runner and a very old pattern using crochet thread. I got this graph a long time ago from the old angelfire web pages, those were so good. I hate it when so many good sites are just gone, like geocities, some good stuff. Wayback Machine had this for awhile, now I can't find it.

I started this a long time ago and was going to start it back up. I know you chain 206 to start, wish I had the full instructions, but you can follow the graph. It's not very big, but you can put it in your paint program and make it bigger. Up at the top you'll see the arrow and it says center, kind of hard to read, but you just start that half like it was a mirror image. See where that leaf is starting at the very top, that's the graph going backwards, if you understand what I'm saying. You can google Briar Rose Runner crochet and you'll see what I'm talking about, don't want to use someone else's photo from their site without permission.

Half finished with my red checkered afghan, yay!

Peaceful evening light...

So sitting here today, I looked up and realized how dusty my room had gotten and so quick. I guess it's the fan in the room,so took care of all that today, turned on my twinkle lights that run from the top of the dresser mirror to the nightstand. I love how mirrors reflect the lights, twinkle and candlelights. Lit up some candles tonight, sitting against the pillows, listening to the fan and just thinking on things. Sometimes you have to do that, it helps comes up with ideas.

My daughter was talking about how she started writing a story and she's so happy, because she's had a writer's block. I told her everyone that creates things always does at one time or the other. Sometimes you just have to stop and take other things in to be able to put out something. Sometimes you also have to sit and reflect on life anyway, and not just go and go without thinking.

The little jewelry box was just a little wooden box I painted long ago and modpodged a print out on top I had gotten online. It was so simple and cheap, but has come to be one of my favorite little jewelry boxes.

Miss Molly... Do Not Disturb...

Molly loves laying under my blankets and esp anything I'm working on. I went to grab a cup of coffee and when I came back, as usual, she was laying under the ripple very comfortably...

She looked up at me like, "Did you really just disturb my rest and why?" ...

She looked and started ignoring me, completely turning her body away...

I got up a little bit later, came back and she had turned back...

to her original position...

I've gotten into this mood to do some hard cleaning, started yesterday getting my deck ready for the summer. When you have an old deck that's untreated w/varnish it gets green from over the winter, yuck. I take bleach water and scrub it with a wire brush, whew, luckily it's not too big. When you start seeing the difference it feels so good, like you've really accomplished something and know you won't have to do it again till next year. LOL

Anywayyyyy, I've finished half of it, scrubbing up deck chairs and the table, oh my husband's going to barbecue me something this next weekend, after all this work. :D He will, he loves his grill. I'm not a summer person, at all, but when it's here I like it and take full advantage of it.

I came in, took a shower, amazing how wonderful a shower feels when you get so hot, it's like Heaven. I ran downstairs for a cup of coffee and cut the tops off some strawberries to freeze. I'm going to make a strawberry smoothie later in the blender. So now I'm just chillin' and going to get back to my afghan.I can't tell you how in love I am with this sweet magnolia flower, it's amazing how this one little flower smells.