The cats are delighted to have us home again.
When we first arrived, late last Monday night (or early last Tuesday morning,
depending on your point of view), Tiger had himself a ‘my humans got home’
lunch, then scurried outside to do his business, despite the fact that a gentle
rain was falling.
He then came back
in and dried himself thoroughly on the ankle area of the [once nice clean]
flannel nightgown I’d just put on.
I tried to stay
away from him; couldn’t be done. (I
changed nightgowns before hitting the hay.)
When we get home
from a trip to the mountains, on the one hand, I always feel like the trip was
too short. I didn’t get to go hiking
enough... I didn’t get to see enough mountain lakes, streams, and waterfalls...
I didn’t get to see any mountain goats, mountain sheep, or bears... and I never get to ride any horses out into
the backcountry.
On the other hand, I
worry about poor little Tabby when we are gone, and don’t like to leave him for
so long. When I’m home, he eats little bits, often. When I’m gone, he doesn’t have that option.
He looks okay,
though; the girls took good care of him.
He still has mats in his fur from sleeping under the mulberry tree and
getting sap all over his back. As soon
as the fur has grown out a little farther from his skin, I’ll be better able to
clip them off.
After reading about
some of our exploits of last week, a friend wrote, “Campers are nice, but
sometimes it is hard to stay warm. I
found that ours did a really, REALLY good job of keeping the top half warm, but
oh my can your feet get cold!”
Yes... I remember
sleeping in camper bunks when I was a child, and it was so hot up there, I
couldn’t breathe. I kept complaining... finally my mother poked her head
up there – and came bailing back out all in a worry, telling my father to just
check it out and see how hot it was. He did – and then they both
scrambled to make up the table and benches into a bed for me, and I never had
to sleep in a top bunk again. The heat up there really scared them, for
my personal welfare.
Didn’t take too
many years of that before my father got a 31-foot Airstream --- and I had my
own private bedroom in the back of the trailer. High livin’!
Another friend remarked to our quilting
group, “I think we should all chip in and buy a case of gorilla tape for Sarah
Lynn for all her adventures with Larry.”
hee hee
The mountains are really
beautiful this time of year with the gold, orange, and even scarlet of the
aspens. I love the springtime, too, when the waterfalls and rivers are
running wild, and early summer when the valleys and sides of the mountains are
a riot of alpine blossoms... and midsummer, when it’s so lovely to get into the
High Country and away from the heat of the lowlands... and winter, when
the snow reaches the eaves of the snug little cabins and cottages...
Have I mentioned
that I love the mountains?
The other day, Victoria posted a picture of Baby Carolyn,
sound asleep, in a soft little knit hat... that had slid down over her
eyes. She captioned it, “Carrie has a
unique style choice,” with the following hashtags: #hatsarechallenging, #wecantstop-laughing 😂, #nappinglikegrandpa, #itsdarkinhere, and #whereami.
I commented, “Poor baby!”, and Victoria reassured me, “She
was fast asleep, and had no idea anything was even happening 😄😄 she had wet hair when we went to the store, so she needed a hat to stay
warm – but hat sizing is very odd, so her hats are either tiny or HUGE! So they don’t stay put! Don’t worry, I didn’t leave it like this. 😉”
Lydia then wrote, “Malinda just sits like that when her
hats slide down, and she’s awake! It’s like covering a birdcage: ‘Must be time to be quiet and go to sleep!’ Then she beams at whoever fixes it for her 😍”
Larry remarked, “I’m sure glad there are two grandpas, so no one knows which one
you’re talking about. 😎”
Victoria immediately cleared that up: “You always used to
nap with your hat tipped down over your eyes. 😉”
Guess he should’ve kept still, if he wanted
anonymity. 😏
Tuesday, I finished
emptying out the camper and truck, putting it all away, and started washing the
multitudes of clothes and towels, etc., we had somehow created.
I opened windows
and doors to air the house out. It was only 48° outside, but the sun was
shining, and it was 60° in the house – and my own temperature was running at
about 212°F (boiling point) from all the dashing hither and yon and carrying
bag after bag to and fro, finishing unloading truck and camper and putting it
all away. I sprinkled carpet fresh and
vacuumed all the rugs, swept the floors, and then mopped with Mandarin Orange
Pine Sol.
A little after
noon, I remembered to eat breakfast – banana cream oatmeal. My mug was full
of piping hot New England Blueberry Cobbler coffee. Contented
siggghhhhhh...
By midafternoon, one
cat bed and the cats’ blanket was done washing. The bed was air-drying, the
blanket was in the dryer, and a load of towels and washcloths was in the
washer. And of course Tiger had to come in and get on the loveseat while
the blanket was off. I’d sprinkled upholstery dry cleaner on it
and was going to vacuum it – but there he was, right in the middle of the
stuff.
“Guess you’ll smell
good, too!” I told him, and he looked pathetic and said, “Raaawrrr” in his
raspy voice.
My hopes of getting all the laundry done that day were
dashed when I had to wash another load over again, not once, but twice, because
one of the shirts Larry got transmission fluid on ‘flavored’ the entire
load. 😝 The third go-around, I poured
some Resolve into the dispenser, and that time everything came out smelling
good.
Tiger exited the loveseat, so I vacuumed it and put the blanket back on.
I unplugged the
cute little scented wax warmer from the wall so I could plug in the vacuum for
one last rug – and splashed melted wax on myself. Luckily, I was wearing everyday
clothes. I finished the housecleaning and changed into a
birthday-company-is-coming outfit. (That’s a wee bit fancier than a
vacuum/sweep/mop/do-the-laundry outfit.)
Bobby and Hannah & Co. came that night to give me a birthday
present – a beautiful quilled ‘quilt’ in a shadowbox.
Joanna and
Nathanael gave me miniature clothespins on which they had affixed tiny quilling
designs, too. Levi made
me a card with quilling... and Hannah made a card using the Cricut my brother
Loren gave them. I showed it to him a couple of days later; he’s always
pleased when somebody makes good use of the things he’s given them, especially
when it used to be his late wife Janice’s, as did this Cricut.
I’m going to hang the
shadowbox in Victoria’s old room, which will be my new sewing room (when Larry
quits working such long weeks, and can help me move things). There are
plum-mauve colors in the quilling that exactly match the one wall Victoria
painted that color.
I haven’t been
complaining about my machines and tables and things not getting moved yet,
because the summer was hot – and my basement sewing rooms are nice and
cool. The upstairs is a lot hotter during the summer.
A quilting friend
wanted to know what ‘style’ my house is decorated in.
Uh? Ummm... cat?
I like lots of
different styles (even mixed together, sometimes), but my favorite, I think, is
country. I love those huge log homes that are decorated ‘rustic’ style
(though I don’t care for antlered chandeliers, thank you kindly). I like colorful things... heavy log
furniture... and lace at the windows.
I like braided rugs,
too. I have a couple of books with some beautiful designs, and hope to
make some, one of these days. My grandma made me a round braided rug when
I was little; I loved that thing. She incorporated into that rug fabric
from dresses and shirts she’d made. I
liked that. And I liked the way it felt under my bare feet.
I also like
Victorian-style décor, but probably wouldn’t want to live with it day in, day
out. I think the only style I really don’t like is modern
contemporary. Makes my teeth hurt.
They think we’re at the dentist’s office.
Wednesday, I went on washing clothes. It was rainy, so I couldn’t hang things
outside. Sometimes, it takes three runs
through the dryer to get a load of Larry’s jeans dry.
Soon, I need to get out my winter coats and make
sure they are clean and ready to use.
I once gave the entire family’s coats to the
Salvation Army.
Trouble was, it was by accident.
I’d picked them up from the laundromat after loading
the vehicle with stuff to donate – and by the time I got to the Salvation Army,
my little peabrain had forgotten that the last
bag in the car contained our coats.
An hour later, I would be found headfirst in one
large (and I do mean large – big enough to hold a Volkswagen
bus) box after another, pawing through stuff for that bag.
Yeah, I found it. Thank you, Salvation Army workers
who sympathized with my plight.
Once upon a time when she was quite young, we went
to buy Dorcas a new winter coat. She put
on a cute little coat-jacket and circled in front of the mirror, smiling
happily at herself.
“That one won’t be warm enough,” I told her, looking
for a better one.
“Oh, yes, this one is perfect!” she protested. “It’s warm as toast!” She gave a testing shrug, considered. “In
fact, it’s too hot!”
It didn’t seem to occur to her that we were inside a
store, and said store was not insulating us very well from the 100° heat outside,
and she was standing directly in the sunlight shining through the southern
windows. 😅
Remember those
expensive fold-back mittens I found in The
Warming House in Estes Park a couple of weeks ago? And remember me asking a couple of my girls
if they could make some? Well, guess
what I just found?
I was getting a bag
of gifts out from behind the cheval mirror in my room so I could extract the
gift I’d been saving for Amy, whose birthday is the day after mine... when I
noticed an odd package on my dresser, tucked neatly behind a picture.
I pulled it out.
It contained a pair
of knitted mint-green fingerless gloves with a soft white wooly ‘cap’ to fold
down over the fingertips or button back.
I probably got them
for a gift for someone – but if they’re almost tight on me, who would
they ever fit? Emma? Too late to go on saving them, though; I gleefully
pulled the tags off after trying them on, and tucked them right straight into
my scarf-and-gloves drawer.
“Sooo... never mind
about knitting or crocheting those ‘Hunter’s Mittens’,” I told the girls, “unless
you can make them out of Double Heatlok Thermal Cotton (in bright jewel tones).”
I finally washed the
last load of clothes (or so I thought) shortly before 4:30 a.m. Thursday
morning. I got back up at 10:30
a.m. An hour later, I was washing bedding, preparing to put our winter
blanket and quilt on the bed. I spread the wool/velvet/corduroy Jewel
Box/Log Cabin quilt out to air on the deck. We’ve been issued freeze
warnings a few times lately; it’s time for that big quilt to be back on the bed.
And then I found
one more small bag of clothes that I’d brought in from the camper. I tossed them into the washer.
The white skirt I’d
been wearing the previous Sunday when the transmission line leaked all over the
pickup came out of the washer with a few souvenir remnants of transmission
fluid.
I doused the spots
with Resolve and pitched the skirt back in with the Harvest Star quilt.
It came out
spotless.
The quilt was soon draped
over the railing, the skirt hanging on the line, pristine white again. I arranged the quilt carefully over deck
railing and iron deck bench, making a tent, so the cats wouldn’t find it
appealing and lay on it.
Didn’t work.
Teensy landed on
it, tent shape or not, and smushed it down on the bench so he could sleep
comfortably. I found him there the next time I took some clothes out to
hang them up. He had the grace to look
sheepish, but he stayed put. At least he
was clean, for once. No muddy
pawprints... no pine needles... no remnants from rolling in the dust...
Victoria and baby
Carolyn came visiting. As she was
leaving, Loren came to see our camper.
Victoria hurried out to show him the baby, which always pleases him.
A little while
later, Larry got home from work, and Loren helped him clear off the back of his
1989 red-and-white Chevy one-ton crewcab pickup in anticipation of putting the
camper onto it. He plans to someday sell the silver Dodge.
They were about to
start the transfer when Larry realized that the big shiny chrome smokestacks were in the way. Now, that
was a revoltin’ development, and it halted the process for the evening.
Meanwhile, I went to Hobby Lobby for the batting for my
customer’s quilt.
When I got home, Larry fired up the Traeger grill and
started smoking the rainbow trout he’d caught at Keller Park State Recreation
Area. I cooked some vegetables to go with it, added some fruit to the
menu, pulled out some whole wheatberry bread (with sunflower seeds!), and that
was supper.
The fish were so big, I could only eat half of mine. I saved the rest for another meal.
It was nearly dark
when I suddenly remembered the sheets, blanket, and quilt out on the deck. I rushed out to get them, hoping they hadn’t
gotten damp again in the night dew; but they were nice and dry, and smelled
soooo good. I love bedding that has
dried outside in the sun.
I made the bed with
the fresh linens and the wool/velvet/corduroy quilt, but put the thinner
fleece blanket back on rather than the thick one. It’s not cold enough for that one yet.
Friday, we heard from Larry’s cousin Kaye Lynn that his Uncle Earl, a
favorite uncle of ours, had passed away on October 8th. The funeral had been the day before, on the
12th. He’d been diagnosed with
stage four pancreatic cancer only two days before he died. He was
81. His wife, Aunt Lois, Larry’s
father’s sister, has dementia.
That day, I loaded
my customer’s quilt and began quilting it.
After several hours of steady quilting, I took a little break to post pictures from our trip to Colorado,
taken on October 6th:
The average snowfall per year in Idaho Springs is 146”.
But you get 249 sunny days with that.
When Larry got home
from work, he found a box on the front porch – another couple of quilts had
arrived from a customer in Tampa, Florida.
Gotta quilt faster... gotta quilt faster...
The one I am
quilting now is made of 30s reprint fabrics, in a mini bow tie pattern, and
measures 96” x 99”. The pantograph is
called Dahlia Delight.
I quit quilting at 2:30
a.m., then came upstairs to download a few pictures of the quilt and post them. I did a bit more computer work... tried to
keep from falling asleep... kept thinking, What else did I need to do?
Finally, when my eyelids just wouldn’t stay open, I thwacked the laptop
shut and headed for bed. Halfway there, I thought, Oh! Yes! I need to
send my customer pictures of pantographs she might like for her quilt!
And then... Well, it can wait until tomorrow. And I toddled on my
way.
Saturday afternoon
someone wrote to me, asking me to make her a ‘king-sized blanket and two
king-sized shams’. I thanked her for
asking, but explained that I no longer make quilts for customers; I only do the
quilting after the customer puts the quilt together.
As a final touch,
to stop people from trying to ‘coax’ me into it, I tell them how much the
Graceful Garden quilt appraised for:
$9,000.
The lady wrote back
politely, “Thanks. I don’t knit myself.”
Eh. I try not to sew myself, too.
Eh?
You do know that
punctuation (or the lack thereof) can be fatal, don’t you?
Witness: “I’m going to eat, Grandma,” versus “I’m
going to eat Grandma.”
I rest my case.
Sunday morning
after church, Hester and Andrew stuck a box full of all sorts of things in the
Jeep: Fiskars snips (exactly what I
needed)... a WoodWick diffuser scented in Cinnamon Chai (mmmm, mmm), quilting
clips, and a glass sun-catcher to hang in the window. The card is handmade, too.
Before going home,
we got some gifts for some of the kids, so we could give them their presents
after the evening service. All on the
same day, October 13th, it was Teddy and Amy’s 15th
anniversary, Caleb’s 24th birthday, and Caleb and Maria’s 4th
anniversary.
Some of the
traditional gifts for the 15th anniversary are linens and
crystal. When you have 9 children, linens are a little more
practical than crystal, right? So we got Teddy and Amy two large, thick,
soft bath sheets, one in a large aqua/white houndstooth, the other in plain
aqua.
For Caleb, we got a
warm hooded sweatshirt in tree-camo print.
Last Thursday night, Larry’s brother Kenny took his wife Annette to a hospital in
Lincoln. She’d been quite sick, and in pain. We have since learned that she has
cancer. That’s always awful news to
hear. They can’t operate, so will start
chemotherapy. She’s 51 years old.
Last Wednesday, I
signed up for a live webinar for the new EQ8 (Electric Quilt), which will be
coming out soon. Since I have EQ7, I
will only need to purchase the upgrade.
I chose the webinar that started at 11:00 p.m. tonight. Just finished watching it... and I will
definitely be buying that upgrade. Nifty
stuff! I don’t believe I’ve bought a
quilt pattern since getting EQ7. Well,
maybe a book... or two...
The lady for whom I’ve been doing so much quilting, upon hearing that I
got a couple of quilts from someone else, wrote to the quilting group, “That 30s
Mini Bow Tie was going to be the last quilt I sent, but now I hear that she’s
getting others sent to her...humpff!! Maybe I need to pack up some
more. A lot of my friends here want her address, and I’m not sharing
until I get some more done, lol.”
I responded, “LOL,
Donna with the ‘humpff’. And the other lady is making noises about ‘lots
more quilts’ ---- so I hurriedly told her that her third one will be the last
one I can do before Christmas! I had planned to make somethings for the
grandchildren, but I can see I’m running out of time.”
But I need
to make things, as that little vacation of ours (to say nothing of the
purchased pickup camper) seriously cut into my Christmas present money!
And now it’s
bedtime.
,,,>^..^<,,, Sarah Lynn ,,,>^..^<,,,
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