Brrrr It's Cold This Morning

   Good morning,

      Brrrrr we have had a lot of wind and cooler temperatures for a few days now. We have been very spoiled with warmer than normal weather this fall so far-so no complaints.

   I did get my camera really fast. Larry set it up for me a few days ago. I took a couple photos into a sunny lake just now. It took  me awhile to figure out where they were in my computer but found them. I think for the most part the pelicans have migrated on to their next destination. We are just seeing a few now. Lots of sea gulls though. This morning there are lots of small birds flying around over the lake-fishing with the high waves. This time of year until next year May we enjoy bird watching over a very peaceful lake.

  This camera is very similar to one I had before, just need to use it a bit to figure out zooming in etc-I am no tech person at all. 

  Well I will need Larry to help me with the photos-as they would not upload here, I found them and needed to  copy and pasted instead

  The birds really blend into the lake. If you click on photos they will enlarge lots more

  I ended up finding a small Butterball turkey-15 pounds. I wanted a smaller turkey but all they had were gigantic turkeys haha.   We decided to brine and smoke it. If the wind decreases we will set it up in the smoker later today. The butterball turkeys have less additives than the store brand turkeys.

 Since the house is cold this morning, I am drinking a cup of coffee with a splash of my homemade Kahlua which is 4 years old now., so t tastes like the real thing now  I found this instant coffee that is really good if I just want one cup

Enjoy your day.

Update: Larry says the photos are just set up different on the computer-so can't just upload them to my blog like I usually do. It does take a bit to find them but it will get easier-and we have photos smiles

Watching Pelicans over the Weekend

   We got a real treat over the weekend-watching the large white pelicans on the Lake in the Ozarks.

Saw singles fly by and then pairs over the weekend. Then late yesterday two large flocks of them. We watch them catch fish, one even went after a seagull 

 I found this video on Facebook from our conservation dept.

  Also found this photos online of the pelicans on Lake in the Ozarks

 

 Wen they fly you can see the black under their wings.

  Today was rainy in the morning but rest of our day has been cool, dreary and windy.

It has been a year since I have spent any time in my craft room. I have done a few things on the couch but not in my room. Needs a super good clean for sure.to rid the dust in there, but it felt good. I am setting myself up to make Thanksgiving cards to mail out to friends.  Will be something fun for me.

  Off to get up the steps and hill to check the  mail-it has gotten windy and quite cold out there now-feels like a cold fall day. we have been spoiled for sure.

  Happy Monday

Good Morning Friday & Camera Woes--Updated

   We are fogged in here at the lake again this morning. I did enjoy a glorious full moon over the lake last night-very bright.

   I did get my new camera in the mail on Tuesday, took a few photos. Yesterday got the booklet out on how to download the photos.  I am not a tech person at all. When I plug the camera into the computer it brings up a screen of three choices-I need to select the middle one to download. How do I do that, as of course it is not clickable.  So amazon had a chat help for my camera. He could not help me so he sent my issue to the seller.  Early this morning all I get is a photo of the page in the booklet.  Frustrating for sure I was told I would get a video and tutorial.  I wrote back and told them if they can't help me will be sending the camera back.

  Life as a senior with no tech knowledge can be quite frustrating. I have never had this kind of issue with a camera before. Usually you just plug it in and the photos download.

  End of gripe

  Yesterday I worked on cleaning the fronts of all the wood kitchen cabinets with a wood cleaner-and I got the window clean that is in front of the sink with the help of one of Larry's workers. That window gets so dirty for some reason.  Next up will be to clear off the coffee area and clean and put back. Scour the sink, clean the floor and the kitchen will be clean going into winter. Oh one more thing I need to do is empty the frig and clean that too. Hope to finish up the kitchen today.

  Next up will be to clean the rest of the wood in the house and do the floors, wash rugs.  I only have rubber backed rugs now in the kitchen, and in front of the two doors-can't risk falls with my handwoven rugs any more. 

  With cleaning I have not gotten back to my sewing my little bag together. Hope to this weekend.

I made a pork loin roast in the oven yesterday. I used one of my cast iron skillets This was so delicious. I rubbed rosemary all over the roast and then added Mrs Dash garlic and herbs.   I used this recipe as a guide

  Happy Friday

 Update: Larry played around with the camera, the computer won't recognize it, after a half an hour or more-I said enough is enough I am sending it back to Amazon. That is a good thing with Amazon very easy to return items with a free shipping label. I do have to drive in to our bank where they have a UPS and Fedex drop off

  We searched for a different camera and went on Walmart.com They had a Kodak digital that uses regular batteries and got good reviews-they were a lot cheaper too than what Amazon was selling this one for-pays to take the time to shop around online.  We did also see a Minolta digital that was very impressive for just a little bit more money. Could not find what the battery was though. Had Japanese lens and a big upgrade overall. I went on Amazon they had the same camera again for more money, but in reviews one said this was not a point and shoot camera needed to set dials-not for me. so ordered the Kodak

 

Veteran's Day

  Wishing all of those that have served in the military a happy Veteran's Day

  (photo found online)

Brrrr A Fall Day is Upon Us

   Good Afternoon Saturday,

        Lots of rain last night, Missouri does need rain though. Since this is also a windy chilly day soup is just the perfect meal for us today. I am making us a beef soup from scratch-no salt beef broth, a can of USA canned beef, and I will also add potatoes, fresh green beans and some peas, a can of diced tomatoes with garlic, and a big handful of dried soup mix that I get from the Amish store.  I usually make chicken soup so I will need to adjust spices on this one..

   I so need to go through my kitchen cabinets as the spice cabinets are packed and I can't find what I am looking for-ugh.  It needs to be done. I bought some organic dried soup mixes that include most everything but the meat but can't locate them any where sigh. Oh well I have decided this month to really clean house here-going through cabinets is my first priority before winter.

  The other day I went through buckets (with tight lids) of  my rice and beans.  I don't have the extra freezer space any more to keep everything in there so these buckets have been in the basement since we moved to the lake.  I brought up 4 buckets so I can get to them easier. All sorts of different rice and beans.  Yep I am just used to always storing foods that I can make into dishes. and if the weather is really bad and I can not get to the food store I can always make us something.

  I still have fresh apples and I bought a bag of fresh cranberries recently so I think I will bake us up a crisp-have not done that in awhile Larry and a friend that comes by to visit us love this too.

    I did just order a digital camera this morning so I can post photos again. Hoping this one will work out as I upped the price a bit on this camera Supposed to be here on  Thursday

  Recently I was not happy that another wind up kitchen timer stopped working  I was telling Larry these always lasted at least 10 years or more-not now. So he says why don't you check out the digital timers. Me-"what??"  So I chose one-and I Love it! A simple thing but never knew of these before. They are more accurate and very loud.  Do you have one of these? You can tell I don't get out and about much any more smiles.

  I have started sewing my slow stitch piece into a bag. Doing this by hand as well and it is slow go with the thickness of the muslin fabric I put behind the stitches. I need to look in my stash for a thinner needle I think.

  That's about it for me. I am hoping to find the Notre Dame game on the tv later today

I found this Snoopy soup mug online

Oh and my author friend that lives near Yellowstone Park posted this video about Yellowstone Park with soothing music in the background. It is not hers but I really enjoyed the scenery and the music so wanted to share as well

Have a good weekend

It's a New Day (political thoughts)

   I took the duck out of the smoker yesterday morning. I was really pleased with it. This ended up being pretty expensive though The duck was around $20.00 plus the brine ingredients and we did still have the smoking wood chips. When you smoke -- the meat really shrinks- a lot and there is not a lot of meat on a duck to begin with-but I was happy with the result.

  I know most of my American friends here on my blog are on the far left liberal side but I hope every American comes together as one nation. 

   As soon as the winner was announced--  Hamas says they are ending their wars. Putin called Trump to talk about ending his war with Ukraine.  I think the biggest problem in our country is the lies from main stream media. Once people stop listening to the main news networks or at least compare them to the honest networks and compare information and then make a decision for yourself as to what is the truth everyone will be better informed.  The meltdown of the mainstream media was something to watch-and the big movie stars and singers-why should anyone care about what they think??

  Common sense, ranchers, farmers, the Amish communities, our younger generation, legal immigrants that fled communist countries gave Trump the win. Looking at the map pretty much only areas of blue were the large cities. I am happy common sense prevailed to save our country.. Also Trump donates his salary back-he does Not line his pockets with money during his Presidency as so many have done in the past.   Trump loves America and doesn't need the money-too many in the past get richer being President.

  Before Obama,  Americans came together after Presidential elections  I hope we can again and be one nation. Why does anyone want an open border for the world to come in unvetted??  Right now they are pouring in-none of us are safe with this going on.  Not fair to all of those that came in legally and went through  the long process to become Americans. Biden is using our Social Security and Medicare to pay these non Americans.

and Wow I saw last night that Harris copied Hillary's speech pretty much word for word in the beginning of it.. She has plagiarized in the past as well.

  I am deciding if I want to keep my blog or not, I have enjoyed sharing my crafts etc in the past but not sure about going forward  Perhaps a blog break just not sure yet.  I need to decide what to do about a camera-as I don't have a working camera any more.  

  Update: I do enjoy my blog and visiting friends, so I will be keeping my blog going forward. I just ordered a digital camera from online so hopefully this will work out well  if not I will send it back and try again

  Have a good Friday Hugs from the Lake

Duck in the Smoker

   We set up the duck I bought in the smoker early yesterday morning.  It was in the salt-brown sugar-pickling spice brine for several days.

  Some how we misplaced the racks that go into the smoker-have no idea where they could have gone-and I looked everywhere I could think of---so Larry turned a foil pan into a rack of sorts.

   Since I was up late last night I continued to add the smoking chips every 4-5 hours. We are using cherry and also Jack Daniels chips made from aged barrels

  I flipped the duck over early this morning.  Larry set up his cell phone so I could take a photo to share

This will need to go all day and perhaps tonight as well. I forgot that the smoking also really shrinks the meat-smells good

Gob Bless the USA (Thoughts Added to this Post)

 One Nation Under God 

   Americans of all races and religions have spoken and taken our country back at the polls. 

     Now is the time to unite as Americans and together bring back our country to it's former Glory.

   

  

When I was much younger (now 75) after an election we were all united as a country and with each other being fellow Americans.

   In my opinion this all changed with President Obama 

Since that time the far left ideology and lies by the media wants to change us to a far left socialist country. 

  When I was watching the stats from the election last night-the majority of voters that saved our great country were legal immigrants that became citizens because they fled a socialist-communist country to be free. Also the rural vote with farmers and the Amish came in to vote to save our Republic. 

Found this photo on facebook

  I saw today where a huge crowd of Harris supporters waited for hours and hours for Harris to appear-She never showed up-she didn't care enough. I feel for those Americans with their disappointment and loss. 

 All Americans are welcome in to the common sense Republican party. 

Over Reach of the Feds in New York

 This is another example of over reach by the present party in power right now.  I am sharing this story as it is heart wrenching and un excusable 

   This was a beloved squirrel that made  millions of followers happy and entertained. This couple rehabs and helps animals and "Peanut" was happier indoors as a pet then being turned back into the wild.  He was a family fur friend for 7 years.        

   A few day ago the Feds showed up and treated them like criminals or drug dealers and  took Peanuts and a raccoon and murdered them  Can you even imagine having this happen to You??    

  Our country is pretty evil right now but tomorrow is our Liberation Day  

Here is an article from a newspaper

And below is a video about this

 

  I do allow comments-but if they are full of hatred for our country they will not be published  

    I try not to publish too much politics as the majority of my online friends are far left liberal-which in the past was never an issue, so why is this even an issue now???  Those of us that are American citizens-we are Americans and One nation under God. Period and we need to get back to loving each other again. (end of rant)

Welcome November-Updated

 Wow we are closing in on the end of this year with holidays and soon to welcome in a new year-Wow is right Smiles

    This has been a long year for me being Larry's caregiver since October 2023 but it has also gone fast too.  I have just three more blocks on the bag handles to finish slow stitching-and then I can hand sew the bag together to see how it looks. I am looking forward to the finish to see how this will turn out.

  Today we will be much cooler-in the low '60's F We had gotten spoiled with a warm October Most of the leaves are down now do to a lot of windy days and we did get one night of hard rain this week.

  On a sad note:  it is good that I am still approving comments as I have been getting hate comments now for a few weeks-so if that person is reading this --your comments will Not be published-and I don't read them in their entirety   No reason for this hatred and you hide behind anonymous .  I am thinking this person is not reading my blog posts but decided to choose me for their hate speech-I needed to let this be known was happening.

  Oh and I wanted to also share that I just set up a duck-grown in the USA with nothing added-in a brine this morning-after this it will go into the smoker. Larry enjoys doing that, he'll need to show me how to work the smoker though. 

   The last few whole chickens and turkeys I have purchased are not worth eating any more unless you can find a local farmer that raises them.  I looked at the ingredients in the turkeys recently and the store brand had two lines of chemicals added, and the whole chickens are really horrible eats these days as well. This duck I found at Wal mart was raised in the USA nothing added but a low salt water solution. It looked really good out of the bag. .So now it is in the brine of water, canning salt, pickling spice, and organic brown sugar.  Will keep you posted how this turned out. 

   Welcome November Everyone

Last Day of October

 Wow another month that flew by

God Bless America

Brown Bag Cookie Molds

 Are any of you that collect baking items--Are you  familiar with Brown Bag Cookie Molds?

   Back in the late '80s when we had our wholesale/retail Bird business we had a booth in Chicago at a trade show.

  When I was walking around I spotted this company and fell in love. This was a wholesale trade show-so all the prices reflected that. Of course I went crazy and bought lots of different molds at wholesale prices. These are pottery molds that make large cookies, they also had several small square or round shortbread molds.  Each mold was inserted into a brown bag-thus the name-Brown Bag Cookie Molds.  Over the years I bought several more pieces.

  I love all things kitchen items and I have a pretty huge collection of molds, cutters, stamps for cookies.

Anyways the instructions were not to bake in the molds. but form the cookie in the mold and then take out and bake. I didn't always have great success-especially with a gluten free dough.

 I dug out a Halloween shortbread mold and was looking for a recipe.  I found this awesome video and she bakes in the molds. Wow game changer haha. 

Here is the video sorry the video showed up but then when I posted said not available-strange.

   Here is the link 

   In the video you can see the molds. I looked online-Ebay and Etsy- and molds from this company are now considered vintage-so I guess I am more vintage than I thought-haha

  I looked online for a photo of my Halloween mold but couldn't find one-so here is a photo of mine

We finally got rain last night-lots of it with wind lightening and thunder. It  has been close to two months I think with no rain here.

Happy Friday and weekend

Good Morning

  We have had such a beautiful October month so far. Monday we were almost 90 degrees F. Wow and the leaves are beginning to fall now. We will start cooling back down rest of this week.

  I did get the last of this year's grass cutting done-what a relief that is. The guys have gotten the water projects fixed-sadly we got ripped off with the lift-wires were burned off or broken. Of course when Larry contacted the seller no reply. Larry is working on figuring it out. Since the lift goes up ad down it is a complicated motor-and expensive if he could fine one.

  Larry starts back on physical therapy this week-hoping that helps him get stronger. He still has one leg that will just go out on him with no notice..

 My slow stitched first bag is getting closer to having the stitching finished. In another day or two  I will be sewing the other panel to it and completing the first bag. Enjoying this project, and I think it will go faster going forward.

and----- today is a big one for me-I turn 75 today-haven't wrapped my head around this yet-smiles.

   I did bake up a cheesecake last night to celebrate both of our October birthdays. This time I swirled in blueberry preserves-it baked up pretty.. I always seem to end up with a big crack on top of my cheesecakes.

  Enjoy the last of these autumn days

Gorgeous Day Today

 I had a busy day today. Had to go to town this morning for a part for our water, cut some grass, and spent an hour pulling that mint that totally took over my perennial garden. Turned out the abundance of water was coming from the well-after fixing everything else about the too much water issue--  it was the well.

   So the mint took over everything and pretty much choked out most all of my perennial plants that I had started from seed. Such a bummer for me.  I did find our shallots-the last of what Larry's Grandpa brought back from Israel-so happy we didn't lose those.

    This photo you can see the shallots, and a couple of perennials on either side that I don't know what they are

The green spot in the middle is more mint to get pulled out

This is the big pile of pulled mint

I always liked this area-the big copper pot on top, old tree stump and I had planted a lot of perennials in this area. . Those red stalks are probably poke weed that needs to come out

Surprise found this blooming plant that has been hidden with tall weeds

a couple little blooms that came up from fallen seed of last years' plants

Larry bought this used lift to help get him up to the top-hoping it works. We paid one of our workers to drive to get it for us-if it works I am thinking I can put heavy groceries in this instead of getting it all down the steps

Happy new week

Is it Really Friday Already?? Slow Stich Update

    We woke up with a bit warmer weather this morning, and full sunshine-Nice. I may try to get some outdoor work done this afternoon. This morning I thought I would make us lasagna for our main meal at 2 PM -something I have not made in a long time

  I did bake us up fall cut out cookies-everyone loved them-we had our friend and the two workers that have been helping us here yesterday-along with one of their Moms, so I shared the wheat cookies They were a big "hit" with their coffees

  This photo is of  my gluten free cookies.  I was happy with the frosting as it hardened up in a couple hours. I used butter, milk, vanilla extract, meringue powder and half confectionary sugar and half keto powdered sweetener-turned out really well.  So the frosting was half the sugar as were the cookies I made for the wheat version-half organic sugar and half Splenda. I wanted to cut the sugar a bit

Note: All photos will enlarge for better viewing-just click on them

I did get more stiches done. This is going well, and I think each bag will stitch up a little faster now This orange hand  dye is now all stitched. I may consider stitching across this-not sure yet

Last night I stitched this section. 

   This piece was dyed with Pebeco sun dyes that I had added coarse salt to as it dried in the sun. That was a fun sun dye day with a neighbor that had never hand dyed before. The sun dyes are fun as you can put leaves or a flat object on top and after being in the sun it will leave the impression on to the fabric I made different things with those pieces already.  

  I have not removed the chalk lines yet-so that is what the white is. I went to my embroidery thread stash and found one that blends into the fabric

 The pretty clear yellow piece was hand dyed with mimosa leaves. In my opinion it gives the most lovely yellows from natural materials.  The goldenrod is a bit tricky or at least it was for me-it took me three seasons to realize as soon as you see yellow-must pull it out of the dye bath-or it will turn cloudy and a bit brown instead of yellow.

   At the woods house we had a beautiful mimosa tree-so I had looked up to see if it would dye or not. Once the tree is in bloom with their pretty flowers-that's when to collect the leaves and dry them for future dye.  Once dry-I pulled off those tiny leaves into a paper bag-as you do not want the stems in the dye.

Happy Friday and weekend 

    Any plans for the weekend?? We will have beautiful weather here at the lake

My Slow Stitch Progress & Mail Surprise

 Good morning Sunday,

  I have been slow stitching on my first bag, and am enjoying it so far. Nothing planned out til I start on a new block of my hand dyed fabrics.

   Some of the threads I am using are hand dyed variegated DNC embroidery threads that were a gift from one of my slow mail friends. I really like them a lot, so found out who the artist was and just ordered her Rockies collection.

  I finished that blue block first and last couple of days working on the rust dyed piece.

     I decided I did not want to stitch over the heavier rust dyed areas so stitching around those.

Photos will enlarge for better viewing

  There are some white chalk lines still showing up on the blue block

I really like these pins-they stay in place while handling the fabric when stitching. The straight pins would be coming out and stabbing me as well haha. These are special safety pins as they don't have that big curl on the bottom which would damage the fabrics-these lay flat and if that rounded end goes into the fabric-not an issue.

ooops I should have turned the photos on the next two as that will be the direction on the finished bag

This one below is the variegated hand dyed thread, as is the threads in the blue dyed block  I had started stitching this first to see how the threads would look on the orange-I like it-then decided I needed to stitch up the rust dyed block below it first

I just love getting slow mail and surprises in my mailbox-don't your??

  This handmade card is from Deb--I love it!!  I am enjoying it on the mantel with my gnomes

Update  around 1 pm  just finished the rust dyed block-  am happy with it

Peanut Brittle

   I have not made a batch of peanut brittle in a couple of years. I love it but my stomach sadly does not.

It is a fun candy to make, I buy a large bag of peanuts from the Amish grocery store every several years or so. I  make it now for one of our friends who also works for us when we need projects done.

  He is driving several hours away to pick up an outdoor lift for  Larry-he has a spot to put it next to the rock wall that will take him up to the top-and into his new electric chair-made for outdoor use.

  So I thought I would surprise our friend  when he gets back today, with a batch of peanut brittle his favorite.

 The last time I made it in the microwave-I still use a thermometer as only way to know if it gets to 300 degrees F or not. It turned out really good that way

  Last week it was a total failure-it would not get up to temperature so that was a toss in the garbage it went.. I could not remember which bowl I used last time so I think I used a bowl too large. . 

    So I looked around online for another recipe-and perfect he suggested getting a 2 quart Pyrex  I found an anchor hocking brand made in the USA   Happy dance! good results this time. The other tip I read was to use the instant read thermometer instead of those bulky candy thermometers-why didn't I think of that??? so much easier.

  I have a marble slab that Larry rescued from demolition back when he was in his 20's still in Chicago at that time  Perfect for candy making I also make my chocolate barks on this marble.

We will be back in the 90's this weekend 

 Enjoy your weekend

Foggy

 We are still in the fog this morning-which is cool to see early mornings. The air temperatures have been dropping in the early mornings but the lake is still warm

  The view early looking towards our neighbor-and I took these through the window so not bad

This one-surprise the sun shows up through the fog

This Morning's Sunrise

 

A New Week

 Good morning, a new week is upon us-we are full sunshine but much cooler now we have fall temperatures today.

    The lake was very busy do to events happening and our temperatures making it to the 90's-perfect for boaters. We saw many fisherman on the lake.

  Last week our workers got a lot done for us. Saturday I moved our large Weber grill close to the smaller one near the front of the house. Much easier to use there since close to the front door and kitchen. That was a job though as it is heavy and I moved a lot of the rocks too for around the base. This weber is probably over 30 years old now. Didn't get to the acorn ink project though. I did get gluten free and wheat batches of sugar cookie dough mixed up.

  I will be making another trip today to the local hardware store for more materials for our workers this week-to finish up the drainage project where Larry fell off the wall a year ago this month.

  Today the Kansas City Chiefs football and the Kansas City Royals baseball game will be playing at the same time tonight--so if I get the baseball game on the tv will be recording them both.

  I have watched a lot of film from phones of all the organizations and private people and business's helping the flood victims from the hurricane. I took down my rant post but for me it was important to express my thoughts. We must care about our fellow Americans.  Now on the fema page they say they are helping-however most all of the films I have seen the locals have not seen them or they are hindering.  Like refusing to let the independent helicopters land-who have been helping since day one.  It is a horrible situation Biden doesn't even know what is going on,   I am not in a position with my age and Larry's caregiver to go down and help so am praying for the victims.  Such a horrible nature's disaster.

  Happy Monday

Happy Friday and Weekend & Book

   Happy Friday,  

     We are quite cool in the early mornings for a bit but by noon we are in the high 80's or 90's.  This type of weather occurred soon after we retired to Missouri back in the fall of 2003  I like it because one can get a lot done outdoors in the mornings before the heat comes in.

   We have hired work done these past few weeks. The biggest problem was the water issue, Larry solved the water coming down the large hill across from us (where the eagles sit) and started working on another drainage issue when he got hurt a year ago. So the next project was to find the well, dig it up and see if that was the issue of the too much water.

  What a huge job that was, I have never seen a well set up this way and we have always lived rural with a well. The two guys were able to find the problem and fix it. One is a long time friend that lives near our woods property and his cousin came with-they are both excellent workers. We needed a small truck load of river gravel with the sand and the driver apologized for the high price-this load is usually around $30.00 delivered this time almost $300.00-Biden-Harris economics Yikes

  I bought J..D..Vance's book a few weeks ago and just finished reading it. This was a newer edition as he added an extra chapter from 2 years ago when it was first published.

    I had lived in North Carolina back in the late '70's and had seen rural communities very very poor. This book was a bit difficult for me to read in the beginning about when he was a child-on how very poor they were, his Mom always fought drug addiction, married numerous times, and the violence and screaming and yelling in most homes. His Grandma helped him through all this, encouraged him to figure out how to get to college. So he enlisted in the Marines, served in Iraq-learned a lot and used the GI bill for college. Then he went to law school. I thought this book was well written and  worth the time to read-an eye opener on just how poor so many of our population is still, but he found a way out.

The lake area will be very busy this weekend. That bass tournament with the $100 thousand dollar first place prize is this weekend, and in Versailles a city I go to for drivers license, the small Wal mart, etc is having their yearly huge apple fest-so I will not be driving any where over this weekend. Smiles.

 I need to go over the instructions again, and will set up one of the weber grills to make the acorn ink while we still have nice weather. Hope to do that this weekend, or early next week.

  Happy Friday and weekend! Hoping you have lovely weather too

Voted & Acorns

   Larry got his absentee ballot in the mail a few days ago-so he voted, and I drove in to the courthouse to vote. I called and was able to bring his ballot in with me, instead of mailing-I just had to sign some papers. I have always drove in on election day and voted-but I decided to drive in to the courthouse instead early and while the weather is much nicer too. 

  I was the only one there voting-I drove in early though, so it was really nice. My eyes are getting bad from the dry eye issue so wanted to drive in with less traffic too. This time there were numerous issues to vote on-the only one I said yes to was that only American citizens  can vote in our elections here in Missouri-no illegals that the left is pushing-I really don't understand that-they are illegals 

   The oak trees are fully loaded with acorns. Every day for a couple weeks now they are constantly falling on the roof down to the deck. The floor is totally covered every day-so I just blow them off. Yesterday I got to thinking-what about acorn ink or dye??  

  So I found a really good ink recipe that I want to make. Only thing is that this needs to be made outdoors do to the odors in the cooking process. I need to figure out a firesafe spot to do that.

  Here in this article that I found (I had read several but liked this one the best)   she gives  options with using the caps too or not.  I also found this dye recipe  and this was an interesting video by another artist  I have lots of my handspun wool that is white-but I am not up to the mordant process (fixative) right now

  I grabbed a little paper bag and gathered up a bunch of acorns and caps just now When they fall the caps come off the nut.

I need to bring this amaryllis pot of bulbs indoors soon-we got down to the low 40's F last night, this will not survive a freeze

Happy mid week!

Happy October

   October has always been one of my favorite months-both of our birthdays are celebrated in October, and when we lived in northern Illinois before retirement-I just loved the deep blue skies and gorgeous fall leaves.

   Here in SW Missouri we do not always get those deep blue skies and here with mostly oaks and hickory not as much leaf color as I was used to. The first colors are the deep reds of the sumac bushes, a few yellows from the nut trees like black walnuts, but the oaks are mostly brown-never knew that til we moved in the woods. A lot of the oak leaves stay on the trees too until the spring leaves push them off.

 We have early voting here in Missouri so I will be driving in to our courthouse to vote this week. I asked for an absentee ballot for Larry this voting cycle. I prefer to vote in person.

    We both celebrate our birthdays this month too-I turn 75-Yikes Have not wrapped my head around that one yet. smiles

    I do feel better since I lost a lot of weight-about 12 pounds so far-just need to get toned up and see if I can manage a walk around our steep hill of a road-that is also a circle. I have also stopped buying snack foods like chips, fritos etc I was addicted to those and my body doesn't like those anymore either. That was hard-as I always would  rather eat snack foods than a meal. Now I grab a small cup of fruit, or cut up an apple.

  I wanted to make us some fall cut out cookies this month. I have a very huge cookie cutter-stamps-molds collection-but only found cutters for a pumpkin, and an apple-so I also grabbed a bison, and a dog. I bought two leaves and an acorn cutter for more of a fall variety  Found a package of natural food colors too. Maybe this weekend I will start on those.  Was also searching for a keto frosting for sugar cookies-to keep the sugar content lower. One recipe called for meringue powder which I have not worked with before. I also cut the sugars in the baking recipe with splenda and keto sweeteners and use a little natural sugar with those.

  Looking at the weather forecast-Wow we will be in the 80's for a long stretch-loving that.

Enjoy your October

  

Good Morning Sunday-Slow Stitch Progress

 Good morning Friends,

   It has been very windy here, so not working outdoors this weekend. Today we warm up to the 80"s but still windy.

  Congrats to the KC Royals baseball team for making it into one of the wildcard spots for the year's championship. They have had  some injuries, lots of new players, were so close to getting in and then they started losing lots of games-so I stopped watching them. over the last couple of weeks. Watched the game that would get them in and they lost-ugh, but another team lost so they got in haha.  First in 10 years since they got in the playoffs.

  I think I have more time in pinning my slow stitch project than sewing so far. I had bought some short applique straight pins as the instructor I am following really likes them. So, I was online hunting some down-they are hard to find.  I did find some I really liked and two online shops had them-but for both the shipping and taxes were higher than the pins-ugh. So I scoured Amazon-found one company that had them the review was good.  When I got them-I liked that they were short, but these were Not sharp at all-so no good for this project.

  I went back to the silk pins my Mom bought me years ago-they are thin and veryyyyy sharp and long pins-perfect for quilters.  I started to sew and kept getting  stabbed by these sharp pins that will draw blood as well. So ok now what to do??  I went through my bag of sashiko items that I bought two years ago-and found two little boxes of small no coil safety pins. These are sharp and will work-but what a job to change it all. These will be a pain to move around as I sew, but at least I won't get stabbed and the patches are now secure.

I changed the pins after sewing this little bit.  I had to keep taking out my stitches as they were too small-being used to hand quilting stitches. Not even, but I am not going to worry about that-as this project is to be fun and hopefully relieve some stress I used a stick of white chalk for a rough line to follow.

I did finish up the second wolf block-stitched it per the pattern this time. But instead of everything being one color-I used different colors for the outline stitches. I think I am liking this better than the first block. I may just turn these into pillows. I am thinking of a tea or coffee dye to get rid of all that white though. Those of you that have followed me for awhile-know I do not care for white. I have not rinsed out the blue pattern as of yet.

  I did search online for a good price for Melania's new book. I watched an interview about her book, and decided I wanted to read it. The prices are all over the place along with shipping added. This morning I checked out Thrift Books-they had the best price with free shipping. It pays to "shop" and look around for best price.

Happy Sunday and have an awesome new week.