Miracles in Oklahoma

Skip ahead to about 1:30 if you don't want to watch the whole thing...

Crochet Work Basket

Dusty Pink & Linen

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I've had this recipe on my "To Do" list for a long time. It's Trisha Yearwood's Coconut Cake with Coconut-Lemon Glaze. I made it yesterday evening.

The glaze ruined it for me. There was way too much of it, and it was much too sweet and lemony for me...it had a bitter lemony bite to it. (Yes, I know how to grate a lemon without getting the bitter white part in it. That wasn't the problem.) I love lemon AND coconut, so I don't know why this just didn't knock my socks off. 

On the other hand, the cake is GREAT. I've had the recipe for the cake for a long time, but it's called a Vanilla Wafer Bundt Cake in my recipes. It would be really great without the glaze. I will make the cake again, but I won't use this glaze recipe. Maybe just a light dusting of powdered sugar would be best.

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This is a really good little magazine with a lot of patterns and a great price at $3.99.

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Fletch has a rash on his belly. He has it every spring & summer when the grass comes out. It's ichy and drives him nuts. He and Sammi both have allergies to grass so they get 1/2 a Benadryl nearly every day to help with the itchiness.

Fletch loves to be held like this so he can look at everything upside-down. The first thing he does when he is picked up is lean his head back so you'll hold him that way. He loves you to walk around the house with him looking at everything upside-down. It makes him very calm. He is a very strange dog. We think he might be slightly autistic, and I'm not kidding.

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I'm late for my Three O'Clock Coffee. I've gotta scram. See ya.

Those Colors Were Ugly!

Ollie-Wallie Baby

Now what was I going to say? Oh, yeah...

So I was sitting here this morning crocheting another square for the pile and watching Will & Grace re-runs, and it happened. An idea blossomed from my mind out of nowhere. Unfortunately it means starting all over with the squares, but I don't care. The more I looked at them, the uglier they became. I hate all those colors together! Yuck! Why didn't you tell me?

Something incredibly beautiful has taken their place. I don't even have to see it all put together with the edging and the border to know that this is going to be exactly what I want. I can see every detail in my mind. Isn't it weird how that happens? It doesn't happen very often with me. I'm usually the one that just copies other people's fabulous ideas, but this one was born in MY brain. Yay!

Scratch that last post from your minds. I'm starting over and it doesn't even hurt. The Captain is working today through Sunday and I've got nothing to do but feverishly work on bringing this little seed from my mind to life.

I've gotta go. I have piles and piles of squares to make!

Keep your nose away from here!

Stop sniffing around!

No Peeking!

Love ya'll.

Have a great weekend!

What's She Doing Now?

Oh hush. I can start as many projects as I want!

It was an accident, really.

Remember that magazine I showed you the other day that I said I'd never make anything out of it? Weeeeell, I took another quick flip through it and noticed this graph in the back pages. It grabbed me, and I picked up my yarn and hook and made one...and then I made another one, and another one...then I went to my stash and started digging out more muted yarns...and I kept making them.

Now I'm not a square person. I'm not one to sit and crochet square after square because I usually don't enjoy it. But. I was hopping around all my usual blog haunts, and saw THIS UNBELIEVABLY BEAUTIFUL BLANKET! Oh, my. Isn't it gorgeous? 

So I'm pretty sure that was in the back of my mind when I started these. Mine won't be as pretty in this worsted weight yarn -- I think dk yarn makes everything prettier because it's smaller yarn and takes a smaller hook. Anyway, this one won't be shabby, and I'm having a good time with the squares. I haven't even thought about what color I'm going to use for joining, but I'm pretty sure I'll be using the join-as-you-go method. I hate any kind of sewing, even just whip-stitching squares together. The last round of each square and joining color can make all the difference in how your blanket looks. I can't wait to see what develops.

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During THE STORMS last night, I was nervously crocheting away and watching the weathermen having the time of their lives trying to cover all the deadly tornadoes and hail and storms in the DFW area. We were the lucky ones that didn't get much other than thunder and lightening and gobs of rain. Thank you, Lord. But many others weren't so lucky and need our prayers.

Tornadoes scare the shit out of me!

Goodies & A Very Neat Quilt In the Making

I made a couple of cakes to take over to my sister's for our Mother's Day get-together...

I made a Hummingbird Bundt Cake with Cream Cheese "Drizzle."

That's quite a drizzle, huh?

I added a cup of coconut to the batter.

Recipe I Used Here:  Hummingbird Bundt Cake

Then I made my Granny's Fresh Banana Cake

This cake is nothing like banana bread. It's a yellow cake made from scratch, no bananas in it, and the "frosting" is just fresh-sliced bananas with the icing drizzled over the layers. You cook the icing to just below softball stage and it's a little tricky...okay, it's a whole lot tricky because my Granny didn't give explicit instructions for it. You know how grannies are.."Just put in a little bit of this, just eyeball it, cooking a few minutes until it looks like it's done," etc. Anyway, the icing is sugary and wonderful. Mine started to hardened up quickly as I was doing the top layer. I should have stopped and added a little milk, but I didn't. This cake is SO FREAKIN' GOOD. The recipe is a closely-guarded family secret, but I'll share it with my sweet bloggy friends if anybody thinks they'll make it. I may have already shared it a few years ago, but I can't remember.

This was me sitting on a stool cooking the icing.

The whole reason I'm showing this picture is because I think my hair looks good. LOL. How vain of me. I ended up burning the first batch of icing and had to start all over with a heavier pan.

My sister also made a Banana Split Cake (top center).

I ate some of everything. Diet be damned.

More on the diet thing another time.

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Now about that quilt....

I am not making it. I don't sew, remember? My momma is making it for my sister, and I think it's pretty darn cool. All of the material used to make the quilt is my sister's old scrubs (she's an RN), pants and tops. Here are some pictures of it in the making...

Of course, it will be much bigger than this. This is just all that would fit on the table for a picture right now. All of the hearts will be made with printed material, with the backgrounds solid except one, which will be the opposite...a solid heart with a printed background. My mom is going to sew embroidery my sister's name and graduation date on that solid heart. (It's the maroon heart shown above). Isn't that a neat idea? Maybe it isn't anything new to you quilters out there, but I'd never seen anything like it. So cool, and I'm totally jealous that my sister is getting a quilt that my momma is making. I'll have to beg for one of my own when she's done with this one. Maybe she can make one with all my dogs' hair incorporated into it. Ha-ha.  I'm keeding!

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That's it from me today.

Thanks for visiting!

Talk at ya'll later.

Mother's Day

I got roses...

From my sweet husband!

I love the card.

That's all it said, and it makes me smile every time I look at it.

I needed his love yesterday and he knew it.

Gray Oveja

My Latest Oveja Shawl in Gray

Love the gray, but hate the yarn. I had several skeins of Bernat Berella "4", a really stiff and rough worsted-weight yarn, in my stash that I needed to use up. I hope it softens up once I wash it. I did my own thing on the edging on this one. I didn't write it down and I'm not even sure what I did, but I like it for something different.

By the way, "oveja" means "sheep" in case you were wondering. I googled it.

 

A little closer look. The top picture is more the true color of it, but it's a little darker gray than either of these pictures shows.

I got my new yarn today and got at least two more colors specifically for this pattern, so you'll be seeing more of these. I really like this shawl, both to make and to actually wear. I've made a LOT of shawls, but this is the only one I've ever worn.

If you see this magazine and are tempted to buy it, DON'T. I'm really pissed off that I did. It's full of unrealistic, non-mainstream patterns you'd never make and certainly never wear. That pineapple garment on the cover looks like it's a pretty shawl, but it's a sweater...and a stupid-looking sweater at that. Yuck. I'll never buy another Vogueknitting magazine. Ridiculous! (I can appreciate the artistic quality of the crochet, but that's not what I want in a crochet magazine. I want patterns I might actually make and use.)

As you were.

Grannies' Grannies

I went over and visited my momma and daddy yesterday and she had these two blankets draped over her couches.

This one was made by my Great Aunt, Jewel Squyres.

We called her Granny because she raised my Daddy.

Mmm...grannies!

This one was made by my grandmother, Levoi Barton.

Both of them are not with us anymore, but I'm really happy that we have some of their crochet goodies to admire. I'm happy to carry on the family crochet gene. 

When I look at them and look closely at the stitches, I wonder what they were thinking about when they made all of these stitches. I know how my mind wanders and different things float through my mind while I crochet, some stay for a few rows of contemplation and others just stay around for a few stitches and another train of thought takes its place.

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While I was in the waiting room at the doc's yesterday, I saw this recipe in a magazine and took a couple of snapshots of it. I've got to try it some day...

This was the best one I got for printing if you want. Left-lick on the picture first, and when the new size comes up, print it. You should get a full-size copy that way. If that doesn't work, copy and paste it into a Word document then click on it and pull in the corners to the size you want, and then print. If that doesn't work, just get out a crayola and some paper! Ha-ha/

I put this one up too, so you could see part of the cake and know what it looks like. It sounds so good to me! This recipe came out of an issue of Good Housekeeping magazine.

This is the view from my momma & daddy's back porch. I stepped out there yesterday to get a picture of the pretty climbing roses. It's was raining so the light wasn't great for picture-taking, but they still look pretty.

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I haven't made any progress on anything crochet in the last few days except for that Oveja shawl.  My new yarn should be delivered from JoAnn's on Saturday. I'm going to make a black one and a gray one if the yarn I bought for it works out. I didn't buy the Cottontots in any color other than off-white because they didn't have any good colors in stock. Bastards. Don't have a damn sale and then not have any colors to choose from, people!

~Have a good weekend~

Enjoy your Mother's Day all you mothers out there!

New Shawl & Bad Dog

I made myself another Oveja Shawl.

I also ordered some yarn to make a brown one.

JoAnn's online has the Cottontots on sale for $2.99.

Colors are limited, however.

And I don't think I have to say a word about this...

Heeheehee.
A little shaming is the best punishment!

You're Right!

You're right, you're right! I know you're right!

(That's a line spoken by Carrie Fisher in the movie When Harry Met Sally that the Captain and I always say to each other.)

Yellow Sweetheart Blanket

by Elizabeth at Home is Where the Heart Is

Why do you all have to be so reasonable? 

I meant to tell all of you thank you for your comments on the Sweetheart Blanket screw-up. Although I know what the right thing to do is, it really helps to hear you say it. The idea of making every other panel matching was a good one – I think a couple of you mentioned that – but in this particular case, I want all the hearts lined up. So thanks to all of you for your responses.

I still haven’t touched it since discovering the error. I think I’ll have the Captain pull it out for me tonight when he gets home from work. I won’t have to see it and maybe that’ll be less painful.

I just love that afghan, and I hope to make more than one. It does take a lot of time, though, but that’s okay. The results will be worth it, and I’m going to ALWAYS be crocheting something anyway. It's a dead issue and I'm moving on! Yay, me!

How's about some more pretty crochet?  Okay...

Pastel Granny Blanket

by Petite Pimprenelle

Baby Girl Hat with Bow

by Lisa Corinne on Ravelry

Love these colors together!

By BabyLove Brand

By Babukatorium

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Remember this cotton Oveja shawl I made a while back? I wore it to the doctor's office a couple of days ago and the lady that did my MRI had a fit over it. She went on and on and asked to try it on and admired herself in the mirror. As I was leaving, I put it around her shoulders and told her it was hers. After a bit of back and forth because she didn't want me to just give it to her, she finally accepted it and I left. She said it made her day, but it made mine more. She was so happy and taken aback. She said she was going to wear it to church this Sunday and everyone was going to be so jealous. :) 

There's nothing like a random act of kindness! Try it. It'll lift your spirits and fill your heart with joy every time!

I'm going to make myself another one using that same yarn, Bernat Cotton Tots. It was the only shawl I've ever actually worn, and I had worn that one three times recently and gotten comments from strangers on it every time. It's the perfect shawl...not to heavy, not too big, and it matches everything. Maybe I'd better make several if I'm going to be giving them away all over town.  Hahaha.  It would be gorgeous in black, but the dog hair would show like crazy so I can't do that for myself. The Cotton Tots doesn't come in black either. It does come in a chocolate brown though.  Hmm...