The music stand

This lovely lady is quite the fashion model. Not sure who's clothes she's wearing but the head is my Raggedy Ann and the scarf was mine, crocheted by a neighbor I think. Her bone structure was my music stand. This same music stand also was used as a painting easel occasionally which gave it a nice modern art look with multi colored paint splatters. It was also great for drying socks.  In addition it was actually used for a music stand for most of my growing up years.  This however was it's finest moment.

Kitchen downsizing

After living with a much smaller kitchen for a couple of months this island is the one thing I miss. I can do just fine with less cabinets and drawers, less overall counter space, no dishwasher etc. but this huge expanse of counter was wonderful! I spend lots of time while working in the kitchen here trying to figure out how we could possibly get an island area in that space. I've pretty much decided it wouldn't be worth the effort but it's nice to dream while rolling out dough or finding places to put cookies on cooling racks.

I have no idea how the whole Thanksgiving thing with hundreds of rising butterhorns thing is going to work. It will take creativity!

Cause and Effect

This was fun. Too bad we didn't have color photos back then, it was such a lovely combination of purples and yellows. My sister wouldn't even look at me, backing into the bedroom when it was time for bed and notice how she's sitting behind me in the picture.

School playgrounds used to be very exciting. We had the swings that went ridiculously high, slides that were at least a mile up, tether ball where there was always the chance (and a pretty good one for me) that you'd get smacked in the side of the head and everything with a nice hard asphalt surface underneath. The monkey bars were my favorite and I'd wear shorts every day under my dress (which was mandatory for girls) just so I could flip around on them and not flash the world.

The day this happened I had perfected my no hands spin around the bar (holding on with my knees). That was fine and pretty safe. But then I decided to try a one handed version. I didn't really think that through or I might have realized that that one hand would pull me to one side. Unfortunately that side was the side with the vertical bar which my eye met quite nicely. I don't remember a whole lot right after that except that the doctor kept looking for glass in my eye no matter how many times my mother explained to him that since my glasses were not at all broken there was no need. I got some lovely stitches, a tetanus shot and nice bandaging and off I went to impress everyone with my shiner. 

And now all the we have are nice, safe playgrounds. Boring.

Girl Scouts

Last night I had no intention of buying Girl Scout cookies. I'd already baked cookies earlier in the day and didn't need more temptation hanging around the house. The Girl Scouts were out in front the grocery store but I just went in the other door and ignored them. They were putting quite a bit of effort into it, singing to a karaoke machine quite loudly (and badly) which showed initiative but not enough to guilt me into buying.

After the shopping and a side trip for sandwiches next door, I came back across the parking lot. The girls were still singing, still really out of tune but with great enthusiasm. This time though, they were being devious. They were singing "Sweet Home Alabama".  Out came all my Robert E. Lee High School class pride and off I went to buy Girl Scout cookies.

So, now I have way more cookies than I need, Sweet Home Alabama stuck in my head and no cash in my wallet. Girl Scouts are evil.

Love

I came home from my walk the other day, turned around and saw this. It only lasted a couple of minutes but wow, what an amazing sunrise!

Things like this remind me that God loves his children. He loves us enough to want us to have beauty to enjoy even on hard days. A God who thinks that way is a very personal, loving father to me. It is easy to pray to someone who cares so much about my happiness.

Life is hard, the world is not always a good place and we struggle on a daily basis. However, when we take time to look up from the daily plugging away and see the amazing beauty in the sky that is there for everyone to enjoy, the trials seem to shrink to their proper size instead of being the huge issues that wipe out all our happiness. Joy can come to anyone in any situation from a Father who's purpose in giving us this earth was to bring us happiness.

Disasters of the kitchen variety

Not too long into our marriage, we discovered that pancakes were a source of marital discord.  We each have very definite opinions about how they should be cooked which is a problem but I also had rather intense reactions when things did not go right with them (sticking to the pan, falling apart when turning etc.). It has made for many rough starts to the day throughout the years.

One day I got mad enough to just fling the offending pancake across the room.  Unfortunately it went into the window sill where my glass swans sat.  One of the swans got hit and ended up in the sink, in pieces.  This, of course, caused more angst and it was just a lovely morning all around.

The picture above is a morning when the whisk attachment for the mixer decided to have a minor break in one of the wires.  Eggs whites went all over the place in the time it took me to figure out what in the world was going on. Amazingly enough I was able to just laugh this one off.  Maybe I'm finally growing up!

Grandmas and Quilts

I have always admired my Grandmothers.  One I always thought of as very cultured and educated.  She always looked very classy and proper.  I admired that but couldn't imagine quite being able to pull that off.  My other grandmother was more what I thought the classic grandmother should be. Her standard outfits were the polyester pants and blouses that pretty much every older woman I knew back then wore.  Her hair was what I thought the standard grandma style should be and she had wonderful wrinkles and age spots that I thought were just plain cool.  She also painted, crocheted and quilted.  This was what I wanted to be when I grew up!

Unfortunately polyester pant suits went way out of style, my hair is still mostly brown and I'd look silly with a short grandma perm.  There is hope for the wrinkles and age spots though.  I tried painting and came to the conclusion that I have absolutely no artistic talent so that's out.  I can crochet but who needs more crocheted toilet paper covers anyway? But, I love quilting! I love the way the fabric come together to make a beautiful quilt top and most of all I love hand quilting.  I love that it takes a long time and is repetitious. I love that I feel close to my grandmother when I'm sewing those tiny stitches.

So, in my jeans and button up shirts and with my mostly straight, mostly brown hair, I make quilts for my children and grandchildren.  Then, unlike my grandmother, I take pictures and post them on Instagram, Facebook and all those other things she didn't even dream about.  Now if I could just find me some polyester...