Oh this is so weird. 2 years??? Guess I like to read blogs more than I like to write them. But life is busy and full and wild and ever changing and challenging and surprising. So I'm checking in with this funny thing called "my" blog.

DC

The Gates

I recently went to Washington DC to see my brother graduate from law school. My sister graduated got her MBA the same weekend in New York. What a dynamic duo!!! We had such a great time. My other sister and Dad took me to the Renwick, which is part of the Smithsonian. It is a gallery devoted to craft in America and had an exquisite, if small, collection. The building itself is kitty corner from the white house and part of a row of beautiful old buildings that, according to my Dad, had been slated for demolition and were saved by an architect working for JFK who brought the situation to JFK's attention. Thank God for forward thinking people.



The Grandfather Clock

This is carved entirely from ONE piece of wood. It is incredible! The artist bleached the wood to make it white, no paint was used.

Tomorrow I will find the names of the artists...sorry about that!

There was only one area where you could take pictures. My favorite exhibit was a room of paper lily pads hanging from the ceiling. It was pure magic. Go there if you can!

Rebirth?

OK, let's try this again...

I'm now on the new blogger and hubb-o found the cable to the camera so I should be able to post photos soon. I tried to switch over yesterday but it wasn't happenin' in blogger/google land.

I wanted to say how sad I was yesterday, Memorial Day. I was recently in DC at the new WWII memorial. (Not impressed by the way, it is so impersonal and monolithic. My Dad called it "fascist, like something you would see in Nuremberg" and I agree.)

This isn't anyone's "Great War". I weep for the soldiers of the world and the citizens of Iraq and for everyone caught up in the misery and destruction we have caused.

Thank God for people like Micheal Franti and Dennis Kucinich who are brave enough to posit a different path. They give me hope.

Ok, it's a craft blog, but I never said it wasn't a leftie craft blog!

Peace everyone!

I really love these things

I am a Snapdragon What Flower Are You?

My Tarot

You are The Lovers

Motive, power, and action, arising from Inspiration and Impulse.

The Lovers represents intuition and inspiration. Very often a choice needs to be made.

Originally, this card was called just LOVE. And that's actually more apt than "Lovers." Love follows in this sequence of growth and maturity. And, coming after the Emperor, who is about control, it is a radical change in perspective. LOVE is a force that makes you choose and decide for reasons you often can't understand; it makes you surrender control to a higher power. And that is what this card is all about. Finding something or someone who is so much a part of yourself, so perfectly attuned to you and you to them, that you cannot, dare not resist. This card indicates that the you have or will come across a person, career, challenge or thing that you will fall in love with. You will know instinctively that you must have this, even if it means diverging from your chosen path. No matter the difficulties, without it you will never be complete.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Regularity

Looks like I'm about a once-a-weeker. Had a wierd week last week dd (5 yrs old) had shingles. Shingles??!! "But old people get that!", everyone said. Yes, and sometimes little girls too. It attacked the nerve going down her right leg and it HUUUUUUUURT. Few things are as horrible as a child weeping in pain. Dd is usually an on the go kind of a person too, so seeing her curled up on the couch for days on end was disturbing. She had walking pneumonia a couple of years ago and we called it running, skipping, leaping pneumonia. That gives you the idea.

But she is back at Kindergarten this week and feeling good. As the doc said, our kids get the wierd stuff, but it is all stuff you get better from. Something to be mindful and thankful about!

I have been participating in the One Skein swap. It is now over. I had such a good experience. Both my secret pal and the person for whom I was a secret pal were wonderful and sweet. Here is one picture, my July surprises before I sent them off. The person I was pal to was a crocheter, so I made her a needle holder out of felted sweater wool and fabric. The polka dot fabric was new and the flowers from one of dd's dresses that got bleach on it.

More swappin'

This is my swap with Zarah for August's Project Spectrum dye your own sock yarn swap. In true fashion I was late, so I did an extra project for her and made a needle holder. It is made from felted wool sweaters and I embroidered it as well. She sent me a GORGOUS (and huge)hank of wine colored sock yarn which I am in love with. She said it is enough to make knee highs with, so I'm wondering if I could get a shawl out of it?? She also sent a beautiful beaded crystal bracelet. She was the organizer of the whole swap! My yarn was truthfully more fushia than purple but I think it turned out really pretty. My friend Aleta and I were experimenting with cake icing dye and didn't have vinegar in the first batch of dye, so most of the purple dye came out and it was hot pink. Redying with the vinager got us closer to purple but we could not cover up the pink. Maybe someday I will see it knitted up.

My blue sock swap partner is knitting socks with the yarn I sent her right now and it is so exciting to see what she's doing with the yarn. Check out her site http://knittingkryptonite.blogspot.com/.

I'd say have a good weekend, but so far I think I'm monologing (if that is a word).

Grateful

Today I am feeling grateful for friends. I met up with two Momfriends at Cloud City Coffee yesterday-they have an area with toys for kids and good treats and chai and coffee. We had six kids from age 1 to 8 and kind of took over the place, but all was very pleasant. How nice to have a weekend with no scheduled plans and to be able to just catch up and talk. I love summer but it is such a busy time. We've had rainy mornings and cooler temperatured here in Seattle and it is really feeling like fall.

We are also really LOVING the new Community Center/Library/playground near our house. Our neighborhood really needed a gathering place that wasn't totally commercially based

I wish I had my camera for the view out my car window yesterday of a patch of green green grass with yellow leaves evenly dispersed all over it, such a Seattle moment. One of the things that makes up for the gray, gray winter sky is how green it stays here all the time.

I am working on my Mason Dixon Log Cabin Blanket for my daughter (I haven't thought of good blog names for the kiddos yet) in Knitpicks Shine. It is soooo soft. Since I have no photo to post I will post this Gee's bend quilt for inspiration.