Christmas spirit has been slow to arrive this year. Oh to be sure the house has been in full Christmas Fairy Barf splendor for weeks now - the desire to begin making gifts? that is where the spirit has lagged. But it has finally hit - maybe four - five days ago. So far I've felted a dragon, penguin, and pony - made three tote bags from restaurant cast-off Thai rice bags - made two pair of mittens and four bomber hats from felted sweaters.
To felt a sweater you put a 100% wool sweater in the washer and wash on hot - you know the drill, anyone who has ever owned a wool sweater knows the drill. Until fairly recently I always figured those sweaters were ruined. But now I know differently. You can use the resulting close packed wool felt (Barbee clothes) to make hats, mittens, bags, throws... any number of projects. So now I troll thrift shops for wool sweaters regularly. I'm always looking for people to just give me their old wool sweaters (already shrunken or not). Anyways, I've been collecting them for several years without actually starting any projects - needed a good stock pile to get going. At this point the collection was pushing the limits of my storage capacity so hats and mittens are underway. It's loads of fun to put bits together. I have lined all the pieces with fleece from those $3 throws they sell this time of year. Much cheaper to line with those than to by fleece by the yard.
So here are some of the things produced so far - several other pieces are in progress and of course I've already decorated a few dozen glass ornaments, but those have been packaged and many already delivered as gifts. The penguin is a rock hopper, hence the orange head fringies.
I took the picture of the three blue hats five time and just couldn't get the them to light well - I'm hoping it is my own monitor that is the problem and that the picture looks ok to all of you. I know my monitor tends to make things look darker than they are.
So there you go. Gifting for us is primarily hand made - told you that before. Within the immediate family gifts tend heavily to books and music.
As for the chicklet invasion - it begins today. D2 is bringing her boyfriend home for a couple days and on her way across the state she is swinging over to pick up D3 and bring her (and all her instruments) home for the holidays. Tomorrow D1 and her husband arrive from just outside Raleigh to stay until Thurs - it is their year to spend Christmas proper with his family so we get them before for a few days. Sunday the fiancée of D3 will arrive to stay for a couple days (lives in Charlotte when he is not at school) and D2 will take her boyfriend back to the Triangle Area (Durham to be exact). His car is a rattle trap and can't be trusted to cross the state - he is a grad student who's father disappeared very early in his life and the young man takes care of both his mother and little sister so there is no money in his life for a new car. He works as a manager in the dorm where he lives and has worked there all the way through his college career as well as working with youth in an academic camp each summer (except last summer when he worked as an intern with BCBS of NC - his master's is in hospital management). D2 will return sometime Monday afternoon. Also on Monday afternoon my husband's family is coming here to see D1 and her husband for Christmas (they all live about 45 min away) then in the evening we are hosting the Christmas gathering for my family. Normally my mother would do this but her brother (my uncle) is at death's door and she did not want to try to host the gathering as she may have to head down to Jax at any moment.
Once we get past Monday it will be just us chickens - whew... But you see why the spirit being late is a problem - I only have until Monday! And now I need to prepare this house for multiple and shifting overnight guests and loads of coming and going. Oh, and I need to cook - and do some laundry - and go to the grocery store, and....
Merry Christmas to each of you. Though I'll be in and out here, will check in at your places daily - anyways this may be my last post here for a bit. Unless of course the spirit moves...
To felt a sweater you put a 100% wool sweater in the washer and wash on hot - you know the drill, anyone who has ever owned a wool sweater knows the drill. Until fairly recently I always figured those sweaters were ruined. But now I know differently. You can use the resulting close packed wool felt (Barbee clothes) to make hats, mittens, bags, throws... any number of projects. So now I troll thrift shops for wool sweaters regularly. I'm always looking for people to just give me their old wool sweaters (already shrunken or not). Anyways, I've been collecting them for several years without actually starting any projects - needed a good stock pile to get going. At this point the collection was pushing the limits of my storage capacity so hats and mittens are underway. It's loads of fun to put bits together. I have lined all the pieces with fleece from those $3 throws they sell this time of year. Much cheaper to line with those than to by fleece by the yard.
So here are some of the things produced so far - several other pieces are in progress and of course I've already decorated a few dozen glass ornaments, but those have been packaged and many already delivered as gifts. The penguin is a rock hopper, hence the orange head fringies.
I took the picture of the three blue hats five time and just couldn't get the them to light well - I'm hoping it is my own monitor that is the problem and that the picture looks ok to all of you. I know my monitor tends to make things look darker than they are.
So there you go. Gifting for us is primarily hand made - told you that before. Within the immediate family gifts tend heavily to books and music.
As for the chicklet invasion - it begins today. D2 is bringing her boyfriend home for a couple days and on her way across the state she is swinging over to pick up D3 and bring her (and all her instruments) home for the holidays. Tomorrow D1 and her husband arrive from just outside Raleigh to stay until Thurs - it is their year to spend Christmas proper with his family so we get them before for a few days. Sunday the fiancée of D3 will arrive to stay for a couple days (lives in Charlotte when he is not at school) and D2 will take her boyfriend back to the Triangle Area (Durham to be exact). His car is a rattle trap and can't be trusted to cross the state - he is a grad student who's father disappeared very early in his life and the young man takes care of both his mother and little sister so there is no money in his life for a new car. He works as a manager in the dorm where he lives and has worked there all the way through his college career as well as working with youth in an academic camp each summer (except last summer when he worked as an intern with BCBS of NC - his master's is in hospital management). D2 will return sometime Monday afternoon. Also on Monday afternoon my husband's family is coming here to see D1 and her husband for Christmas (they all live about 45 min away) then in the evening we are hosting the Christmas gathering for my family. Normally my mother would do this but her brother (my uncle) is at death's door and she did not want to try to host the gathering as she may have to head down to Jax at any moment.
Once we get past Monday it will be just us chickens - whew... But you see why the spirit being late is a problem - I only have until Monday! And now I need to prepare this house for multiple and shifting overnight guests and loads of coming and going. Oh, and I need to cook - and do some laundry - and go to the grocery store, and....
Merry Christmas to each of you. Though I'll be in and out here, will check in at your places daily - anyways this may be my last post here for a bit. Unless of course the spirit moves...
As is my habit from the first very poor Christmas of my married life - I make many of our Christmas gifts. This one is probably my favorite for this year - the boy wants to keep it. The dragon is for my niece, and no - I don't want to make another one so we will not keep him. I don't know how well the color shows up on your computers but mine is showing his body as blue and light blue. Actually his body is bright teal and deep purple. His face around his eyes, nostrils and upper chest area are golden orange and his nose and lower belly are yellow. He is pretty colorful.
Yesterday I felted a selection of microbes for my other niece who is getting her PhD in micro-biology. Now I need to find something that will make a reasonably good facsimile of a petri dish.
giggle
Oh and, for the record - last year we had our first big snow on Dec 18. Now, it really was a big one - 10 maybe 12 inches - but this year's first snow is today. So far we've got 3 maybe 4 inches of perfect packing, snowman making, sleding, walk the dogs in it - SNOW! Still snowing so we'll see what we end up with here.
A seven year old boy I know saw a Butterball Turkey commercial and commented how gross that was and there was no way he was going to eat turkey nuts with butter for Thanksgiving! hahahahaha
So, the head of the TSA is offering to give senators a pat down.
I have a few thoughts on that. One) we know from the articles we've been reading and video we've seen and/or heard that individual TSA agents handle these pat downs in different ways. Two) who among us believes for one minute that whatever this guy would subject senators to would be the same as what the rest of us will be subjected to? Really? How likely is it that dear Senator Claire McCaskill, who likens the pat downs to "love pats" will get the same treatment as, say the woman from Amarillo who, in 2008, had her top pulled down by TSA agents in front of other passengers and who then laughed and joked about her for an extended period. Of course we are also treated to Emmett Tyrrell who wonders " How many ... Americans would welcome a soothing pat-down midst the hurly-burly of travel at our nation's stress-filled airports I do not know, but count me in -- especially if the patter-downer is a cute little number on the order of, say, Sarah Palin." --- Um, Tyrerell? Only those who have been so mind numbed that they allow the government to lead them through life as though they were in a trance..." whatever you say Obama, lead us." - NOT! And while we are reading what Mr Tyrrell has to say, once again we are treated to a lefty for whom it is fine to refer to a woman as a "cute little number", no not sexist at all - not a misogynist he, oh no - he "cares" about people, he is a liberal.
I also understand that the TSA is angry with coverage on these incidents and claims that their screeners are "professionals" who behave in a professional manner. Well, I've traveled a good bit and been through many a security screening (though not through a nekked scanner or one of these "love pat", get in your pants, feel you up, sexual assault screenings - yet) and I can tell you the percentage of screeners whom I would consider competent and professional in their manner is frighteningly small. More like thugs who love to throw their "power" around and treat the traveling public like garbage just because, for the first time in their lives, they can. Let's not forget these TSA screeners are now government employees...
We also know that common sense and discretion is in very short supply when it comes to the TSA and their security policies.
In the "TSA offers to share a little love with senators" link up there ( first paragraph) - John Pistole says we don't know what new way terrorists might try to strike so they have to change up their methods of screening (always, of course, after the cow is out of the barn). I'm wondering this, we know that drug smugglers have been known to hide drugs in their...well, nether regions. If terrorists decide to try that route are we all going to be subjected to...um....probes from that point on? And again I say - when was the last time El Al had a problem with terrorism? Wouldn't we expect them to be target number one? And do they use nekked machines or love pats on grandmas, 3 year olds or every tenth passenger (unless of course that tenth passenger happens to be named Mukhtar, in which case they would of course skip to the next person - right? can't be profiling...noooo)? Heck no they don't use our methods of screening. Wouldn't the smart thing be to maybe see how our ALLY solves the problem? Maybe they are onto something? Maybe?...
I still want to know why our government decided to go the nekked screening machine route instead of the puff of air explosive detection route. I've been through those machines, they are not intrusive and I understand they work pretty well - though sometimes overly sensitive. OK, I'd rather get a pat down after one of those went off than go through the nekked machine.... Just sayin.
I don't plan to go meekly along with this bull crap. We are being treated to undue search, molestation, exploitation, and a major dose of overbearing government here. We do indeed, as Americans, have a RIGHT to travel. It has always been our RIGHT to move about freely. Don't tell me it isn't a right, it is certainly more a right than say a RIGHT to have to broadband for goodness sakes. And with that right to move about freely - how else does the TSA suggest we get to Europe should we desire to head over the pond? Don't tell me on a ship - they have security screenings for ships too. You folks do know that the TSA wants to be able to do these same screenings for people traveling on buses, trains, and subways too right? There comes a time when we have to stand, we are in those days.
Sure hope you don't hear about me on national news next time I fly...
Update--- You should read this! A cancer surviving flight attendant was forced to remove and show her breast prosthesis! Dear lord, we must get hold of this insanity!
I have a few thoughts on that. One) we know from the articles we've been reading and video we've seen and/or heard that individual TSA agents handle these pat downs in different ways. Two) who among us believes for one minute that whatever this guy would subject senators to would be the same as what the rest of us will be subjected to? Really? How likely is it that dear Senator Claire McCaskill, who likens the pat downs to "love pats" will get the same treatment as, say the woman from Amarillo who, in 2008, had her top pulled down by TSA agents in front of other passengers and who then laughed and joked about her for an extended period. Of course we are also treated to Emmett Tyrrell who wonders " How many ... Americans would welcome a soothing pat-down midst the hurly-burly of travel at our nation's stress-filled airports I do not know, but count me in -- especially if the patter-downer is a cute little number on the order of, say, Sarah Palin." --- Um, Tyrerell? Only those who have been so mind numbed that they allow the government to lead them through life as though they were in a trance..." whatever you say Obama, lead us." - NOT! And while we are reading what Mr Tyrrell has to say, once again we are treated to a lefty for whom it is fine to refer to a woman as a "cute little number", no not sexist at all - not a misogynist he, oh no - he "cares" about people, he is a liberal.
We also know that common sense and discretion is in very short supply when it comes to the TSA and their security policies.
In the "TSA offers to share a little love with senators" link up there ( first paragraph) - John Pistole says we don't know what new way terrorists might try to strike so they have to change up their methods of screening (always, of course, after the cow is out of the barn). I'm wondering this, we know that drug smugglers have been known to hide drugs in their...well, nether regions. If terrorists decide to try that route are we all going to be subjected to...um....probes from that point on? And again I say - when was the last time El Al had a problem with terrorism? Wouldn't we expect them to be target number one? And do they use nekked machines or love pats on grandmas, 3 year olds or every tenth passenger (unless of course that tenth passenger happens to be named Mukhtar, in which case they would of course skip to the next person - right? can't be profiling...noooo)? Heck no they don't use our methods of screening. Wouldn't the smart thing be to maybe see how our ALLY solves the problem? Maybe they are onto something? Maybe?...
I still want to know why our government decided to go the nekked screening machine route instead of the puff of air explosive detection route. I've been through those machines, they are not intrusive and I understand they work pretty well - though sometimes overly sensitive. OK, I'd rather get a pat down after one of those went off than go through the nekked machine.... Just sayin.
I don't plan to go meekly along with this bull crap. We are being treated to undue search, molestation, exploitation, and a major dose of overbearing government here. We do indeed, as Americans, have a RIGHT to travel. It has always been our RIGHT to move about freely. Don't tell me it isn't a right, it is certainly more a right than say a RIGHT to have to broadband for goodness sakes. And with that right to move about freely - how else does the TSA suggest we get to Europe should we desire to head over the pond? Don't tell me on a ship - they have security screenings for ships too. You folks do know that the TSA wants to be able to do these same screenings for people traveling on buses, trains, and subways too right? There comes a time when we have to stand, we are in those days.
Sure hope you don't hear about me on national news next time I fly...
Update--- You should read this! A cancer surviving flight attendant was forced to remove and show her breast prosthesis! Dear lord, we must get hold of this insanity!
"I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
