A beautiful day in the neighborhood.....

A few weeks ago, the weather had been so bad. It had been cloudy all day and as the sun was setting it came out. I went out on the deck to take a picture because I was so excited that it was red and that meant we would have a rain-free day for the next day.

Today was a gorgeous day, but cool. My husband's brother took my husband to Durham today for a treatment for his MS. While they were gone, I decided to try to get out and get some pictures. This yellowbell bush is right outside the bedroom window and I see it every morning when I raise the shade. This bush was planted back in the 1930's when this house was built.

A dear friend of mine moved back to NY when her husband died and she gave me these buttercups. They surround a trailing rose bush. I love crocus! They will pop up through snow and when you see them, you know Spring is not far away. We have two boxes of pansies planted on the deck where we can enjoy them by looking out our bay window in the kitchen. These are one of my favorite flowers. My grandmother loved flowers and had a beautiful rose garden and always planted pansies across the front of her house. I like to pick these and put in a small vase on the kitchen cabinet. These smell so good.

Hope you enjoyed my flowers.

♥Love ♥,

Marie

Decorating for St. Patrick"s Day

I now have my light box ready for March. I did the same thing to make this one as I did for Valentine's Day (directions are in a former post). I saw on another blog that instead of printing a picture
she bought cling-ons at the Dollar Store. She did her bow like mine and then just changed the cling-ons for each season or holiday. Have fun and use your imagination.

Love, Marie

Knitting with a Purpose.....

I participated in the 2011 Special Olympics USA Scarf Project for the Winter Games. These scarves are a symbol of unity, compassion and support, and help create a powerful sense of community across the Special Olympics Movement. The patterns and colors of thread were provided by Red Heart yarn. You could choose to crochet or knit. I also decided to do them for my home state of North Carolina. I have a long-time friend who has a special needs daughter so I did mine in honor of her.

I have also continued to knit prayer shawls for our FUMC prayer shawl ministry. Below is the latest one I have finished. You cast on a number that can be divided by 3 and then you knit 3, purl 3 every row until you have around 60 inches. Bind off and add fringe that is also divisible by 3

Love,
Marie

Pretty in Pink.....

Our son and his wife came home from CA for Christmas. As I had announced in an earlier post, they surprised us by letting us know they are expecting their first baby in June. When we were taking them to the airport to go back home, we stopped to eat and also went in a Michaels. I needed some thread and as we were looking we all saw this pattern book. They loved it and our daughter-in-law picked out the thread. As you will see below, I made the set and it is finished except the buttons. The day I finished it, they called to tell us that at their doctor's appointment they found out there baby is a boy. Oh, Well! I will put this pink set in my Grandmother's box for the next baby. We are very excited that the baby is a boy--he can carry on the family name.

This pattern is from Cuddle-me Layettes by Leisure Arts

Love is in the air.....

I printed this picture on regular printing paper and
then my husband sprayed it with a couple of
coats of clear sealer. I glued it to the glass
light box with a glue stick. Then I made a bow
to go on top and wrapped some of the
same ribbon around the edges. For Easter,
I will take this picture off and do something different.
Love, Marie

Frosty the snowman

After Christmas, when I was putting away my decorations, I decided that I would use snowmen on the table for a while. We have had snow off and on for a while and are probably having more next week, so I thought the snowmen would work out well. The centerpiece was a gift from a friend and the plates were gifts years ago from my daughter's grandmother-in-law. The colors of the centerpiece and plates work well together. I am going to enjoy them a little longer and then pack them away and put out valentines.

Naydine's Winter Wonderland

My friend Naydine and her husband took a drive in their neck of the woods on the morning after Christmas. They took over 100 pictures and it was hard to decide which ones to share. Hope you enjoy!
Love, Marie

Over the River and through the woods...

To Grandmother's house we go. Our daughter, her husband, and three children drove 2200 miles round trip from Oklahoma. Our son, his wife, and our granddaughter dog flew in from CA. A friend picked our son, wife, and dog up at the airport and brought them home. They arrived around 8:30 PM on Christmas Eve. Our daughter called and they were about 40 miles away. They had planned to go straight to the motel and come to our house the next day. We told them to come on and stop because we had plenty to eat. They came and there was a lot of chatter. Then, things got quiet. Our son handed me a gift to open and I said I was not to have a gift because we don't exchange gifts any more. He said it was something they all wanted me to have. I opened it up and it was a picture frame. I asked "What is it?". They all yelled "you are going to be a grandmother, again". The picture was the first ultrasound of the new baby. I started screaming and could hardly get my breath. I had prayed that I would live to see our son's first child. The baby is due in June. They had kept it a secret from us because they all wanted to see my reaction. I could not have been given a better gift than another grandchild to go with the three wonderful ones I already have. Our son and his wife had just adopted a dog from the shelter and I thought the dog was to be my grandchild at least from a while. Oh, by the way, my husband is thrilled about the news too.

To top everything off, we had our first white Christmas since 1947. It was absolutely beautiful! I am going to share some snow pictures with you. We also celebrated our 5oth wedding anniversary while they were here because they will all be in CA after the birth of the baby. My husband and I will not be able to travel to CA because of our health problems. Our kids and grand kids took us to a Chinese restaurant on Christmas Day to celebrate.

View out the den window

View from the front porch

front of house

Our granddaughter built a little snowman. It was too cold to be outside very long.
Below is Kona from CA in her first snow. She has on her new coat bought just for the trip.

A Few of My Favorite Things.............

I have a new favorite thing this year. My sister is
a talented pianist and has played around the world accompanying the local high school choral groups. She has played several times at the White House during the Clinton and Bush years. She has made many trips to Vienna and has just returned home after being snowed in for a day. She said it was absolutely beautiful. They all went shopping down in the Village Christkindlmarkt and she bought me my new favorite thing--it is a wooden Christmas tree that is also a music box. My Christmas china is the


Christmas tree pattern by Cuthbertson
so I thought the perfect spot for the
tree was on the kitchen table. Below is
a story book from the Bush years . This
was also a gift from my sister when she
performed at the White House.





















The little Noel train was at home when
I was growing up. The Mr. and Mrs. Claus
kissing and the little girl bell are gifts given
to us by our next door neighbor who has
since passed away.












The Mr. and Mrs. Claus salt and pepper shakers are from Hallmark and are probably at least 30 years old.









The cup with the note and tea bag were given to me by
a special friend the year before she died. I place it on the
table each year with the book - A Cup of Christmas Tea.

The table set with the Christmas china and
a pineapple pattern table cloth that I crocheted.

I placed some of my Santa ornaments and tatted snow flakes
on this tree in the bay window in the kitchen.















Clare Becky, always gets dressed in her Christmas dress and gets her special place at the
table. Our children say that I love her more
than I love them. Ha!

I keep my Santa cabinet out all year long because I like the spirit of Christmas all year long. To the right of the cabinet on the wall you can see my Christmas wall-hanging quilt. To the left of the cabinet, in the hall, you can see some of my L&L angels that I have cross stitched.


The snowman, three Santa's, and the winter scene carved in a nut shell were done by Jerry, the husband on my long-time internet friend, Kathi. They will always be some of my favorite things--they are special!

I cross stitched the Nativity on the candle stand.
The stand was made by an elderly man and I
was lucky to be able to get one before he
passed away. I love my candle--a gift from a
long-time internet friend, Kathi.

Another Nativity that I cross stitched and it is over the mantle and I have part of my angel collection sitting below it.

Now, it Christmas can come! This little paper mobile was bought in the 1960's before our son
was born. It always hangs here between the kitchen and den. One year we had trouble finding it. You know how you put things away where you will know where to find them. Well, we looked and looked and our son said Christmas could not come until we found. Thank goodness it was found just where we had put it. Ha!

Knitted Shawl

I had been looking at this pattern on line for a while and could not decide if I wanted to try it or not. I had some left over yarn and finally made the decision to plunge into it. You can find the pattern by going to Google and searching for Traveling Woman Shawl. There is also a free spread sheet to download and print. Boy! That spread sheet is wonderful--you check off the rows as you finish and you know if you have the correct number of stitches. This is not a difficult pattern, you just have to be sure to keep the correct number of stitch. This thread was too soft and did not hold the points when I blocked it. You will see this pattern done in some wonderful yarn. Good luck if you decide to try it. I had my friend, Naydine, to model it a couple of different ways. The view below can be moved off the shoulders and be more of a cowl.

Bye, Baby Bunting........

The popular thing today is..swaddling the baby. I went on the internet searching for buntings or cocoons. There are all kinds of patterns...knit and crochet free that you can download. The pattern I chose is from Bernat. The pattern is shown in stripes but when I went to Michael's, I saw this variegated yarn that I like. The girl that helped me is expecting her first baby in January and she really liked this yarn. I thought it turned out pretty.








I like to give receiving blankets
as a gift and the mother's have said
they have been perfect for swaddling.
I usually buy the blankets at
Target--I found they have a great
selection. I add a crochet edge to
the blanket to fancy them up a bit.
I try to keep some for girls
and some for boys on hand because they make
an inexpensive and useful gift.

My Try at Making Window Stars

I saw the beautiful, colorful stars that my internet friend made. Before I ordered the colored kite paper, I wanted to try my hand with some copy paper. I thought it came out pretty good and I placed it in the bedroom window. If you are interested in making some, go to The County Blossom blog--her link is on the left side of my blog under Favorite Places to Visit. She has really good instructions and where to order the papers. Have fun!

Knitting

I have been busy knitting prayers shawls for our church ministry. Before I started knitting them, I did not realize all the prayers and love that go into each shawl. Prayers are begun when the yarn is purchased and then as you start to knit and as you knit. We make the shawls and they are given to the person without them knowing who made it and the person making them does not know who receives them. An internet friend of mine was diagnosed with cancer and had surgery. Before she started chemo, the prayer ministry mailed her one. She said she cried when she got it in the mail and took it to her chemo treatment. They nurses remarked about it and she told about it being mailed from a prayer ministry in North Carolina.
I am not showing pictures of the shawls but the above picture is a pair of wrist warmers or fingerless gloves that I knitted for our daughter-in-law. I did not do a thumb and have done these for her to see if they fit. She is tiny and I tried to make the pattern smaller. You can find the pattern on line here.
Love,
Marie

Decorating for Fall

This is a cross stitch pillow that I made. I have patterns for one for each month.

Out kitchen table decorated with a Hallmark pumpkin that I had bought when the kids were little. It is still holding together enough to still use it. The other little pumkins and decorations were gifts from friend.

These jack-o-laterns are made from some gourds that we grew a few years ago. I placed them in my grandmother's dough board.

This is one of the boxes that I am fixing to go on the front porch rails. I still have some more arranging to do when I get them placed out front. I love the pumkins and they were a find at Dollar General last year. We have a new Dollar General near by and I hope to get there to see what they have neat for this year.

A fellow blogger, Faye, Behind My Picket Fence, had some of the wooden box Jack-o-lanterns

for sale last year. I loved them and asked her if she would mind if I made some and she gave me permission because she said the postage would have been expensive. We went to a friend's house that has a work shop and they had the wood stacked up. We had a great morning of cutting, painting, eating, and fellowship. We didn't make them to sale but just for us to enjoy. Thank you, Faye!

I wish everyone a great Fall!

Love,

Marie