Wool on a wednesday...

Yes I know it is Thursday, but this is what I did yesterday.  Mom and I wanted to go up to Spry Whimsy, mostly to see Peter and Ingrid, but also to get some wool and see Peter's latest creations.  He is an amazing felting artist, She is a spinner and being with them is calming and inspiring and energizing all at once. Ingrid was not in the shop yesterday but it was nice to see Peter. Mom and I had been talking about going for awhile, Dad who is still recovering from surgery was not really listening to us.  He arrived at my house thinking we were spending the day planning for our businesses and the kids 4H projects and maybe running to the Woodcraft store. He did think it was a little weird I want them here at 8! Spry Whimsy is a bit more than an hour away and I had to be back in time to pick kids up from school. Boy was Daddy surprised!

 I bought this wool (above two photos) to be plied against the the skein below.  Once I got it home I am not so sure, but it sure is lovely. Merino and silk blend. I am going to spin it up really fine and them make a decision.

 I want to play with the color wheel so I got these, that is three ounces of each.

More color play but this time a continuous blending experiment like in the current issue of Spin Off magazine.

We have a lovely day and Dad even got to go to Woodcraft but after we got the kids. They were given popcorn and sat quietly and quite contently munching while we shopped.  Mom helped my make dinner and Daddy took a nap in my chair with granddaughters giving him pillows and blankets and stuffies to cuddle. Then they made off with his hat and coat and played pretend to be Grandpa.

Hope you are having a wool... wonderful... week!~ Julia

Come have lunch with me

In the interest of feeling better, losing a bit of weight, and generally eating better I have decided the make lunch a bit more important of a meal.  I normally grab something, either from my own kitchen or out while doing errands - though I must admit I sometimes invent errands to do the two Chicago style dogs for $3 special down the street...shh!  I am then hungry and crabby later. I have been seeing these yummy looking recipes over at Farmish Momma and I wanted to try them, but thinking about the hard time my children would give me kept me hesitating. While at the grocery store this week I thought, I could just make some for me... Brilliant! So lunch is on! 

This is the yellow split pea soup she posted in her real food/real budgets series. I made a few changes, my husband was eating too and doesn't like blended soups so I skipped that step, I think it may have been necessary.  I cooked this much longer than she says, and the peas have a disagreeable - to me - texture that likely gets fixed by the blending.  It tastes amazing though, next time I will just cook it longer. I did not have any bacon grease handy so I fried up two slices and added them to the bowl of soup at the time of serving. I also added red pepper flakes because I add that to everything. 

 On the topic of bacon... I made these for Valentine's day.  Pretty but I prefer my bacon non-floral. No one in the family complained however!

For some crafting bits, I switched to cloth pads for that time of the month.  I bought some Glad rags brand and wowsa was that expensive, but rather than have something plastic-y paper-y rubbing against me all that week I have flannel. Much, much better. I did cloth diapers for my kids and thought about this a lot then. I have only had issue with them moving a bit during wear no leaks. So I am trying to make a few that are similar to what I bought but slightly differently shaped, hopefully these changes are comfy. I made a few before and they worked just as well as those I bought.  These are extra pieces of flannel from various kid projects and cotton batting leftover from quilts.  I have discovered a love hate relationship with grommet snaps, I love them when I line everything up, hate them when that is not happening. You might notice that the horse pad has two snaps set into one flap, that is not a design feature!

hope your plans are going according to plan! ~ Julia

Selling, new blog, surprise.

After a long time of talking about, dreaming about, and thinking about selling my crafts, I have decided to go for it.  I set up an Etsy site and am doing all the necessary forms and such to be all ready to sell.  I am planning on participating in a local farmer's market's craft weekends. It is once a month along with the market so I thought it was a gentle way to dive into craft fair selling and hope it will be a good fit for my family. To show what I am doing I created a new blog for the Business (that sounds so big!) it is MoonBound ArtisanShip

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Sometimes ideas run away with me.  I decided that while my husband was off on a business trip I would empty, clean, carpet shampoo, and paint our bedroom - as a surprise! So I had a week to get everything done, this was the only room we did not paint when we bought the house, typically taking care of ourselves last thinking there.  I got my Mother and friend and co-conspirator R over to help. Mom watched the kids, folded mountains of laundry and also did some canning while R and I attacked the bedroom.  I did not clean it before my husband left - no surprise there - so we just grabbed stuff and threw it about the house. Like many people I know our bedroom had become a place where I would hide stuff I did not want to deal with while cleaning other rooms! Hopefully, I am done with that.
R got her Husband to come over after work and help move the furniture either out or to the center of the room.  We all had a nice dinner together and I discovered exactly how bad of a job my vacuum had been doing! The pictures about are us (R is working the camera and we are both laughing manically) at about 1am mixing the greenish paint I bought for this when we bought the house 5 years ago and all the leftover whites and creams we could find.  I did not want to spend more than $30 on the whole project to be an extra super part of the surprise, unfortunately I misremembered the name of the paint color when I went to get a second gallon and the color they gave me was bright deep teal. Not a good surprise. So sticking to the budget (which was wasted on buying that awful color) we mixed something up.
We got the room done and put back together and I managed to clean the house within an inch of it's or maybe my life before my hubby got home. Surprise accomplished. Surprise out of hand - Oh Yeah!

Hairpin Lace afghan I am making for my Grandpa out of yarn I received from my Grandma's stash. I have five done and think I will need thirteen or so.

I am still knitting, crocheting, spinning, and sewing up a storm here, but have found out that on days I do a lot of listings or book work type stuff the crafts come a bit harder. So I am trying to get all the necessary paper stuff out of the way before lunch and then playing after.

The kids need more time outside and I am longing for spring.

Chasing my dreams and hoping you chase yours ~ Julia