By hook or crook.

I was thinking tonight "What have I made since Christmas?" It seems like I am always working on something. But from my chair mostly. I have spent the whole month of January and this month also crocheting. Mark-scarf and hat, Jaidyn-layette set of sweater and bonnet, 2 pairs of booties, friend-bonnet and booties, cousin John-hat, 4 pairs of dolls socks, complete doll outfit of dress, hat and socks, 4 doilies, Shayla-mittens, Christmas 2009-scarf, grandbaby hope chest-2 booties, sweater and bonnet set, to sell-3 felted mini bags. And there is probably something I have forgotten. Oh the lil red dress hot pad for Liz. That is a whole lot of crocheting! No wonder tonight Mark asked me if I was needing any yarn? He said it was because he thought the gift I had "on the hoook" was about done and wondered what I was going to make next. LOL He knows I have to be doing something or I go bonkers. And right now I am spending most of my time in my recliner. We were talking about what would happen if I lost the sight in my good eye. Maybe I have posted this here before, but I have keratoconus in both eyes, but my left eye is dark now. It is agreed. I would probably be Hellen Keller in the early years. Not the later more gracious ones. But the screaming having a hissy fit ones.

A sweet lady came up to me at church tonight and really blessed me with her testimoney. She had lived with lupus for 10 years and had been healed. Just woke up one day and it was gone! What a miracle. And what a wonderful testimony to share with me on a day I was really feeling pretty bad (am using my cane right now). AND she didnt even KNOW I had lupus!! She just knew I was sick. God is no respector of persons and what He will do for one He will do for all!

"For there is no respect of persons with God," Paul declared (Rom. 2: 11).

Now doesnt that just put a smile in your heart? I hope this encouraged someone today as much as it encouraged me.

Here is a freebie stitchery pattern to share with you all.

I posted this late in the spring last year, about too late for Easter. So thought to repost it earlier this year. Go HERE and scroll to the bottom of the page to print the full size pattern. Happy stitching!

The snow missed us! The temps stayed too low and it was ice/sleet. Just a dusting of snow. Mark went into work on half day after waiting for the highway to clear. I am so glad we didnt get what they had projected! We have been very blessed this year.

Look who is growing up on me! Our Baby Shayla is becoming a Miss Shayla. Debbie commented she was loosing her baby look and become more a lil person. I cried out a big ole NO on that one. LOL Aunt Angie isnt ready to see her grow up. But I best be getting there cause she is! And so quickly!! Notice the crazy bangs? Well this winter she cut her hair! Needless to say she is not ready to start her own salon anytime soon! She cut them straight up in a V shape. Go big or stay home is her motto huh? It is taking quite awhile for them to grow and be straighten evenly. But they look so much better than 3 months ago. Little Stinker Girl.

We celebrated our Mom's birthday last Friday night at the local Chinese restaurant. Shayla did very well. I wasnt for sure what she would think of it all as she hadnt been there before. We love it there, but the food doesnt always settle well for me so dont go that often. It is a buffet style restaurant so she found lots to like and even ate some shrimp with Granny. Two funnies (And not meant to offend anyone please.)...I had taken her to the restroom and she was listening to the music. She thought they should change the radio station to country and could we ask please. LOL As we were eating she commented "it smells funny in here". Then asked if we had any air freshener in the car because she didnt want to take the smell with her. She was MUCH better than Heather was when she was young. Shayla said she would like to go back. Sis hated to eat Chinese and we had to order or carry in hamburgers for her. AND tell her to hush about fifty times each visit! LOL She likes it now of course.

Shayla loves helping with Baby Jaidyn. Here she is helping Heather give her the bottle. Look at all that pink. LOL

Easy Peasy Cupcakes! 2 ingredients

1 cake mix and 1 regular size can of diet soda

The ones pictured were made from a yellow cake mix and a can of Sunkist Diet Orange. Mix together. Spoon into paper lined muffin tins. Bake at 350 degrees for approximately 20 minutes or until they spring back when touched. They are the texture of angel food cake. To figure the calories most boxes say they have 12 servings. Multiple that times the number of calories per serving. Divide that number by the number of cupcakes. That is your calories per cupcake. These were 114 calories and 2 Weight Watchers points. (Mark is doing the point system.) I also made a batch using a chocolate cake mix and a Wild Pepsi Cherry diet soda. They were like a mild cherry chocolate flavor. Not too strong. Mark is one happy man with his cupcakes now. :o)

This is an afterfact comment. We found the chocolate cupcakes got wetter on top much faster than the yellow cake mix. Dont know why. But they did.

They also have no cholestrol in them. I do not remember the carbs, but they were really low.

We are getting ice and snow right now. I can hear someone spinning on the road right now! Projecting quite a bit of the fluffy stuff. And it is to be low single digits with the temp. BBBBBRRRRRRRRRRR i

I love Scrabble! My whole family does really. And this is my new happy thought for the day...week! Online Scrabble! Scrabulous is great fun. I play the solitare version. Let me know if you wanna play with me. Just shoot me an email and we will figure out the email and group version. FUN!

Comfort foods make it alllll better!

Basic Granola

1 small box of old fashion oats

1/2 cup shredded coconut

1 cup chopped nuts (I used almonds. You can add all you want. More is best!)

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 heaping teaspoon cinnamon (Or amount you like.)

Mix all this together in a very large bowl.

Warm on the stove in a small saucepan...1/4 cup oil and 1/4 cup pancake syrup.

Heat through. Stir in 1 teaspoon vanilla extract. Pour this over your oat mixture. With your hands, work through thoroughly. Spread granola out evenly onto cookie sheet or a jelly roll pan. Use 2 pans if needed. You want a thin layer. Bake at 300 degrees for 40 minutes. Stir every 10 minutes. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely before packaging. Can be kept in the refrigerator up to 3 months or sealed in container 1 week. This recipe is for the loose granola, not the clumped kind. If you wish for the clusters, double the liquids. And if that is not enough to suit you, triple it! You can add basically any grains you wish to this basic mix. If you wish for fruity granola, add them AFTER baking and granola is cooled. You can add raisins and dried fruits, chocolate chips, peanutbutter or butterscotch chips. The ideas are endless! The basic granola can quickly be turned into a trail mix.


We had storms baby! And winds!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And rain enough to flood the backyard and get into my playhouse :o( Even with the portable sump pump pulling it ran in just a bit. I was supposed to go to the doctor today and was afraid to leave. Good thing I stayed. Ran the pump twice! I have told Mark, this is the year we fix the problem. Too much stress worrying if the farm is going to float away! I put in a conference call to Daddy to get his ideas. Can you say a huge mess and ordeal? But must be done. My dollys and I cannot take the stress!

Flu be gone! Make that mister a misses and that has been me for over a week. BUT I am getting better now. Thank you for all the sweet emails. Now onto our previously scheduled programming...............LOL Oh speaking of which, Survivor starts this weeks. YAYAY!

I have had this song on my mind all weekend. Thought to share it with you.

We have the icky sickies here. Otay. Maybe not quite that bad. But remember me posting Mark was sick? Well he loves me enough to share his germs with me. :o( In all honesty, he is very upset about it. But it isnt his fault. I just catch everything. Saturday after I went to bed I woke up for a drink and thought....I am sick. That is how fast it hit me. Went to bed fine. So today I went to the wizard and received a shot and came home with a Zpack of antibiotics. And some lil gold cough pills that look like tiny round vitamin E capsules the dr swore by. Interesting.

Someone asked why I was putting so much in Etsy? Was I doing all this crafty stuff at one time. Are you kidding?? I mean, nope. I have a bit of inventory from my fall shows that I didnt attend. Had to drop out of 2 due to being sick. So.....Etsy here we come. BUT some of the merchandise is new, hot off the press, just made, never to a show before, just made if for YOU stuff. LOL

Just wanted to pop in for a sec so no one would worry or wonder. I have made some sweet bloggidity friends.

Ssshhhhhhhh someone is sleeping.

But I cannot wait to show her the layette Aunt Angie has finished for her. It might be a wee bit big yet, but she is growing FAST! This is a Leisure Arts pattern I changed up. I like the side opening instead of the normal center. It fastens with 3 pearl buttons that barely show in the photograph. The flowers have the buttons as center accents. And NO worries on them coming off. They are practically welded on! The yarn is the softest chenille baby yarn I received from Mama Urchin last year. I got it like the day after I found out the baby was "on board". Perfect timing. Thank you Jennifer.

Something quilty!! My Thru the Year Christmas quilt blocks. The first picture is the blocks I received for January. Cute stuff huh? The second picture is my January/February ones. The girls will get 1 Santa, candle and snowman (applique nose) each. We have agreed to do our own embellishing. That is the fun part! LOL

This is one of the Valentine's I have been making. Popped some in my shoppe. Having fun making these. And yes, I used glitter. LOL Those who know me well, know this is NOT my norm. But the German glass glitter really added the festive touch needed.

Mark is all sicky with a very bad sore throat and fever. How loud can I say, I do not want to be sick??!!!! I have had hives the past couple of days. Actually this is the second time this week. Just the small bumpy itching kind. Stress does that to me sometimes. Blech on the itchies. Yay for Benedryl.

Thank you for the birthday wishes. I appreciated them greatly. Got more cards this week too which made it fun.

Here are a few pics of the items I have added to my Etsy Shoppe. More items to add this weekend. Just gotta do the photo op thang! LOL

And I am quilting! Well making blocks anyways. I think that counts!! I am doing a small Christmas block exchange with 2 other girlys. The particulars are blocks must be in increments of 3-inches. Primitive fabric theme...darks, no whites or brights. And all Christmas related. I will share pics of the ones I have recieved and the ones I am sending this month when I get a chance. I really wanted to do something like this for a long time. Gather together enough to make a couch/chair throw is what I am thinking. Adding more blocks to my stash as I go along. But the fun variety of blocks from others makes it extra special. We all have different scrap stashes and that will be fun to see. I am trying to work mostly from my scraps as much as I can. Course that means I just make smaller scraps!!!! LOL

Wanna see where my lil red potholder dress went? Go HERE and visit my dear friend Liz. She is an amazing quilter, painter and friend.

Happy birthday to me. LOL Well the 13th actually. I was spoiled rotten by my family as usual. They are so good to me. I appreciate greatly each birthday I am able to have. Being sick sure makes you realize those numbers getting bigger is a GOOD thing! LOL So yay for turning 45. :o)

Have you heard Josh Groban? I am planning on marrying him when I grow up. And yes, my dh does know this. I mean this boy (He is 26.) is so amazing. Listening to his earlier cd now. So I will share one of my favorites with you. Enjoy!

The Dolly Days/Daze continues. LOL

This is Truly my first Bleuette modeling an ensemble I crocheted for her. Made from bedspread cotton thread. It had been in the works for a bit and finally got back to it. Matching cloche hat and socks of course! :o)

Here she is with her mini dolly friends. I know you think I am silly. But I do love my dolls.

Here is a bit of eye candy for you. LOL Baby Jaidyn smiling for her Aunt Angie! Such the cutie. And ya'll might as well get used to seeing baby pictures. Cause that is just what we do.

Now this is a pic of my old lady crafting as Mark has called it. Whatever. LOL This is an oldfashioned dress potholder I have made it for a friend from crochet thread. Had seen them and made the pattern up as I went along. It takes more thread that I thought with it being 2 layers. And I love the thread holder. Got one for me and Penny at WalMart. Keeps the kitty fur a bit further from the thread and I am not chasing my thread around the house. The project also shoves nicely into it with the hook and scissors. It really takes so little to make me happy :o)

Happy New Year's everyone! Praying for a healthy and better year for all of us. Peace to the world and an end to the war.

We spent last night playing games and eating here at the house with the neighbors. A young couple just 5 minutes older than our dd. LOL Well 5 years anyways. LOLOL The wind was beating the house like crazy! Today woke up to snow. Wind chill tonight is -5 degrees. BBBRRRRR!! Before the wind got so bad and it was still daylight, Debbie stopped by with Jaidyn. Got me a bit of lovin's in. Such a snuggly she is. I totally forgot about taking her picture. Deb you gotta remind me! I get so caught up in kissing the baby, I forget everything. :o)

Here are 2 lil cuties I made this weekend. They are 2 1/2-inches tall. And so fun! Mark just called out that it is pouring down snow again. Let the games begin! Winter and 2008 are here!