Thursday, June 19, 2008

Goldenrod

I needed to get back into making some finished projects, so I went back to one of my favorites: dishcloths. Normally I make dishcloths to give away, but these are for my kitchen. The kitchen that we tried to paint purple, but after 6 different shades abandoned for something my husband calls "Harvest Gold," the paint company calls "Arizona Tan" (appropriate considering my origins,) and I call "Goldenrod" (surely I'm not the only one who misses goldenrod from the Crayola box----seriously, what color do little girls color Cinderella's hair now? "Mac and Cheese?") Anyway, here is the attempted dishcloth glamour shot:

Sherry 391

These are both crocheted. The cool thing about dishcloths is that you can try out new stitches without taking on a huge commitment like an afghan. I'm really liking the top one.

I'm picking the kids up at the airport today. They are coming home a couple days early from visiting their Grandma Pat in New Mexico. I missed them and will be glad to have them home, but worry about the family dynamics that make it so that my daughter and her grandmother can't get along for a week. James was only there one full day, and after being uncomfortably caught in the middle and trying to keep the peace, he was ready to come home, too.

The kids will be home to help with the preparations for the two week trip to Hawaii. This is going to be an adventure, Oahu and Maui on the strictest of budgets for maximum vacation fun. More on that later.

Thursday, June 05, 2008

It's JUNE.

Audrey March '08

I'm shivering in my PolarFleece, but I'm not complaining (much.) We had 95 degrees one weekend last month, and I really do prefer the 52 that is happening right now, but it does feel more like March (when the picture of Audrey in the hat--no, I didn't make it-- was taken) than June.

Audrey has a Mini Relay for Life today in the cold and rain, to benefit the American Cancer Society. The seventh grade at their school started raising money for the Cancer Society last year, when one of their former classmates and his father were diagnosed with cancer within a few weeks of each other. I have mixed feelings about this---the Cancer Society has a pretty high administrative/fundraising overhead (40%) and I'd rather they raised money that would be used locally. But there's no doubt that the kids work really hard at it, last year they raised over $7,000, and this year they are hoping for $5,500. All the first period classes come up with their own fundraisers: a car wash, a video game tournament, etc.. Audrey's class painted and sold cedar birdhouses, I would run out and photograph hers now, but it's raining and the light is abysmal. As an entire grade they do a carnival (which happened last week in sun and a comfortable 72 degrees,) and the relay.

Audrey will be walking in the relay. She's not using a cane this week, but she's still too delicate to run. She jumped rope in PE earlier this week and came home with swelling in one of her feet. The school wants to know what we are DOING for her to FIX the problem. They want her to not be absent, and to be able to do PE like the other kids. The whole "she has an auto-immune condition that would be diagnosed as Lupus if it were a little worse, but since it's not we don't want to start her on a life-long course of steroids with all the side effects they bring, so we are trying to watch her diet and not stress her" just doesn't fit into their definition of special needs. John wrote her an excuse for PE one day when she was hurting and called it "non-specific tenonitis," and someone at school asked me if she was going to have surgery to fix it. For all it's flaws, we've had the kids in public school with good results so far, and I'd like to continue that way. Why is it so hard to say "She's going to be absent more than other kids, she's not going to be able to be held to the same standards in PE," doesn't that happen to other people, too?

School gets out for summer vacation next week. We're looking forward to it, brief as it will be.

Monday, June 02, 2008

Belated Memorial Day Post

Memorial Day weekend we went to Spokane, where John was signed up to participate in a bicycle race. Spokane is a very long way from here, 8 hours or so. We couldn't leave until after 10:00 Friday night, when John got off call. The race started at noon Saturday. John and the kids slept in the car, I drove. Even after a 45 minute nap at a rest stop, I just couldn't drive the last hour, so John had to do it. We got to the race site a little before 6:00 AM, set up the tent and napped for an hour and a half.

The race was a 24 hour mountain bike "Round and Round" on a 15 mile course near the Spokane River, with some pretty mean hills. John was on a two(officially)/3(unofficially) man team. John did two laps (his team-mate, George, did EIGHT, the unofficial team-mate, Stan, did three.) His first lap was at 3:00 in the afternoon, and the second one at 1:00 AM. Here he is after his first lap:

John After 1st Lap R&R Memorial Day '08

I was not there after the second lap. I was in bed, in a motel, with a cushy bed and real running water. I did get up and drive him back to the race after he had a shower and a nap, so I don't feel entirely guilty.

John and his team were not in medal contention. But they had fun. . . I think.

Spokane is a long drive. A really long drive.

Dipping a Toe

I've been wanting to come back to the blog. After all, it's been almost a year. Things have happened. Projects have been started. . . .Maybe that's it. There hasn't been a lot of finishing going on. Or maybe it's the hypothyroid thing. Anyway, I am going to try to regain my blogging mojo, to get my groove back. Take some pictures, make some entries, re-enter the blog-o-sphere as something other than a lurker.

Speaking of lurking: one of the current things making the rounds is a favorite things mosaic. I thought this would be easy. HAH! Anything that requires me to learn to use a new tool, like the Mosaic Maker, is not going to be easy for me. But I did it. And I'm pretty darn pleased (and more appreciative of everyone else's mosaics which I assumed were an easy alternative to a blog post.)

The rules of the game were to go to Flickr and select a photo from the first page of the search for your answers to the following questions:

1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you go to?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What do you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One word to describe you.
12. Your Flickr user name. (I used my blog name.)

Here's what I came up with:

Favorites Game Mosaic

1. Sherry. Not what I would have chosen. My mother actually wanted it paired with my middle name: Sherry Ann. I've always felt like more of a Margaret (Maggie to my very closest friends,) even before I married a man whose grandmother is named Margaret (but never Maggie to the best of my knowledge.)

2. Strawberry crepes with strawberries and whipped cream. Not that I would want to eat it every day.

3. Tornillo beans from a mesquite tree/bush. I went to Tornillo High School in Tornillo, Texas, where I was in a graduating class of 25. Tornillo means screw.

4. Tomato red. True red.

5. Christopher Walkin. The man cleans (compulsively.) He's clever. When someone asked him about running for president he said he would be a good president because his talent is looking at other people and knowing what their talent is; he said he could surround himself with people who knew what they were doing. I liked that.

6. Coca Cola. Sigh. I'm a Coke addict. Trying (again) to switch over to the diet stuff for the sake of my midsection.

7. As I was going to St. Ives. . ." Cornwall. I loved Cornwall when my husband and I went there in 1991? 1992? with his Granddad Reed. I'd lived most of my life in the desert, Cornwall was terribly exotic. I want to go back.

8. Coconut lemon cake with cream cheese frosting. A local restaurant makes it. My friend Missy and her mom Linda do a spot-on version.

9. Solvent. I want to be solvent when I grow up. And I LOVE this photo, because LOOK! I not only get to be solvent, but also CLEANER and THINNER My husband would be so pleased. I gotta get me some of this.

10. Books. Book stores. Powell's City of Books in Portland, OR. Not including people and animals, books are my biggest love.

11. Foggy. Most of the time. And it doesn't help that I'm a little had of hearing, and easily distracted.

12. Northwest Nest. AZ Hamills brought up nothing. Northwest Nest brought up this gorgeous osprey's nest, which I love, because ospreys are everywhere here. My favorite one has a nest on a light pole at the Castle Rock fairground's race track. It was unpreterbed by a VERY noisy go-cart race we went to, and made a couple of trips back and forth with fish and rodents for it's chicks. That's poise, or maybe single-mindedness.

That's all for now.