Blanket Progress and Flowers!

Ah... It is a super nice day outside today. But I have re-injured an old injury in my foot and am wearing my walking boot again. It seems to help my foot feel better. So I have been reading and crocheting a lot.


My star stitch blanket is getting bigger. I am really liking it. Yay!! It is the first big project and the first blanket that I have made.

Pictures of my blanket progress:

And some pretty flowers: Water Lilly and Clematis

Hope everyone is having a sunshiney day!!

As Always,

Peace,

Katy

Cleo's 1st Birthday!

Cleo's first birthday was on May 21st! My sister and I were excited to celebrate with her.

My sister baked her 3 peanut butter and carrot cakes.

Cleo really enjoyed them!

She unwrapped her presents. This is the squeaky gecko toy I got her. It has about 7 different squeakers and a rattle in it's tail.

My sister, EJ made Cleo 2 new bandanas.

And EJ found a crocheted pig toy for Cleo.

Cleo finally discovered the joys of unwrapping presents. This Christmas, she didn't really understand what was going on. But she was excited for her birthday presents.

EJ found a rawhide baseball for her and I found a giant rawhide bone.

Cleo enjoyed her birthday very much. It took her almost the entire week to finish all of her treats and goodies. 

Happy Birthday Cleo!

As Always,

Peace

Happy Memorial Day!

Happy Memorial Day to all of those families and friends in the world who have lost a loved one.

Thank you to those soliders who have served... no matter what country it has been for. Every person has lost someone due to a fight for what they believe in.. whether it is the same belief that the US has or a different belief of what is right. Today, our differences are set aside as we remember those who have given their lives and those who have made it home with so many horrible memories. They all need our support and love right now and always.

Our vets have seen so many things.. whether those things were part of war that the nation wants to forget or part of a war that the nation still admires. It doesn't matter. Those vets are people and they need to be supported. They went to war at the time they did because the government believed it was the right thing to do. We can't just shove them aside and forget about those vets who served in the wars that we no longer wish to remember. The reality is that there were people who fought in those wars.. whether that was the right choice or not.. and now those same people who made it back home are being ignored by their families because they have so many bad memories, anger problems, and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. They need our love and support to help them have a moderately normal life for the rest of their years.

The most of what we can do is to offer support and a safe, loving place to those young soliders who are now coming home from recent/current wars. They need to have the support from their families and friends  and fellow humans in order to live a somewhat normal life. They have many years ahead of them, and they don't deserve to be shooed away by their families.

So Thank You, Thank you, Thank you to our vets. To all the vets in the world who are experiencing the same memories and problems. Thank you for serving and allowing many countries to gain more rights. Thank you for giving up your normal way of life in order to serve and experience death of fellow soliders and friends. Thank you for going through all of the horribleness that is war in order to help your fellow citizens gain something that you/they believe in. Thank you.

Peace,

My First Monarch Caterpillar of 2012!!!!

Hello all!


I found my first caterpillar on my milkweed yesterday morning. Mommy Monarch had visited last week and was laying eggs. I went out just to see if I had any caterpillars and... there was one! Usually where there is one, there are more nearby... I just haven't found them all yet. Once they get a little bit bigger, they will pop out on the plants. However, there are usually several that are all the same size which means that they all hatched around the same time. So right now I can only find one, but in a few days I will be able to find a lot more!! :D


Here are baby caterpillar pictures!

 Some pretty flowers and water drops!

 A milkweed beetle!

 My waystation sign!

As Always,

Peace,
Katy

Star Stitch Blanket

Hello Everyone!!
I hope everyone is having a cheerful, sunshine filled day! :D


As for me, I just found a cool blanket made with the star stitch. This is my current project! :)


I saw Jules' blankets (Little Woollie is the name of her blog) that she has made using the star stitch that she found. She was nice enough to post the address of a tutorial for making the star stitch on her blog. I decided to try it. 


To my delight, the blanket is coming along very nicely. At first, I had a problem with the first row curling up. After a few times of ripping it out and redoing it, I went on to the next row. After I had a few rows completed, it stopped curling up. I am a very tight crocheter. I also tried to work on keeping my stitches loose. However, the blanket seems to be working ok now. 


The star stitch is very relaxing and quick to work. I really like that it is not a "gappy" pattern. 


I started by chaining 265 stitches because I wanted it to be wide enough to wrap under my legs. Now I am working on the length. Here are a few photos of my progress.

This is one side of the stitches.

This is the other side of the stitches.

I was going to do 3 rows of yellow, but ran out. So I had to switch around my colors a little bit. However, since I have no plan and am just doing random colors it is still working out alright. I ended up doing 2 rows of yellow and then 1 of teal and am now working on a purple row. I think I  might do some orange rows after the purple. Then I have to decide if I want to repeat my colors again or keep going random but with repeating colors since I ran out of yellow. Guess I'll see what I feel like once I get to that point.

Well... I have to go and work on my last school project of the year. I am not very motivated but really need to get it done so I have more time to relax and crochet. :)

More pictures to come soon!

As always,

Peace,
Katy

Garden and Spring Flowers!

Hello all,


This weekend I was at home and took some pictures of the flowers. They are so cheerful. Plus, the flowers never get tired of modeling for photos! :)

Cleo recently decided that she loves to run through the daisies. They were all nice, but now they have paths pushed through them in several places. That's what puppies do! Cleo will be 1 year old on Monday, the 21st! 

This is a Hummingbird Moth. It fell into our pond, and my dad fished it out. We put it on a daisy to warm up and dry off. It stayed for about 15 minutes and then flew off.

After my sister's grad party, we took down our balloon decorations. Cleo played with squishy balloons when she was younger. She is very gentle with them and likes to carry them around by the belly button. She was super excited to carry around these 3 balloons that were all tied together.

After a little while, she had popped a couple of the balloons. They didn't scare her though. She just picked up the balloons that were left. We always supervise her when she has balloons so that if they do pop we can take away the broken pieces before she finds them and possibly tries to eat them. We are careful, and she enjoys playing with them.

As always,

Peace,

Katy

I survived this weekend!!!

Well, I survived this past weekend. It was crazy and somewhat stressful, but it had its fun points too.


My sister had her high school graduation party. I think we had about 100 guests come through the house in a span of 3 hours. It wasn't too overwhelming. It was a constant, steady flow of people though which was nice. My cousin and his newborn baby even showed up and surprised us all. It was nice to see a lot of our old friends that we don't see much anymore.

Anyways, after the party, everyone was exhausted. Cleo fell asleep on the chair on the screen porch. Her new favorite place to sleep.

The weather was great and everything worked out great! Cleo was afraid of the new baby when he started to cry. She went up to sniff him and then backed away as fast as she could. She likes to run back and forth when you blow the hairdryer at her. She turns it into a game and likes to run away and then sneak up and then run away again. She probably would have gotten to that point with the baby just because she was excited from all of the people, but we didn't let her.

Lastly, Mom and I joined our UU church. We each got a pretty rose and an official name tag! There were a total of 31 new members, which I think is pretty awesome!

Well, I think that is all for now! I hope everyone had a nice Mother's Day weekend!

Have a good day! :)

As always,

Peace,

Katy