the long way home ...

i do think i am quite blessed to be living in the northwest ...

oh sure there are days when i could use a little less "liquid sunshine", but the climate is temperate and the geography ... ah ... now that is what makes living here a blessing ...

yesterday, a friend took me on a tour mere minutes from home ...

i thought i'd share a few photos with you ... something to make the day a bit less drearier and a bit more cheerier ...

have a happy weekend ...

and every once in a while, take the long road home ...



i did it ...

a few years back, i found a wonderful milk stool at an antique shop in the skagit valley ... it was even painted the most perfect clean white possible ... (i'm thinking perhaps this milk stool had not seen too many barns in its day) ...

for a few years, that lovely stool sat waiting quietly in the corner for the day that she would have a new seat cover ... she waited and she waited ...

and she waited ...

now i'm fairly new to crochet work and i've tried crocheting in the round a few times but each time i did the end result was a floppy flippy piece of fiber that looked more like a beach hat than anything that would lie flat ...

so yesterday's challenge to myself was to crochet my stool a lovely cover ... a lovely flat cover ...

so with trusty hook in hand and two "how to" crochet manuals on my lap, i got to the task ...

it grew and it grew ...

until finally, finally this afternoon, i completed my first flat seat cover ...

and i'm thinking perhaps it was worth the wait ...





"fall back" ...

i'm not ready for it yet ... the chilly mornings ... and dare i say the dark mornings ... dark dark mornings ... and we have not even had our "fall back" moment yet ... leaves are dropping around me ... it's a misty morning ... missing my instant gas fireplace just a wee bit ...

mondays mean house work for me ... put the house back together after a usually fun albeit busy weekend ... restock the pantry ... and so on and so forth ...

i'm always so happy when friday arrives ... and equally happy to see monday mornings when everyone heads back to school and work ...

so floors have been swept ...

cushions fluffed and back in place ...

washing machine churning away ...

don't ever let anyone tell you that "stay at home" mothers don't work ... i've yet to meet that strange elusive creature called the non-working mother ...

my goals for today:  catch up on the happy valley fair registrants and sit down with my trusty crochet hook and finally, once and for all and with great perseverance, learn to crochet someting in the round that actually will lay flat ... i've got a lovely old milk stool, painted just the perfect white, demanding a crochet seat cover ...

so with my trusty dog by my side ...

i'm off to work ...

wishing you a lovely crafty week ...

and, with any luck, tomorrow i shall have a photo of a newly covered milk stool ...



walk, thrift, craft, read, garden ...

walk, thrift, craft, read, garden ...

and not necessarily in that order ...

but, definitely under the category of "these are a few of my favorite things" ...

after a quick stop to post a heartfelt package ...

i dropped by my bank to resolve yet another card issue ...

not a complete loss though as my journey took me by value village ... very serendipidous i thought ... and most considerate of my bank to be situated quite handily to our local thrift store ...

besides the racks and racks of gaudy halloween costumes, there are treasures to be had ...

and have them i did ... two lovely lambswool sweaters found their way into my cart ...

can't wait to felt them and get to work ...

keep an eye out for new wares showing up daily in the etsy shop ...

and, in the meantime, thanks for dropping by ... always a pleasure to see you ...

and hope the sun is shining where you are ...

it's a perfectly perfect day here in the northwest ...

with fall comes much crafting ...

'tis truly that season again ...

the season that begins with the letter "c" ...

dare i say it out loud ...

no not THAT season ...

i mean the crafting season of course ...

time to throw open the studio doors ...

oil the sewing machine ... (speaking some kind words to her often helps as well ... she can be a bit cantankerous at times) ... but then who am i to speak ... or write as the case may be ...

so we are decking the halls with scissors and yarn, scraps of fabric and buttons, doilies and vintage cloth ...

ready for whatever the crafty gods might send my way ...

there are some old items with new features ...

gauntlets with lovely crochet edging ...

and some new items ...

so happy fall everyone ...

it's my favorite time of year ... a busy time in the studio and at home ... lots of wonderful veggies popping up in the garden and the rains haven't found us ... yet ...

happy crafting ... is there any other kind ...

silence ...

there's that old saying about the thundering silence ... and that is what is resonating in my home today ... thundering silence ...

why? you ponder ...

well the cherubs and my groom are off camping ... and i am left home ... home alone ...

just like the movie ...

there were days when i would have crawled across broken glass for such silence ... but as many things in life, now that i have it, i miss the energy active children bring to a household ...

my eldest cherub travels in packs these days ... and so often there are anywhere from three to six additional charges here at brookside ... arriving like locusts to purge the pantry ... they prattle about the property and usually end up in front of a movie with frosty bottles of root beer strewn about the floor and crumpled chip bags rolling about ...

and i wouldn't have it any other way ...

i love emerging from my cozy bed on a sunday morning to see girls like puppies curled up together half on half off the couch ... sighing in their sleep ... waking up all doe-eyed and ravenous ...

this has become my sign that summer is here ... kids curled up like puppies ...

when did kids learn to be so amorous with each other ... they are always saying "i love you" to each other ... hugging and walking arm-in-arm ...

and speaking of kids, i must share some photos of my other two kids ... the two new additions to our home ...

we are now the proud parents of two nygerian goats ... two sweet sisters who have retired from their days of breeding ...

they prance about the pasture ...

with the sweetest of natures ...

they are so very curious ... and playful ...

and now i must move on with my day ...

have a wonderful day yourself ... i am hoping the sun is shining wherever you might find yourself ...

and give your kids a hug ...

cause the silence is thundering here at brookside ...

spring ...

well, despite the snow last night, yes your eyes are not deceiving you, i did in fact say snow ...

and no you have not turned the pages of your calendar prematurely ...

this is indeedy april ...

so, as i was saying ...

despite the snow last night ...

spring has arrived in sammamish ...

in a big way ...

 

here's suzanne and i, literally up a tree ...

but well worth the effort ...

to put things into perspective ...

when we did the winter install, we did a few calculations just for fun:

 each knit panel required 1600 rows of knitting (created using a manual knitting machine)

each of the six trees required between one and 4 panels to wrap completely

installation took 15 hours with 11 volunteers over two days

we used 68,000 yards of recycled, reclaimed and retired acrylic yarn

this is equal to 38.6 miles or

85 pounds of yarn

...

so, off with the old ...



and on with the new ...

so, mother nature, if you are listening ...

we've done our part ...

it's your turn ...

please send us some sunshine ...

and, if it's not asking too much, please turn up the thermometer just a smidge as well ...

happy knitting ...

like there's any other kind ...

tickled pink ...

well i'd be a bald-faced liar if i didn't confess to being absolutely tickled pink over the article written and illustrated by seattle times news artist Gabriel Campanario ...

gabi visited our fair city last week ...

he met with my "partner in yarn", suzanne, and i ...

we shared the recent yarn bombing trend with gabi and he asked loads of questions ...

suzanne shared the process of procuring approval for the year-long tree sock project ...

afterwards we retreated to suzanne's studio to show gabi two fiber artists in action ...

suzanne churned out what seemed like miles of knitting on her machine ...

i wound balls of yarn ...

many many balls of yarn ... towers of yarn balls ...

and gabi sketched and painted ...

and the end result was the article "fresh socks may tickle fans, stump critics" ...

thanks gabi for spending the day with us ...

we tried to be on our best behavior but we did warn you ...

now speaking of tickled pink, here's a sneak preview of what's blooming in sammamish for spring ...

think pink ...

the squire ...

i've taken to calling our dog "the squire" ...

now those of you who know the dog formerly known as Sgt. Pepper can attest to how hard he worked to earn that title of Sgt ... he truly spent much of his day chastising those about him ... barking orders and commands ...

take me for a walk ...

stay away from this yard stranger ...

what are you doing ringing my door bell ...

how dare you sit on my couch ...

do not leave that package on my porch ...

did i say you could walk on that sidewalk in front of my house ...

and on and on it went ...

bark bark bark ...

command command command ...

well ...

can i just say ...

he's a changed dog ...

he struts about the pasture like he's the king of the world ...

every dog has his day ...

eventually ...

dare i say it ...

i awoke this morning, albeit a bit late, to blue skies and i'd be lying if i didn't say my heart gave a little jump for joy ...

but of course in light of what is happening in japan, i shan't complain about our weather ...

as an aside and just to have a "proud mommie moment" to share, my youngest cherub asked his teacher yesterday if he could organize a coin drive at his elementary school for some of the victims of the earthquake in japan ... he has a generous and kind soul he truly does ...

however ...

i think it might be time for ms heart to fill in some of the gaps in the blog ...

looking back, i realized i went from planning for the happy valley arts & crafts fair to NOTHING for weeks ...

and then i leaped right into the brook ...

so if any of you are still listening, let me catch you up on what has been happening in my little corner of the world ... 

in december, shortly after the 2nd annual happy valley arts and crafts fair ended -- on a successful note i might add -- my "partner in yarn" and i got to work on a huge knit art installation for our fair city ...

but let me go back even further ...

once upon a time, on a busy corner in our town, there stood 6 beautiful old evergreen trees that reigned over the main street of town ...

however, with progress came a widening of the roads in our fair town and irreparable damage was done to roots of the evergreen trees ...

and so it came to pass that the trees were destined for removal ...

rather than cut the trees to the ground, though, they were left as 20 foot stumps ... not nearly as regal without their evergreen crowns ...

oh there were several suggestions made on what to do with the stumps:  remove the stumps, carve the stumps, cut the stumps up for fire wood, etc ...

but my "partner in yarn" came up with a grand idea ...

we'd been mucking about with the idea of covering the trees in knitting as any fiber artist worth their weight in yarn would ...

so she designed a multi-season project, presented it to the city representatives, sought out grant money and, many months later, the trees have been crowned again ...

here are my cherubs helping with the installation of our knit sox ...

now one of the goals of art is to get people talking about art ... and having six, 20-foot stumps in the heart of one's city, covered in knit sox and snowflakes certainly got people talking ...

mostly people loved the sox and their rather dr seussical whimsy ... but there have been dissenting voices as well ... and that's ok too ...

but now with spring time, comes a new season ... and so my partner and i are busy with knitting machines and yarn winders ...

so i've babbled on like my brook for long enough ... and i haven't even gotten out of the month of december yet in catching you all up ...

christmas has come and gone, two family birthdays have been celebrated, i've traveled to the east coast of canada to watch a niece play ringette in the canada games ... and joined a new small group at my church ...

i spent a last birthday with a favorite uncle ...

and moved from my suburban neighborhood to a more pastural property ...

unpacked mountains of boxes ...

painted ...

prayed ... a lot ...

and today i am looking out my kitchen window ...

across the pasture ...

the skies are blue ...

and it's a good life ...

so happy knitting ... is there any other kind? ...

of course if you were privy to some of the knitting machine sessions wherein we knit thousands of rows of knitting at a time, you'd know that sometimes knitting is not always a happy time ... knitting machines jam ... yarn snarls and tangles ... and the air can turn quite blue at times ...

until next time, enjoy your day and do something nice for someone else ...

blogs from the brook ...

it's been a long time coming ...

years in fact ...

but i finally have my waterfront property ...

now perhaps i should have been a bit more specific ... in my mind, it was a windswept cottage by the sea ...

but with children still in the coop and the need for good schools, we have found our beautiful brookside property to be ideal ... and if you've read Anne of Green Gables (and if not, why not?) then you'll also understand my feelings about living next to a babbling brook ...

we don't have the Haunted Wood she wrote so often about but the howls coming from the pasture certainly feed one's imagination late at night ...

so if you've been wondering where ms. heart has been, i've been packing and purging ... plastering and painting ... getting one house ready for sale and another house ready for living ...

and as of saturday, our old house is sold and the new house ... well the new house is liveable in that everyone has a toothbrush and access to running water ...

now my dear friend linda suggested i post a photo a day ... i'm not sure i am that prolific but i'll definitely share what inspires me ...

as often as i can ...

whether it's a tiny bird bathing in the dirt outside my kitchen window or the wanderings of the lovely white goose that lives down the lane ...

and in the meantime, with prayers and a happy heart, we begin our new journey ... in our new house by the babbling brook ... where i hope we'll live happily ever after ...

or at least until that brook becomes a mosquito nursery and we are forced indoors for the duration ...

have a wonderful day ...