I haven't given an update on Gibby for a long time. He's doing well. Fortunately, he has taken on the job of raising Gadget, and Gadget isn't an easy pup to raise. Gibby and I spend several hours every morning working together to turn Gadget into a decent dog - and it's very hard work. Gadget has had dozens of toys, but only one survives, the rest have been beaten up and chewed up by Gadge when she's in her divil dog moods. Poor Gibby either has armor for skin or he has tons of bruises hiding under his beautiful fur coat - Gadget bites him, leaps on him, and throws her toys at him. Once in a while, usually when she's chewing on his tail, he gives her a warning growl. She runs back and forth through the house and Gibby tries to keep up with her but quits after one run. She can recuperate with a ten second rest, Gibby needs a deep sleep. I am soooo glad to have Gibby, raising this wild puppy would be a disaster without him. I only have a chance to write this now because Gadge is busy chewing up a leash and my favorite white blanket - wait, that's MY blanket - STOP!

Working on the Lion

I've been spending every spare minute working on the Frost Lion. The lion is finally done and now I'm working on the grass under the lion - doing some antegodlin with 6s near the sky and ground boundary and 8s in the rest.

On Friday, I started working on the rug in my quilting group at the community center, ate lunch there, and then just moved my project into the large dining room so I could watch the life painters while they worked and get some hooking done - so, I hooked from 10 to 3, then moved to the store and hooked from 3:30 to 7:30 - wouldn't you think so much hooking would have filled up most of the pattern? I basically hooked an area that I could cover with my hand. I guess I'm a slow hooker.

The Lion Roars

I didn't get as much done on the lion as I expected to last night. A man came into the store wearing a big Russian fur cap, so he said "Hello" in Russian, and I said, "How are you" back, in Russian - the full extent of my high school Russian. We had quite a conversation, turns out he was a student, in fact, the class president, at University High back when I was a teacher in the same building. I was teaching first grade in University Elementary, almost 45 years ago. He came back a second time and brought with him a book of Edgar Guest poems -- a book he had taken from the school library way back when. Since the school has been closed since 1970, he felt giving it to me was as close as he could come to returning it to the school library. Talking with him reminded me of a lady who had been the much admired school librarian, Ms. Sarita Davis. She was the most caring and dedicated librarian I've ever met. She encouraged me to write stories for children, was even going to send one of my books to a publisher, when she literally dropped dead in the hallway walking between the high school and the elementary libraries.

Less Frosty Lion

I removed the yellow/cream tweed that was showing up in photos as bright white and am now hooking the mane with mostly yellow/tan/light brown tweed. I like it a lot better. It's too bad the photos don't show the colors more accurately, the black background is a very active antique black - lots of colors showing through. I wish I could get a photo that would show those colors. I decided that hooking at the store just isn't enough, there are always too many interruptions, so I'm packing a bag and taking the lion home. We'll have a lovely eveing of dogs, television, and hooking. I think I'll even bake some scones - I found an "easy" recipe that uses lemon-lime soda.

Lion Too Frosty?

I haven’t been able to hook since Thursday, but while I’m resting at home, I’ve been thinking about the Frost Lion.  I’ve been working on the head and basically only looking at the head – and, by itself, the lion head looks a lot like some kind of unusual space monster.  I decided it was time to take a good look at the whole pattern and see how the head is going to fit in.  I’ve been anxious to get enough hooked to see how the antique black background will do, so I have hooked just a little bit around the top of the mane.  When I look now, I see way more of the very light colored mane hairs than I should….

Frost Lion Day 3

Again, not nearly enough hooking time. I had a computer lesson with a really nice gentleman whose children told him he needs to join the computer age - taught him how to search for dump beds for pick-up trucks. He's coming back tomorrow to learn how to use a laptop. Then I had a one person hooking lesson. Dee is hooking a picture drawn by her grandaughter that's really cute.

Next I had a visitor, a really nice woman who visits every so often and frequently brings me special things. She met Gadget the last time she was in, so today she brought me a book about a farm with border collies. After she left, I couldn't get into hooking until I'd read at least the first chapter. My job is supposed to be selling things so that things leave the store, but some of my best days are filled by the kindness of people bringing me thoughtful things and/or just stopping by to talk.

Anyway, it was already sundown by the time I got to hooking. I'm trying to close up and go home around sundown, but I felt I had to do some hooking anyway. I gave the lion some ears and a few strands of mane - I wanted to get some mane bumping into antique black, but that will have to wait until tomorrow. I'm wondering now what the lion is seeing - maybe he heard the noise of a hooker sneaking up behind the flowers on the far side of the rug.

Frost Lion Day 2

Only a little more done on the lion today. I didn't get to the store until 3:00 and then had customers in and out the rest of the afternoon. I had one Indian chief who bought an antique microscope for his medicine woman's valentine present, and then I had a little woman who grew up in New England but has always wanted to live in England, in high society a century ago - she makes button greeting cards.

Funny what you learn about customers. I think I almost like talking to customers as much as I like hooking! I had one grumpy guy who strode in, strode to the back of the store, strode back, said, "Got any local photos?" and I said, "No". I do, but he walked right by them twice and I didn't feel like sharing them with a grump. I'm thinking about putting whatever local history I have into a little book - I may run an ad asking people to share stories about my building. I heard one the other day from Donna at the Senior Center - she met her first husband at a dance upstairs (in what is now my rug hooking studio). She went to the dance with a girlfriend. This man walked right up to the girlfriend and then turned and asked Donna to dance - and then she said, "and we danced together for twenty years!" Lots of people have told me stories over the years and I should have written them down. I guess I can't start any sooner!

The Frost Lion

I've started hooking the lion in the Frost Lion rug. I've had a hard time trying to decide what colors to use for the lion. I've researched photos of lions several times now and had thought I would use wool that I dyed with Cushing's gold and old gold, plus some wool I bought on eBay called "lion's mane", but the colors just didn't seem right.

I'm having a terrible time trying to get Blogger to let me put my photos where I want them, so I guess I'll just leave them at the bottom. I looked at a lot of photos taken of live lions and I also had a lot of fun studying Edward Hick's paintings with his Kingdoms that included lions that changed and aged as his paintings changed over many years. You'll be able to see in the first photo that I've decided to do a shadowed gray/buckskin lion, although right now, with so little hooked, the lion looks more like a goat.



This is one of Edward Hicks' lions

A second Edward Hicks lion

Close-up of an African lion

My favorite lion photo - I'd love to know what he's thinking.

I decided to use Hicks' lions for my models. I'm guessing that a post-American Civil War rug hooker would not be familiar with live lions and would have to rely on available books or paintings or photos. Edward Hicks, a Quaker minister, painted at least 62 different "Peaceable Kingdom" paintings and they all included a lion. Those paintings could have travelled from his Pennsylvania to other Quaker meeting houses in New England and elsewhere, so I'm guessing our early hooker could have seen at least one of them. Of course, the pattern gives some information about how the lion should be hooked. The pattern gives a longer face to the lion, but that's all workable.

Martin Luther King Day

This is not one of my normal blog posts, but I wanted to send the top photo to the Ellen Degeneres show. After a wonderful concert in Hill Auditorium (bottom photo for you non-wolverines) a group of us were walking to the parking structure when we passed the store that carries UofM sporting goods and saw this mannikin in the window. Whoops.

DONE!

My SJ rug is done! Well, at least the hooking is done - I still have to do the whipping, but I'm putting that off until some time in the future. I may want to add a border, but I'm anxious to get started on my Frost pattern and I want to think about border possibilities for a while. With the extra monk's cloth folded back, the rug seems a lot smaller.

And now, Gibby and Gabby are really pals. Gibby is soooo patient with the puppy - she jumps all over him, chews on his ears, bites his cheeks, puts her paws on his nose, etc. and he just takes it. Sometimes he comes to me for attention, but as soon as I pet him, she's all over him again - I think she doesn't want to share.

This morning, I was in the barn cleaning up after feeding the chickens and Gabby walked in. She and Gibby had been in the dog pen and apparently she figured out how to get out. I was a little panicky because I didn't have the driveway gate closed, but she ran right to the house - whew!

Patches

Poor Patches.

Ever since her mother died before Thanksgiving, Patches has been in hiding. She's been hiding in a destroyed couch in my library, a room that is now basically only a pass-through to the door that leads to the dog pen. A few days ago, she spent about 36 hours hiding in the bathtub. The last couple days, she hid behind some boxes under my desk in the library - when I found her there this morning, she was shaking from head to toe. During this whole time, she would come out to eat, but only eat about half of a can of canned dog food, and if I tried to pick her up she gave a small growl and let me know she might bite me.

One of my motivators for getting a puppy was an attempt to bring Patches back into the world. She has always been a playful dog, so I was hoping she would play with the puppy - but, so far, she doesn't want anything to do with the puppy and even leaves her food bowl if the puppy looks at her sideways.

So, today, I begged Patches to come out from under the desk and was surprised when she came to me. I put a leash on her and led her out to the car - and then I realized how much I had been neglecting her - I used to take her with Blue and George in the car almost every day, but after Blue died, I had gone in the car alone or recently taken the new puppy - so, anyway, Patch was glad to be in the car - she went right away into the very back part where the sleeping bag and pillows are. She stayed in the car while I had lunch with friends, then I took her to the store.

I had just gotten Patches settled at the store when a young girl opened the door and waved to the driver of their car to come in - and here's where the world becomes a funny place. The woman who came in had not been here for a dozen or more years - she moved to Illinois years ago. She is the person who rescued Patches when she was only a year old. I had sold Patches as a small puppy to a grandmother who had never let her out of the basement for a year. Neighbors were talking about how horrible the grandmother's house smelled and that's how I heard how badly Patches was being treated. One of my weaving students volunteered to go get Patches, and she did.

She rescued Patches again a year later when she visited the dog pound and saw Patches being taken to the "euthanization" room. She stopped that process and called me and I, of course, was anxious to take Patches back. She arranged the adoption for me.

We had not seen her since that phone call, and here she was today in the store. Patches jumped all over her. I saw Patches happy for the first time in weeks. Patches is about fifteen years old now, and hadn't seen her rescuer since she was a young dog, but she obviously remembered.

Patches is better now, not hiding. She made a nest behind the counter at the store and has been acting like her old self all afternoon, even with lots of people in and out of the store. She even shared my supper with me.

New Dog Toys

Gibby and Gadget, who is now being called Gabby, have been playing wildly for days now. Poor Gibby gets worn out long before Gabby is ready to stop, so he takes a nap while she shreds every piece of paper she can find. The noise of their wild playing gets really loud and sometimes their play includes leaping from sofa to chair to chair to dog bed and back to sofa - a wild whirlwind that makes sitting in a chair in the same room a little uncomfortable - so, I decided it was time to get some dog toys. I studied a catalog, read up on "unstuffed toys" called skins, and then I added dog toys to my shopping list. When I went shopping tonight, I picked up one toy, but trying to get a lot of toys was going to be expensive - so I bought some toe socks instead. The toe socks were on sale, 3 in a package for $2. When I got home, I gave the purchased toy to Gabby and it scared her - the toy talks and does some heavy breathing just like a playful dog. After a few minutes she played with it anyway. Then I gathered up a few coke bottles - bottles that had already been stripped of their labels by Gabby - and I stuck them in the toe socks. They made great toys, the crackle and pop when chewed on, there's enough left at the cuff end to hang onto for teasing and throwing, and Gabby likes to pull on the toes - great toys. Gabby wore herself out with the new toys and is now sleeping on the back half of my chair.

I got a little more hooked on my SJ today, now only three blocks to go. I also have a couple blocks in the middle that need to be redone - I must have been in a pretty dull mood when I hooked them.

Welcome Gadget!

I had intended to spend every spare minute this weekend working on my Sincerely Jane rug. I thought I would have everything finished except the binding, but I haven't even picked up a hook. This little critter under the table, sitting on my wool bag, has occupied every spare minute.

This is Gadget, also known as Gidget. She joined us a week ago and is a wonderful addition to the family. Gibby has learned to play with her. Patches stays far away. She's in perpetual motion, always looking for a toy - like an empty dog food can, a toilet paper roll, or anythng that can be ripped and torn (just rescued my checkbook as the bite and double-twist were being applied).

Sincerely Jane Update

This is my Sincerely Jane at the end of November. If I count the partially done blocks at the top of the rug, I'm halfway finished. I'm expecting a slow weekend at the store, so I should be able to get several blocks done. I'm finding this challenge is a lot more challenging than I expected - each block has to be individually color planned and then coordianted with all of the blocks around it - it's just like hooking a brand new rug for each block. The only blocks that aren't hard to do are the animal blocks - my favorites. The next animal I'm going to do is the dog - I'm going to reverse hook the tan I started with and hook the dog with a black and white tweed, in honor of Blue. I'm anxious to get this rug finished, or at least close to finished, so I can start the Frost Lion pattern.

Once Again, Mourning a Dear Friend

Blue, Australian Cattle Dog

Blue and her daughter, Patches

Blue and Patches

Blue passed away on the Monday before Thanksgiving. It's taken me a week to be able to write about her. It's always hard to lose a pet, but it's been especially hard losing Blue. She was with me for almost a quarter of my life and was a connection with so many of my other dogs - she came to live with me soon after I lost Tuffy, a New Boston Terrier. She was a wee puppy who immediatly fit in with the pack led by Shady, Shady's son Shep, and Ben the Dog Who Came to School. Shep and Shady lived to 16 and 17, and Spot the Puppy Who Came to School for Show and Tell, joined us. Spot did everything he could to try to get rid of Blue - one time he took her off on a 20 mile run and then left her. Another time, he took her behind the store into the woods and dumped her in a frozen pond. Both of those times it was a miracle that she ever came home. Blue had a litter of puppies before I knew she'd had her first heat cycle. Ben fathered some, Spot others. Ben and Spot both met their demise as free-running farm dogs. Then our vet arranged an adoption and George came to us. I had sold all of Blue's puppies and she seemed pretty lonely, so I gave her the puppy and told her she could raise him - and she did. She set rules for George and bullied him into following them - they were inseperable. Then one of Blue's puppies, Patches, came back to us. She'd lived the life of an abandoned wild dog for a year and had been trapped when she was killing a farmer's chickens. Blue tried to make Patches behave, but Patches wasn't easily cowed and is still a little worried about being "caught" - eventually they became very close friends and Patches became Blue's guide dog when Blue's sight was limited. Blue and I had a special bond. Even when she was blind she could read my mind. Like a true Cattle Dog, she was happiest when she was with me or close enough to watch me.

Sauder Village Rug Show was Great - Again!

The 15th Annual Sauder Village Rug Show was a collection of fascinating smaller rug shows: The Circus Train collection of mats made by the Green Mountain chapter of ATHA, a collection of rugs hooked by Patty Yoder, rugs hooked by Jenny Ruup, rugs hooked by Magdalena Briner and Evelyn Lawrence, the rugs in this year's Celebrations, etc. Each Sauder show is wonderful, and this one is no exception, plus it offers a unique educational experience by displaying new ideas (Nola Heidbrieder's pond rug hooked on dyed hookable foundation} and rugs hooked using embellishments, etc. I've never seen a better or more interesting show - so I'm going back to look again tomorrow.

Back in Business - the store is open

I reopened my store a few weeks ago. It's taking up a humungus amount of time, so I have my hooking set up so I can get some done while I wait for customers. I took photos today and put them together in a slide show. With a nod to Gene and Marsha Shepherd, the slide show ends with a picture of my garden.

Cambria Pines Rug Camp

Starting on the first day of June, I drove out to California to attend Gene Shepherd's Cambria Pines Rug Camp. The camp is held each year at Cambria Pines Lodge in Cambria, California. The camp started with registration on June 5, Sunday afternoon; Classes started Monday morning and went on until lunchtime on Friday. There were some very impressive teachers at camp: Susan Feller and Nola Heidbrieder shared a large room with Gene Shepherd, Laura Pierce and Diane Stoffel were in other parts of the Lodge building, and Jane Olsen taught with her grandaughter in a separate building. I started taking photos on the second day of my trip, after I had driven through Michigan, Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska. I arrived in Cambria on Saturday afternoon and stayed the night in a motel (quite a treat after sleeping in my car on the way out) and spent part of the morning exploring on the ocean shore. The slide show shows the Cambria Pines Lodge building called Woodfern where I stayed for the week (and where Jane Olsen's class was held on the ground floor). Somehow, I never took a picture of the main lodge building where we had our classes and meals. This slide show ends with the mid-week rug show - I expect to make a part two slide show when I download the photos still in my camera.

Very Sad Day Today

George, May 1, 2011

George is gone. He lasted only a few days more than the vet predicted. He passed away this afternoon. The warmer weather we've all been waiting for made his breathing more difficult. I put him in his "angels are everywhere" sleeping bag and buried him in the back yard. His good friend Cathy came out and planted violets on his grave. He was a good, brave, kind, and gentle dog. I'd like to believe he's with my mother now, she loved him, too.

Benefit for Hooked Rug Museum

YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED to a HOOKED RUG MUSEUM BENEFIT HOOK-IN MAY 14, 2011 10am - 4pm Where: the Hamburg Senior/Community Center in the Hamburg Township Complex on Merrill Rd. ½ mile S. of M36 Take US23 N.from Ann Arbor, S. from Brighton, to the Pinckney exit Coffee and tea will be available in the morning, a lunch buffet will be available at noon There will be a brief presentation by a Director at Large for the Hooked Rug Museum of North America, with a possible (if all the high-tech stuff works right!) large screen Skype visit from Nova Scotia with Suzanne Conrod, a gifted hooking artist and founder of the museum. With high-tech luck, we might also get Suzanne and Hugh Conrod to explain their new and exciting discovery relating to the earliest history of rug hooking. There will be photos of some of the antique rugs in the multi-million dollar collection waiting to be housed and displayed in the new museum. The museum is going to be a real treasure and a vacation destination for all of us, starting in 2012. The rest of the time will be for hooking and chatting with old and new friends with maybe some time put aside to visit some very select vendors. *********************************************************************** Cost: $15, unless you would like to make a larger donation to the museum Lunch reservations must be in by May 5, 2011. Send check to: Phyllis Lindblade P.O. Box 96 Hamburg, MI 48139 If you have questions, please call Phyllis at 517 304-9659

Sincerely Jane Challenge #3

On Saturday, May 14th, I'm going to hold a hook-in in this facility.

This is the Hamburg Senior/Community Center. A great place for a hook-in with two wide window walls helping to create great lighting for hooking. The main room will hold up to 150 people. The hook-in will be a benefit for the Hooked Rug Museum of North America. I have to work on getting invitations out pretty soon.

I spent all of my spare time this weekend working on drawing the patterns for my Sincerely Jane rug. While I was busy, the dogs were mostly sleeping - I caught this photo of Blue sleeping with George as her pillow. George didn't seem to mind at all.

It took all morning on Saturday to get the first two rows done, then I had to go to a meeting in Ann Arbor. When I came home, I drew a couple more rows. Then today, I've so far finished seven rows. I've decided to add a ninth row, so I have row number 8 to draw and row number 9 to select and draw - then I have to make a decision about wool. I was planning to do the outlining in antique black, but saw some lovely suiting wool at the JoAnn store today - it was a charcoal color with a lot of flashes of other colors in it. That wool reminded me of some dark blue I bought at Sauder last summer. I'm going to try to guesstimate how much wool I'll need and see if I have enough of the Sauder wool - it could be more interesting than antique black.

Another Doll

I knitted another doll, and this time filled it with a lot less fiberfil. It's really not easy to determine how much filling is the right amount of filling. I'm going to pull out some of the filling in the first two dolls and re-felt them when I felt the new one. I'm hoping the re-felting will bring the hand and feet fibers closer together because right now, you can see the white fiberfil through the over-stretched stitches. To re-felt I'll have to pull out the eyes and nose and then the post-felting dolls will get new eyes and maybe have new personalities.

At my quilting group today I said I was making them for the rummage sale in the fall and I already have one sold! I think they're pretty cute and it's nice to know someone else thinks so, too.

Knitted Felted Dolls

My latest project has been doll knitting. I found the pattern for "Felted Kuku dolls" in Love of Knitting magazine. The knitting is really easy - all stockinette stitch with a couple rows of purl two together and knit front and back in the same stitch. The only unusual stitch is the "bobble" that makes the ears - and that's basically knitting and purling in the same stitch multiple times. There are two rectangles for the legs, a bigger rectangle for the body and head, and two smaller rectangles for the arms.

The rectangles were sewn together and stuffed with fiberfil, and then hair was added. I followed the directions with the black haired doll, pulled a strand of yarn through and then knotting it, but I did the yellow haired doll like rug hooking, only with really long loops. Then, following the directions, I pulled some non-wool yarn through to hold the fiberfil in place. I won't do that with my next doll, or I'll do it very differently, because all of those white strands of yarn ended up as a mass of tangled soapy yuk in the washing machine after felting.

I learned that I had overstuffed both dolls - you can see how over-stretched the hand and feet yarns are. I pulled some of the stuffing out, but the yarns would not relax (because they're felted!) With the hair sticking up, the dolls are about eleven inches tall.

I needle-felted some eyes and saw the dolls finally have some personality - so then I added some needle-felted little snub noses. I took the dolls to the senior center today to show a couple people and then sat them in a chair next to me when I played Bingo - and I won, so I think they make lucky charms.

I learned several things with these two dolls that will help while I knit some more. I'm planning to donate them for our senior center rummage sale which will probably be in October. I'm going to be really careful about where I store these dolls, Gibby can't seem to take his eyes off of them. I'm sure he thinks I'm making dog toys.

Marauding Cats

Whenever I talk about my poor old farmhouse, I feel like I'm telling that children's story that goes, "fortunately, such and such good happened, but unfortunately then such and such bad happened." This weeks adventure once again unfortunately has to do with cats. I thought all of the cats had left the building, but apparently I was incorrect. For two nights I heard strange noises from upstairs - last night, it sounded like a cats was racing around and playing in my bedroom (which I haven't used since I moved back into the house - originally because I was worried about rats running around in the night). This morning I finally decided I had to investigate. I found the odd door into the attic-like storage room off of my bedroom wide open. When I looked inside, I saw at least a dozen cats scurrying and leaping over boxes and piles of stuff that's been stored for decades and flying out of the window. The window that shouldn't have been open - in fact, it wasn't exactly open, it was broken.

It took a while to clear a walkway through to the window - in the process I found the typewriter my dad gave me when I turned sixteen, the framed illustrations from Kahlil Gibran my grandmother gave me to decorate my college room, and jars of dried-up poster paint from my first teaching job when I had to buy all of my own supplies. The window glass was very old, very thin glass with little bubbles in it that I'm sorry to lose. It was knocked to the outside, so maybe there was a cat stuck in that room who finally burst his way out. I took the measurements to replace the glass, but I went into town so late that it was dark before I got home and there's no electricity in that room, so I left the door tied shut (with the electric cord from an old tv antennae tied to the frame of the bed) since the latch doesn't hold, and let the cats have the room for one more night. What's a little more outside air coming into this house? I'll fix the window with plexiglass and put a hook and eye to hold the door closed tomorrow.

Sincerely Jane Challenge #2

This is the second incarnation of my SJ rug plan. There will be five blocks across and eight blocks down, a total of 40 blocks, with a half inch sash between all blocks and an inch wide sash around the outside. The rug, before whipping, will measure 34.5" across and 49.5" down.

I divided the blocks into five types. The first type is animals, and there will be one animal block in each row - I haven't yet decided if they will all be upright, the way they are in the photo, or if they will be turned in several different directions so the rug doesn't have a top and bottom.

The other types are rounds, triangles, straights, and stars. Each block falls into one of those categories and my plan is to scatter the different types throughout the rug, with no two blocks of the same type next to each other. The photo shows two blocks that should be moved - at the far right (if you're standing to the right of the photo) the last blocks in the second and third rows are two rounds next to each other. Photos can be very helpful.

Now, I have to start working on color. I'm thinking antique black sashing with mostly red and a light gold for the block colors - the light gold taking the place of the white in the original quilt.

Sincerely Jane Challenge

I've started organizing my pattern for the Sincerely Jane Challenge on Yahoo Rughookers. The original quilt made by Jane Stickle during the Civil War has over two hundred individual little patterns that are easily converted into geometric hooked rug patterns. I'm not particularly fond of geometric patterns, although I am terribly impressed by the Jane Stickle quilt, so I am planning to throw in some animal patterns just to make the rug more mine. Since the rug is being made from quilt patterns, I decided the animals should also be made from quilt patterns. I selected a book from the large quilt library at the Hamburg Senior and Community Center (a building I am particularly fond of because my mother was one of the Independent Seniors who planned and built this wonderful place - and today is the one year anniversary of my mother's departure.) The book My Grandmother's Patchwork Quilt by Janet Bolton includes a set of patchwork pattern pieces. I have copied the animals from those pieces to add to the Jane Stickle patterns.

I've copied some of the pattern squares, 4.5"x4.5", onto tracing paper and have laid them down in a possible arrangement. The arrangement in the photo is probably about half of the final pattern and doesn't include the sashing that will run between all of the squares. I'm thinking right now that the sashing will probably be a half inch wide in the interior with wider sashing around the outside. The animal patterns will be scattered wider apart than they are in this first photo. I need to copy about 30 more geometric patterns and will also probably create a few more animal patterns that aren't in the patchwork book - for sure, I will add a sheep that will look like the sheep pin for the Rughookers Merit Program.

So, I'm off to select more patterns...

Hanging Cat(s)

Early this morning, there were two cats left in the pool room. The window shared with the bathroom was open all night, with the board leading from it, and I think about a dozen cats used the board bridge to leave the room. Once I closed the window and the two leftover cats finished eating the catfood I'd left in the pool room, I thought the problem was solved. While I was away with three of the dogs, Joe came out and rebuilt the part of the ceiling that had crashed. (He also brought out some beautiful stone that will be put on to camouflage the cinderblock chimney.)

George had a bit of an accident in the car while we were away, so when we got into the house I just wanted to have a quiet time with him. However, there was no quiet to be found. There were scritchy scratchy sounds in the walls, small kabooms that made Gibby jump, and then quiet little meows. I went upstairs and searched for cats - no luck. Back in the living room, the noises started all over again - it sounded just like a cat was stuck inside the wall, but the wall is only a single layer of plywood - there is no inside. Back in the living room again - scritchy scratchy, Gibby jumping - so I went out into the new room, and there, up by the top of the chimney, three quarters of a cat was hanging down from the ceiling. He wiggled and squiggled and pulled himself back up into the ceiling. I moved a big stepladder over to where he was hanging, if he drops down again and swings out a little, his feet should land on the top of the ladder. I don't know if he was trapped up there when Joe did his repair or if he is an explorer who found a new way to break through from the roof. I don't even know if he's the only one, but I'm hearing more meowing and Gibby is back on the alert.

I have a sign at my back door that says, "Welcome...come on in and hang around" with a little cat hanging from the sign - I guess it was prophetic.
The cat came down while I was writing this. I went out to check, scared him, and he raced right back up that stepladder and disappeared into the ceiling. A few minutes later, there was another big kaboom. Part of the ceiling fell down again. uurrrggghhhh!

It's Raining Cats!

The work on my house seems to go from one disaster to another - today's was cats falling through the roof. The cats like to sun on the roof of my former pool room - the light wall of the house reflects sunlight onto the black roof that absorbs heat, so the cats sun themselves all day long. Yesterday, I heard a huge ka-boom noise and thought it must have been ice falling off of the roof. When I went outside to see, all I found was a pile of the tin shingles I had placed in the space where one of the roofs meets the side of the pool room roof. The tin filled a gap that I then shingled over. I didn't know that Joe the builder had removed the tin.

I didn't learn until today that removing the tin let the cats go deeper into the tunnel created by the shingles covering the gap. When Joe insulated the roof, he couldn't figure out how to deal with that section, so he put some 2x4s across the length of it and tacked some insulation board to it. Apparently the weight of the too many cats brought the temporary fix down. Yesterday's noise was that ceiling section crashing to the floor with some cats - and more cats fell during the night. I woke up several times thinking I was hearing the dogs making a lot of noise going out the doggy door - but it was cats. This morning, when I was in the bathroom, I heard a crash that sounded like it was right next to the bathroom wall - so, I finally went into the new room - and it was full of cats. Now, much as I care about and care for these cats, they are still barn cats and most of them are basically feral cats. Very few of them will come to me and even fewer will let me pick them up - and none of them will respond to me when they are already terrified. So, cats here, there, and everywhere, and no way to get them outside. I finally blocked the outside door open, put the dogs in the car, and left for a while. When I returned, the cats were out of the room, but the roosters were going in!

I thought the problem was probably solved and Joe said he would come out tomorrow to do some repairs - but then I started hearing booms and bangs and little meows. Upstairs. Over the dining room. Over the living room. Up where I don't go. UGH.

The open space created by the wall that melted away while the house was deserted had worked it's way up the wall to the second story. The dining room ceiling is barely six feet high, so the second story isn't very high up and part of it falls into the new room. There is a giant hole through the old board and batten and plaster going into that room. It's a funny little under-the-eaves kind of room that I never use - in fact, I piled stuff in there when I moved into this house in 1972 and I've never looked at the stuff since. I took a flashlight upstairs, found the door to that room open, (it opens into the "master bedroom") and the rooms were full of cats. I don't know how many because they all scrambled away and hid into, under, and behind all the stuff I haven't looked at in decades. I have no idea how to get them out of there.

Years ago, I expanded my bathroom to include the hallway that used to lead to the upstairs. So, I have now closed off the bathroom, opened the door at the bottom of the stairs, and opened the window into the pool room. If I was a self-respecting cat, I'd go down the stairs, see that open window and jump up, walk down the board I placed against the window sill, and get into the pool room. I haven't yet decided whether or not to leave the outside door open since I don't want to let more cats in...

I hear cats moving around, but no more ka-booms like they're raining through the roof...

More George

George is the sweetest dog. He's half border collie and half gordon setter - I think he inherited intelligence from the first breed and gentleness from the second. He's thirteen years old and not going to have another birthday. When we moved into my mother's home, she claimed him as her own. When we visited her in a number of different nursing homes, George was always a welcome visitor - sometimes other residents wanted to pet him so much it took forever to get him down a hallway.

He's had a pretty decent life - when he first came to me as a puppy, I thought he'd be a small dog so I cuddled him in my lap and ignored his great big paws until my lap wasn't big enough to hold him. The photo above was taken last spring when he'd been shaved to make it easier to treat a skin problem - I'm glad his long hair has grown back. Unfortunately, he's been growing more than hair. I wish I could put him in my lap now.

GEORGE

June Mikoryak's Yankee Ingenuity

Well, the photos are proof that my memory fails me. Good thing June was nice enough to go out to her car and pull out this rug to show me the day before our class at Sauder Village. However, even though this is not my favorite color plan, the central motif is anchored to the rug and not floating above the background the way mine seems to be. I had remembered June's background as having scattered yellow strips, obviously remembered the wrong color and the wrong placement for them - they are mostly placed in a very orderly fashion, not randomly scattered like mine.

I think I need to rethink my background. In the meantime, I guess I'll hook some corners while I watch the Superbowl ads.