Friday, July 24, 2020

The kids gain a small sense of normalcy, and summertime crafting continues...

Hello all and I hope that your week has gone well! Ours here actually gained back a bit of a sense of normalcy with the kids having actual activities to do, yay! Henry has been working at his Catholic high school to earn money towards his tuition, and Anne has had Girl Scout camp, both virtual and one day of in-person. She's also back to her martial arts classes, in-person, and this is all helping her so much, as she was struggling with everything just being online. It's been more running around, ferrying the two of them places, but it has felt SO GOOD for them to have real socializing with their peers, and to see more smiles on their faces this week.

In other good news, twin baby robins have hatched in our backyard! We've been having such a wonderful time watching them grow. No pictures, as Mama Robin is very protective and is never far from the nest. Anytime we're back there, she's giving us the hairy eyeball from a perch atop the power lines. 😂 She and Father Robin also "escort" any other bird or squirrel out of the yard that happen to wander in. :-0 It's provided hours of entertainment out our back window, to be sure.

I've also been continuing my crafting quests, and made great progress this week. My mother-in-law's summer top is coming along beautifully:


I kind of want to keep it for myself, but I'll try and restrain. ;-) I'm on the second of Mike's Steelers socks:


And Dianne asked about how my crochet thread was working out, and so I rembered to post a photo of my very first doily!

Pattern is Simple Beginner's Doily, and is available for free!
I'm very pleased with how this came out! I did use one of the skeins that is size #3 thread (thicker than the others are at size #10), sort of a training wheels approach, if you will. Now I'm going to make one with the thinner thread. But this looks great on our table! Really brightens things up. I've never been particularly into doilies, they seemed lacking in purpose to me or something like that :-0, but I appreciate how they cheer up a surface. I think we could all use a little cheer this summer, yes?
I'm plotting lots of these for gifts, and also some cotton dishtowels and cloths. I'll post pictures as I make things!

In Catholic news, I'm currently finishing up the St. Anne novena, and my Anne makes her first communion next weekend! What I ended up doing last weekend was taking just Henry to Mass, and this weekend I'll take Anne. It's definitely an easing in process with the kids, after them being away from Mass for so long. But we're getting there. I tried to use the car ride to talk to Henry about faith stuff, and I'll do the same with Anne this Saturday. In this way I can single the kids out a bit for individual faith attention. Pray for me! :-0

How is your week going, dear reader? Chat with you soon!

6 comments:

  1. I have to say I'm jealous of Mike's Steelers socks! We're a Packers family, and the thought of green and gold socks is enough to make me want to learn how to knit :)

    I just made two zucchini breads from an overflow of garden zucchini and have been inundated with romaine lettuce and snow peas as well this week.

    Have a wonderful weekend!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Amy! This dyer that I get the Steelers and Bills yarn from could easily make you Packers yarn, I am telling you! :-0

      OMG, your garden sounds amazing! Homemade zucchini bread made from your own grown zucchini? *swoon!* We have peppers in our garden (bell and banana) which are coming in quite nicely, plus roma tomatoes and basil!

      Delete
  2. The doily looks so pretty :-) Let us know how the finer thread works. I inherited all my crochet thread without labels, so I'm not sure what size it is. I might try a tatted doily with one of the colors since I've never really got the hang of crochet.

    Your robins sound like excellent parents! Keep an eye out for upcoming flying lessons. I happened to interrupt one in progress by accident years ago when I was outside. I froze. There was no doubt that the mother robin was teaching the little one to fly. Very cool.

    Wishing you a very happy and blessed Feast of St. Anne. As you can imagine, the feast is a very Big Deal at the church here. In fact, this is their 148th annual novena to St. Anne! Feel free to take a look at st-annes-shrine.org. It is a beautiful church.

    Prayers for you and your family :-)

    Dianne

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Dianne, and thank you so much for the link! I enjoyed praying the St. Anne novena very much, and have hope that it will bear a lot of fruit. :)

      Ah, I gotcha on the crochet thread. I finished my #10 doily last night, and it's currently blocking. I'll photograph the 2 sizes side-by-side and have a crafty post next week again!

      So cute on the robins! Ours fledged, and I'm a little worried because 1 was gone before the other. Granted, 1 egg had hatched earlier and the baby was clearly bigger than the other one, so I guess that makes sense? But now the second one has fledged, and we can see her hanging around our backyard a lot, and her dad is tending to her quite diligently. But no sign of mom and the bigger baby. Maybe because she fledged earlier, the mom is taking care of her? I don't know, but I'm trying to gain insight into the robins' lives, LOL!

      Delete
  3. Glad things are getting better for you and your family. Your projects are looking good. We are trying to stay cool in all this awful heat.
    Joan,Marion and Marilyn

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hello ladies! Indeed, although not as oppressive as earlier this month, it has been sneakily humid again here, and it's putting a cramp on my in-home dancing and fitness, lol! Stay cool! I know the cold weather will be here again before we know it, and I should just enjoy this, but I do this every year, ha ha!

      Delete

Thank you for commenting! I read and appreciate every single one, and I will respond to each one personally!