Owl update

The other night, as I was reading in bed, I heard our Eastern Screech Owl calling for the first time. I'll be honest and admit that I got giddy about it. I know they've lived in the maple tree outside our bedroom for at least two years, and even seen them a couple of times, but I've never heard the call of the owl before. It was amazing. I'm beginning to understand how people can turn a little birdwatching into a full-time avocation.

Oh, and I also started a Christmas gift, a superhero- mask for the boy. I'm a whole 1.5" in so far. I'm kinda inventing this as I go, so we'll see if it actually makes it to "Finished object" status. I'm dubious.

Seriously, someone stop me!

Thanks to my mama, I am the proud possessor of a Clover needle felting kit. She wanted to try it out and present it to her local Sewing Guild tonight, but found the whole process rather mind numbing. I expressed interest on Tuesday morning(as I am wont to do with pretty much anything fiber-related), and a short while later she appeared at my doorstep with needles and a brush and some of her first experiments.

A few minutes later I was rifling through the box, with the knowledge that I am now the "expert" for tonight's meeting. I did a little googling for tutorials, but didn't see all that much out there. Best way to learn something is hands-on, I always say.


poke. poke. poke. poke. This is kinda fun. Poke, poke, poke. I wonder if I have any old fulled sweater scraps downstairs. And some yarn scraps. Poke poke poke. I think I need to make a special two-hour trip into town to buy some wool roving so I can do this thing right. pokepokepokepoke. I need to poke poke poke go poke poke poke to the store and do the poke poke dishes. After one more experiment...

Needless to say, I'm wayy behind for the day. But look what I've done.


The girl loves it too. She made this for her teacher, out of cheapo craft felt. (it's not wool, but it does seem to work pretty well)



Even the boy is getting into the action. Here he is designing "super hero symbols."


But now I really really need to get started on the other stuff like dinner and dishes and going to the library.

UPDATE:

Still nothing exciting going on. But the blog feels sad when I don't post for weeks at a time, so I'm giving it a little attention this morning as I sip my coffee.

We did have a fun time last night when Mr Deplume's brother and family came over for dinner and lego tower-building (that was mostly a kid activity, though). I'm now kicking myself for getting not one photo of the event. They are from a far away state and it will likely be the only time they come over this year. Oh well.

Now I need to go pack a lunch for the girl and get dressed. Later today, I go back to the front room for more plastery adventure. Wish me luck, my faithful reader!

Just move along, nothing to see here

I mean it. I have very little to show for my days lately. I ripped down some wallpaper in the front room, and started patching holes, but then I realized that I needed to tape the corners in the room before I can go any further. I went to the hardware store and bought the tape, but they didn't have one of those nifty inside-corner-putty-knife-dealies. So no progress there, until I have a chance to get to a home improvement warehouse.

I have still been working on my "doable" shawl, but now each row takes like 15 minutes to complete. Have I mentioned that there are vast expanses of stockinette stitch on this? That's a whole lotta purling, folks. I thought a mostly stockinette lace weight project would be good, as it's mindless. A little too mindless, it turns out. It's rather like a woolen lobotomy.

But I've gotten all the dishes done three days in a row! Super boring factoid there, but it really is nice to wake up to a clean sink. Thanks, Marla Cilley! SOme day I'll even follow the rest of the tidy-house steps, but for now I'll be happy with my dishes progress.

And now for something fun: My four-year-old boy refers to the legs of pajama pants and sweatpants as bottom sleeves or foot sleeves. As in "My bottom sleeves are stuck on my knees!" IT cracks me up every time he says it. And I fear that soon he'll learn the right words, never uttering footsleeves again. The thought makes me sad. I don't want them to grow up quite yet. Waahhhh!

Tonight, we'll go to a local fair and ride rides and eat carnie food. Good times. Good times.

That's all for now!

Patterns? We don't need no stinkin' patterns.

Aprons were always part of the uniform in my table-waiting years, and I'd learned then of their usefulness. I've gone back and forth with wearing them though, during my adult years. If you are wearing an apron, it means you are doing housework. And since I hate housework, I prefer to act like it doesn't exist-- an apron is a cruel reminder of the incessant cycle of cleaning and dirtying and cooking and repairing. It seems that once you start wearing aprons, however, can never go back to life without them. Well you can, but you trousers get dirty quite quickly from the incessant hand wiping (being a waiter in a busy restaurant teaches you all sorts of bad habits). I'm currently back on an apron-wearing kick. But I have run out of aprons, as the old ones I got when I moved out of my parents' house 14 years ago finally had all ripped or disappeared. I do have one Christmas one left, but I'm not ready for poinsettias and holly just yet.

So I set out to make some more. I have about 4 apron patterns around here, some borrowed from my mom and a couple I've acquired over the years too. I do dream of making myself a couple of Lucy Ricardo aprons, but in really wacky prints. But what do I do when I go to sew one today? I decided to invent my own pattern on the fly, by recycling one of Mr. Deplume's old denim shirts. It's been said (usually by me) that I rarely do anything the easy way. And today's sewing escapade certainly bears that out.

However, after an hour or so of guesswork (45 minutes of that also included prayer), I ended up with a usable apron. There are pockets, ties, and the bottom three buttons are still functional, in case I ever want to make it a split apron (handy for more strenuous housework). I'm pretty pleased with myself.

I hope that if I make another one, it will take considerably less time. That's how it is supposed to work, right?

I've got Bats in my Boudoir!

At 1:30 am, my husband tapped me on the shoulder (at first I thought he was looking for some lovin’, lol). He said “we have a bat.”
I said “huh?”
"We have a bat." This time he stated it more slowly.
The slowness didn't help, "Wha??"
"We have a bat. In the house."
"What kind of bat?" I was still holding out hope that he was making a joke about our son's bear with the Batman suit.
"A bat bat."
"How do you know?"
"I was trampled by a cat while she chased it."
"Where is it now?"
"I assume over there where the cats are staring."
"Oh." It took a bit for it all to sink in.

Once I fully woke up and saw both cats sitting on the dresser, staring at the bat at the window, I fetched a small bucket from the kitchen, and turned on the light. This made the bat fly in circle for what seemed to be 12 minutes (I’m sure it was under a minute, though.) Mr. Deplume was still lying on the bed, not quite sure what to make of the situation.

I realized he could keep this up for an hour or more (the bat, not my husband), so I started trying to hit it with a Captain America comic (first thing I saw on the floor). As it turns out, it is very hard to hit a bat with a rolled up comic.

After a couple of minutes of watching me flail about, he snaps out of his stupor and stations himself on the other side of the bed with his pillow. After a couple of tries, he bonked the bat with the pillow, knocking it to the floor, half under the dresser. I grab the bucket, scoop him up with a magazine (full-sized this time), and we deposit the little guy back outside. I am happy to report that he hopped right up, and he flew off toward the neighbor’s house.

Note: it is very hard to go back to sleep at 2AM after chasing a bat out of the house. Also, when you wake up again at 3 AM, you'll be intently listening, to see if the bat had brought a friend who was still indoors. I like them better outdoors. Much better out there, eating skeeters. I hate skeeters, regardless of location.

I don't have time for this

Seriously. There's no time in my life for another hobby. None. Zip. Zilch. But fluffy roving and a spindle appeared at my doorstep the other day (really-- I go to get the mail, and find it there. I didn't order this stuff). What was I to do? First instinct was to put it in the cupboard and ignore it. But instead I left it on the desk and ignored it.

for 20 hours.

Then I couldn't take it any more. It was just staring at me. Taunting me. "You know you want to," it said. "You'd probably be good at it, too. You could be a prodigy-- you've always wanted to be a prodigy haven't you?" And then the force of it moved my fingers to youtube.com, where I started watching videos of people turning fluffy bits of wool into yarn. All of a sudden, I realize that the spindle and some roving were in my hands. And I was twirling and pulling and winding it into something that resembles yarn, sort of.


I have to take a few days away from it, though, to ready the house for an upcoming 4th birthday party. But watch out-- next week I'm going to get the hang of it. Then I'll need to get another job to pay for the new expensive hobby.

So close...

I had a setback yesterday-- The third and final can of trim paint got pulled from the basement yesterday, to do the finish coat. I pried off the lid and started stirring it. I suddenly realized that it was flat paint! I thought I had bought three cans of trim paint way back when, but only two of them were semi-gloss. At first I was wondering how the home improvement warehouse could have screwed up so badly, but thinking about it now, I believe I bought it for the ceiling in the dining room. Oops. Now I have to buy another can of trim paint before I can finish. I might try to work on that this afternoon. I really really want this room done. I have a hankering to start on the kitchen and don't want too many projects going on at once. I'm bad about having too WIPs at once, whether they be knitting or home renos.

Speaking of WIPs, I started my Ravelympic socks again yesterday. I started doing two socks on two circulars, from the Knitpicks sock blank that I dyed on Friday. But it's just too many challenges at once for me, and since I had to rip the two socks out once already (too small, they never would have fit over my heels), I just cast on for one sock the second time, and am winding the second strand of yarn into a ball as I go.

My son is not happy that I'm using one of his cylinder-shaped blocks as the makeshift nostepinde. He seemed satisfied when I promised to give it back to him. However, I came back to my knitting after having gone to the kitchen, and found a little wound-up pile of yarn next to the sock. Hmmm. Apparently, when I promised to give the block back, I hadn't impressed upon him that I'd give it back when I was DONE. He just figured that he'd take it back right away. Little stinker is always looking for an angle. Luckily, the yarn slipped back onto the block with a little finessing, and we're back in business. If I get a chance, I'll take pics later.

It's a raver! It's a terrorist! No...

it's painting day at the Deplume household.


I finally tackled the railing/banisters of the stairway today. This stupid project has taken more than a year now, but it's so very close to completion. After a frustrating false start with a primer that claimed to adhere even to glossy surfaces, but was clearly lying, I went back to my favorite old standby, shellac. This time, the shellac came in the form of BIN Shellac Based Primer. I love this stuff. It covers well, blocks stains and odors well, and dries lightning fast. The only drawback to it is that there are some fumes involved. First, you use mineral spirits to remove any waxy or oily buildup. Then you use ammonia to prep the surfaces for painting. And the primer itself has a fair amount of denatured alcohol in it. So of course, to avoid brain damage and/or blindness, I use a respirator. I look cute, eh?

Anyway, if you don't remember what I started with, here's a little reminder. In the above self-portrait, you can see the pre-painting banister/baluster (I can never get those words straight) as well as the odd little discolored plastic mirror on the newel post, which is also now covered up. The trim in this house was all painted a dingy cream color, of course being covered with bright white paint. Here's where we are now.


I still need to apply a finish coat, and probably some sort of protectant to the railing, but we are definitely in the home stretch. Next stop: kitchen!

I've been busy!

That's not exactly a truthitude. I've only been busy playing with yarn. The house is a mess, the roof still has a hole in it and the dishes aren't done. But the fruits of my labor are much more picturesque.

First up, some beautiful bamboo yarn barf. A friend of mine, who is an experienced wool roving and yarn dyer, tried out some bamboo yarn, to see if she wanted to branch out from wool. Unfortunately, when she tried to re-skein the yarn after dyeing, she found that it had turned itself in to many tiny tangled "yarnlets." She got one hank sorted out, then gave up and sent me the rest.

I figured that she really was exaggerating about how badly the yarn had held up, but hoo boy, she was right! I spent an entire evening of watching tv trying to get together one hank, and it was no picnic. The thing was in no fewer than ten pieces. A sane woman would give up, but the stuff is just so darn pretty that I'll probably find a way to use it anyway.

And hot off the presses, folks, a summer sweater for me. I started this in March, but then got sidetracked, and worried about length and sleeves and decoragtive finishing a lot. I finally got sick of knowing it was there, undone, and pulled it out this morning. I realized that I didn't like the look of the sleeve I had done, so I pulled it out and left just the sleeve cap. I also forwent the decorative edging I had planned, and did just a simple single crochet border. I really still ought to get a cute little frog closure for it, but I'm calling this baby done. I might even wear it to church this Sunday. :)

Pattern: created by Knitware sweater design software.
Yarn: Knitpicks Shine Sport, color: Cream
Hook: US H/5.0 mm

Sorry about the deer-in-the-headlights look, it's hard to pose for a portrait taken by a six year old. But don't you like my new hair cut?

Ack! roof repairs in the rain.

After dinner, we were milling about, waiting for the big rain to stop and a particular TV show to begin when dh announced, "we have a leak." He went and got a bucket, and I started to see dollar signs.
It's raining cats and dogs and we just replaced the thingamajig and the watchamacallit, meanwhile, the doohickey and doodad are higher on my to-do list than the roof.

I took a deep breath, figured out that it was obviously near the edge of the low roof outside our bedroom window, and went off to look at it. I opened up my bedroom window, removed the screen, and launched myself over the dresser. That area is a section of rubber sheeting, as opposed to standard shingles (historically, most everything in my house was done in the most "frugal" way possible), so I looked around for a hole. Sure enough, there was a wrinkle at a seam about 10" from my window. The seam's adhesive had failed, and the hole was large enough I could stick a finger in it. crap. Once again, the Peter principle has kicked in-- home ownership is the ultimate example of having risen to the level of my incompetence. I have no earthly idea about how to fix a roof of any kind.

BUT, I didn't want to have any more leak, and I especially didn't want to have to leave a bucket in the family room until it stops raining, so I went downstairs, found an old vinyl tablecloth, chopped off a hunk with the kitchen scissors, and plopped it over the hole. I put some heavy stuff on top to keep it from blowing away right away and woohoo! it worked. The drip stopped in spite of another hour of steady rain.

Tomorrow's to-do list has just added "learn how to fix hole in roof." It's always something when you own a old house, eh?

Instant Gratification

That's what I've titled my recent knit project, although its designer named it the Star Crossed Slouchy Beret. I guess that's a good name too. I started it on the 22nd, and finished it last night. That's 5 days, people-- I don't know if I've ever knit something in only 5 days. Not that I'm that slow a knitter, I just get sidetracked really easily. But this was a hat with bulky self-striping yarn, cables and sz 11 needles, it was over before I could get bored. I'm still impressed with myself, though, as in this same 5-day span, I replaced the screen door latch, painted a window seat, newel post, and a couple of back door steps, weeded and mulched a few flower beds, planted three plants, installed the clothesline, helped out with Vacation Bible School at my church, went swimming thrice, among other things. I didn't do any laundry, though. Poor Mr Deplume spent much of yesterday working on that. The guilt is fleeting, though.

It's made from a partial ball of Austermann Murano, and it is soft and squishy and all too hot to wear in July, even just to take a modeled picture. I plan to make a matching neck warmer for myself out of the remaining 89 grams of yarn. :)

BIG NEWS!!

At about 11 o'clock this morning, my older child lost her first tooth. I repeat: we have tooth loss. Several of her friends in kindergarten were losing teeth 10 months ago, and she's been very impatient on this front. Anyway, it was marginally loose yesterday, but some fresh corn on the cob sped up the process, and a chicken sandwich closed the deal this morning. We have secured the tooth, and it will be presented for Tooth Fairy confiscation tomorrow night (they'll be staying at Grandma and Grandpa's house tonight, and the Molinator doesn't have their address on file). She was later surprised to find that Mr Deplume took half a day off work, and we all went swimming, where she showed off her new talent, the back float.

It's been a very big day.

Now we're off to drop the kids off for the night, then have a (slightly belated) birthday dinner consisting of copious amounts of sushi, then some shopping to spend the birthday money from my Mama.

green fur bike

green fur bike
Originally uploaded by NormDeplume720

First the good: this guy was showing off his free ice cream. Who doesn't love free ice cream?

But the the green fun fur -- that's just odd. Maybe it's just that I'm a Midwestern goober, but I just don't see the benefits in this. Anyone from Southern California care to enlighten me? And the upkeep: I don't want to have to vacuum my bike, too. Can you imagine how gamey that furry seat gets after a couple of long summer rides?

As promised, the grilled meatloaf recipe

Someone expressed interest in the recipe from my last post, so here it is. If you try it, please let me know how you liked it. I'm really a fan, I think.

1 lb. Ground beef
1 lb. ground pork
1 Egg, beaten
1 Onion, finely chopped
1/2 c. Cracker crumbs
1/4 c. Ketchup
1 tsp. Prepared mustard
4 or 5 dashes of Worcestershire sauce
a dash of salt, a sprinkle of pepper

sauce
1/4 c. Ketchup
2 Tbs. Brown sugar
1 tsp. Dry mustard
1/4 tsp. Nutmeg*

1. Combine meat, egg, onion, cracker crumbs, 1/4 c. ketchup & prepared mustard in large bowl; mix well. Shape into loaf; place in lightly greased 10-inch metal baking pan.**

2. Combine 1/4 c. ketchup, 2 Tbs. brown sugar, dry mustard and nutmeg in small bowl; mix well.

3. Grill over hot coals for 15 minutes. Place double thickness of foil on grill. Remove meatloaf to foil. (We found that it got a little too black on the bottom, so next time we'll spread out the coals, or move the loaf to the other side of the grill for less-intense heat)

4. Grill for 10 minutes longer or until cooked through, basting with ketchup mixture.


*The nutmeg really does add a nice flavor, even though it seemed weird to me at first.

**Because I had a time crunch issue, I placed it first into a 9-inch square pyrex pan and microwavfed it for 10 minutes at 50%. It didn't cook the loaf, but it heated it through enough that it only needed 25 minutes on the grill. I moved it to a metal pie plate before sticking it on the grill

So much to post, but so little devotion

I'm in a slump here. Every day something happens that causes me to say to myself, "you should put that on the blog." But every day, I reply, "I'll do just that later tonight." But it pretty much never happens. But it stops here. I am now making a concerted effort to actually document the interesting stuff, instead of procrastinating. Procrastination is really only acceptable for yucky stuff like calling the dentist or paying bills or scooping the cat litter, not fun things like playing on the internet.

So here's a big catch-up post.

First off, we have a little example of Norm's insane obsession with old crap. A tricycle from my Grandma's barn. About 25 years ago, Grandma Bug decided she wanted a tricycle to use for exercise. So she got one. It was yellow and big and heavy and had a big white basket on the back. We kids loved it, but it was too hard for her to pedal up the hills on their road. Enter bright idea #2, the electric trike. It is red, powered by a motor on the front and a car battery mounted between the back wheels. We kids loved that trike, too-- nothing like pedaling down the road, and then pulling the power-assist lever on the hills. Zoom! I remember it like it was yesterday.

Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago, when I saw a thread on Bikeforums about resurrecting an old trike. Suddenly visions of bicycle restoration pop into my head. A phone call, a flashlight, and a lot of dirt later, I came home with this:

The original yellow tricycle had been sold many years ago, but the red DeSoto was there, waiting for me. It needs a lot of work, but is in amazingly good shape for something played with by preteens and then stored in a barn for the last 20 years. If all goes according to plan, I'll remove the motor and put a big basket on the back.

I'd like to take a moment, here, to mention that Mr. Deplume never said a word. He helped me load it into the truck with only one little question, "why are we bringing this to our house?" And when I gave him my answer ("so I can fix it up and ride it, of course") he didn't even give me a funny look. He's a good egg, I tell ya.

Next post that should have been made last week:
I actually finished something! I've been working on this prayer shawl for months and months. I will never again use that pattern. It's too mindless and too tedious all at once. And it felt like the shawl refused to grow. But I persevered and got it done. This is my first object made from a recycled thrift store sweater. You can see the original sweater on the Ravelry page for this project.


And lastly, I made meatloaf on the grill this week. Well, Mr. Deplume was in charge of the actual grilling part (we like to keep our gender roles archaic, thankyouverymuch). I didn't take a picture of it, though, as meatloaf is ugly. But it tasted great. I started with a recipe on someone else's blog, but changed it considerably as I am incapable of following a recipe (or pattern, for that matter). It didn't really resemble the author's recipe at all when I was done with it. I remembered what I did differently, so if anyone wants my take on grilled meatloaf, let me know and I'll post it here for you.

So that's all I have for today, but promise to be back soon with more madcap adventures.

oops- sunburn

I took the kids swimming yesterday. They had a blast. There were lots of blow-up flaties and googles and flippers. Both kids are itching to go back right now. In a rare instance of good parenting, I managed to slather both of them with sunblock. In a not so rare instance of run-of-the-mill stupidity, I forgot to slather my self with same. So now I have a upper-torso sunburn. At least I was wearing a hat, so my face is largely unaffected. As the optimist that I am, I'm thinking 'Hey, at least it will even out the awesome farmer's tan I've been rocking this summer." I hope it doesn't peel and go all away, just leaving a flaky and unattractive farmer's tan.

I have been trying to work on my many UFO's lately. The problem with working on stuff like that is there is no spark, no drive to get going. So I'm all too happy to sit around playing on the internet or cleaning the house and not knitting or crocheting. I have promised myself to have finished at least two projects before the Olympics. I'm not great at meeting self-imposed deadlines, but now that I've put it here, maybe I'll do better. :)

Nom Nom Nom. Doves are yummy

or so say the owls in my back yard this morning.


I've been watching them for an hour now, and they are still eating. There are two kids and one grown up. I wonder if this is the same owl I got a shot of last spring. Either way, I love their hoo hoo, ho hoooo sounds at twilight. I love that I have enough trees that they call this place home. I don't even mind that I'm going to have to clean up dead bird bones later today. I am blessed to live in an area that hasn't managed to wipe out all of the native species that belong here.


Update: I emailed the Illinois Raptor Center, and they very quickly responded to my query. Those are Eastern Screech Owls. I had been thrown off because my birds didn't have big ear tufts, but as it turns out, they can flatten them down sometimes, too. As an aside, I learned that the screech owls who live at the Center are named Mulder and Sculley. Their names match their mysterious nature, I suppose. :)

A few last vacation pictures

On Thursday we went to Wild Things, a wild animal ranch. We got to see several big cats, a hyena, a baboon, etc. Unfortunately, most of them are behind chain link fences, so the pictures aren't great. But we did get to get some good views of elephants and ostriches. The zebra would only point his butt at us and poop in our general direction. At least he didn't projectile pee on the tour leader like the bengal tiger did.

Well crap-- blogger is being pissy about photo uploads, and I don't feel like messing with Flickr at the moment. I'll try to fix this up again later.

Name that contraption

Hey you-- with your mind in the gutter-- it's not what you think. That's a Banana Bunker. It'll keep your lunch nanner from getting all bruised in transit. Pretty cool, eh?

We're all healthy now in the Deplume household, although I'm still not totally unpacked. Life is just as busy as before we left, with dentist appointments, t-ball games, story time at the library, and on and on and on. Once stuff settles, I promise a few more vacation pictures.

And by the way, I crocheted a hat while on vacation. Right now it looks really ugly. I'm hoping that blocking will prove itself a miracle once again. Cross your fingers for me!