My first Giveaway and Review, and my awesome yard sale finds

I am hosting my very first giveaway! The product is called My Memories Suite v2. It is scrapbooking software that is as easy to use as it is fun! I had never even tried scrapbooking before and never thought to do it on my laptop, but now that I have I think that I am hooked! I downloaded and installed it tonight and immediately made an album featuring my daughter. It is her Princess Diva album! Here are some of the pages from it I made using this ==> software.

Gothise - A place for alternative people - Member Home Page

Gothise - A place for alternative people - Member Home Page

I have an account here now. I was hoping for something like facebook, but more alt, but so far I haven't really seen anything to do on the site. Maybe it will get more interesting when I spend more time looking around on there. Who knows. I love social sites, so I will stay on there :)

Getting back into the groove

I have been knitting on my socks and now I remember why I put them away for a little while. I enjoy knitting, I really do, but it gets boring! It seems to be the same thing over and over. I love learning new things, but once I learn them they aren't new anymore. So then they start to get boring. That is why I put away the sweater I was working on, because the row after row of stockinette stitch got very tedious. Then I started on my first pair of socks and had to have a challenge along with the learning to make a new thing, and decided to make them two at a time, toe up, on one circular needle. Then it got boring. Then I decided to make a cute swirl skirt for my daughter. Fun, fun, not so fun, boring, repetitive, tedious. Then it was springtime and I wanted to try for a garden and I put away my knitting stuff and my cross stitch stuff (oh, did I forget to mention the eight cross stitch projects I started and then forgot about?) to try my hand at gardening. You are starting to get the picture, right?

Well, I have been working on the skirt again now that the socks are starting to get boring to work on more than a row or two at a time. I have dug out my cross stitch WIPs and have them ready to work on. My garden is starting to produce less, so I have more time to work on my crafty things. I am still out in my garden a few times a week. My tomatoes are getting bigger and I still have hope for a few red ones before frost hits. I started some more herbs to try to grow indoors, since all the ones outside died before they really got to grow (the poor dears). I haven't been experimenting as much in the kitchen lately. I could only do so many new squash recipes before Bobby finally got burned out on that veggie. He was the only one to like squash until I began to grow it and find all kinds of recipes using it. Now I, and the kiddos, enjoy it as well.  Below are some pics of our kitchen adventures this summer!

Serenity making porcupine balls

Salmon and Garlic Roasted Squash Spears

Salmon and squash again

Chicken, squash, zucchini, roasted red peppers, and tomatoes over bowtie pasta

Tilapia Montreal with garlic roasted squash spears and mashed squash

Check out my mutant cucumbers in the bottom of the pic

My cucumbers never did do well. They all turned out to be pear shaped and we called them cucumber grenades half the time. They tasted fine, just looked funny. You can't tell how big my squash usually were by these pics, but they were usually really good sized and so tender. Loved them. Have some in the freezer for this winter. The okra never really produced enough for us to use. I ended up giving it to my grandma. In the pic above, the okra was almost as long as a banana. i forgot to pick that one for a few days! The beans produced OK after the bugs stopped killing them. I only got about a cupful from each plant. I left the Anasazi beans on the vines to dry. I have quite a few out there right now. They took a lot longer than the garden beans or the kidney beans to start producing. But wow, they really took off.

Anyway... back to my crafting. I finally have my HAED pattern kitted up and ready to go. There were around 89 colors to gather, so it took me a long, long time. Thanks again to everyone who sent me floss! It was such a huge help to me. I am going to wait until January to start on it. I am doing a challenge with some other people that I am in groups with. We are together in a group on facebook called CrossStitchCrazy2012. We are doing a challenge that I have seen some others do this year, which is start fifteen projects on the first fifteen days of the year, and then work on the all year long and try to get them all finished. I am looking forward to it. Not only do I get to work on my HAED chart, but also a few of the kits the kids got me for Christmas. YAY

The many beautiful colors for my HAED chart, the QS Emerald Dragon

The HAED design I am going to work on soon called the Emerald Dragon

OK I am going to end this for now. I hope to have more to show you/tell you soon. I haven't been taking many pics lately, but will try to get some good ones soon. Wish I had a good, digital camera instead of my crappy phone camera!

Well, until we meet again, my craftiest of crafters.........Happy Crafting!

an awesome giveaway

Check out this giveaway! I hope I win something myself :)

gripped into books 1000 followers giveaway

Squash bugs, pickles, and boredom

There still hasn't been anything new to report on my crafting. I am just too lazy to start up again, I guess. I am mostly sitting around on facebook or reading all day. I am doing pretty good on my reading challenge. I have read 93 books so far this year. I think that count includes a few short stories I found online by my fave authors. I am still experimenting with new recipes. I have been cooking different kinds of fish. Who would have guessed I would end up enjoying fish! It still isn't my favorite food, but at least I no longer hate it.

My garden is still doing all right. Most of my cucumber vines have died. As soon as they started growing some cucumbers, the vines dried right up. So did the cucumbers. None made it to more than a few inches long. I brought one in before it yellowed and Bobby picked it up and said "hey, I didn't know you could grow pickles!" Then he laughed his rear off. It really did look like a pickle. I really need to get some pictures transferred to my computer so that I may share them on here!

The biggest problem I have had with my garden are the squash bugs. I know that most people would just pick them off the plants and kill them, but I cannot bring myself to touch them. I have made a soap spray and I go out and spray the plants every time I see some, and I scrape off the egg clusters when I find them. I had to cut off and pull up half of the only zucchini plant that was producing because of these bugs. I am wondering if I had some of those vine borer bugs in there too. The plant was half dead and kind of gross looking. It is doing a lot better now. I thought it would die after I cut so much off of it, but it is looking pretty healthy.

I think that is probably about it. Not much else to talk about. My kids are doing pretty good in school. Serenity is in second grade and reading on a fifth grade level. She has already surpassed the reading goal they have set for the end of the year. They test on words per minute by having the kids read a short excerpt from a story for a minute. The goal at the beginning of second grade is fifty some odd wpm and for the end of second grade is eighty some odd wpm. Serenity is already reading at 128 wpm. Yay Serenity! Of course her retelling score isn't up to goal yet. She is retelling the story at around 33 percent and the goal for the year is 50. I think she needs to slow down on the reading and concentrate more on the story itself. I am still proud of her. She read her little tushie off all summer at the library and started getting into the juvenile sections to pick books instead of the little kids section.

Joey has started to navigate away from manga and YA books a little and has been reading a lot of Stephen King books. He, too, is doing pretty good in school. So far he has a C in French, a B in Biology, a C in English, a D in Algebra, an A in interactive media, and I think a B in intro to 2 dimensional art. If he had actually did all of his homework and turned it in, his grades would be a little higher in a couple of classes. I told him that with it only being the first few weeks of school, he really can't be slacking off on that stuff. I was angry at first, but when I looked at the grades he has received so far, I realized it is the zeros he has received on an assignment here and there that has made his grade so low. If he works harder, then he will have all A's and B's in his classes. So instead of being mad at him, I am just going to ride him a little harder about actually doing his homework and showing me proof that he did it.

All in all, my kids are doing good in school so far. I am going to push Serenity a little more on math and science to try to get her more equal in her education. I would like to see her get the opportunity to skip grades like I had when I was around her age, but that is not going to be my goal. I just feel like she is unbalanced and I want her to be able to do math as easily as she can pick up a book and read it. I have a program on the computer to help Joey with his French and I guess I should find one to help him with his Algebra as well. I feel that he is able to do better, and I want him to have the tools with which to succeed at his classes.

OK. I think I have rambled on enough. I will end it with a thought.......

(I didn't say I was going to share the thought with you though!)

As always, Happy Crafting!

Long overdue update!

Well, I haven't been doing anything, so I haven't had anything to tell! I quit my job at the Dollar Store and have been sitting on my butt doing nothing. Haven't knit anything in months, nor cross stitched anything. I am about ready to get back into it though. I have been working on my garden. Only been harvesting summer squash so far, but have cucumbers and zucchini growing and almost ready to harvest. I have about six tomato plants that still haven't done anything. They are getting big though and I still have hope that they will produce before the first frost kills them off. All my herbs died, so I am starting over and am going to keep them all in the house. Started some sweet basil, dark opal basil (or some name like that anyway), some cilantro, a couple parsley, and some more chives. I will baby these and hope they don't die out on me again.

I even have some corn growing in my back yard! I had a bird feeder out there for awhile before I got rid of my income, and I guess the cracked corn that the birds kept throwing out decided to grow. It is funny to see the seven or eight stalks growing out there. I am going to see if it ripens and I will harvest it for the squirrels.

I have been experimenting on a lot of different recipes. I have a long list of recipes that I still want to try. I wish I had been taking pictures to share with anyone that still might read this blog. Some of the dishes turned out quite lovely. Tonight I made some garlic roasted summer squash and some mediterranean salmon. Everyone liked it, even Serenity and the neighbor girl! LOL.

Well I will end this for now. I am hoping that with the kids back in school I will get back into crafting and blogging. I miss everyone I used to chat with. I haven't even kept up with my yahoo or ravelry groups. It is way past time for me to go back and say hi to everyone.

Until next time my flawlessly faithful tanglers....... Happy Crafting!
(or Gardening or reading, or whatever hobby you got going on)

just another sleepy want-to-do-nothing day

Well, I haven't been keeping up with my blog like I did at first. I haven't been doing a lot of anything lately :) Here is an update for whoever wants to know what I have been doing lately.

I did manage to find a job at the Dollar General Store. I start Tuesday! It is only part time for now. The assistant manager is leaving and if I do a good job as a cashier, then the manager plans on moving me on up to the assistant manager position. I hope that means more money LOL. It is so weird. I haven't worked a steady job in years. I am so used to being a stay at home mom and doing nothing but what I want to do when I want to do it. It is going to be hard to get back into being an employee! I am looking forward to it though. I miss interacting with people other than my kids and my man!

Hmm... other than that there is not a whole lot to share really. I mostly have been reading a lot. I have managed to do a little knitting. I have a couple of pictures of the skirt I am knitting for Serenity. It doesn't look like much yet. I messed up on it a little and didn't catch on for a while, so I am just going to go with it. It just makes one stripe bigger than the others and one a lot smaller. I don't think it is going to bug Serenity at all, so I am leaving it as is. Here are the pics:

Other than that, I haven't been working on any of my crafty things. My socks and sweater are sitting around, watching me sullenly, wondering why I lost interest in them. My multiple cross stitch WIPs are trying to act like their feelings aren't hurt as I ignore them daily. I am a horrible crafty momma lately! I know they will be there when I am ready to get back to them, though, and am not in a hurry to get them finished. I am just in a different obsession right now :) My gardening.

We borrowed a hoe, a rake, and a tiller from my aunt and uncle a couple of days ago. Also a bunch of straw to lay over my garden. We worked for about three hours and got all the grass dug up an moved off of the spot I picked for my garden. Bobby did most of the hoeing and I mostly raked up the big clumps of grass and roots and made a nice worm hill. Any worms and night crawlers we dug up went into the worm hill. The hill is up against the fence that is around my garden patch, so a few of them will likely find their way back into my garden. Bobby managed to till up about half of my garden before the storm rolled in. He covered it with a tarp for now, hoping that any roots left from the grass will die. I have a couple bags of manure/hummus mix that I want to work into the garden before I mulch it with the straw. Most of my seedlings are about ready to be transplanted out there now, but the rains don't want to stop long enough for us to finish getting the garden ready. My uncle came today and picked up his tiller, so we will have to do the rest by hand, I guess.

I have barely been able to move these last couple of days LOL. I am not used to all of this physical activity. I started out with the hoe and really worked my muscles with that. Then, by the time I was done with the raking, my arms where so weak and quivery that I could barely use them. I woke up yesterday morning with my back and legs hurting so badly that I could barely get out of bed. It was actually kind of funny. I need to work on getting into better shape, before my garden kills me :)

I can't wait for the next few dry days so I can finish up out there. I am an impatient gardener. I want everything to magically grow overnight and start bearing. I am ready for some fresh tomatoes and carrots. I am eager to have some fresh, homegrown zucchini to use for baking. Also, this year is the first time I have ever tried herb gardening. I can't wait to have some fresh herbs to use for all the recipes I want to try. If I could wave a wand and have everything ready, I would! But, I have to try to be patient and let everything grow. Let's hope I don't manage to kill off all of my plants before they can produce! I do not have a green thumb at all! So far, so good on the seedlings though. I was surprised by how many seeds actually germinated. Some of the seeds I had were from a couple of years ago. I am keeping all my seeds in the freezer to try to keep them longer. That way I won't have to go buy more next year. Also, I am going to try to harvest my own seeds from whichever plants produce the best this year. I am so excited to actually have a garden! :) I haven't had one in years.



So I will end on that rambling note. I hope to have some great pics of my garden after I get it all planted, as well as some more of the spiral skirt I am making. Here is a link, if anyone wants to see how it should look when I am done, or if anyone is interested in purchasing the pattern:  knit-spiral-skirt

So that is it for now. Until next time my tangled tanglers... Happy Crafting! (and gardening for you that like to garden!)

Knitting pattern: How to knit an English bulldog - Knitting - Canadian Living

Check out this link:
Knitting pattern: How to knit an English bulldog - Knitting - Canadian Living

This is the cutest bulldog! I need to make me one, since I cannot have pets where I live.

I am joining a new reading challenge!

I am going to join a challenge I came across. To read 100 books this year. I had already planned to read more than that anyway, so I figured why not. :) I think everyone should join in either this one:







or the one on goodreads:

2011 Reading Challenge

Amanda has


read 31 books toward her goal of 125 books.

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31 of 125 (24%)

view books

How I wish for sun and a good planting day

Well, I haven't been keeping up with my blog lately. I haven't been doing a whole lot of anything these last few rainy weeks. I have read several books, came across a couple of new authors and got reacquainted with a few I had read before, and started a new series. I have been slowly knitting on a baby cocoon. I have not been doing any stitching. Me and my cycles LOL. I have been cooking a lot of new dishes. I think I will post a few pics of my cooking. :)

I am finally learning how to make omelets! Here is one with bell peppers and onions, cheese, black olives, and mushrooms. Bobby likes his like this :)

My first attempt at making chicken enchiladas. We all loved them. I ended up with enough filling for 24 enchiladas. We ate on them for three days and were sad when we ate the last one!

This tasted better than it looked :) It is chicken leg quarters baked with potatoes, carrots, and mushrooms covered in a cream of mushroom soup mixed with chicken broth. Even the kids liked it!

Bobby and I loved it. Joey liked it. Serenity doesn't seem to like anything like this. It is Chicken, tomatoes, spinach, garlic, and orzo. Tasty and colorful!

My first lasagna. It looks weird on the one end because Bobby wanted some black olives and mushrooms on his and not as much cheese. It ended up feeding us for two days, plus I have half of it stored in the freezer for a lazy day :) Once again, everyone but Serenity liked it.

Other than the new recipes, I have mostly been cooking my normal foods. BBQ pork steaks, garlic and herb mashed potatoes, and mac and cheese went over really good last week. I made some of what I was raised calling Italian Spaghetti or Goulash night before last. Still eating left overs :) Of course, Serenity doesn't like it. It is just some pasta with ground beef, onion, garlic, italian seasoning mix, and tomatoes. I used canned whole tomatoes with sea salt and cut them into chunks. Good ole comfort food.I didn't cook anything special for Easter. The kids spent the night away from home so Bobby and I just ate leftover red beans and rice with sausage that I had decided to try to make the night before. It turned out okay. I prefer the stuff out of the box. I just need to get the seasonings right, I guess.  Tonight it is just beans n burger for supper. Couple cans of pork n beans cooked with hamburger and onions. Of course I salt and pepper everything I cook :) Usually add garlic powder to at least half of everything I cook as well. I have been trying to experiment with different seasonings, but we usually come back to the same stuff I always use LOL

Enough about food before I have to go cook something! Kids are doing good. I can't believe they both have glasses now. Joey got his a couple of weeks after Serenity got hers. She needs hers for school and for near activities and Joey needs his for school and for far activities. How are my kids always opposites in everything? It boggles the mind!

Joey had to go have an ingrown toe nail cut out last week. That was fun to watch. I had seen it done on Dr. Oz, but not in person before. Today is a check up to make sure it is healing ok. The podiatrist put some kind of chemical on it to keep that part of the nail from growing back. Let's hope this works so he doesn't have to go through it all over again! Want pics of that too? LOL Joey took a couple, but I think I will spare you all from that image!

I have been waiting for this rain to stop and for the ground to dry out enough to till it. I am going to try to have a garden this year. I started some seeds about two and/or three weeks ago. I also bought a tomato plant and had one given to me as well. I have already had to transfer the tomato plants to much bigger containers. A few of my bean bush seedlings are getting too big for their containers that I had to move them into. I hope I can get everything into the ground before they give up on me! I also have some chives starting to grow, some baby carrots, a few bell pepper plants and a couple of banana pepper seedlings that have poked their heads up. About five watermelon seedlings are looking all happy in their container so far. I can't wait to see if this stuff actually grows for me this year! I wanted to do the tomatoes upside down and had some buckets ready for them, but I think they are getting to big to easily transplant them into the upside down buckets. They might be too big to go through the holes now. I don't know yet.

My tomato plants have taken over my kitchen table :)

Some of my seedlings

another view of my seedlings :) See my happy watermelon seedlings in the green container!

I got an awesome box of yarn from a lady this week. It was a Pay if Forward. Basically like a RAK (random act of kindness). How a pay it forward works, for you that don't already know, is someone sends something to someone that needs it or could use it, or just really wants it, then in return that receiver, when they are able to, will do the same for someone else someday. Hopefully I will be in the position to sooner rather than later. I have been looking for a job recently, as Bobby is out of work right now. I might stay in the workforce once he has a job again. It would be nice to have some extra money occasionally. Also, if I don't work, then we will never save any money towards getting married and eventually moving out of this crooked leaky house with the irritating drain problems :)

Lots of little bits and pieces along with the full skeins. I love it!

Some of it was sent for a specific pattern I have for a skirt for Serenity. She loves purple!

 I have written a children's story that Bobby is urging me to send out to see if I can get published. He also suggested making it into an ebook and selling it online. I am not sure where to go with it. His brother would like to illustrate it. If I go that route, I may do the ebook thing. If not, then I guess I need to have it looked at, edited, proofread, and all that and get it sent off to a lot of places that will say either no, or give me no response at all. Yep! I am a pessimist LOL Any suggestions on what I should do, and how are greatly appreciated :)

Until next time, my happily tangled tanglers...... Happy crafting!