How I Learned To Crochet Snowflakes, and Catching Up.

1.   Copy a crocheted star garland pattern from  Becca's Patina Moon blog.  Print out and save the instructions with the best of intentions.  

2..  Get inspiration from Amy’s  Keep'n The Sunny Side  blog  post on crocheting snowflakes as well.
(Click on the word blog to visit either site.)

3.   Take  the star garland crochet pattern to JoAnn's and search for the correct sized crochet hook  and  linen yarn.

4.  Wonder if  that linen yarn  is available at a specialty yarn store, because JoAnn’s  doesn’t have it.

5.  Decide that maybe crocheting  a star garland with linen yarn isn’t going to happen yet.

6.  While at the store, remember Amy’s snowflake garland and decide to purchase fuzzy white Wool Ease yarn which is a  wool and acrylic blend.

7.  Later in the afternoon  call three friends  to ask some basic questions on how to start.

8.  Leave messages on all three answering machines because no one’s home.

9.  Wonder about calling a fourth friend who also crochets when the phone rings with helpful answers from the first friend to get home.  Thanks B.

10.  Feel stupid asking about how to even find the end of the yarn without destroying the skein and ending up with a huge knotted mess.  I know the end is tucked  inside, but I couldn't find it.    I also needed to know if I  should wind the yarn into a ball before even starting to crochet snowflakes.

11.   Find Amy’s post on the crocheted snowflakes that has the necessary You Tube video instructions. 

12.  Stop and start video  twenty times while trying to understand and keep up with the instructor.
The Kindle was handy  and right there in my lap to watch  as I struggled with  the instructions from a right handed person.  I’m a lefty.

13.  Answer phone and greet husband who is on his way home.   Realize that dinner time is in  20 minutes when he gets home and I hadn’t even thought of what to make for dinner yet.  Thanks be to Trader Joe’s for some tasty  selections from their freezer section.  Because I can steam broccoli  quickly and put  a 'good enough' dinner on the table when I’d been gone most of the day.

14.  Return to the crochet project and continue to restart the video a hundred thousand times.

15.  Realize that even slightly fuzzy yarn is not a beginners best friend.   Shoo Liberty away  several times.

16.   Trade a hand full of treats for my  skein of yarn with a half finished snowflake.   Not an easy quest when Liberty decides that that skein of yarn was just too enticing and she wanted to keep it.  Keep away is Liberty’s favorite game….   I think I’ve said that before.

 17.  Continue  to stop and start the video  and finally finish my first crocheted snowflake.

18.  Decide I need written instructions so that I wouldn’t use up what’s left of my monthly bandwidth allotment by watching this one 13 minute video over and over.

   Restart the video one more time and  hand write the instructions into a notebook.  At the same time, I’m using my cell phone  as a voice recorder so that I can listen to that instead of the video.

19.   Start a second crocheted  snowflake and concentrate on how the yarn is supposed to flow through the fingers with the correct tension.   Decide to have the ladies show me how to wind the yarn through my fingers  Sunday night at Bunco.

20.  Set aside the yarn for a second.    Then retrieve the skein of yarn and a half finished crocheted snowflake from Liberty yet again.   Curse.

21.  Resume the project with wet slobbery yarn.

22.  Finish the second snowflake.  It only took 4 hours to make two snowflakes.      I need 10.

23.  Lie awake early in the morning with this very blog post running trough my head.  Get up and write all this down and save it for when I have a guilt free blogging block of time.

24.  Use phone video  camera to record the you tube video.  Now I can watch the video on the phone any time I need to and watch it without using bandwidth.  Smart idea and yeah, it happens once in awhile.

25.  Sunday night:  Take photo of friends hands while asking questions on just how to hold the yarn                   through the fingers.

26.  Eleven snowflakes later:    Finally get it.  Can now crochet a snowflake in 30 minutes or perhaps 20 without distractions.

27.  Realize that one of the snowflakes in the above photos is backwards.
28.  Refuse to care.
29.  Wonder about how to attach snowflakes to a chain stitched banner line and think of stitching some pearl beads to the snowflakes.
30.  Remember to say this.  Pine cone pitch and crochet don't mix. 

Whew!  Time for tea.

This seasonal flavored tea 

from Trader Joe's is my current

wet weather favorite.

I didn't try it last year 

when I first noticed it, because 

I'm not all that fond of peppermint.

But after hearing good reviews of it

from another blogger this year,

 I decided to try it.

Not only does it have peppermint leaf

 as it's first ingredient. it also includes 

 green tea, orange peel, vanilla

cinnamon, milk thistle, blackberry leaves

carob, chicory and vanilla bean. Zero calories.

There's a touch of sugar as the next to last

ingredient. Doesn't that sound good?

It is.

Speaking of wet weather.

We've made it through four back to back

storms with tons of rain.

The lake level went up twenty feet in one week.

Not kidding at all.

It has rained buckets.

Now it's time to catch up with 

 a couple of answers 

 to previous blog post comments.

Connie asked me  what the difference was 

between heavy cream, and whipping cream.

I didn't know off hand.

 I just know they're pretty much interchangeable.

  I did look it up

to find that heavy cream has 36% milk fat.

Whipping cream has 30 to 36% milk fat 

and it often contains stabilizers and emulsifiers.

Missy asked what's the name of this mountain.

It's Mt. Shasta

here in northern CA.

Liberty update.

Shhh... She's sleeping right now.

Liberty showed some swelling in

her belly where her incision is last Friday night.

So we took her in for a checkup with her doctor

first thing Saturday morning.

It's not infected and there's no redness or heat.

She's been too active and has irritated her 

inside stitches.  So... she's on tranquilizer pills

for a week to give her a chance to heal better.

It hasn't slowed her down much.

But she's sleeping right now,

and that's a good thing!