Amazingly, I'm Back!

The 4th of July weekend is upon us and it has cooled down from the triple digits to the nineties which seem much cooler in comparison.  We were even able to open all the windows last night, which I love to be able to do.  

I continue to work on my autumn cross stitch picture and here's where I was earlier today:

Isn't that just the cutest house?  As I mentioned in my last post, simple but with details that take it a step above primitive.  

And here are a couple pictures of the completed Christmas tree quilt top.  So glad to finally be done with it! I do like it very much in spite of the fussy nature of all the triangles.  

Of course it still needs to be quilted, but I can wait on that.  Now it's on to making Daniel some new boxers for his jammies.  They're all cut out and ready to go.  

Maybe I'll get going on them tomorrow. That sounds like a good 4th of July project!  Too hot to be outside much and my sewing room is air conditioned.  :-)  

And that's it from the resort today!  ♥

Meanwhile . . .

Yes, April came and went, and so did May and now we're on the last day of June.  Boy, time sure flies when you just puttering along!

So what did I do?  Just the usual.  Cooking, cleaning, baking, you know, the usual household chores.  And reading.  Lot and lots of reading. I've always loved to read and having that Kindle Unlimited subscription just put lots of fun books at my fingertips.  So I indulged.  I'm a fan of cozy mysteries.  A few murders, but no gore, ugly violence or bad words.  Just entertainment.  And I was entertained.  

So now I'm slacking off the reading a little and working on some counted cross stitch.  A number of years ago I did three little Prairie Schooler seasonal scenes and I found the fourth one last winter. Unfortunately I had to buy a booklet that included the ones I had already made to get it. It's an autumn one so I decided to get cracking on it so I'd have it ready when fall comes.  Guess what?  It's as much fun as a cozy mystery!  

Here's a picture showing all of the four seasons:

I'm working on the one in the lower left and here's where I was earlier today:

These little designs just make me happy.  Prairie Schooler is the company that does the yearly St. Nicholas's I have been stitching out for years.  I love the colors they use and the simple yet detailed designs.  Primitive but not excessively so.  (And I love borders!)

The weather here has been hot.  HOT I say!  It was over 107° today and yesterday, and it's supposed to last through the weekend.  I'm so very thankful for air conditioning!  

And finally, what about that Christmas tree quilt I started last winter?  Well, I finally got the last of the top pieced today.  Hopefully I'll be back to share about that soon!  ♥

April Come She Will

There is the sound of lawnmowers in the land!  (I hear one as I type.) The trees are starting to turn green!  The sun has shone for the past four days! We won't go into the snow that fell last week, or the wind that blew and blew and blew.  April has finally arrived!  

Not much else is going on here at the resort.  A little of this, a little of that.  And "that's all she wrote" for now! (My dad's favorite saying for something that was done.) ♥

Sunshine and Snow

A Facebook friend posted this little hummer this morning and it's a perfect fit for this day--we woke up to high winds and snow.  

The sun is out now, but it's still windy and cold. It's a shoes, socks, t-shirt and cozy shirt over the t-shirt, coffee in hand kind of day.  They predicted that we might lose power, but thankfully that did not happen although we have friends on a rural power company and they did lose power late yesterday afternoon.  Of course the problem for them, and also for us when it happens, is that they also lost access to water because they have their own well.  They have horses and she said that fortunately the horse trough was full so they could grab bucketsful and at least make their toilets flush.

  

We've been enjoying watching the Gonzaga Zags basketball team in the March Madness playoffs. Ann and her gang have come over for several of the games which has made for some fun parties, especially when "our" team wins!  We have high hopes for Tuesday night's game!

Bruder Bear and Karen are due to arrive Wednesday for an overnighter on their way to daughter Kirsten's house for Easter so we have more fun in store.  Thankfully we did a good house cleaning last week so no pressure to get it done now.  Ann, Eric and boys will be here for Easter dinner on Sunday.  We'll have our usual ham/salads/pies picnic.  Yum!

So that's the latest from here at the resort.  The quilt has seen quite a bit of progress and I'll do an update soon, but it will most likely be April by then.  ♥

March

March is such a strange month.  Weather all over the place, daylight savings time kicks in (and kicks me!), and it's neither winter nor spring. But, it is what it is.  Even the muse has been missing.

I have been reading lots of fun "cozy mysteries" on my iPad using Kindle Unlimited.  I've kept up the subscription as it's less than ten dollars a month.  You can hardly buy one paperback for that price and the library has been either closed or on weird hours due to the virus, so it's been a treat to be able to prowl for books and download whatever strikes my fancy.  I'm currently on a series in England in the l930s.  

The sewing room has actually been seeing a little of me and I'm working on a Christmas quilt from a kit Dan got me for Christmas.  It's been a little slow going as the template that was sent to use with it had an error in it.  It took some doing to get that settled and then I had to figure out how to line up the different pieces as they're triangles. Tricky to do to get them placed properly before stitching, but now that I've gotten the hang of it, I'm finding it fun.  A learning process for certain though. In the picture below, only the top row of trees is done.  Hard to tell since the white triangles between are the same color as my flannel backdrop.

And a further update on the new dishwasher, christened Louise by Dan (also called Weezy and LuLu).  She continues to perform perfectly!  I'm so happy! ♥

As February Draws to a Close

We had snow in October, snow after Christmas, and now February has brought winter back in full force.  We must have gotten at least a foot of snow last week, and almost every morning since then we've gotten up to more.  Yesterday it snowed and this morning we had snow and wind.

It was amazing to watch.  I'm attempting to insert a video of it, so we'll see how it does.  UPDATE: I published and it seems to work just fine.  It's fun to watch in full screen! Brrrrr!!

In two short days March will be upon us and I think I'm ready.  Spring is starting to sound very good.  ♥

The Big Snow

For once the forecasters seem to have hit it right. We've had a little snow over the past week, but then we began to hear that a big storm was coming, followed by yet another one.  And we have snow! Over a foot with more to come starting later today.  It's gorgeous and only in the twenties, so we have it much better than the south.  I hear Texas is a mess--single digit temperatures and no power; they're having a very bad time.   

But here at the resort we are enjoying a beautiful, cozy day. Coffee cake for breakfast, cups of warm coffee and tea, a little counted cross stitch and a fun books to read.  The big grandsons have taken off to do some skiing.  Ahh, the young!! Meanwhile, D is enjoying a little sledding.

Here are a couple of pictures from here at the Resort this morning.

View out the back--not a black and white photo!

The front view.  Boxwood marshmallows!

  Brrr!! Stay warm!!  ♥

Hello!

Well hello there!  Here it is, Presidents' Day weekend and Valentine's Day all in the same few days.  How quickly February passes.  And today is the birthday of one of our nieces.  Party on!

It's been a beautiful day.  Snow was forecast overnight, but it didn't begin until about daybreak.  It's cold, very cold as in the teens, and so even though it snowed almost all day, we got maybe three inches of very light, fluffy snow. We are supposed to get more over the weekend so we'll see how it goes.  

I don't have a lot of Valentine decorations, but I did make that runner last year with a kit from Shabby Fabrics so this is its first appearance.  I do love it!

I still use the four red hearts on sticks that Daniel gave me when he was five.  They warm my grammy heart each year when I get them out. Treasures, that's what they are.  

And of course, we must have the appropriately colored peanut M&M's in a bowl.  

I'm continuing to stitch away on my counted cross stitch.  I ordered a few more patterns for the Prairie Schooler Santas from more recent years and they came.  I saw a framed piece someone from the Instagram group for the Santas did and I'm hoping to do something similar.  It will probably take me a year or so though, so don't hold your breath!  :-)

And last, I ordered a new Instant Pot cookbook by the Six Sisters and it came.  I think it's going to be a good one!

Hope everyone is keeping warm!  This cold seems to be affecting a large part of our country.  But it is winter! ♥

Sunday Evening

Well, I just remembered that I'd better pop on and at least say I'm here! It's been a lovely, relaxing day with snow falling throughout.  They said we'd maybe get half an inch, but at least three are down, and since it's still snowing, maybe more by morning.  Dan plowed this afternoon and I napped.  Sounds like a good balance of effort, doesn't it?  :-)

We stopped at Subway to grab a couple of subs for lunch after church. I've found a new one I really like--teriyaki sweet onion.  I get a foot-long and save the other half for lunch the next day. Rats, now that I'm thinking about it, I want to go and eat it now.  Must.Be.Strong. Must.Be.Strong.

Tomorrow I need to get serious about beginning my Christmas baking. Think I'll start with a couple of cookie recipes, one that needs refrigerating, and one I can bake right away.  Now that I've written that, I'll have to be accountable.  

Here's a closeup of the top of the china hutch featuring a little counted cross stitch scene, also designed by The Prairie Schooler. 

Stay warm out there!  Winter seems to have arrived in all its icy beauty. ♥ 

And the Snow Came Down

 

And I'm thrilled I'm finally getting the camera figured out and was able to capture the snow as it fell.  It was so beautiful!  And yes, I had Christmas music playing.  ♥

A Tale of a Rotisserie Chicken. . . and Stew

I mentioned that we went to Costco a week or so ago. One of the things we purchased was a rotisserie chicken for the amazing price of $4.99.  I meant to have it for dinner that night when we got home, but we were later getting to Costco than I had anticipated, which meant we were later leaving, so we popped into Taco Time and got a bite.  Which was interesting because they served it to us in a bag, which we carried to an available table and unpacked.  Such strange times. . .

Anyway, the chicken became our Saturday night dinner, and then again on Sunday.  And there was so much left!! A day or so later, I decided to chop some up and make chicken and black bean enchiladas.  The recipe said it made four or five, but I ended up with a dozen!  I froze six and we ate the other six that night and the next. And still there was chicken left, so I chopped it up and froze it.  Saturday night I decided to make pizza and opted for white sauce and the frozen chicken, along with a little Canadian bacon, red peppers and olives.  We ate the pizza for two nights and I ate the rest for lunch today. (Dan was so kind to let me have it!) And we still have those six enchiladas in the freezer.  That $4.99 chicken has already fed us numerous meals with two still to go. I feel kind of like it was the loaves and fishes!  I think I'll be buying another soon.  

And stew?  We have had a very cold November.  We have snow again, with more forecast for tonight and tomorrow night.  I love cold weather cooking--soups, stews, breads, muffins.  Right after breakfast this morning I pondered supper.  I knew I had some potatoes and celery in need of using up, so I thought of stew.  I have a recipe I clipped from the paper years ago called Five Hour Midnight Stew.  It's fairly simple, but you have to remember to get started early as it bakes in the oven for five hours as the title states.  

It tasted so good!  I had some leftover muffins from a couple of weeks ago in the freezer so I zapped them to complete our dinner.  There's lots of stew left, so I'm good to go for a few nights.  ♥

Snoctober!

Well.

I took some photos of our beautiful leaves last Thursday night.  The yard and the trees were so beautiful!

And then Friday came.  And so did the snow.  

This was just the beginning.  We ended up with about four inches.  And it's still here!!  I feel like it must be December.  (I have refrained from playing Christmas music, however!) Five days of snow and cold in October.  Tomorrow is supposed to finally be above freezing and then maybe the snow will melt.  

We stayed in and cozied up to the fireplace and I've been knitting away on those brown socks.  Good news!  I should be done tomorrow.  I was able to get away with undoing just the toe of the too-short-sock and I'll be the first to say how amazed I am. I'm just glad it worked!  Time for a new color of yarn!

I'm also getting the Christmas wall hanging quilted, a little at a time.  I finally decided to just stitch in the ditch using my Bernina 830 and a walking foot.  I'm so thankful for a machine with a large throat space and my nice sewing cabinet so that everything is level with room to spread out.  Spoiled, that's what I am.  

Well, that's the latest here at the Resort.  Just trying to stay warm and get a few projects done. I made a yummy ham and pea soup in the Instant Pot this week and that's kept our tummies warm, along with muffins.  I do love winter cooking!  ♥

Last Day of September

How can it be the end of September already?  But as I look outside, I definitely see signs of fall--leaves turning color, that blue, blue sky of late September, early October.   Such beautiful days we've been having! Perfect, as a matter of fact.  

Now that I've finished the peaches, I've taken a few "lazy days" and relaxed with some reading and knitting. I'm still working on the brown tweed socks of last spring and discovered that somehow I made the first one too short in the foot area.  Never mind.  I'll see if I can rip back and go again.  If not, I'll just reknit the whole thing.  Mindless, relaxing work.  Sounds good.

Here's a few picture of our house ready for the season. 

I love the fall additions to the hearth.

My favorite corner.

We took a big plunge last week and met with a contractor to do some much needed work on two of our bathrooms.  The lovely (not!) green tub, the last vestige of that awful color in the downstairs bath, will be replaced with a walk-in shower and the upstairs guest bathtub will get a beautiful new surround.  I'm so excited!  He said they would get to it in six to eight weeks, so all should be done by Christmas.  

Meanwhile, we are also toying with raising the sunken living room to the level of the rest of the main floor.  Our advancing years are making us ponder work that could enable us to stay here more years and that step down was a real headache for my parents.  Mom crashed twice when she forgot to step down. 

It's pumpkin season!!  Let the leaves fall and the wind blow and candy corn rule!  ♥ 

Puttering Along

This week started out with a fun evening on Monday.  It was my belated birthday party!  Dan and Ann finally found a time when all the local family could get together so we celebrated with pizza and cake.  We had such a good time! If I don't make our pizza (and who does for their own birthday party?), we get Papa Murphy's.  Our gang of boys love the 5-meat stuffed pizza so we had one of those and then our usual "chick" pizza with the addition of sausage to keep those boys happy.  Dan bought me a beautiful cake and we ended with it and ice cream.  Mmmm...

At this stage of our lives Dan and I rarely buy one another a birthday present because there's not much we don't already have.  He won my heart by buying me a box of Hostess Orange Cupcakes which are my guilty pleasure.  

Ann got me a bag of goodies from the stationery department--flower post-it notes, and another package of colorful ones,  a beautiful journal and a pack of gorgeous felt-tip pens.  So much fun!!

I love, love, love colorful pens!  I've started on the journal and used two colors so far.  The journal cover says "grand plans", and as I wrote, I don't really have any besides knitting, stitching and spending time with my family.  Enough and more!

Meanwhile, the week was a scorcher!  After moderate weather most of the summer, true August arrived this week.  

Not quite as hot as the day I was born which Mom said was 109°. And in an unairconditioned hospital.  I've disliked hot weather ever since.  ♥

It's a Knitting Kind of Day--In August!!

Yes, people, it's barely sixty degrees and cloudy out there.  Brrr! I'm thinking of picking up my knitting needles and getting back to a pair of socks I started earlier this year.  It's just that kind of day.  

Dan and I have been saying for the past few years (maybe even ten), that fall seems to arrive in August anymore.  When we were kids the famous words were "hot August nights", but we've burrowed under the covers all month.  And daytime temperatures have been mostly in the eighties.  We're not complaining! Dan grew up in Spokane and remembers many hot, hot days and nights and the little town I grew up in was in a canyon and never cooled off at night after day temperatures in the nineties and hundreds.  I remember laying on top of the covers and having the windows and curtains wide open hoping for cooler air.  No one had air conditioning in those days.  

(And let me drift off, for a moment, and remember shopping for school clothes on 90 plus degree days in unairconditioned stores, trying on wool sweaters and skirts.  And of course, we did this in the nearest "big" town, so my mom, coming from the Seattle area, insisted we had to dress up to go to town and that included wearing nylons.  Yikes!  Of course our car had no air conditioning either, and it was a 45-minute or longer drive to get there.  There was, of course, the ol' "four-sixty air conditioner" -- sixty miles an hour with all four windows rolled down, but that created havoc with our hair. . .)*

Suffice it to say that I'm not the least bit sorry to have a cool day today.  Here's a picture of my finished quilt top on my design wall.  I think I've come up with my quilting plan so hopefully I'll get to that in a few days.

I've been in a baking mood since finishing the top and tried Joanna Gaines recipe for blueberry rolls to great success.  If you have her second cookbook, I can totally recommend her recipe.  Our zucchini have come on and I made a double batch of zucchini bread two days ago. An old standby, but still so delicious!  Just had a mid morning snack (or as the British call it, elevenses) of a piece with my coffee.  

And last, here's a picture of the butte and sky to our south taken a few evenings ago.  Love the light.

And that's the news for now!  ♥

* I realize I've used "of course" three times in a row in this paragraph, but on reflection, they needed to stay. They define the situation.  Of course! 

Crazy!

Well.  

What a day it's been.  Four snowstorms, sunshine, a virus version of a birthday party, and an earthquake.  Yes, that's right, an earthquake.  

So, to back up, we got up early this morning and my husband daringly went out in search of some items I longed for in my kitchen.  Specifically, King Arthur bread flour, and cream cheese.  There were other things, of course, but those were tops on my list.  He scored!!  As I told one of my nieces, I feel like the richest lady in town.  

And then it snowed.  Really, really snowed, and everything turned white.  And a while later, the sun came out.  Repeat three more times during the day.  

And then the birthday "party."  One of the dearest ladies I know, a friend from the first days we moved here, has a birthday today.  Her daughter came up with a genius idea for a way to celebrate Gill's (she's from England, so it's pronounced Jill) day.  She emailed a few people, asked them to email others, and so on.  We were all to drive by Gill's house at 2:30, bring a flower, and honk our horns.  They would have Gill on the front porch.  At the appointed time, I found myself in my car, down the que about five cars, and it began as more and more cars showed up.  As we got to the front of the house, Gill was on the porch and her daughter had a bucket to gather the flowers as we drove by.  I am allergic to most flowers so I took some of the quilted potholders I made before Christmas.  They did have flowers on them!  Gill was absolutely overcome as car after car drove up. What a wonderful gift for her!

And then, the earthquake.  About five, I was sitting here at my computer when all of a sudden things seemed to start moving.  Was I dizzy?  No!  The curtains were moving, Dan's empty recliner was rocking, the whole house was moving!! I realized what it was and shouted to Dan who was in the basement.  It turns out it was a rather large quake situated in the center of our state, fortunately where there's not much of anything.  

What a day.  March is definitely not going out like a lamb.  ♥

January Days

It's been a dry winter and the last few days have been dark with lots of fog.  This means the days are not so beautiful, but the upside is that often, when it's cold enough, the fog freezes on the surrounding vegetation and creates frosted beauty that can take your breath away. Every little blade of grass and every twig will be covered with frost and the world becomes a fairyland.

Today, the frostline is higher than our house, but I just snapped this picture of the hill across the way.  The trees are white and beautiful with the fog hovering just at the top.

Sometimes we are tempted to call January "Janudreary", but it's amazing how any kind of white brightens up the day, even if it's not snow.  

Meanwhile, I continue to feel much, much better.  A little cough still lingers if I catch a whiff of any scent, but it's almost gone and I'm rejoicing!  I spent this morning running around town getting my hair cut and getting my teeth buffed and polished at the dentist.  I really need to be dusting and doing some laundry right now, but it'll wait a little longer.  We have leftovers for supper so I can putter where I want knowing I don't need to be in the kitchen.  Which reminds me; last night I made an old recipe for cauliflower and it was as good as I remembered.  

Frosted Cauliflower

1 head of cauliflower, cored and left whole

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1 T mustard

1/4 tsp onion powder

1/4 cup grated cheddar (I used Mexican blend)

paprika

Rinse cauliflower and place in microwave safe bowl and cover.  Cook 6-7 minutes per pound. Mix mayo, mustard and onion powder.  Spread over cooked cauliflower and sprinkle on the cheese.  Add a sprinkling of paprika and microwave another minute, uncovered.  

Way back in 1980 when Dan got me my first microwave for Christmas (I was so in hopes of getting one, I was like a kid and could hardly sleep that Christmas Eve!), it came with classes at the local appliance store where he purchased it.  This was one of the recipes we were given. I think I could eat the whole thing if given the chance. Yes, it's that good!

And now, I really need to get that last load in the washer. By then the dishwasher will be done and I'll need to empty that.  The dusting?  We'll see!  ♥

Baby, It's Cold Outside!

And if you don't believe the title, check out this picture of our indoor-outdoor thermometer, snapped just a bit ago:

Yes, dear readers, that appears to be the high point for the day because it's already dropped to 10.4 degrees. So thankful for a warm house, warm slippers, and hot coffee!  

I watched the D-man (Daniel) yesterday while Ann and Eric and Keaton were north of here at a Lego Robotics competition.  Eric headed up a team of six 12-year-old boys and they have worked all fall on their robot which had to meet certain criteria in a given scenario. They were rewarded with two first places and qualified for state competition! (Read about the program here.)  A full day, starting at six in the morning, didn't seem like the thing for a little guy, so I was happy to be able to spend the day with him so the others could enjoy the competition. We all had a great day!  And Papa Dan showed up in the afternoon bearing a Cyrus O'Leary sour cream lemon pie, so the three of us enjoyed a little "coffee break" with yummy slices. Daniel loved it!  We shared with the others when they got home.  And where was Cameron you ask? Well, he watched D until I arrived at ten, and then he worked on homework until it was time to be picked up at 12:30 to go play in two basketball games for his school. (He's on the JV team and is also often tapped to play with the varsity.) 

Meanwhile, Christmas is fast approaching and the other day I decided I'd see if I could get another pair of socks knitted for my mom.  I'm over half way done with the first, so I think I'll be able to do it!

If the yarn looks familiar it's because I knit my first pair (since high school that is) out of the same yarn two years ago.  I love how it creates such a unique and almost scandinavian pattern.  I think she'll like them!  

Keep warm!  ♥

The Heat Is On

It's August and it's hot.  Dan just snapped this photo on our indoor-outdoor thermometer:

Note the humidity:  17%.  The air is smokey and if you stand outside, there's strange feel to the air.  Dan says that's because of the low humidity and the angle of the sun; it's like you can feel the sun's burning rays.   I'm grateful I can be inside in air-conditioned comfort.

Meanwhile, I was supposed to be driving across central Washington on the way to Seattle with my mom and brother today, but because I'm still coughing and blowing my nose, I decided I couldn't go.  Mom is going to get a new lens implant and I didn't want her to get my cold, and even more, I didn't want her to get it and give it to my dad.  Dad had a terrible winter with his heart and pneumonia and there's no way I want to be responsible for his getting sick.  And I'm certain a hacking cough wouldn't have been good for Mom's eye.  Some of my coughs make me feel like my eyeballs could pop out and that couldn't be good for her implant. 

I hope you're staying cool. 

Did I Say Spring?

I slept in this morning.  Until 8:30, and it's a good thing I did, because I didn't see it snow which would have been quite disheartening.  Oh, it was wet when I got up, but it was pouring by then.  The rain has stopped now, and even a little sun is out, so I was able to capture this picture of the mountain sporting its new coating.

I'm reminded of 2008 when the last time it snowed was the Monday after school got out--June 10th. We got up to discover over an inch of snow that day, and all we could do was laugh. Imagine: the first day of summer vacation and it snowed!! Global warming doesn't seem to be much of a reality around here.

Meanwhile, as Kathy pointed out in her comment, my original post on spring did indeed return. How strange! The way things are looking, it'll be a while before I barbecue again, so I'm going to need to look at that picture every now and then.