Let's Change the Subject

Lou's coming home for a quick visit this week and on Thursday we're planning a little alone time at the above hotel. It's the Marriott Renaissance in Detroit. Lovely hotel. Can't wait. Concierge level you know. It's one of the perks of having a husband who's never home. When he travels it's mostly Fairfield and Courtyards but when he takes me places I get the good stuff because of all the points he's collected.

Again this is a huge mishmash but here goes. While I was in Delaware Brittney painted the kitchen. This is the color of the wallpaper and trim before the painting.

Here it is after the painting. It's a very lovely red with the very palest of yellows for the trim.

I know that neither of these are very good pictures but the kitchen is in the middle of the house and the lighting stinks. The cabinets are very dated and I hate the tile counter tops but the paint makes a huge difference until I can get my crap together and budget for a real kitchen remodel.

Maggie in the pool in Delaware with her cousins Taylor and Kelly. Hard to believe that 6 months ago this kid was petrified of swimming pools.

Did I mention that my parents came for a visit? It's been a couple of years since they'd been here and it was the first time my mom was introduced to my fibery world in depth.

Ok. funny story. Before my mom came her friend offered her some wool to give to me. Usually they throw away all of the wool when they sheer these sheep. Never one to turn down a free fleece I said "Great! What kind of sheep is it from?" Mom said "I don't know I'll ask".

A couple of days later she calls me back and says that her friend asked the person who owns the sheep and they said.....

Ready?

Grazing Sheep!

Well, I just started laughing and laughing. I'm still laughing.

So she brought the bag of wool. It was HUGE. It took up half my trunk. It weighed over 30 pounds. There were 7 fleeces inside and it was good medium wool. I thought it was Romney or something close. It was very dirty but pretty fine as far as medium wool goes. I saved out a fleece and took the rest to be processed at Zeilinger's. Turns out it's Horned Dorset. It's very lovely and I can't wait to get the roving back.

O.K. here's another short story. My mom is in my shop for the first time and I have some posters hanging showing different sheep breeds. She is studying them one by one and finally says, "So can you show me a picture of a regular sheep?" Again I am laughing and I say"WHAT?" She says, "You know regular sheep, like everybody has." I said, "I'll show you a regular sheep if you can show me a regular dog."

Here's my dad. Cute isn't he? And a saint for putting up with the mother for so long.

Ryan needed a haircut. Nothing like trying to get an even cut on a moving target. He only obliged because he watched my dad get his hair cut first.

Ryan's first scooter. I meant to post this earlier for my darling but was sidetracked. So there you go Lou - now that you'll see it in person in 2 days.

We went to Frankenmuth to drop off the fleeces and also show my parents around. My dad took a carriage ride with the kids while my mom and I went to the craft fair that was there that weekend.

Here are some bronze shoes and socks which are part of one of the Frankenmuth fountains.

We ate at Zehnder's. It was my first time and it was delicious! You can get family style chicken dinners here with everything you could want. I would totally recommend this place. If you don;t want chicken they do have other things on the menu too.

At the end of your meal everyone gets ice cream with a little plastic toy in it. My dad's was the mermaid.

Nora's toes just cause they're cute. Eight month old baby toes in nail polish and little thong sandals. Adorable.

I finally finished the support spindle skein. It's qiviut and silk done on an Ann Grout Acorn spindle. It took me 2 full months of regular spinning to finish it. It weighs 1.05 ounces so I need to do some more for the wrap card. I think there is about 650 yards. I can' remember. I did count it but I'll have to get back to you.

Look at that! I think I'm going to put it in the fair. I wrapped it on a plastic niddy and washed it and dried it right on the niddy. I really want to try slapping a skein around because I've never finished a skein by fulling but this is not the one to experiment with.