Beautiful Days And A Bit Of Traveling.

I have been absent for a few days. More about that down below, but first I wanted to show you this house that’s across the street from Brad and Mandy’s. Look how tall that skeleton thing is on the left side of the garage! I can’t believe how many houses are decorated up for Halloween these days, and the money that must be spent on all of the decorations.

Dennis and I decided to take a little trip to the Amana colonies. We had reservations during that terrible heat wave a while back, but decided to reschedule. We had a wonderful time. The photo below shows me sitting at a table in the Ox Yoke Inn in Main Amana. They serve the most fantastic German food you can imagine. You can choose to order just a plate like you would get in a regular restaurant, or to have it served family style where the bowls of food are unending! We used to come over here about once a year when our kids were small. They would stay with Dennis’s parents, and this was our weekend getaway for the big people. 😍 The seven towns that make up the Amana colonies are located just a short distance from the Iowa/Illinois border, just north of interstate 80.

There are lots of shops, museums, furniture, bakeries, workshops, and even a woolen mill there. The streets are all very walkable, and each village is located just one days drive away from each other by ox cart. Although the villages are called the Amana colonies, the people who settled there are not Amish. There are Amish people living, not too far away though.

This was our room in our bed and breakfast. I absolutely loved the bed. Both of us said it was the most comfortable bed by far, away from home, that we’ve ever slept in. Isn’t it pretty? We were able to have the window open all night long and you couldn’t hear a thing. I never heard a car drive-by or anyone outside walking. So different from living in the city.

This bed-and-breakfast has 15 rooms, each decorated completely differently, and with their own private bath. We highly recommend it if any of you are interested in a trip here. Marc and Julie are the owners who are about our age. They are getting ready to retire for the second time. In his former life, Marc was a mechanical engineer! The bed-and-breakfast was just put up for sale for only $650,000. That is a steal! The Inn is booked solid on weekends all year long, and in the spring, summer and fall it’s almost always full. Also around the holidays. It is immaculately kept, and I love the way they had it decorated. Name of the bed-and-breakfast is Die Heimet it’s located in Homestead, Iowa.

Here is Dennis taking a break before we went out to visit the shops again!

He must have really been concentrating on his breakfast this morning when I took this picture. Doesn’t he look serious? The breakfasts here are amazing. This morning was an egg and cheese frittata with spinach and tomatoes, a fruit cup, (that we had already eaten), homemade cinnamon rolls, and fresh squeezed juice. Everything was homemade. Even the cinnamon rolls were made by June early this morning. 

Last night I took this photo of the sideyard our bedroom window looked out onto. If it hadn’t been so chilly, we would have gone out and sat on the double swing for awhile. Got down to 37° last night though.

Dennis found me a sweet little sheep at the Woolen Mill store. This was made from wool right there in the colonies. He knows I have a special place in my heart for little lambs.

I’ve been working on the Christmas cross-stitch ornaments for a few weeks. I’m almost done with the actual cross-stitch of the sixth one and I have seven to make in total. I chose a more intricate design than I usually do. After that, I have to go back and do the outlining on each one, and put the names and year on them, and then sew them into the actual ornaments. Lots of work left to do! They will eventually be Christmas ornaments for our kids and grandkids.

One of the ladies at the over 55 apartment building where we lived last year, asked me if I would make her a scarf. She’s very tiny and so the scarves she buys at stores are always too wide and too long for her. She asked for a scarf between 30 and 36 inches long. This one turned out to be 33 1/2 inches. I use the “Dudester” pattern which I think is free on Ravelry. Dennis picked it out because I made him a scarf several years ago with the same pattern, only much longer and one with repeat wider. I used I love this yarn in the color “purple gradient”. It used exactly one skein.

I’m also working on another prayer shawl using more of the Baby Bee Sweet Delight  in the color “naked”. It’s the same pattern and yarn I used for the baby blanket in my last post. I’ve just adjusted it to be more narrow and I’ll make it much longer. It was a convenient project to work on in the car during our trip. We drove all the way across Iowa and back again, so I got a lot of crocheting done. On the way home today we stopped in Atlantic, Iowa for lunch. We like to find small local diners to eat in when we’re traveling instead of the big chains. We ate at the Farmers Diner and it was wonderful! We both got huge bacon cheeseburgers for $5.99! Unbelievable!

The world does give us a lot to worry about these day doesn’t it? I’ve been spending a lot of time with the Lord in prayer for the situations happening around the world, especially in Israel and Gaza. My heart goes out to the innocent people on both sides of the conflict. But, since I am a natural worrier, I have to remind myself often of what the following photo says.

The following made me smile when I saw it. You better believe I would have the door open very quickly!

Wishing you all a very wonderful and blessed Wednesday and all the days following.

Blessings and love,

Betsy