Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to each one of you, my dear blog friends. You are indeed a gift to me. 

May you feel the wonder of Christ-child as we celebrate the day of His birth.

Much love and blessings to each of you.

Betsy

Brrrrrr!

Like most of the rest of the country we are having bitterly cold weather this morning. The windchill is -47F as I type this. We didn’t get nearly as much snow as was predicted… or maybe we did, but it all blew around and so there was no drifting that I can see from the apartment. They were out at 4:30 this morning with snow plows in the parking lot and snow blowers and shovels for the sidewalks. I don’t think many people will be venturing out today though.

I thought I would share a few of my Christmas treasures with you. Some of you will probably remember these little poinsettia girls. I made them the first Christmas we were married in a ceramics class I took with Dennis‘s mom. The sweet little wooden snowman has pride of place next to them. Cindy from the “Delighted Hands” blog on my side bar made this for me. I treasure it.

Here is our little Christmas tree. Remember it from our winter in the camper? It’s perfect for our apartment. I bought a tiny little black and white buffalo check tree skirt for it yesterday at Hobby lobby for $1.50. All of their Christmas decor is 70% off. Piper and I had a grand time wandering around those aisles looking at treasures. Papa just followed us all over the store.  He’s a very willing servant to Piper, (and me too.)😍

We spent the morning yesterday taking Piper Christmas shopping for mommy and daddy. She had a list and she checked it twice! She knew exactly what stores she wanted to go to and exactly what she wanted to buy. Then we came back to the apartment and she wrapped them. We picked up lunch and shared it with Mandy before coming back home to try to beat the big storm.

In the afternoon they made these Christmas trees downstairs in the craft room. It was a lot of fun, I’m just not sure where I will put this. Super simple if you have a glue gun and extra ornaments.

While working on one of my Christmas projects I broke a knitting needle cable and had to wait over a week for the new one to arrive to finish the gift.  I guess they do wear out after years of use. So, over period of three days I made this blanket. I absolutely love it. I showed you some of the snowflakes in my last post. I went around each one twice with red and then join them together and crocheted a border on it. I should be able to leave this out most of the winter as it’s not just a Christmas only design and it sure adds a pop of color to the apartment.

Oh my goodness, it is so cold outside! Brrrrr. I just came in from taking Zoey outside and I felt like my fingers were frozen in less than 30 seconds. It seems that most of the country is in the same predicament. I plan to stay home today and tomorrow because there’s lots to do around here.

My computer is still not repaired. I can’t believe how lost I feel without it. They had to order a new hard drive and now we’re being told it will be ready at end of this week which I’m guessing means tomorrow since it’s Thursday already! I’m  looking forward to being able to comment on your blogs again.

Dennis had a phone call this week from a local company asking if he was interested in working for them. They asked if he wanted part time or full-time and he said he would be interested in part-time.  He is at a job interview right now. He’s going a bit stir crazy here after working for so many years such long hours and I think he would enjoy getting out for a few hours every day. Me? I’m very content in our apartment visiting with the other people and taking part in some of the activities. 

This afternoon there is a scripture service with a carol sing that I’m hoping to go to. I’m still coughing and so singing isn’t very easy for me but I would enjoy hearing the others. I do love it here. Dennis and I are both much, much better, I just have a lingering cough and get tired easily. He seems as good as new. Thank you all for your prayers for us while we were recovering.

I pray that you all have a very blessed Christmas and safe travels if you’re going anywhere.

Blessings and love, 

Betsy

On The Mend!

Whew! That was certainly a harrowing week and a half. We seem to finally be on the mend after both taking five days of Paxlovid prescribed by our doctors to combat Covid. I’m still exhausted all the time and have a cough that I fear will hang on for awhile. Dennis is still pretty tired too and has a very deep voice these days. But, we have had two negative Covid tests over the last three days so we are no longer infectious. I did a grocery order last night for Walmart and we went and picked it up this afternoon. That is the first I’ve been out of the apartment building since a week ago last last Monday. I wouldn’t wish this on anyone. So much for having the original immunizations and the boosters. I was even too tired to knit or crochet for a lot of the time. You know that for me that’s nearly impossible. I hadn’t made it through an entire movie or television show in over a week without falling asleep until today!

I still have one last Christmas present to finish but the cable for my interchangeable knitting needles broke and I had to order a new one. It won’t be here until next Monday, so I will be knitting down to the wire on that present. I have started a few other things in the meantime though.

Several of the crochet podcasts that I watch have made a granny snowflake blanket. I am making my own version of it, called the “snowflake granny square”. It’s a free pattern on Ravelry. I’m making the center of the square, the snowflakes, white and I’m finishing the square with red and then will join them together. I hope to have it finished before Christmas and it will be a blanket I can leave out all winter. I almost made one that has Christmas trees in the center instead of a snowflake, but changed my mind because I want to be able to leave it out longer than just the Christmas season.

This is a black-and-white photo of the front page of the pattern. Where it looks black it will actually be red in my blanket. I’ve seen people use light blue and midnight blue for the border and sparkly white for the snowflake. Every one of them is beautiful. I just started the snowflakes tonight and I have one square completely finished and 10 more snowflakes crocheted.

It is a super easy pattern and should crochet up in no time. It’s nice to be crocheting again after so much knitting the past several months.

Below is a baby blanket. My niece Chaela gave me the pattern and the yarn a couple of months ago. She said there was no hurry to finish it since her nephew that she bought the yarn for graduated from high school this past year. Ha! So I’m making the blanket to give back to her and she’ll have it as a gift next time a friend has a baby. I took this photo after midnight and the yarn looks very washed out, but it is Bernat softee baby in the baby denim marl color-way. I just started the blanket yesterday and I have about 12 inches done on it so far.

The next two photos I took while waiting in the car for Dennis to come out of the computer shop. We’ve had light snow all week long with little to no accumulation. It sure looks pretty coming down though. Compared to the Dakotas and Minnesota we came out light in the snow scale! Aren’t these snowflakes beautiful though?



And on the computer front I will hopefully have my laptop back by the middle of next week. What a nightmare this is all been. And to have it happen while being sick with Covid is even worse. Every day we have a new nasty surprise with our bank account. I’m determined not to let it get me down though, during this Christmas season of celebrating our Lord‘s birth. It just means I’m not able to comment on any of your blogs right now, but as I said before, I am reading them and trying to keep up with all of you. Hopefully I will be back to commenting soon!

And now I need to go to bed as it’s almost 12:30 in the morning. My sleep schedule is not normal right now after being sick. Take care of yourselves and try to avoid this nasty stuff. Wishing you all a wonderful weekend and I’ll be back again soon.

Blessings and love,

Betsy