04.30.07
Posted in Redwood Living at 1:35 pm by Lynette
For those of you who knew my Grandma Stoops, I’m sure you’ll recognize her face in mine.
This is the finished costume I’ll be wearing when we vend at shows. I represent a 1900’s era woman named Rosailina Worth. She was born in 1857 and would have been my Great Great Grandmother. I choose her because she lived on a farm, would have known how to knit and make her own clothes. She had 5 kids and would have been my age in the early 1900’s.
What do I have on? Let’s start at the bottom….1 pair crotchless pantaloons (vintage) , 1 petticoat (vintage) , the skirt I made because you cannot find anything original to fit a woman in today’s world. Finally an original apron with hand crochet lace.
The shawl I knit last fall, the shirt is a Wal Mart (gasp!) cotton shirt I re-worked to fit the era. The gloves I purchased from an antique mall and the Hat is an original and compliments of a vendor on ETSY. Finally the shoes are new but are reproductions and actually fit fairly well.
I can now say I know why these 1900’s women, especially the working class which is what I represent, wore those crotchless pantaloons and always had their sleeves rolled up. They were HOT with all those layers on; and to think it was only 65 degrees in our front yard.
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Posted in Redwood Living at 6:52 am by Lynette
As I’ve stated before, this is Little League season. We’ve worked ourselves thru just about half of the games. This past weekend was spent in Ferndale and Fortuna helping the Six River’s Little League celebrate their 50 year anniversary. It was a good experience for our guys even though our team lost all 3 games. A good experience because the Players AND the coaches learned some lessons like - be sure you listen to the correct base coach so there are not two of you on second base at the same time…..common guys, we are in the majors for goodness sake!
We (Del Norte Residents) have always known our neighbors to the south have many, many more players to draw from. Our population is about 28,000 for the whole county which is the northern most county of California. Whereas the city of Fortuna has a population of 10,000+. It is a fact that we cannot, usually, compete against our much larger neighbor. But occassionally we do pull out wins and it is a big deal for us.
Good job Pirates! They are the best team in our league this year and will go to the tournament of champions I’m sure. (Oh joy, we play them tonight….hopefully they will not slaughter us too badly!)
This week is also my #2 son’s birthday. The ‘baby’ is growing up…..
He’s 12 this Wednesday. I’m glad he’s having a better Little League season than when we started. He is talking about playing next year. This will be a coup for his team. The rules for Little League state you may not play if you turn 13 on or before May 1st. His birthday is May 2nd. That means he will be about 5′9 and 150 lbs playing 1st base. Ha! Ha! I know I posponed that C- Section for a reason! I better have that certified copy of his birth certificate with us at all times.
Let’s hope he’s not shaving by then!
Happy Birthday DJ….we’ve very proud of you!
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04.25.07
Posted in Festivals and Vending at Shows at 7:49 am by Lynette
Yesterday was spent up at Riyescott Ranch ironing out details about our future vending opportunities. We’ve decided to participate in the Tall Masted Ships event here in Crescent City. Two tall masted ships will be sailing into our harbor next Tuesday to help celebrate our City’s 150th anniversary. At first we choose not to vend due to the high price they were charging ($250 for 2 days). But it appears sanity has prevailed and they’ve lowered the cost. So we’re in.
Now the panic starts. We’re doing 3 events in the next 2 months. The first panic attack came when I realized I’ve not made my costume yet. I have bloomers, shoes, hat and a corset. BTW, forget that corset, not only does it not push up and suck in my waist, but I cannot breath or sit. Not a very nice sight in public, blue face and fainting. So I actually have bloomers, hat and shoes. I do have the fabric and patterns. Next week will be costume making with taking my measurements, a serious subject in itself!
The next series of panic waves came when I thought, what if we sell the majority of our products? What will we have for the Azalea Festival and Black Sheep? I foresee days of sock making, sitting until my arse is numb and my eyes crossed from picking up all those tiny stitches with size 1 needles. Linda Skyping my asking how things are coming. Both Linda and I will have raw fingertips from knitting, dying and felting. Won’t we be a sight? We’ve decided to keep the web store open through our vending events so feel free to visit and check us out.
In my minds eye I see us sitting in our 1900’s costumes, her spinning and me making socks on the Legare with gobs of folks watching and buying. Oh, did I mention we have period music, period posters and memorbilia? It will be nice, now if I can just get my ’stuff’ together and get busy. Not much blog posting for me in the next two weeks.
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04.21.07
Posted in Redwood Living at 11:39 am by Lynette
It was one of those moments when your son does something that makes you tear up. We watched the graduation, JK walked out after the ceremony, handed his Dad his badge and said “Pin me Dad”. Ahhhhh…sniff, sniff.
He could have done it himself, he could have asked me, he could have asked the girlfriend, but by asking his Dad it made the day complete.
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04.18.07
Posted in Redwood Living at 8:22 am by Lynette
The seasons have changed here on the Redwood Coast. It is the time of year when you take your life in your own hands by sitting on the front deck. Basically I’ve created my own problem by planting a butterfly/hummingbird friendly front yard. You see we have competing hummbing birds. After some research I’ve found that when a hummingbird finds a ‘food source’ they will defend it against all commers. This defense takes on the form of lighting speed dives, clicks, feather displays, squeals and dive bombs at anyone’s head who is near. Here is today’s winner.
(Sorry for the crooked picture, I was leaning over the stove and trying not to frighten him away). With all the flowers and trees blooming in the yard it is amazing these birds drink as much as they do. Yesterday I had that feeder filled up to the top. But I really shouldn’t complain. I make my mixture 1 - 1 sugar to water. My DH says I am a hummingbird drug pusher. They are addicted to the solution. No wonder they defend it from all the other hummers.
We leave in a couple of days to go watch the oldest son graduate from the ‘Academy’. This is a very big thing for JK. He is 22 and has made this decision (after many different jobs). This occupation will carry him to a very comfortable retirement. In a way I’ve been a bit jealous of him. He has tried out several occupations, attended college and flurted with becoming a Licensed Nurse. He has floated around the career pool for 4 years and finally decided upon working for the State of California. I never had the opportunity to test the waters, to decide for myself what I wanted to be. When I started college I was in shock and the decision was made for me by my Mother. You see my Father had passed away, unexpectedly, within 10 days of me graduating from high school. I really don’t remember if I was consulted but I found myself enrolled that fall in a business college and set on the path of a career in accounting. I wanted to be a radiologist or someone in a medicial support career. But instead I solgged through Business College and started my career in accounting. I was OK at it but never really embraced it as the career of my choice. It was my Mother’s choice and it did pay the bills.
Anyway, we are very excited, proud and thrilled he has made it through this 16 week academy. Thrilled because it is a tough class schedule with a lot of difficult subjects. Don’t get me wrong, JK is very smart, he writes well and is unbelievable fit (actually he is in the best shape of his life if I were to be honest!) It is just that he has struggled with ADHD. He has choosen not to use any of the commonly recommended treatment - drugs. He has worked out skills to overcome his ADHD and has succeeded. I only hope his fellow workers will go lightly on him. You see he and his dad will be working at the same location and I’m afraid he will be kidded quite a bit. Oh well, it is time to cut those apron strings, he can take care of himself. If it gets too bad I just might have to direct my husband to step in. We’ll see.
Finally, today is house cleaning. The Realtors will be visiting tomorrow and one is showing our home tomorrow night. While walking down the road the other day to get the mail, I was reflecting upon how much I’ll miss this house if we do sell and move. The youngest, KT, was walking with me. I told her about how I used to walk up and down our road for exercise while I was pregnant with her (I was 42 - gasp - and didn’t want to stray too far from home) I remember the first day of school for her and how she was very brave to ride the bus home. I remembered falling trees that blocked the road, pot hole filling (akkkk!) the house that almost burned down, the bear that visits our road in the fall and ransacks our apple tree…many memories but mostly I remember the birds. We’ve gotten so we can tell by their songs what kind they are. Flickers, Quail with their babies in the fall, Oregon Junkos, Warblers, Swallows these and many more visit our road during the various seasons. This takes me back to the beginning of this post. Hummingbirds. The rain has stopped and they hummers are once again feeding from the flowers in the yard. Maybe I’ll go sit out on the deck and watch. The house cleaning can wait.
My suggestion to you today is walk outside and take in some nature and have a beautiful day.
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04.17.07
Posted in Redwood Living at 8:00 am by Lynette
I talked with my oldest daughter last night in the wake of the shootings in Virginia. Many of us think, how could it have taken so long to notify the students and faculty that there was a problem? Didn’t they have an emergency plan? Had no one ever thought something might happen and there would come a need to close down the University?
I am sure we will see ongoing dialogue in the days/weeks/months to come regarding this issue. I expressed my concern and confusion re. the security/notification system on her University, Humboldt State. She brought some things to the conversation that I was unaware of.
1. There are no phones in the classrooms at Humboldt State. Therefore you could not send out a mass phone alert.
2. There is no alarm system to notify of a serious problem. No bells, no PA in each room.
3. There are computers in every room and the powers that be can send out an immediate notification to each computer…but what if no one is looking? Would people just think it was a hacker’s prank?
4. With the campus sprawling and open to anyone, it would be very easy for something like this to happen there.
5. Drills? Would a University take time to run a drill so students know what to do? In our elementary school they have fire drills, silent drills, stay and defend drills. Is there anything like that in Universities?
We send our ‘adult’ children off the college worried about binge drinking, date rape and drugs. Up until yesterday, mass murder was not on my list of worries. As a parent, after the Colombine shootings, I had that tough talk with my then high school age students. What would you do if that was your school? How would you react to a crazed student with weapons? Where would you go? It was a good diaglog and I was saddened that I had to bring something so ugly into the forefront of their minds.
Our world has changed, as we all know. But I think we’ve forgotten just how ugly a single act can be. My thoughts go out to those who have been touched by this very ill young man. Tragic, that is the word that comes to my mind.
Peace….
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04.15.07
Posted in Knitting at 7:19 am by Lynette
In a past post, Knitting with disaster, I talked about a vest I was knitting without a pattern. I also mentioned how sometimes I amaze myself. This vest was a combination of several parts. A pattern from felted accessories, wool from Shaniko’s own Columbia Sheep, Ashford acid dyes and large beautiful button from Ah Kimono! I guess you could say I’ve combined the old, new and Asian all into one article. The best part about the vest is it actually turned out how I envisioned it. This, in it’s self is amazing considering all the different stages it/I went through.
First the knitting…a very basic k3,pl pattern with purl row after 6 rows which gave a window pane type look. Then I had to rip out the arm binding twice because I didn’t like how it bunched up the arm. Finally I added the collar/front band after the vest was felted and the band was felted. One think I realized just in time is do not lay it out to dry in the sun, the dog will help with the drying process. 
I learned several things one very valuable.
When felting an item you will be adding knitting/embellishment to later, always finish off the edge with a row or two of cotton yarn. The item will felt but the cotton won’t and you can easily pull out those stitches after the felting and drying. What is left are nice little holes to pick up stitches and add your embellishment.
So show us the picture already. Here you go. 
And the Back.
And thanks to Linda for suggesting I add another color to the dye pot. I initially wanted to dye it brown but she suggested the brown dye over the grey wool would be dull. So I added equal parts of Brown and Purple. What came out was this beautiful mahogany. I love it, it fits and I feel I’ve made a giant leap in my confidence. All these years of following patterns have paid off. I can actually design an item and have it turn out the way I want.
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04.12.07
Posted in Gardening at 7:21 pm by Lynette
What is wrong with this eye candy picture? Nothing really. This is how I start my pumpkin seeds. I empty out eggs, add dirt and seeds and water. I’ve found that by planting these pumpkin seeds around Easter I can put them out in May and actually have orange pumpkins for October & November pies.
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04.10.07
Posted in Redwood Living at 9:39 pm by Lynette
It is little league time of year and we were looking forward to a fun baseball season. My son didn’t get to play last year because he was in a wheel chair for 8 weeks and a walking boot for 4 weeks. Then on to 6 weeks of physical therapy and we missed the season. DJ is a dedicated player, he is a good hitter who almost always gets on base. He attends all the practices and games, even the make up practices. We are on time and always come ready to practice and play. But tonight was the first game. It did not go well.
All the kids showed up and so, of course, the coach could not play everyone. Three had to sit out, one was DJ. At first I thought this wasn’t fair. As I said above he has made all the practices, at least half the starters tonight have missed practice. He is early if not on time, again some of the starters do not get to practice and games on time and have not made the make up practices. I understand playing your best players but when one of the bench sitters is your son, it is difficult to be objective. I know we won’t see everyone take their turn sitting out and I don’t think that is fair.
In a perfect world, dedication and sportsmanship would count for something. I had forgotten little league is not the perfect world. Sure my son is not as quick as the much smaller players, he is 5′ 7″ and 135 lbs. He has grown 6 inches and lost 35 lbs in the past 9 months. He is awakard and unsure and sometimes unaware of his ‘body sense’. But he was hurt tonight. Emotionally hurt, enough to have tears in his eyes. Sure he held it together during the game but I choose to leave him alone in his room after we got home to cry. This is the first time I have seen dissapointment and a feeling of not being good enough in his countenance. I’m not even sure if he will want to play again. He understands the fact that some players are better than others and some have to sit out. It’s just the reality that you are one of the worst on your team that has crushed him.
What does a parent say? I’m sorry you sat 3 out of 4 innings on the bench. I’m sorry everyone showed up for the game. I’m sorry you only got one at bat and when you did get on base the coach replaced you immediately with a pinch runner which basically told everyone who was there that you were not good enough. (A board member actually came up to me and asked if the coach always did that. I think he felt it wasn’t right.) I’m sorry you only got to play your position for 3 plays. I’m sorry you aren’t better, faster, I’m sorry….no I’m mad a hell because DJ is basically crushed and I cannot do anything about it.
Life and little league suck. I want to take my ball and go home.
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04.09.07
Posted in Redwood Living at 8:05 am by Lynette
For those of you who have been reading along with my blog (thank you by the way!) you may remember the frog blog.
I’ve created my own problem by placing the frogs found in the yard next to the pond. One was nice, two were fine but then we moved on to three and the croaking was really loud. We thought all this croaking was done because the ‘breeding’ season was suppose to be over. Apparently not!
With my oldest son comming home for some much needed R & R I decided once again to go on a frog hunt so he could sleep in silence. So out the family went. I waited until Saturday night while we were watching The 10 Commandmants. I figured we would do the frog thing while the movie was showing the plage scenes…kind of poetic I thought, plagues, frogs, burning hail…you see the connection? Anyway, I asked the Dh to start lifting up the big slabs of rock that surrond my pond. After he almost fell in I took on the job. I know my neighbors think we are truly weird, all standing around the pond with a flashlight and the DH holding the soon to be frog container.
Four, I found four under one rock. One was really fat and the Dh said that must be the female. Overlooking the obvious assumption that if a frog is fat it is female, I gathered the four frogs up and placed them into the jar. Off we went, all four of US, to the tub in the garden. It is a nice tub, old cast iron enamel type thing sunk into the ground with rocks surrounding it. A very nice home for frogs.
By Sunday morning 6 a.m. to be exact they were back. How did they find their way so quickly? Is this a game for them? Maybe it is a game for us? Maybe we are then ones who are being made fun of. Hmmmm. Anyway, all four are back and croaking up a storm. Hopefully that female will get on with business and lay her eggs so the guys will go on to something else like living quietly under a rock and eating mosquito larvae. After all, that is why I put them there in the first place.
Won’t the new owners of our house just love the croaking next spring? I consider that kind of a going away present from me! Welcome to the country. I wonder if I need to disclose that information under “unusual or excessive noises in your vicinity”?
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