Question

I bought yarn this weekend, not much because I cannot afford to drop one to two hundred dollars a pop in a yarn shop. I buy little bits at a time as I can afford it. Like any knitter, I
love the feel of yarn. I love to go into a shop and pick up a skein of yarn and feel it. Hold it. Think what could be made from it. Even figure out if I can afford this skein along with the skein I came in to buy.
My problem of late has been that I sometimes feel that I am really not welcome in certain shops.

There are five shops within a 25 mile radius of me. Shop #1 is in the city of Burlington. The woman who owns this shop is friendly enough but she usually remains behind her counter and does not interact with the shopper beyond what she can answer from behind her counter.

Shop number #2 is in Mt Vernon. I quit going to her shop years ago. You know, I generally have one or two very well behaved grandchildren with me when I go out. H. at shop #2 follows me around and watches me so closely, not offering help, but making me feel like she is sure either I am going to steal something or one of the kids are. She does not need my money at all.

Shop #3 is also in Mt Vernon. When I walk into this shop, I am generally greeted. She will show me where whatever it is that I am looking for and then more likely than not, go into her office and work on other things. Now, do not get me wrong, I understand having to multi task, but if I need something more, should I have to go looking for her? Could she possibly say to me something like, "I have some things I need to do, I will be right back here." She has left the door open for me to approach her if I do need more.

Shop #4 I rarely go to, it is the furtherest away and I will only stop in if I am at my mothers and need a little something. The mood is helpful, but never friendly.

Shop #5 is in Stanwood. S is an amazing knitter and a very hands on person. I walk into her shop and is always greeted with a smile. She puts down what she is working on, or excuses herself from whom she may be talking to and comes to see what I need. If she is not busy with another person in the shop, she will converse with me for a moment or two about what I am making and what type of yarn I like. One of the last times I went to her shop, she showed me yarn she had ordered special for me. Others will be buying it too, it is out on the shelves for everyone, but she ordered it because of what my latest knitting projects have been. She always have a happy hello for Olivia and or Darius if they are with me. I really feel welcome in this shop. I feel like she appreciates the money I spend in there.

I am wondering with the economy as it is, why are shop owners not more like shop owner #5? It is obvious that given the choice, I will drive the four or five miles off of the freeway to Stanwood to purchase my yarn. Not because S's yarn is any better than what any of the four other shops offer, but because when I walk into her shop, I feel like I am important to her, not an imposition.

Proposed Ground Zero Mosque Already Exists!

I have been unable to post videos for more than two years. Tonight I was able!! Small miracle!!!

I love the evening view from my front window!

Is this where you want to send your children?

Some more finished projects

This cute little hat is 100% wool and will fit an infant to small toddler.
An infant size hat made from left over wool.
This hat and scarf is a wool blend. I started it to give to Olivia for her birthday, but her head is so big she cannot wear the hat. I need to cast on adult size for her. One thing our family has is big heads:)
This is the back view of a 3 month size coverall. 100% wool.
Front view of the coveralls. I really like these little pants. Especially for winter time. They are made very roomy and will accommodate a cloth diaper.

Now I need to cast something on again. Am vacillating between a skirt or just a pair of longies.

Have been in kind of a knitting slump lately

But I thought I would share some really cute pants I made. I actually made these before I went to Washington DC. I have made a second pair, but do not have the buttons on them yet, so I have not taken a picture yet. Above is the back view.
This is the front view. They are a newborn size. Let me know if you are interested in them. Remember all proceeds go to building the Church in Dar es Salaam

A friend sent me these pictures and I found them just amazing.

You can see that this is a dam. I do not know where it is, but I know it is not in the US because in the bottom picture, if you look in the upper left corner of the picture, you will see a castle.

Yep, those are Mountain Goats.

Castle, directly below the letter R.

Constitution Day

I found this on another bloggers blog. She calls herself Mama Bear and writes the blog Challenged Survival. In light of Friday being Constitution Day, I thought it would be fun to share it on my blog also. We should never forget all these brave men put on the line to insure we had the freedoms we have today. In my heart I truly feel the Constitution is a document breathed by God Himself, using these men to put pen to paper to write what he instructed them to write. It is time to stand and protect it.

I am James Madison.

Stan and I have known for years that he has

multiple food allergies. We have eliminated so many foods on our own. However, this summer he just seemed to be sick after every meal. He finally had allergy tests run. The results surprised us in some aspects and were what we already knew in other. The surprises?

Who do you know who is allergic to:

Carrots

Peaches

Pears

Asparagus

Mushrooms

Lamb

almost all seafood, including crab, lobster, oysters, salmon, red snapper, clams and shrimp.

Almonds

Barley

Buckwheat

Corn

Pecans

Peanuts

Sunflower

Whole Wheat

And Rice?

Rice has been a staple in our home for years. After I got home from DC, I went shopping and one of my purchases was a 25# bag of rice. Peaches and pears, his two favorite fruits. Carrots he takes (took) in his lunch almost daily. I just bought a 2# bag of those too. We would have asparagus 2 or 3 times a year so that is not a hard one to eliminate. He will not allow mushrooms to even make it to his plate. No problem there for them either. He has never ever eaten lamb so how does he develop an allergy to it. We do enjoy some seafood, especially salmon, (we do live in the Pacific Northwest) and shrimp.

No surprise:

Beef

Milk

Sugar

Needless to say, meal planning has become even more a challenge.

Other side of the coin? We are still able to plan meals. Thank You Lord!!!

Kind of a slow Birthday month

But there were two important ones we celebrated. Jesse #6111 is officially a teenager, turning 13 on August 2nd. Another huge milestone for him will be starting high school as a Freshman this year. I took this picture as we were landing in Seattle last week.
And................my favorite daughter in law of all time, Darla (in the purple) had her birthday on August 21. Sorry Darla I could not find a more current picture of you than this one. We are so blessed to have you as a member of our family. I most certainly am a blessed mother in law:)

Happy Birthday to both of you, you both know you hold a very special place in my heart and "I love you the most."

If you know me personally,

Then you know I am a very feeling oriented person. I am happiest if I know I have pleased you. If what I have done does not please you, I am in a blue funk for days. In light of that, I have been struggling with what some people felt towards the Rally and the fact that I had attended it. That was until I picked up a book given to my husband one day two weeks ago. The author of this book is Robert Hobson,, and he himself gave it to my husband when he visited his office. Stan read it and told me it was an amazing book. I picked it up this morning and have only read three chapters. I have found my answer to my taking part in the Rally though. In my heart, I knew I had done nothing wrong, but you know how those "feelings" can work on you. I want to share the first chapter with you. It is a bit long, but I hope you will bear with me and read it.

The plane dipped its wing and there it was, the village of Hoskins, New West Britain, Papua New Guinea. I could not believe that I was on the mission field where my friends Ken and Stephanie are missionaries along with their two youngest children. The three oldest were attending school in Goroka.

After lunch we were enjoying a bit of nostalgia regarding Stephanie's parents, when in the midst of our laughter, Joel came into the living room. With a rag doll under one arm and a plastic horse under the other, he declared defiantly, "These are mine!" Okay, who cares? I thought. We laughed, ignored him and went on with our conversation.

However, I could not help noticing the look on his face. Such a fiercely determined, willful look of arrogance for such a little boy. There was no doubt to whom the rag doll and plastic horse belonged. The impact of that statement still lingers in my mind. Who cares to whom they belong? to Joel they were valuable, and he certainly did not want any misunderstanding as to whom was the rightful owner.

A rag doll and plastic horse. Their value? Not much. Yet the defiantly, Joel proudly declared ownership. There was no life in either of the two; that didn't matter. At that moment his whole life was wrapped in those two items.

Sound familiar?

We as Christians have our pet doctrines, evangelical cliches, theologies, denominations, evangelical phrases, hymns and choruses. Should anyone doubt their value, all one needs to do is challenge us and we will all hear along with Joel:

"These are mine! How dare you challenge the value of my personal 'evangelical' rag doll and plastic horse?"

What is the value of a rag doll and a plastic horse? There is no life in either. The rag doll could not speak or react. The plastic horse is unable to respond and certainly he couldn't ride it. But never mind.........."These are mine!" There is no truth in a rag doll and plastic horse, but nevertheless, "These are mine!"

Truth and value are unimportant to a three year old boy. What was important to him was ownership of two insignificant, lifeless objects. Ownership, not relationship. For a functional relationship to exist, there must be life from both sides. Otherwise it is not relationship, it is ownership of the worst kind.

The Lord Jesus did not die on the cross in order to provide for us a non-life or non-living relationship. He did not redeem us so that we in turn could pump out some nondescript meaningless relationship to Him and to others; to program ourselves and others into a man-made system of so-called "religious" spirituality.

The fact is that the Christian life can be simply summed up as a conglomeration of all of the above. We each have our own private "rag doll" and "plastic horse" that we value and trumpet as the "truth." We clutch the denominational rag doll to its death and ride that plastic horse as though it had life. We prop it up, program it, pump new blood into it, expecting it to come to life. There it stands, completely absolutely lifeless; but so very precious to us. All in the name of a rag doll and plastic horse that we call the Christian life.

These are mine!is nothing quite as important as a rag doll and a plastic horse, if you are three years old!

Thank you Robert G. Hobson for showing me someone else's rag doll and plastic horse in not necessarily mine. Now I must go read the 14 remaining chapters of Rag Dolls and Plastic Horses.