Fireworks, Family and Fun

Is this not the world's most beautiful apple pie?

There's even sour cream in the crust, and the apples are pre-cooked and drained before being put in the filling so the bottom crust doesn't get soggy.

If D4 decides to change fields, I think she'd have a great career as a pastry chef!






Li'l Missy discovered that Grandma's slippers are nice and fuzzy inside and feel very good on little feet.

Unfortunately, they are rather large on little feet, being intended for Grandma's clodhopper feet.

So navigating around in them is problematic. However, she did give it her best shot.

Check out those curls. She's got great hair already!



Heading over to D5's in a few, to celebrate the Fourth with family and fireworks. Depending on the state of the neighbor's trees, there's a good view of the fireworks at the Fairplex from D5's front lawn. Her talented hubby rigs up the speakers outside and plugs them into my iPod with the patriotic music program on it, and we can listen to John Philip Sousa and Lee Greenwood and the rest of them while watching fireworks.

Cool stuff!

Of course I'll bring something to do with my hands, assuming they won't be full of babies--with the three youngest grandkids there, plus baby Paige (do I really think of myself as a great-grandma?), there may be enough so I'll get a little baby-time.

Maybe.


Here's wishing you and yours a grand and glorious Fourth (assuming of course that you're in the US and celebrating it; I think the Brits have a little different "take" on it than we do, and I know Canada Day has just passed).

Another Day, Another Month...

What have I been spending my time on, you may ask? Well, not this:

It's suffering from neglect. I just am not loving the way it's coming out.

Maybe I need to let it marinate a bit more.

Now., Lady Eleanor III is moving along. She'd move even faster if she wasn't so long and didn't provide such a nice WARM lap covering. When it's 90 degrees and 90% humidity, well...

The Grandcarrot's sweater is moving right along. I do believe that it is just about to the shoulder decreases. This is one of those patterns where I don't think the "payoff" in terms of texture is really worth all the effort of creating it, but we'll see when it's done. It is a cute design!

Then there's the Wee Boy's sweater. It's got a finished back, and I'm well up the fronts. Yay for small sizes!

The yarn is Sirdar Snuggly, a really nice-feeling synthetic. It's not that "crunchy" ack-rylic, and after seeing how the Sweet Pea sweaters have held up to being washed and worn and washed and worn again, I'm very pleased with the yarn.

Ah, but this is the Summer of Crochet Love GCA for the OOPs knitters. I had several ideas in mind--even bought some luscious alpaca in black, white, and two shades of grey to make a crochet blanket.

Yeah, so not going to happen! When I saw what my fellow OOPsers are doing--Ellen and Madge and Annette especially, with their bright colors and Koigu and Babette or Babette-wanna-bes? I got out my 10-pack of Noro Silk Garden and started granny-ing.

Well, Noro is full of surprises. Four of these blocks came from one ball of yarn--I can get 4 blocks and the start of a fifth out of a skein--and the new skein I'm working from has purple in it! (No purple in the first one.) I am not joining them as I go, because I am going to get another batch of SG in a brighter colorway and mix the squares up. Otherwise I'm afraid this would just be a giant yawn. Then again, it might not. Noro is full of surprises!
One week, our group went to Abuelita's in South Pasadena for a "field trip" and for our usual knit day.

Do you really think I could go to a new yarn store and come out empty-handed?

This is the new Rowan Studio book and I'm making t he little sweater on the cover. In Rowan's Summer Tweed. I'm really enjoying knitting with this yarn, and the pattern is quick and easy so I can work on it while I'm spending time with Li'l Missy. "Watching" isn't the word for what I'm doing, exactly, since she's at a very interactive stage and has been known to grab my ball of yarn, clutch it to her chest, and exclaim "Mine!" with an impish grin.

It's summertime so the quilts on the backs of the sofas have changed with the season. I thought June 30 was a good day to put away the winter trees.

Hence, watermelons.

And ice cream.

No, these are not new. They go back quite a ways, in fact, and were class samples way back when. But they are fun and summery.

You know what else is summery?

Ripe apricots. The tree is producing a small crop this year--it either needs a heavy pruning, or else it's at the end of its productive cycle.

Kind of like me??

Anyway, I'm going to try to do better and keep the blog updated. This is going to be a busy summer, what with the Vegas gang arriving on Friday for a long holiday weekend, then later in the month the Denver bugs will be spending some time at Camp Grandma. (I'm surprised they can tear themselves away from their pretty new house, but I'm glad they're going to come to visit!)

I'm also planning to go to Asilomar again at the end of the summer, so I've started "training." The pedometer is back in service, thanks to D4, and I'm back to keeping track of my steps. Pretty pathetic when I can barely make it to half of my daily goal--but then, that's what a goal is for, right??

Right??