Thank you to Secret Pal(s)

Yesterday was a busy day. My youngest daughter is participating in Cross Country running with the high school. Every morning for the past several weeks she is up early and I am taking her for practices.
Also yesterday my son had tickets to attend a concert. Tickets he won from a local Radio Station. He was thrilled to win these tickets, managed to get a day off from work and had an extra ticket to take a friend along with him.
So.... alot of driving yesterday. After dropping off my son at the concert, my daughter and I decided to visit a local shopping mall on the way home. We spent the entire day at the mall. What fun we had. Mostly looking, not much buying. We did however have some fun buying some neat organizing things from the Container store. I found some of the "Space Bags" to put extra seasonal clothing in. These are hanging bags and will help make space for hanging clothes. I had to give these a try. Also found some other sizes for storing away extra winter clothing, comforters, pillows, blankets, etc. I also found a sweater drying rack for drying washed fleece. I needed one of these since I plan on buying some fleece from a local supplier that is in the "raw" (means that it is unwashed). My daughter found some organizers for her locker to maximize space with some organization.
We arrived home after a fun day of spending time together, shopping or shall I say for the most part..... looking and not buying. Upon our arrival my husband informs me that I have 2 packages. I had no clue what I may have arriving in the mail. Then it hit me.... maybe suprises from my secret pal? Yes.... it is!!! I am in two secret pal exchanges.... KR Secret Pal and Secret Pal 2 exchanges. I received packages from both of my secret pals yesterday. What a joy and surprise to receive these packages.
So.... first of all.... let me thank my secret pals. You are both very thoughtful and I love what you sent to me.
From my KR Secret Pal I received...... Chocolate and mints...... Specifically.... dark chocolate Hershey Kisses and York Mint Patties. Both are my favorites! As soon as my husband spotting the Kisses.... he was putting out his hands for a sampling. I shared a few with him.
I also found in this box of goodies...... a pattern for the Shapely Tank Top. I have wanted this pattern and have some light pink yarn that may work well with this pattern.
A silver heart shaped box with more Hershey Kisses and a package of beautiful stitch markers and row markers. I love these too. I really needed more stitch markers for the Charlotte Web shawl I am planning to make soon.
A notebook with a pink pen. Really pretty.... black with a hot pink heart. The pages are hot pink. Great notebook for Knitting notes for when working on projects, design ideas, etc.
A box of cute notecards. These are really, really cute. The envelopes are lined with a vibrant purple, the note cards say imagine and have a cute little shear bow on them.
Yarn.... 2 skeins of beautiful, vibrant eyelash yarns. I may add these to a felted purse for myself of add to some yarns for a nice winter scarf. I love lots of color.... especially in the dark, dreary winter months when everything is so gray and gloomy. Vibrant colors lifts me up to escape the dreary months of winter. I have never seen these colors or this brand of eyelash yarn at the only 2 yarn stores I have found this past year in our area. I love to try new yarns and wish I lived closer to some of the larger stores with more selections to choose from.
My secret Pal from KR attached a card on the outside of the box..... What a thoughtful message and such a cute card with a puppy and kitten on it.
I am looking forward to making things with what you have sent to me. Thank you so much for creating such a beautiful, thoughtful gift for me. (((HUGS)))
The next package is from my Secret Pal 2. She must have read my blog.... She has sent me a card with a very touching note along with a book to make my grandchildren some beautiful handknitted hats, mittens and scarves. All of the patterns are fair isle designs based from nursery rhymes. The book is called "Nursery Rhyme Knits" by Theresa Boyer. I have never seen this book anywhere. What a beautiful book, filled with alot of patterns that I plan to make some gifts for my 5 year old grand-daughter and for another grandchild due in February. My oldest daughter will love these when she sees what I am going to make. I can also make things for my nieces and nephews.
This book will be treasured for many, many years. I can see making all my future grandchildren lots of beautiful handknitted things. There are alot of tips for each pattern. And since these are fair isle.... this will give me more ways to use up odds and ends of fleece left over from larger items that I sew and machine embroider.
Thank you so much for selecting this book for me and thinking of my grandchildren. This will be fun to create things for them. (((HUGS)))
I see that I have some catching up to do with my writing......
The past few weeks the farmers market sales have started to be increasing. That is good. This money that I earn go towards what I use to buy Christmas gifts. For several months I have been very worried that I would not have money saved to shop with for my children. But... that seems to be changing..... thank goodness!
I have sold some of the purses I have designed, knit, felted. I have a few more customers planning on coming back to buy this week. So.... I am busy creating more purses to replace what I have sold. I felted a few more purse last night.... one of the purse felted a bit smaller than I had hoped.... kept in in the wash too long....oops.... but it will sell. Of course it will.... it is the Ohio State University colors. I already have a few women that were watching me make that one that wanting one. Reminder for myself.... must buy more red wool yarn and more gray fuzzy yarn (eyelash). These will most likely be a hot selling item this fall.
I see that I need to get busy with making more embroidered items, more soaps and lotions for the fall art/craft shows in addition to this market. Also have some other items that are running low in inventory. So.... next week.... when my daughter is back in school..... it will be time to get back to working full time on making more inventory to have available for fall sales.
Last week.... while my youngest daughter was at her cross country practice.... I made a visit to the local wool co-op store to buy more dark blue merino superwash top wool for a sweater I am going to make for myself. They also had a gorgeous golden color merino top wool (superwash) that is perfect for the star design work on this sweater. While I was there.... I bought some natural off white top wool.... not superwash.... for dying. I want to experiment with dying soon. And also I was given a tour of the area where all the unwashed wool is stored that comes in daily. I was able to take home a bag of "raw" wool to wash and spin. The price for this is very, very reasonable and I plan to stock up the next visit I make there. I can hardly wait to go back again. The best part..... I can choose what I want, no shipping and choose to buy 1 lb. or several pounds. I see more fun with dying and spinning in the near future.
I managed to buy 2 more spools for my spinning wheel also. I have found out recently that having only 4 spools is not enough for all the spinning I have been doing over the past few months. It is nice to have 1 extra spool per 2 spools so that once I am done spinning 2 spools or yarn I have an empty spool to do the plying.
I have managed to get a few skeins of the dark blue merino that I bought last week spun. I bought 2 lbs. and hoping this will be enough for the sweater I plan to make. According the the pattern as a bulky weight wool I should have more than enough to make this sweater. But.... I like to have a bit more.... than not enough. I may have to go buy just a bit more to finish up this project.
I mentioned that I felted 3 purses last night. These are purses I have recently knitted. I have another on the knitting needles to replace the red one that shrunk a bit too much. Hopefully I can have it done by Friday.
Along with the things I normally take to the market I have begun bringing some pickles I have recently made. My youngest daughter and I are also planning to make handmade cookies. A past vendor that used to sell cookies and pies has urged me to make cookies because she knows I will sell out each week. I am trying to come up with a few more ideas of handmade goodies. I am thinking dip mixes, drink mixes, etc. Maybe even handmade breads.
I have been asked how I am feeling lately.... Here is the update..... I am doing better. I have fully recovered from the severe reaction to anethesia. My doctor felt so bad about that.... he should.... he did not give me what was needed to counteract this reaction. He knew and has always known that I have problems with anethesia and/or anything that is strong on my system. Now he knows why I push for this.... and he is feeling pretty bad. The little "talk" I had with him prompted him to make sure he made note on my charts to not forget this in the future for any other procedures. Same with antibiotics prior to "ANY/ALL" procedures. He took a huge risk.... and I don't take risks when it comes to my health. Anyways.... it is all OK now. I am better than I was and the meds he has increased are helping. The procedure has helped also with the severe choking I had each time I ate anything. He told me that biopsies came back all OK. I did have some constriction in the esophogus which caused the severe choking. He was amazed that I was not having even more serious problems from what he saw when he scoped. He promptly told me that it was too the point that the constriction he saw would cause even more serious problems with my breathing. Hmmmm..... makes me wonder if this is what was causing some of the serious asthma problems for several years. Who knows.... but..... atleast the constriction is broken and stretched out to prevent choking. It could need stretching again but.... let's hope not. The severe bleeding was from the stretching of this constriction. That is what prompted the xray immediately following the surgery procedure to find out if something else was going wrong. But all was good. So... to my friends that have been very worried..... don't worry.... I am all fixed up and OK once again. You all know that I don't let these types of things slow me down much. This little inconvenience though... really knocked me down for a week or so. But.... I am up and catching up on all things I normally do. You all know me well.... busy, busy, busy..... nothing slows me down for long. A week seemed like a LOOOOONG time.... but really it isn't if you really look at the whole spectrum of things. No need to get into a tizzy and worry. LOL!!! And just so you know..... this should be all I need to go through now for the remainder of the year.... it has been a very trying year with all this stuff.... but I am all patched up and good as new again.
OK.... enough said...... I just wanted to make sure that I wrote to my friends that read here that they really don't need to worry so much. Close friends and family..... see.... I told you that I am doing much better.
Well..... time to get to work on seeing how these "Space Bags" are going to help me maximize space by shrinking things into these bags. If they don't appear to do what they claim..... I am taking these all back to the store. Too bad we can't fit an entire household of "stuff" into these "Space Bags". Now that is a novel idea isn't it??!!! I am purging things as I am organizing and I really have created more space. I see that the real problem is..... I have so many hobbies.... and not enough space to store it all in without doing some reorganizing. It is looking much better though. And I am really amazed at how much space I am freeing up as I work on this each week. The biggest problem I have found is storing things in boxes instead of Rubbermaid containers..... boxes are all odd sizes and take up too much room. Rubbermaid maximizes storage space by getting rid of all of the boxes and restoring the contents in the plastic containers instead. Everything in Rubbermaid is so much healthier also. Boxes seem to attack or make dust, absorb moisture and this then eventual leads to other problems. So.... I am purging all boxes.
I need to run.... to have some fun with the reorganizing and purging.