Rain . . . Beautiful Rain!

This morning we are having a gorgeous rain. A nice soaking, beautiful rain. No violent thunder. No lightening. Just clear, cool, wonderful rain! We rarely have real rain. I love it. Makes me feel happy and energetic. If I had been dressed I probably would have gone out in it! A wonderful time to curl up in a big chair in the back room with a book. If it was colder, I'd say with hot tea as well, but how it feels now, I would probably prefer an ice cold ginger ale! So, a beautiful morning to start the day off. Thank you, Jesus, for rain!

He will give the rain for your land in its season, the early and late rain, that you may gather in your grain and your new wine and your oil. - Deuteronomy 11:14

Our Birthday Celebration - Stan Hywet Hall

We decided to celebrate our birthday today. We were all kind of tired yesterday, so we stayed home and had pizza and ice cream for dinner! Yum! Well, today dawned bright and nice, so we called Dad and he took the rest of the day off from work and came home. Mom had a surprise destination, so we all got into the car and started off. Of course, Mom and Dad knew where we were going and I found out halfway through that Sarah figured it out five minutes down the road. However, for once, my built in sense of direction failed. . . . That is a joke . . .

We went to Stan Hywett Hall up in Akron. Sarah and I have been wanting to go there for the past year. We went once on a field trip, but that was many years ago and we didn't really remember it very well. They do self-guided tours now, which was great, as we could go through at our own pace - which is always slower than the guide's idea of a tour!

The house was started in 1912 and finished in 1915. Built by on of the founders of the Goodyear Tire Comp. as a Summer house for his family. What a Summer house. It is a Tudor-style Hall. The family actually bought many of the furniture and some of the entire rooms in Britain and had them shipped over to Akron. It is simply gorgeous. Sarah and I had a wonderful time and were really inspired for our novel. It is just too bad that you can't take indoor photos and they don't sell postcards! That means that next time we go, I will be taking my sketchbook!

For the novel, and in general, I really liked the billiards room and connected office. Dark panelling, huge comfy-looking window seats, sofas, and - of course - the pool table. The office was small, all wood, lined with photos. Also cool was the bedroom for some of the sons. Perfect for Harry. Had this really cool bookshelf built around a sofa on the side wall. The library was tops too! Surrounded in wonderful bookshelves, stuffed furniture, movable lighting, AND a secret door to the great hall! Man, would I love to have room with a secret door in a bookshelf!

It was really fun to notice how many of the items that we own a version of! Guess we do live in a museum! It was really fun to see a house where they hadn't restored so much of the stuff and it looked like it was lived in. Very personal feeling. Very enjoyable.

For dinner we went to Mulligan's Pub and Grill. How fantastic. Kind of like a Friday's. However, they have an entire vegetarian menu! We had huge veggie burgers, cheese sticks, fried mushrooms with horseradish sauce, and absolutely wonderful french fries! It was a wonderful birthday! We got a pass for a year, so Sarah and I would like to go back to the Hall before Winter sets in.

D-Day: 6 June 1944

"You remember it. Remember every bit of it, 'cause we are on the eve of a day that people are going to talk about long after we are dead and gone."
- The Longest Day

Sixty-seven years ago, the world was at war. Fighting the axis powers of Germany and Japan. England had been fighting Hitler's Nazi forces for five years and on the morning of 6 June 1944, the greatest armada the world had ever known sailed across the English Channel and landed on the beaches of Nazi-Occupied France. The Allies fought there way inland and across France and into Germany to destroy the Nazis and their hold on the world.

Remember D-Day!

The Horror of Summer and The Beauty of Lupines

Today we hit the record highs. Made it to 91 degrees F here. 88 F in the house! Needless to say, I am dying. The cats are dying. Mom is dying. Sarah is even hot. And people wait all year for this season. They can have it!

I am looking forward to Winter again! Coolness, snow, birds framed against the snow and ice, hot dinners, Christmas, early sunsets . . . everything. ( Irving Berlin said it best - "Where it's snowing, all winter through, that's where I want to be . . . )

The only nice thing is that the lupines are absolutely gorgeous! Stunning. I think I could have an entire field of lupines. I think Lupines must have been in the Garden of Eden. They truly sing the beauty of God. "Lupine" would be a great name for a pet! I can't look at them enough. I hope they continue to spread. Simply breathtaking! I think I'll go upstairs and read "Happy Winter" and "Miss Rumphius" . . .

Fibre, Fibre, and more Fibre . . .

Yesterday was the annual Fibre show at the Wooster Fairgrounds. I love fibre shows. Of course, Sarah goes with the object of buying fibre for felting. I go for the enjoyment of looking . . . and feeling! Sarah ended up getting four bags of different kinds and colours of wool. I got a stack of crochet pattern books. Really, really exciting as I don't have many crochet patterns and nobody makes pattern books for crocheting with thread any more.

I saw the cutest little thing at the show, though that I have just got to try making! A knitted stuffed animal sheep! They are fantastically cute! So cuddly, and so natural looking. I just have to find the pattern and try!

This week I have been working on finishing clearing out the front room. Got rid of loads of stuff and almost everything is put back together now. Buddy came over on Wednesday and changed the strings on my guitar for me. I can't believe the difference! It sounds like an entirely new guitar! So mellow and smooth! I love it. Practiced so much that I made all my finger tips tingly. Oops. They got a break yesterday at least! The old strings were starting to get burrs and turn black. Buddy said those strings were over twenty years old and he was amazed they were still playing. These are so much nicer! It sounds so much better. I can't believe it!

She looks for wool and flax and works with her hands in delight. - Proverbs 31:13

Queen Elizabeth Becomes the Second Longest Reigning Monarch

Today, Queen Elizabeth II became the second reigning British monarch, passing George III. She only has a few more years to go to pass Queen Victoria! Next year is Queen Elizabeth's Diamond Jubilee and Sarah and I are already planning what we want to do, what souvenirs we are going to buy and we will wear a lot of red, white and blue! Sarah is going to felt a little doll of Queen Elizabeth just for me in honour of the Jubilee. This is so exciting. Sarah and I can't remember a time without Queen Elizabeth. Well, neither can Mom as a matter of fact. ;o)

GOD SAVE THE QUEEN!
LONG MAY SHE REIGN!

Garage Sales!

Fredericktown had there annual garage sales this weekend! Mom and the two of us went all out on searching for treasures! Our adventure actually started Wednesday with the auction. The three of us went this time and we came home with a few great things. Sarah got a pair of cool French figurines to add to her collection. I got this very interesting glass battleship. Turns out that they were sold during WWII. They came with a paper bottom and were filled with candy pieces. Very different. It isn't everyday that you get a glass statue of a WWII battleship! We got some other things, a couple old dresser lamps, some really nice fake flowers, and Mom got a beautiful old glass cake stand that has swallows on it.

Thursday dawned bright and clear (for a change)! We were out of the house by 9:00am and and did several sales. We headed down to Mt. Vernon and did another sale before taking Dad out to lunch for pizza. We got really nice stuff. A gorgeous floor lamp from the '50s that is Colonial revival style, painted pumpkin orange. Really gorgeous. We are going to put it upstairs behind our love seat in the back room. We got a stack of wonderful cotton woven rugs, some kitchen utensils, a couple TY beanie babies, and a large stack of kids books! We also drove to the MT. Vernon book sale warehouse. What a dump! Everything was so dirty. Really, book sales are not what they used to be. But let's change the subject as it just makes me sad! :o( I did get some Judy Garland LPs, though. That was great, as I can never find her records. Mom got a stack of old kitchen booklets from the 1930s -50s. One really fun one about garnishes. Inspired me!

Friday we went to more town sales. Got some fun stuff. Sarah got a desk lamp that is yellow and matches the the floor lamp that we got. She put it on the sewing stand upstairs for felting. I love these style lamps! After lunch we had to head up to Mansfield for massage appointments and did a couple of rummage sales up there. We got some of the best stuff there. A set of old hard sider Samsonite suitcases. Navy blue. A large one and two matching smaller ones. They have tiny wheels on the bottom, and an attachable strap, so that when they don't need to be carried, you can pull them! We are so thrilled. Sarah and I are going to use the matching small ones when we go to FLA. Got a few more stuffed animals (like we need any more, right?), and some cool nick nacks. We got these old Christmas ornaments (plastic and felt, like the old elves and santas) that are Snow White and the Five Dwarves (missing Grumpy and Sneezy). They are some of the coolest things! I also got a cool tile to hang up in the kitchen.

Saturday we did the last of the town sales. One more rummage sale, that turned out to be really good. We got some glass serving bowls that will match our nice winter Silver Pine dishes and will work perfectly for Cuban meals. A couple of old British tins (I love British tins, they are so different from American style tins), some little figurines, a Barbra Streisand CD (for guess who?! ), a gorgeous old framed cardboard litho for the bathroom, and a bunch of other stuff.

Actually, we did really well this year. We didn't over buy. Bought stuff we really liked or needed. What was sad was the state of garage and rummage sales. Small and everywhere we went the stuff was filthy! It was amazing how many places were selling dirty things! Rummage sales that have been large every other year were really tiny this year. All in all, after we washed everything up, we had a swell time and it was loads of fun. We got some really nice things.

The Royal Wedding of William and Catherine

Yesterday was the Royal wedding. We watched the rebroadcast on the computer. We watched most of the ceremony before we had to leave to run errands. It was really cool. A beautiful service and we got to see Queen Elizabeth! She is beautiful and so classy. Prince Philip was perfect in his uniform.

Mom remembers getting up to watch Prince Charles and Diana's wedding. We have been really excited about this. Actually, Sarah and I wore all red, white and blue clothes today in honor of it!

The service was wonderful. Lovely organ, gorgeous cathedral, and the choir . . . wow! The online streaming was really poor, so it was very choppy. However, we enjoyed it so much that we preordered the DVD of the ceremony and a CD of all the music. It was really exciting to get to see part of it. Sarah and I have already ordered our Royal Wedding Postage Stamps!

"That which God has joined together, let no man put asunder."

Easter with Friends

We have had a very busy weekend! On Thursday, we woke up and the weather was so beautiful. Blue sky, no wind, no clouds, sunshine! The three of us decided that we wanted to go somewhere, so we drove up to Wooster and went to a bunch of thrift stores. Got some Winnie The Pooh books, a lot of note cards, some drinking glasses, and some other cool stuff. Got a General MacArthur plate that even has Corregidor along the bottom! We also went to Apple Creek to a fibre mill where Sarah was able to pick four bags full of different coloured wool roving for felting projects! That was so fun. The smell of wool when you went in was simply wonderful. I love wool. I love felting! Or rather watching Sarah felt! In the end we didn't get home until late.

It has rained since then, so we were all glad that we got to get out and about in the nice weather! Friday we had doctor's appointments and Saturday we spent cooking for yesterday. Yesterday, We went to Church in the morning. It was very nice. They sang a lot of traditional songs and we got to see a bunch of people. Very fun. Then we went to the Keultjes's house for lunch after Church. Ended up staying until half past nine! Time always flies with them. Hannah and Claire came up for the day, so it was a nice chance to see them sometime other than Christmas. We had a blast! They had a small scavenger hunt for their Easter baskets, so Sarah and I gave them some help. An acorn, a feather, a black rock, a Barbie doll, a bird's nest, a red flower, signatures from two neighbors, and two earthworms! We helped Claire find all the stuff except the earthworms! The three of us elected Hannah to do it. She went down to the compost pile and brought a shovel full of it to the front door for Mrs. Keultjes to inspect! It was really, really fun!

On Monday morning, Buddy and Kay called early in the morning and asked if we wanted to go with them to the Loft to get Buddy's violin fixed. So, we drove to Mount Vernon and all went in their car down to Columbus. We went to lunch afterwards and then stopped in at Best Buy to look for a set of speakers for their recording machine. However, all the speakers were junk! So tinny sounding and expensive! So, we went to their house and Kay and I tried all of the speakers that they had around the house. We ended up finding a stereo from his Mom that worked. We cleaned out the whole recording corner and sorted all the cords and cables!

Mom and Kay worked on family history for a while and Buddy and the two of us played around with his guitar and viola. He played all the new songs that he has written and recorded recently. That was a lot of fun. We also got to spend some time with Casey. We gave him a new doggie toy that looks like a shish kabob and he spent the entire evening carrying it around. He is so cute! We ended up staying until after nine and then they drove us back to our car. A super fun day. We haven't had a day like that with them since filming time.

So, our Easter "weekend" has been loaded with fun. We all really enjoyed it, but are now a little tired out. Hopefully this week the Spring cleaning will progress. Onto more fun and adventure . . .

"Christ the Lord is risen today . . . "

Double Yokers and Duck Eggs

Several months ago, the guy down the road stopped selling eggs, due to pilfering problems. We have always bought our eggs from him since a few years after we moved to this house. A very sad affair. He had the most gorgeous eggs that you have ever seen . . . AND the biggest! So now we are having to find a new place to buy eggs. Quite sad. Well, a few weeks ago when we were up in Mansfield, we stopped at a market and bought a half-dozen of the largest eggs you have ever seen! They had placed them on the top of an egg carton and the six eggs filled the space! Oh, Sarah and I were hoping for a double yoker, as we have never seen one for real. On Sunday night I was making eggs for Dad to eat for breakfast during the week, and what do you know?! I found a double yoker! Oh, we couldn't have been more excited. It was the largest of the six eggs and it had a lump in the middle. Joy, joy! I made them sunny side up for Dad's breakfast because I couldn't bring myself to scramble it!

At the bulk food store a couple weeks ago, we bought a dozen Duck eggs for Dad to try. They are big, white (with a slight blue tint), and very hard to crack! Dad really liked them. Supposedly they are stronger, but he didn't notice. We made eggs and rice for him. They are very hard to scramble as the yolks are hard to break. (In the picture at the left, the duck egg is the top one in the bowl!)

So, that is our egg-citing story for the month! (or should I say "honk honk"?!)