Random Ramblings - May 26th 2023

We’ve had several quite warm days recently, which they say will stick around over the next couple of weeks, and at some point after that it's meant to get hotter.  I'm glad it's not meant to get hotter yet.  But with it already at the high end of the temperature range I can tolerate,I’m not looking forward to when it does one bit.

 

*~*

 

    Anyway, as you likely figured out from last week's post attempt, May hasn’t been going quite as I planned.

 

It started OK.  Then we got to about the middle of the month.  I thought we might continue some of the de-cluttering and organizing.  Maybe even finally look in to getting thethings we need removed that need to be disposed of rather than given awayremoved from our house.  But none of thatended up happening after all, and I’m so drained from the past couple of weeksthat it won’t be happening any time soon, because my spoons are long since used up, and I don’t have the energy todeal with anything non-essential at this point.

 

My Mam ended up back in hospital.  This time she was there for ten days.

Ten days with four dogs (Lilie and Logan, plus Mam’s two:Izi and Cai) in the house is too much, especially when two of them (Izi andCai) aren’t used to hearing the comings and goings of people going to thenearby shop, two of them (Lilie and Cai) are easily excitable, one of them(Cai) is an untrained puppy, and one of them (Logan) isn’t a big fan of toomuch play time.

 

We ended up with me and the dogs camping out in the livingroom so that at least Kelly could get some sleep.

 

This is what it sounds like when four dogs are in the same room, barking because someone decided to use our driveway to turn a lorry around in (which is what the beeping you may be able to hear over the barking is).

 

 

At least, I hope the clip will work for you.  It wouldn’t go on YouTube properly, evenafter I converted it to a format that should work, and I haven’t tried doingthis kind of clip directly in to a blog post before.  I figured it was worth a try though.

 

Either way, by day four Artemis was hiding in his cave or tuckinghimself in his shell in an attempt to get away from the chaos.  By day six the dogs had decided they’d hadenough of each other’s company, and Lilie especially was opting for sleepingupstairs with Kelly rather than staying in the living room with the rest of us.

 

Don’t get me wrong, Izi and Cai are adorable dogs.  But, like I said, four dogs in one house istoo much.  Sure, we have a reasonablesized house.  But without a large backyard for them to tire themselves out in, and with people constantly forgettingthat a private driveway is not a place to park when you’re goint to the shop,even if it is very convenient to park there, four dogs definitely started tofeel like too many very quickly.  Soeveryone was extremely glad when Izi and Cai went home on Wednesday evening.

 

Anyway, my Mam is doing as well as can be expected.  That’s all I’m going to say about it though, because she specifically requested that nothing more than that was said, especially online.

 

*~*

 

In other news, I made these little flowers in a crochetclass a couple of weeks ago:

 

 

~

 

Also, they were teaching Tunisian Crochet in another crochetclass.  I wasn’t going to do it.  I mean, do I really need to learn anotherfibre art? After all, I already do needle knitting, loom knitting, and crochet,and want to learn tatting.

 

But it was the crochet group doing it, and I like spendingtime with them on their Zoom calls.  So Ifigured I’d go along to hang out with them anyhow.  I figured I’d work on my blanket while theylearned Tunisian Crochet.

 

For those who don’t know: Tunisian Crochet is a kind of hybridbetween crochet and knitting, which uses some of the stitches for both, plus acouple of its own, and where you often have several loops on the hook at anygiven time (hence needing special hooks, because they’re longer than the usualcrochet hooks, with a knobbly bit on one end like a knitting needle has to stopthe loops sliding off that end).

 

Anyway, I think you can guess where this is going.

 

Yep.  I ended upgiving it a go.

 

I had to use a regular crochet hook, since I didn’t have anyof the longer ones for Tunisian Crochet, but I wasn’t the only one doing itwith a regular crochet hook.  Here’s thelittle sample piece I did while learning:

 

 

Our wedding anniversary was this past Monday (May 22nd)and Kelly had been asking if I wanted anything specific from him for ouranniversary.  So I ended up asking him  buy me a set of Tunisian Crochet hooks.

 

Yeah, you saw that coming, didn’t you? LOL!

 

Of course, with dealing with the four dogs, I haven’t hadtime or energy to play with them yet. But when I can I’m going to make more little squares like the one I didto try Tunisian Crochet out, and then they can be part of the blanket withsquares done with the different fibre arts that I plan to eventually make.  "Eventually" being the key word here.

 

~

 

Oh, and... In case you're wondering... We had pizza for dinner for our anniversary.  With the dog chaos in full swing, we didn't have the time or energy to do more than that to celebrate.  Not that we do much anyway, if I'm totally honest.  We really aren't big on large celebrations, as regular followers of this blog likely already know.

 

*~*

 

I like having fun bottles to put water in to drink.  In a weird sort of way it encourages me to rememberto drink more, because I like the bottles. Whatever works, right? And I just got a new one.  It’s a Harry Potter one.  Spacifcally, it’s a Ravenclaw one, and hereit is:

 

 

One picture shows the whole bottle, and the other is a closeup on the Ravenclaw crest.

 

Kelly wants a Slytherin version, so I’m going to get him onesoon.

 

*~*

 

Speaking of Harry Potter things: one of Kelly’s birthdaycards was a Harry Potter themed one.

 

I actually meant to show you his birthday cards, but Iforgot.  So, here they are:

 The Harry Potter one is from my Dad, and the other one is from my Grandma.

 

Most people we know don't tend to bother with cards these days, hence him only having two birthday cards.

 

*~*

 

I think that covers the main points of the past couple ofweeks.  And I need a nap, so I’m going tolet this do regardless.

 

I hope you’ve had a more relaxing couple of weeks than Ihave.