HRH is not available to play

The Mom said last night, HRH plans to spend her last Saturday before the long planned adventure to South Padre Island in Omaha, WITHOUT US!

Well two can play at that. I think CaDiva and I will take The Mom for tacos (which The Mom is pretty certain she has never eaten.) and then go see The Intern.

See, HRH, we can so have fun without you. Bring pictures.

HRH is headed south

Next week HRH is taking a vacation without either CaDiva or me. She is going to fly down to South Padre Island in the Gulf of Mexico. She is traveling with her friend SLY. They have known each other since their first jobs outside of high school.
We can't wait to hear the stories and see the pictures.

Can you name these sights?

 

Another early night I think

I am still trying to pick the best photos from CaDiva and my trip to DC. But I had a long day and really think I'll go to bed now.

Take care and see you soon.

A crafty Saturday

From time to time, we have a Saturday in, to craft. Well, CaDiva and HRH craft, I put on The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel for The Mom and pulled out an afghan I have been working on for several years. That is the way of it, you see. I have actually counted out and it takes, on average, about 50 hours for me to finish an afghan. I just tend to spread it out over three to five years. 

On the other hand, HRH and CaDiva do all sorts of crafty projects. I have seen them make candy, Christmas Ornaments, and now candles. Note to the house photographer, when your subjects are forming bees' wax tapers, time your photos carefully. You see they carefully wrap wax around a wick to begin the candle. Then they they roll the wax around and around, shaping and forming it with their warmed hands. Just think about it... now you get it. 

I crocheted and watched the video with
The Mom. We ended the day with Chinese delivered. It was a lovely Saturday except for one thing.

I was sitting beside CaDiva and HRH as I counted out five chains to form a circle into which I did single crochets and chain seven loops eight times. The third round is double crochets into each double crochet for seven times until I get to a chain two space where I do two double crochets a treble crochet and two more double crochets before I start the seven again.


While I'm quietly doing this I have a running normal dialogue with the candle-makers and The Mom. Until the CRAFTY ONES decide to start counting and discussing the numbers of sheets and candles while I'm trying to complete a pattern.

In my head, I'm counting one, two, three "I think there are 18 in the box" nineteen, twenty...Wait, wait, that's wrong. Ok, start again, one, two,  three "Well if we had 20 sheets and they were two each" three, four - wait, no that's not right. One, two, three,  four "See there was a girl about 10 and seven other kids" six, seven, eight... WHAT...

I think I might have caught on a bit as to why it takes me five years to finish an afghan. Six, seven, eight , DANG IT!

MOhrh's Birthday tonight

We spent the evening at The Mom's house with HRH and the PC, mohrh and hrh. It was mohrh's 25th birthday.

Life is just too full to plan a grand, girl trip to celebrate this major plateau, such a shame.

Tomorrow HRH and CaDiva are going to craft. The Mom and I are going to watch the Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel while I work on an afghan.

It has been in the works for a few years. CaDiva originally asked for it, but she thinks it will be too heavy since it is double yarn. HRH has claimed it for herself. But then she claims all the afghans. She still blames me for giving the first one away to some who is not only not her, but lived in another state.

I have been going through the pictures from our first trip to DC. Well CaDiva and my first trip. I actually have been there several times. I'll try writing about that next time, I think.

Elevators, Bridges and Fields of Dreams

 So I decided to take CaDiva to see eastern Iowa back in 2007. Why? Well, we drove in from the west when she moved to Iowa from California. But also, I just think it is one of the prettiest parts of the country anyone can see. Oh, and there is the Field of Dreams. It is one of her all time favorite movies. And it was right there, on the way back from back from the Mississippi. So we had to stop there.

On the way, we had great, small town breakfast and saw some neat architecture. Don't you just love country churches?

 We drove up from Davenport to Dubuque. There is nothing flat about Iowa here. At one point, we looked out from the bluffs and saw three states.

The river and sky are only the second and third most beautiful sites in this shot.

 Then someone said, oh you have to go to the Fourth Ave Elevator. Elevator, like in a building or for farm produce we ask. Oh no, not that kind of elevator. This is the the shortest, steepest scenic railway in the world. Well, that sounds like fun. We got our tickets and walked into a small room with steps to nowhere. Except, they weren't steps, they were the seats.

CaDiva didn't really look out the windows but there wasn't much to hold onto and as short as this was it was really a long ride when you are trying not to look out the windows that surround you while holding yourself to a wooden seat with your butt cheeks.

We needed to get up here from down there.

As I understand the story, there was a business man who wanted to go home for lunch and still have time for a nice lay-down before he had to return to work. So he hired this guy to stand at the top of the bluff and pull him up rather than walk all the way around the bluff to get from downtown to his home.  Pretty soon, other businessmen were offering to pay to get the ride too. One thing led to another and you pretty soon have actual train tracks running up and down this steep hill taking people to and from downtown. Pretty cool, huh?

This, I cannot explain.

We were amazed that the entire outside set for Field of Dreams was still there. The farm house, the field, and at that time of year, the stand of corn higher than an elephant's eye.

Truth be told, she didn't stop grinning the entire time we were there.

But then, it had that effect on most everyone there.