November's almost gone

My brother just reminded me that I haven't posted here since the beginning of the month. It's not that nothing's happened; I've just been lazy.

Have you ever watched first and second graders play basketball? Rose is playing this year. They've not quite got it down yet, but they're trying. I noticed that the refs (I think they're high school boys) never call them on 'traveling.'

The Graves County school system has eight elementary schools, so they have their own league.

I also went to Massac Junior High, where Lexi is a cheerleader, and watched seventh and eighth graders play. What a difference! And the cheerleaders are good, too. Cheerleading has changed a lot since I was in school in the late 1950's.

On the 11th, I went to a Veteran's Day program at Rose's school. The following day was a teacher in-service day or something, so Rose came home with me for the night. She wanted to knit, so she picked out a ball of yarn and a circular needle, and I cast on a few stitches for her. She did a few rows, and then took it home with her. I may have lost one of my good Addi needles that I paid at least $10 for twenty years ago.

I'm ready for the Walk through Bethlehem next week (except for zig-zagging across the ends of 62 bookmarks). The loom is dressed, folded, and ready to be picked up.

When they come for it, I'll also have them take these things.

The rustic stool is what I will sit on as I weave. The partial bolt of fabric is some I bought almost ten years ago to make curtains for my back room. Since I have not made the curtains by now, I probably never will. They can use it in the fabric stall to make 'bedouin headdresses', with lengths of the blue stuff to tie them on with. The two bags hold the 'miniature rugs' I wove for the kids to 'buy' with their 'shekels'.

The rest of the stuff I will carry with me on Wednesday.

The white basket holds 156 two-inch squares. The sign says they are four for a shekel, and they can sew them together however they wish. The larger basket has my weaving supplies and the fingerless gloves I wear.

Then there is my costume.

The brown is a long gown with sleeves. The white is a rather long, open-fronted vest to go over it, and the striped fabric is my head-covering. I can't find the 'rope' I used to tie the gown with in prior years, so I'll use one that goes with a long sweater I have. My long underwear is there, too. (It's cold weather here, and we'll be outside.)

Another thing I've done in November is knit two dozen tiny hats. This is a project to spread the word about seafarers and the work of the Seaman's Church Institute. The director of their Christmas as Sea/Christmas on the River program will be in Paducah on December 12, with tags to put on the hats. Then we are supposed to 'hide them in plain sight', for instance, on the ketchup bottle at a restaurant or supermarket. I'm not sure I'll be able to meet her then, because that is the day of Rose's school Christmas program. I'm hoping that I can do one in the morning and the other in the afternoon.

Aren't they cute?!?

November is here

I could have sworn I posted since October 4th.

On the 19th, we celebrated Rose's birthday although it is really the 26th. She is now 8 years old and is pretty and bright.

She's guarding her gifts. This year she and Kyra didn't pout while the other was opening gifts on her birthday like they did last year. I guess they're growing up.

Front and back views of the sweater I knit for her. There is a matching one for her American Girl doll (she now has three, I think.) I don't know what prompted that weird expression on her face.

I love this one of her holding her 4-month-old cousin.

As proof that she's bright, I offer this little story. A couple of weeks ago, I went to Kroger for a few groceries. My bill came to $36.08. I signed a check, gave it to the clerk to print with the machine, and told her that I wanted $20 back. That apparently baffled her. She knew that was allowed, but she didn't know how much to write the check for. The boy doing the bagging was no help, so she was trying to get the attention of the woman at the check-cashing window across from her. She finally took my word that she should write the check for $56.08. I told her and the bagger that they were much too old to have a problem with such simple math, and that my 8-year-old great-granddaughter could probably do it. I later checked all the kids. The older ones didn't even need to think about it, and it took second-grade Rose (no, that's NOT second-hand Rose) less than a minute - without writing it down. Kroger obviously doesn't give applicants any kind of math test.

Books:
The Friends of the Mayfield/Graves County Library had their annual (or maybe it's semi-annual) used book sale last weekend. The books that didn't sell then, were left in the meeting room all this week. I stopped in on Monday after the fiberarts meeting in Murray, and bought six books at the rate of $1 for a hardback and $.50 for a paperback. I've already read two of them - short, easy reads. This morning they posted on FaceBook that today was the last day, and the price was now $1 for a bag (the kind you get at WalMart or a grocery store). So I went back after I did other errands in Mayfield and filled a bag - 10 books, mostly hardbacks.

The top two are the ones I've already finished. I did eeny, meeny, meiny, mo to decide which one to start tonight. These should keep me in reading material for a while.

I will probably donate some of these back for the next sale, but some I will keep on my shelves. This morning, I spotted some I had donated, some of which I bought there last year.