Shopping at the Huntington Library? :-)

“Oh, I think this chair would fit in with my decor wonderfully!”

“Yes, but I think a colorful, comfy cushion would make it just perfect!’

The Ten Commandments of Crocheting

The Ten Commandments of Crocheting

1. Thou shalt not call it “knitting”. Nothing will raise the hackles of a die hard crocheter faster than mistaking this craft for the k-word.

2. Thou shalt always look before sitting down. Errant hooks can find their way quite easily among sofa cushions, and thus into tender body parts, regardless of how “well padded” they may be.

3. The Yarn Stash is sacred above all. Thou shalt never touch, move, organize, spindle or mutilate in any way. THIS MEANS YOU!

4. Yes, I do need all those pattern books.

5. There really is a difference between a work-in-progress and an abandoned project, although it may have been just as long since either one of them has been touched.

6. Thou shalt never interrupt my crocheting to have me watch the greatest play the team ever made. No, it isn’t special; it’s just like every other sports event on TV.

7. Do not remind me that there are more important things in life
than crochet. I already know that. Right now, I can’t really think what they are, but I know there must be something.

8. Never ask how much I spent on yarn, hooks or patterns. This will only force me to lie to you. Then I will feel guilty for lying, and of course, I can only allay my guilt by buying more yarn.

9. Never refer to my crocheted gifts to you as “homemade”. Instead, they are “lovingly crafted” … or better yet, “custom-styled”.

10. Saturday morning is my time to devote strictly to crochet. Please honor it with no distractions …and Friday night as well …and probably Wednesday afternoon. And anytime I need to make a birthday gift. But that’s it. Except for, of course, if I need to make a baby layette, or …

Getty Villa

When we visited the Getty Villa last October, we stopped to admire the beautiful fish in one of the fountains. We overhead a guide telling her group that although there were fish in the water, the Getty had never stocked them! I had to wonder how someone would sneak a fish, even a small one, into a museum and put it into the water without being seen. Judging from the many fish, I guess more than one person had figured out the procedure for doing this successfully!

Ninja Cat?

“Take one step towards that catnip mouse and I will use my laser beam eyes on you!”

Always New and Interesting Events to Begin the Day . . .

No Recipe Yet There is Soup!

My favorite meals evolve out of what I find in the refrigerator and freezer. My aim in life is to avoid trips to the grocery because I always come home with more than i went to purchase. My husband’s only problem with this kind of cooking is that I can never replicate any particularly good meals . . . ever, again!

This evening, I had too many vegetables that needed using along with a small chunk of soup meat. The vegetable drawer in the refrigerator now has more room, the little bit of meat found a home, and a pot of bubbling soup is cooking on the stove. Did I make pasta or rice to go with it? Nope! I had leftover Spanish rice from yesterday’s meal to use for that.

The nice think about soup is that you can’t really make a mistake. You just add things that sound good until it smells good, and a spoonful to test is tasty. Kind of like the first time one jumps off the high dive. You don’t think it will work but then you find yourself doing it over and over again as it is fun . . . and a great way to provide a budget meal that doesn’t taste like one.

Prayer For World Peace

Immaculate Heart of Mary, help us to conquer the menace of evil, which so easily takes root in the hearts of the people of today, and whose immeasurable effects already weigh down upon our modern world and seem to block the paths toward the future.

From famine and war, deliver us. From nuclear war, from incalculable self-destruction, from every kind of war, deliver us. From sins against human life from its very beginning, deliver us. From hatred and from the demeaning of the dignity of the children of God, deliver us. From every kind of injustice in the life of society, both national and international, deliver us. From readiness to trample on the commandments of God, deliver us. From attempts to stifle in human hearts the very truth of God, deliver us. From the loss of awareness of good and evil, deliver us. From sins against the Holy Spirit, deliver us.

Accept, O Mother of Christ, this cry laden with the sufferings of all individual human beings,laden with the sufferings of whole societies. Help us with the power of the Holy Spirit conquer all sin: individual sin and the “sin of the world,”sin in all its manifestations.

Let there be revealed once more in the history of the world the infinite saving power of the redemption: the power of merciful love. May it put a stop to evil. May it transform consciences. May your Immaculate Heart reveal for all the light of hope. Amen

“So that the tears and blood shed will not have been in vain.”

The Freedom of Religion, God, and the Government . . .

We, as Christians, pray for our country. Perhaps, we should add prayers for ourselves to stand up to our country when it tries to adjust our consciences and means of worship to coincide with the country’s secular and unchristian agenda for the world. Right now, pastors are reticent about crossing the ‘separation of church and state’ line lest they lose their tax-exempt status. From what I understand the separation of church and state was put into place to protect religion not the state. Given the many travesties of government to come down in the last decades, they might have been fought more strongly by people of faith if the faithful understood that the government couldn’t tell them how to worship and to keep quiet about candidates that would not promote the values that built this county.

There is a scary repeat of history taking place but like it’s forerunner, the changes are subtle and persistent. There are way too many easy comparisons between the Rise of Hitler’s Germany and what is taking place in the United States today. This is an excerpt from http://christianpersecutioninamerica.com.

While prayer in school had been obligatory the people allowed Hitler to make it optional.

Prayer was removed from America’s public schools in 1962.

Festivals that had previously been identified as Christian holidays were reclassified with secular names.

This has been accomplished all over America.

They took very aggressive steps to control and intimidate “Pastors” to incorporate and encourage various seemingly harmless pagan worship while discouraging churches from preaching the true Gospel message.

Most American churches have already voluntarily surrendered many of their rights by unnecessarily embracing 501 C3 (tax exempt status) registration and some “churches” in America today incorporate “Christian” yoga, “chrislam” and other pagan religious activities into their programs.

They took control of public radio not allowing views contrary to theirs to be broadcast.

In America there is movement to restrict Biblical views as “hate speech” as they now do in Canada and some have tried to do in America.

They supported and promoted Darwinian Evolution to justify the purging of the species.

In many schools and universities in America Creation is not even allowed to be introduced as an option.

In some cases the Christian cross symbol was outlawed and replaced with the German swastika (the swastika didn’t originate with Hitler; it had previously been used as a religious symbol for thousands of years).

Today many of the largest main stream churches that call themselves “Christian” are practicing and promoting the removal of the cross symbol so as not to offend anyone.