I have been so busy with puppies and grading and reading that I have not been posting here like I wanted to in the beginning. The desire is no less, but the follow-through has been less than stellar. So what have we been doing at the Flusi House?
The puppies are almost six months old and they are a handful. Because no one but us and half our family can tolerate so many dogs, the puppies are not terrible socialable. The only place they go is to the vet, so going out is not really their idea of fun. It took us quite some time - probably four months - but the puppies or babies as we really call them are fully integrated into the clan.
They now stay with the other dogs - in other words, instead of ruling one room, they roam freely in the whole house. They sleep with us and I am considering getting a twin bed to add to our king size bed, so that everyone has room. I guess I would have to make new sheets or something because I just doubt they sell triple king sheets! Anyway, they are what we come home for every night...and how we spend our weekends. I think we are about to return to life as it was before puppies - you know, having people over, walking without shuffling feet, cuddling in a lump on the love seat.
I have been crocheting a bit and wish that I had a grandmother who could teach me with her hands wrapped around mine. I have looked at EVERY website and thumbed through every book, but nothing replaces live help so most of what I crochet is the same stitch and the same basic result - a blanket of some sort for someone I love. So --- longing to do something different, I made a trip to our local yarn store thinking perhaps they taught crochet as they do knitting (which I have tried to no avail). The very not-so-sweet lady who owns the shop says to me, Well I know how to crochet, but really what is there to teach - I mean you only use one or two basic stitches that I could teach - the rest of them are pattern specific and who would bother to learn them unless you were working on a project. And who wants to make a crocheted project anyway - there is nothing you can make that you can wear (come on crocheters, defend me here) and you use twice as much yarn and it is too heavy even to be used as a blanket. Blinking widely, I say - well, what about a granny square, can you teach me that? She says, well you just crochet in a circle. Hell, even I know that, but I could use some direction. She finishes by saying, what in the world would you do with a granny square? I walk out the door thinking that if I knew how to make one, maybe I would figure out what to do with them. So in the meantime, I am making blankets. Here is one I recently finished for my brand new grand nephew (making me a great Aunt):
And finally, I have been reading. I have been quite lucky in getting a few Advanced Reader Copies of some very interesting books. If you are interested, try
Shelf Awareness and, of course,
Library Things Early Reviewer program. While I love getting the free books, it is the surprise and the process that I really love. I also belong to two groups that I really enjoy that are associated with books:
The Newberry Project and
Tuesday Thingers Ring - Books and Blogs. As you can probably guess, I spend way too much time on the internet! Another wonderful discovery of late is
DailyLit - a wonderful site where you can have entire books emailed to you in small 5 minute reading increments. I just finished Jane Austen's
Emma this way and it was an excellent way to fill empty minutes. You can also visit my
Book Blog.
Finally, it is summer in Florida and we are enjoying the beach. We usually go with the grandsons, so there is sandcastle building and destroying, shell searching, eating, and overall glee! Now, if we could just rid the world of jellyfish and sharks, we would be fine. Last time we went to the beach, a friend came along with his boat and we saw two schools of jumping dolphins, a zillion little brown and clear jellyfish (noen up close and personal, thank God), a rather large lemon shark right off the coast, a sea turtle and every manner of tiny fish. Life is good on the coast.
Another thing that comes with the summer is a good barbeque and we have had our fair share. Last one was a delight with shrimp, grilled chicken, grilled corn, and a ton of vegetables. To finish it off was a Pea-Pickin Cake. If you have never tried one, here is a picture:
