Great idea...

 I did a bit of surfing on the blogs this morning and I visited Bush Babe,  (http://bushbabe.blogspot.com/)  who lives in Australia.....just think about it for a second.....the other side of the world from me and I just click a button.....but that's another story. She takes the most beautiful photographs and I drool once in a while, wondering if I will ever be that good. There are a couple of other "photo takers" who blow me away too. Chronicles of a Country Girl is one and of course Pioneer Woman. Anyway, this morning Bush Babe shows pictures of her horses eye, with a reflection in it. And she wondered what we could come up with.....so I took what I saw. Familiar and ordinary to me, but if looked at with another "eye", is quite interesting. So here are my attempts... however feeble!!

out the front door

front door in a plate

in a kitchen cabinet

and in the oven!!!! with all the mess on the table,

just keeping it real.

I don't get out much do I?

Yummy cake...

This is a recipe for the most delicious fruit cake.

I make it often and as it makes two loaves

it lasts a while!!

The recipe calls for dates and walnuts, neither of which I had the first time I made it.

I used golden raisins and pecans.

But I have found you can use anything your heart desires, as long as you stick to the amounts. I use only 1c of the sugar, the fruit makes it sweet enough for me. And I don't use the glaze.

 Make sense?

so...the recipe

3 c AP flour

1 ts baking soda

1 c butter

1-2 c sugar

4 eggs

1/2 c orange juice

1 c coconut

8oz dates (or fruit of your choice)

1 c chopped nuts

GLAZE

1 c icing sugar

1/2 c orange juice

Method

Preheat oven to 300 degs

Grease and lightly flour two 9x5 loaf pans.

In a large bowl beat the butter and slowly add the sugar.

Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each.

Sift flour and baking soda.

Stir the dry ingredients into the butter mixture in three parts, alternating with the 1/2 orange juice.

Mix nuts, fruit and coconut with a tiny bit of flour and fold gently into batter.

Pour batter into the two greased pans and bake for 1-1 1/2 hours or until golden brown.

If you are going to glaze it....

mix the other 1/2 c orange juice with the scant 1 c icing sugar

and pour over the cakes, in the pans while still hot.

Cool in pans on a rack.

(this is one I made with the glaze on it, 'coz the hubs likes sweet things)

Now, the last time I made it, I used one bag of mixed fruit (the one with apples and pears and plums and cherries) and chopped it up smallish and just threw it in. I used chopped hazlenuts and organic coconut and I had a fresh orange so I zested some peel and threw that in too!!

I have pretty much thrown in whatever I had on hand and it has always turned out. I don't like very sweet cakes and this one is just sweet enough.

So I hope you make it and enjoy it. It makes up fast, (although it does take 1-1 1/2 hrs to cook), but if you make it early in the day...you can have a piece with your afternoon cuppa, or as an evening snack!

Have a good day.....the sun is shining brightly here and the snow is sparkling......

Helping Haiti.

On the right hand side of the page you will see a button that will take you to a site where there is a way to help the women, mostly, in Haiti.

If you can, please join in and help.

They need so much. Their spirits need nurishing too and doing what they love will help them heal, I am sure.

I am sending all my Embroidery floss and anything else I find. Even sending paper and crayons, for the kids, is something.

Books too.
There is an auction as well. Go over and see if there is something you might like.

Thank you.

It looks a lot...

like Christmas.........again.  What is with this weather? I am not complaining....not after seeing the pictures from down south. But it's been snowing now for almost 12 hours and it is supposed to continue until midnight. It is also very cold and I feel so sorry for the animals. I fed them well yesterday, so hopefully they will make it until tomorrow. They have been digging in the snow and finding a little something...

This was yesterday afternoon

through the window

and this is this morning....again through the window.

NUTS!!!

Oh well....good day to make some more

mosaics/collages!!!!

Good day to cook,crochet,knit,read,watch silly movies on SYFY

and hope the sun shines tomorrow....

please?!!

UH OH.....

I have learned how to make mosaics!!

We're in trouble now!!!!

I just figure that a mosaic is more pics in less space.

I'll work on it and we'll see what happens!!
Some of the ones I have seen on other's blogs
just blow me away...

evening....

clouds were pink today

 the moon came out to see them

wiggle...wiggle...

I saw this a little while ago and was just taken with it for some unknown reason.  It is sooo old fashioned, it's charming! It looks a whole lot harder than it is, so when I find things like that out, I like to share....'coz you know the saying

"If I can do it....."

So, if you want to know how to do this, I'll show you....

I am sure there are places on the Web where you can find patterns and such, but if you don't know how to do the basics then patterns aren't much good!

If you are new to crochet, it is "do-able", because there are no complicated stitches or instructions. You just have to know how to do double crochet and think in 3-D!!

For the above sample I...

ch 20

dc into 8th ch from hook

(that makes the first dc and ch2 )skip 2ch

dc/ch2,sk 2ch into the remaining chains across

you will have 6 dc and 5 spaces.

ch5 and turn

dc into next dc,ch2, skip 2ch and continue across as before.

When you have 5 spaces across and 5 down

you have a workable base on which to do the wiggles.

this is much easier to do than to write....

take the new colour and attach it to the right hand bar

in the centre of the base with a slip stitch.

Making sure to position it so you can go UP the bar, make three dc in same space.

make four dc in the bar at the top

(the bad drawing shows which one I mean!)

four dc down the left side

four dc across the bottom bar

four dc on the right hand bar of the space underneath

across the bottom of that space

up the left side

across the bottom of the space on the left

up the left side

across the top

up the left of the space ABOVE the centre

across the top

down the right side

across the top of the space to the right

down the right side

across the bottom

and join to the begining 3ch and end.

There I told you it wasn't hard.

!!!

It's like following a maze and you just can't lose your place or you will roam for evermore!!

O is the starting place and the ending.

Now the outer wiggles

join new colour to one of the outer corner spaces with a slip stitch

ch 3 3 dc in same space

4 dc in same corner space

4 dc on left side of space

4 dc across bottom of space to the left,

4 dc up the left side

so basically you will be zig zagging along the edge to the left

wiggle wiggle

all the way back to the beginning.

When you get there join to the top of the starting 3 ch and end.

I took the middle out so you could see the edge a little better.

and the photo below is how you wiggle your way around.

Going to the left ....

you can go the other way I suppose,

just be sure to zig-zag.

I only hope this is understandable

I haven't written a crochet pattern before

and probably never will again....

but if you read this and understand it

then that was my only intention.

If you have a problem,leave a comment and we'll see if we can work it out.

I intend to make a little rug to put my dainty feet on while I sit at the computer, but we all know who is going to end up taking it....

rug...wot rug?

Clouds

are the subject of the day.  I stepped outside a while ago and discovered it was almost warm! The storm we were supposed to get hasn't really arrived as described, but we did get rain overnight, and now it is bright and shiny and cloud-filled. One of the reasons I have my camera is because in days gone by I would stand and look at the clouds floating over us and mutter, wish I had a camera, and now I do, and this is what I wanted it for.

I do not pretend to be a photographer, but I love these snapshots.

The blue and white sky is just lovely.

It is windy, so the clouds are scurrying by and changing shape and form as they float over me.

I love the wind, the warm and the fluff.

Will they...

still taste the same?

Cadbury is being sold to Kraft!!

Please DON'T change the recipe!!!

Why couldn't it have been the other way around?

Sunlight

has been in short supply of late

so, the last time the sun actually shone,

I just walked around the house and took some pictures. Mostly because of the shadow-play.

This is an orchid I have had for a while.

It has only bloomed once for me, in the dead of winter. It is a Jewel Orchid and I love the leaves enough not to care that there are no flowers!
(That is not dust on the leaves. Really it isn't!)

This plant is a form of Rabbit's Foot fern. It is quite "mature" now and it seems to be doing very well sitting on the edge of the stand where the light can get to it.

It has curious blue stems that get quite hairy!!!

I like unusual plants.

These looked lovely in the sun and I loved their shadows on the wall.

face on mars!!

This was my mothers..

as was this.

Isn't it annoying to see the dust only after the picture is taken??!!

Oh well, just keeping it real!

I did dust thoroughly after I saw this,

but I'm pretty sure it's all back by now!


An old Chinese vase with a "glint"




and a pretty blue bell

And last, but by no means least,

my Tibetan bead, that husband bought me a couple of Christmas's ago, hanging about in the sun. The grain of the wood in the old mirror really shows.

Lovely!

Have a sunny day, even if it isn't shining...like here.

Is it Spring soon?

Birds, yes

BUT, not water birds!!

This is a Red-headed Woodpecker

and he is a Blue Jay, who is either very tired or contemplating something?

Then, of course, we have the king of all birds!!

and his queen..

Waiting their turn

I took these from the window. It is too cold, and they are too skittish, for me to stand outside, in 20 deg. weather and shoot their portraits!! But I was privileged to be allowed to take these, because I swear they can hear the camera clicking behind the window, so I had to put them up and show them off.

Oh and last, but by no means least, we have him, watching it all from above!!

Until, the next time.

:-)