My dad gave Emma a whole pile of assorted story CDs for Christmas a couple years ago, which he recorded off the 30+ year old records that my sister and I listened to when we were children.

Emma was listening to the "Lady and the Tramp" CD earlier today, and I told her that I listened to those same stories when I was her age, which she thought was very cool.

Then she asked if I still have my CD player from when I was little. I had to explain that we didn't have CDs then, and that I listened to the stories on records.

Silence.

"What are records?"

She did finally know what they were when I described them, and said that she saw some in the library at school. Then she looked up at me quizzically.

"Are you from the olden days, Mommy?"

Gah. This was so not what I needed to hear two days after my 39th birthday.

I wove off another set of bookmarks last week. This was the purple silk warp I dyed in January, along with some lighter purple silk to use as weft.



The one on top shows the lavender weft, in the sections on the ends. The rest of these have all white weft. There were two other bookmarks from this warp, which used the lavender weft, but I don't have pictures of them since they have already left my house...because...

I recently put some of my work in a gallery of local artists here in La Grande, the Blue Turtle Gallery. In a gallery! Me! In a completely uncharacteristic display of bravery, I walked into the gallery and asked the owner if she would be interested in displaying my textile creations. She was quite enthusiastic, and we set up an appointment for me to show her my work the next day. She said she's been looking for a textile artist to add to the gallery for a while, and was very impressed with what I brought to show her. So now I have woven, knit, and crochet items for sale in a gallery. Eep!

One last thing to report:



I am slowly succeeding in my plan to take over the entire house with fiber fun. This is what used to be the computer desk/bookcase in the dining room, formerly occupied by old textbooks and all our assorted clutter, and sometimes used by Shaun to work on his computer.

The bookcase part of the desk just sits on top and isn't attached, and last weekend we realized that hey, we could take that off and suddenly there's all this SPACE! We moved the bookcase part of the desk out to the utility room counter, cleared the clutter, and now I have a carding station!

Plus, the dining table is now available for actual dining, since the carder no longer resides on it.

I love having a dedicated spot for the carder, and it feels very productive to have everything set up and ready to go. Feel like carding a batt or two? Go for it! Right now I have two large bins of alpaca fleeces under the desk, which I plan to work through this spring and summer. The small box in the middle is for carding waste. On top of the counter, right to left: the carder; carding tools (flicker, batt picker, etc); a bin of "add-ins" like silk, bamboo, mohair, sparklies, etc.; bundles of hand dyed bluefaced leicester top ready for blending; a scale; a bin of finished batts; and my "office", with a desk organizer (pens, tape, stapler, etc) and the printer (with trays in the stand for paper storage).

There's plenty of space to work with the batts, pulling them apart for additional blending passes, and there's space to plug in my computer when I need to print labels or receipts. The dining table is close by if I need additional space for photographing and packaging batts.

It's working very well so far.

I've enjoyed growing orchids for more than a decade. They're just such beautiful plants, with the added bonus of gorgeous flowers. I wanted to share the exciting botanical happenings that are going on at my house right now, with a couple plants in bud.



This is Phalaenopsis Golden Light, which (strangely enough) does not have a yellow or gold flower. It is a multi-species hybrid cross with deep, clear, wine red flowers; about 2 inches across and very substantial and waxy-looking. I bought this plant from a local grocery store in November 2008, in bloom, with two basal keikeis. A keiki is a vegetative offshoot from the mother plant. They are more commonly seen on the node of a flower spike, but can also form out of the main "trunk" of monopodial orchids (orchids that grow only up from one point, not branching).

When I bought this orchid, it had two spikes and was on sale because the blooms were fading. The shorter spike had one flower remaining and no buds. That flower faded in about a week. The other (longer) spike had five flowers open and a bunch of buds. That spike bloomed continuously for the next 8 months. After the original five flowers faded, which took a month (they were still there at Christmas), it would open one to three flowers at a time, each of which would last a month. It was a nice constant display. After the last flower finished, it took a rest. This is typically when the flower spikes are cut off to let the plant recuperate and put its energy into growing more leaves and getting strong.

However, both flower spikes were still green and alive, and I knew that often they will continue to develop. Sometimes the nodes along the spike will even develop into flowering side branches. Anyway, since the plant still looked vigorous and the spikes were still green, I left both spikes on the plant. I couldn't bear to cut them. It grew a nice new leaf over the summer.

A couple months ago, I noticed that the tip of the longer spike was growing again, showing four new buds. AND, three of the nodes on the larger spike are developing into side spikes, one of which has a well-developed bud. AND, the shorter spike also has a node developing into a side spike. AND, there is a completely new spike coming out of the mother plant! AND, there is a completely new flower spike coming out of one of the basal keikis! I've never had a Phalaenopsis bloom this well for me before. It's so exciting! Go, orchid, go!

Also exciting at the moment is my Aerangis citrata. I bought this through the mail from a nursery in Montana in January 2009. It was in spike when I bought it, and bloomed with a spike about 8 inches long and 12 flowers. When those flowers were done, the spike dried up and I cut it off. Cool to see the flowers, but not as exciting as blooming it myself.

About two months ago, I noticed a new spike! It's been slow going, because I'm sure my house isn't as warm as the orchids would like, but it is developing.



This spike developed to about 12 inches long with 18 buds, an improvement over last year. Ha! It also grew a nice big leaf this year, which I'm sure helped. I lost two of the buds, though. One got too dry and/or cold while we were gone over Christmas, and shriveled up (blasted, in plant-speak). The other I accidentally knocked off when I was watering (sob!). The remaining 16 seem to be doing OK, though. You can see the long spur starting to develop on the underside of the flowers. The flowers will be white, about an inch in diameter with the spur also about an inch long.

You can also see another orchid in the background of that last picture, below the one that's in spike. That's Aerangis mystacidii, bought in December 2008. That one came to me pretty young, and I haven't seen it bloom yet. It did put on two leaves this year. I also have Aerangis punctata and Aerangis fastuosa, bought at the same time as the A. citrata. The A. punctata budded once, but it blasted before it could open. Both these plants put on two leaves this year as well. I love my little orchid collection.

Last but not least, my amaryllis is well on its way to blooming.



This is a Red Lion variety, with large all-red flowers. Dad gave this to me for Christmas in 2008, and this is its third blooming for me. Only one flower stalk this time around, but it got a little dry and forgotten last summer (oops) when I was stressed about being laid off again.

Yay for greenery in the house!

My contribution to the Fifth Annual Blogger's (Silent) Poetry Reading:



Tremulations
by Sue Brady

I loved you before I met you.
That spark
Brought to startling clarity,
Boundless and immediate,
With your first breath.

Realizing this was true and forever,
I still could not fathom its depth.
Resonating between us,
Amplified,
Love building on itself.

You were eight days old and I wept-
For all the rest of your life,
You would never again
Be eight days old.


----------------------

Fact: I like pickled mushrooms.

Fact: Only one grocery store in my town (sometimes) carries them, and they are $8.95 for a 10 ounce jar.

Fact: Therefore, I never buy pickled mushrooms.

I mean, really. Cucumber pickles don't cost that much. Why do they charge so much for mushroom pickles?

Anyway, yesterday I took matters into my own hands.



Button mushrooms were on sale at the grocery store, so I bought two pounds. Emma, who does not like mushrooms in any form, kept saying "Mama, are you sure you need that many mushrooms? That's really a lot." I think she was afraid that's all we were going to eat for the week!

At home, I washed them, cut them in quarters because they were large (though in future I would just do halves because they shrink when cooked), thinly sliced an onion, and simmered the mushrooms and onion in the pickling liquid:

1.5 cups vinegar
1.5 cups water
1 T dry tarragon
1 T mixed pickling spices tied in cheesecloth
1/2 C brown sugar
1/4 C pickling salt

After the mushrooms and onions were cooked but still firm, I took them out and packed them into hot clean pint jars. I turned up the heat on the liquid and boiled it, then ladled it into the jars, put the lids on, and processed in a boiling water bath for 25 minutes.

The result is delicious; better than the store-bought ones and much, much cheaper. Yay me!

I was on a roll yesterday, and after the pickles were done, I had to make some cookies. I read Renee's blog post on Friday, and the recipe was immediately bookmarked.



They are every bit as good as Renee said they are, even if they are from Martha Stewart's website. You really can't go wrong with a recipe that has 8 ounces of melted chocolate and half a cup of cocoa powder in the cookie dough. They're intensely chocolatey.

And actually, they're not as fiddly as a drop cookie to make, despite the chilling and rolling and coating in sugar. I skipped the second dough-chilling step, and Emma and I rolled all the cookie balls at once. We just put them on a plate, and they were ready and waiting to pop onto the cookie sheet. Much less wasted time between batches. I bet they would freeze beautifully as uncooked dough, rolled and ready to bake. I may have to try that next time.

When we tried one each from the first batch out of the oven, Emma didn't say much. When I asked her if she liked them, she was quiet for a minute, then said:

"My mouth is dazzled, Mama."

Not much to report, but I have been doing some dyeing.



This is a total of 1.5 pounds of lovely soft bluefaced leicester wool, dyed in four different colorways. This is all destined for my shop; I'll probably leave some as top, and use some in carded batts. I love the yellow/orange one - so bright and cheerful. Of course, I also like the green one, and the blue one, and the blue/purple one. It was a good day for color. :-)

Also on the drying rack is some 20/2 silk yarn that I dyed purple. The darker one is actually a warp chain, and the lighter skein is the weft. More bookmarks!

I have been remiss in introducing a new member of the family. Meet Coco.



Coco was a stray that showed up outside our house last September. We have an old barn in our backyard, and there has been a semi-feral cat living under it since before we moved in. He's skittish, and never lets us get too close. We did feed him, though. When Coco started coming around, presumably for the food, she was young, and skinny, and extremely affectionate, and kept getting beat up by the resident cat.

Because she was so affectionate, she came running whenever we were outside, and of course Emma fell immediately, irrevocably in love. Though I tried to deny it, I knew I was sunk when Emma named her.

I was Mean Mom for almost a month, since we already have one cat, and didn't think we needed to take on another. Our first cat, Naia, while incredibly sweet and mushy toward us, has always been aggressive toward other cats and I didn't think we wanted to go there.



So Emma was allowed to play with Coco outside (since there were no fleas, obvious infections, or aggression), but Coco was not allowed in the house. Then Coco and Naia started sizing each other up through the screen door. First there was hissing and growling. Then there was looking, then there was sniffing. Then there was indifference. There began to be pressure from the six-year-old to let Coco in "just for a minute" so Naia could talk to her. And yes, I caved. She really is a sweet cat.



Suffice it to say that "just for a minute" turned into "just for an hour or so", then "just during the daytime", then hey presto, we have another cat.



Naia has accepted Coco far better than I would have ever thought possible. They are buddies. Naia is almost 12 years old, and has been a bit creaky for the past year. He didn't jump as easily or as high, rarely played, rarely ran, and generally acted like a senior cat. Since Coco joined the family, he plays bat-the-crumpled-paper with her, chases her, is chased by her, and is better able to jump onto the bathroom counter. It's quite a difference. They get along very well, though Naia is definitely the alpha cat.



Naia always sleeps next to my knees at night, and Coco does too sometimes, but she has particularly staked out Emma's bed.



Often as close to Emma as she can get.



Naia and Coco also are frequently found snuggled up together during the day, either on one of the cat beds, or the couch, or the very cutest, on My Chair.



One or both of them is usually on me when I'm sitting in My Chair, especially when I have an afghan.

This can make it a bit difficult to do anything on my computer, though.