Category Archives: Family

Animals and Nature, Family, Knitting

Lucky

Posted on by Jean

We have some huge new family news but first a little knitting.  I finished the scarf for my Gram.  This is the yarn and pattern that I bought at Morehouse Farms when I went to meet Jennifer (Major Knitter).  Simple Feather & Fan but I can’t tell you how many times I had to frog back several (once it was about six inches) rows to fix an error.  I even tried once to just drop down the stitches where the repeat error was but I made a bigger mess of it.  Click on the pic for a bigger view.  This merino yarn was SO soft and the colors are beautiful.  Because I used two skeins, I did two rows and then switched skeins so that the color variation would be more even.  There was quite a difference which gives it that striped effect.

Now the big news…

We’d been toying with the idea of getting a companion for Aggie.  We thought about a puppy and then thought we’d look into rescue.  Cavs are such a great dog that there aren’t a lot of them in rescue (well, one is too many, but compared to other breeds there aren’t a lot of them) but I looked anyway.  And then we saw this guy who was rescued by Lucky Star Cavalier Rescues from a Missouri puppy mill.  These two photo were taken after he’d been in rescue care for about a month.

When he was rescued he had a terrible case of mange.  You’ve seen Aggie and other healthy Cavs on Kim’s blog, so you can see how badly he was treated.  He’s also deaf, which no doubt in my mind, is due to ear infection, I could be wrong but it wouldn’t surprise me at all. 

So I wrote to his foster mom and told her we’d love to bring him home and give him the love he needs.  Sadly, she wrote back that he was already being adopted.  We wrote back and forth a few more times and last Thursday morning must have been our lucky day because I got an email from his foster mom saying that the adoption had fallen through and if we were serious we could have him!  I would have left right then and there but we had Joe’s parent/teacher conference Friday morning.  As soon as that was over I hit the road for the twelve-hour drive through NY, NJ, WV, PA, OH to IN to pick him up.  About halfway there I was thinking, “What the hell am I doing”… do you have any idea how wide PA is?!  It was 730 miles each way… at least 400 of that was PA! lol.

The second I saw him I knew it was worth every single mile and every gallon of gas.  He is the sweetest dog I’ve ever met.  It was a pretty full weekend getting him accustomed to our home but he’s fitting right in.  He’s very skittish.  It’s hard to remember that he’s deaf.  He can hear a loud whistle, shout or when Aggie barks but that’s about it.  Aggie, the priss that she is, growled at him as soon as I brought him in the house but we layed her on her back and let him smell her and she’s been fine since.  Here’s the proof:

We toyed with Texas A&M names like “Bear” for Bear Bryant (a great A&M coach), Kyle for Kyle Field and Sarge for Old Sarge but we couldn’t really name him anything other than “Lucky”, now could we?

His birthday is listed as 2/1/2005 so he’s six months older than Aggie.

I’ll keep you posted on Lucky’s progress. He’s going to be absolutely gorgeous when his coat comes back in and he gains some weight but it doesn’t matter.  He’s such a sweetheart and cuddler I’m completely in love with him already.  Who couldn’t be? Rescues are the best.

Cooking, Family, Friends, Knitting

Nothin’ Says Fall like FOOTBALL!!

Posted on by Jean

Black Knights!!  Hooah!

I wish you could feel the excitement here today.  Tomorrow is a special day.   The first home football game of the season and guess who has tickets?!  We are SO excited we can’t stand it.  Best news… we live less than a mile from the stadium so we can walk and not suffer all the traffic.  We went today and bought all the fun stuff for the game.  Evidently football is HUGE here.  Dan even had to bring home one of the office cars with the sirens and lights so that he can get through traffic if he has a duty call.

Dan laughed and said we have a pretty good chance at being at a game when Army wins because they’re playing Rhode Island tomorrow (please, if you’re a Rhode Island fan…  yell at Dan.  He said it, not me).  Next one that we have tickets to is against Rutgers.  He suspects we’ll lose big time.  Still fun to go though.

Kim blogged today about the little things I brought her last weekend and I felt like a schmo for not sharing what she gave me.  I’m sure you all know she’s been working hard to get ready for the fair but she let me dig into her bag of goodies and pick a skein.  This colorway is called Boysenberry.  Purdy, ain’t it.  As soon as I finish up the other socks I started on the trip to NH, I’ll cast Kim’s luscious yarn on.

I turned the heel on the sock I started last weekend.  This yarn is fun.  I’m carrying the ribbing just down the top of the foot.

I also did a little more canning.  A bunch of Gramp’s tomatoes were nice and ripe and I didn’t want to lose them so I made some marinara sauce with them.  No recipe.  Just winged it which is usually what I do when I’m cooking.  I had a bunch of fresh parsley and basil to use up to so it all worked out great.  I only got three quarts but that red color is spot on.  I’ll save one jar to take back to Gramps on the next trip.  He’ll like that I think.

Cooking, Family, Knitting

Take Me Home, Country Roads….

Posted on by Jean

What a FABULOUS weekend! Family, friends, even some knitting!

The biggest reason I begged Dan to endure the winters of the Northeast (he is a Texan, you know) was to be near my family in the Lakes Region of New Hampshire. They’re only a five to six hour drive away (not counting the Friday before Labor Day when everyone and their brother seemed to be headed the same way we were…).  We’ve been so busy getting settled in that we’ve only been up there for once right after we landed back in the States.

Joe got a little taste of what I loved to do as a child.  Go pick dinner out of Gramps’ garden.  Fresh potatoes, tomatoes, cukes…  nummy.

My grandfather is the best gardener, historian, teacher (not professionally) and philosopher.  I love sitting and listening to him talk about anything.  When I was a little girl we weren’t close.  I lived with them for a while after my parent’s divorce when I was four but he was working (they were very young grandparents – their youngest of eight, my uncle, is only a year older than me) and busy with his own kids.  Age has mellowed him but he still doesn’t sit down for more than a couple of minutes at a time.   Even at 81 he still works hard keeping the up with the land and home he’s built for them up on the mountain.  I remember being about 11 and he and my grandmother would be walking us through the woods next to the house he was born in, telling us just where each room in their house would be.  I thought they were nuts at the time.  Funny, here we are, about 30 years later… yesterday morning Dan and I were walking in the woods with my grandfather having him show us just where we should put a clearing for our camper so we have a place to stay when we go up to work on our little cabin we’re going to build down the road from them.  It will be right across the dirt road where his grandmother’s house stood more than 50 years ago.   I love family history and I love going home.  I love showing my boys through the little town where my roots go way back.  Lots of people have that every day but growing up military and then raising military kids…  that’s one of the things I miss the most.  Roots.

Years ago Gramps used to make these spicy pickled green tomatoes.   As he got older he stopped making them and my Uncle Chet started.  Dan and I always managed to get a jar and we’d savor them for as long as we could.   If you remember, my Uncle Chet passed away suddenly less than a year ago.  Gramps and I made a date for this past Saturday to make those special little treats and I couldn’t help thinking Uncle Chet was up there grinning down at us and probably thinking we’d never make them as good as him.  He’s probably right. lol.  It was so much fun to share this with my grandfather.  He showed me how it was done.  When we were leaving this morning he told me I could take half the jars and he gave me a few pounds of green romas so I could make some more.  I wouldn’t take more than two jars and I plan on bringing some back to him on our next trip.

The other big treat was getting to finally meet someone that I’ve considered a friend for quite some time now.  Dan and I felt right at home in Kim and Ken’s wonderful home.   They live only about a half an hour from my grandparents so I know we’ll be seeing each other again and hopefully have the chance to spoil them as they did us.   I brought my camera.  I really did.  I have no idea why I didn’t take any photos because they would have been great.  When we got back to my grandparents and were trying to describe the day I hit myself in the head in disbelief.  Kim and I have so much in common and it was so fun to finally meet her family and her beautiful little dogs.  It was funny to see four little Cavs go sniffing at Aggie (who is a little alpha and used to being in charge).  The hubs kept busy talking the whole time as well.  The boys even had a great time playing in the pool and rolling around with all the dogs.

I even got a little knitting done on the trip there and back.  Just a sock but it feels good to have the wool and needles in my hands again….

I leave you with a before and after picture of the town store that my great-grandparents ran for years.   It’s so sad to see it as run down apartments now. 

Family

At Long Last… He’s Home!

Posted on by Jean

I’m so behind on emails and I really try to answer all but I don’t think I’m going to catch up this time so please accept my thanks for all of your kind words and support.

Dan didn’t make it home on Wednesday.  The whole plan I had went down the tubes.  I still didn’t tell the boys and when a couple of more delays came into play we decided that we would ask that someone from the office go pick him up and bring him home.  I sent the boys on the bus and about the same time they were arriving at school, unbeknownst to them, their dad was landing at Ramstein Air Base.  After going through security and everything else he finally got to our door just in time for some lunch.

Then the fun began when we went to the school to surprise two little boys that had no idea how good their day was going to turn out.

The video link is at the end of this post.  We went to Joe’s class first.  I brought the video camera in under the pretense that I just wanted to video him in his class.  The little ham went for it and you can see the big smile he put on for the camera.  Then you’ll hear me say, “Okay…okay….”  That was Dan’s cue to come in the room.  Joe was in such shock that he just said, “Hi, Dad.” like he just saw him yesterday.  He started crying though when Dan was holding him and the stun wore off.

Then we hit Daniel’s class.  My friend works in the office and went in and called Daniel out like he was in trouble.  You’ll see her running out of the room and then Daniel come out and spot Dan right away.  He was a little misty-eyed too.  It was so good to see my men all together again.  It was fun and we definitely made the right choice in not making the boys wait.

Animals and Nature, Family, Knitting

1/2 a Saturday Left

Posted on by Jean

As of right now we have 1/2 of a Saturday left.   The boys think we have two.  Here’s the clicker.  For weeks, at least six, I have thought the 7th was on a Thursday.  Dan’s Detachment Sgt’s wife called me from Italy yesterday to see what my plans were for “Wednesday”.   I assumed she wanted to drive up a day early and needed a place to stay.  I said, “Oh, it’s only a 2 1/2 hour drive for us so I’ll just go up on Thursday morning.  Would you like to spend the night here with us and follow us there?” 

Dead silence.  Cricket.  Cricket.   I’m thinking, “What?  What’d I say?!”

“But, Jean, they come in on Wednesday.”   WHAT?! I ran to look at my calendar.  Holy crap! She was right! Why didn’t anyone tell me that the 7th was Wednesday?!  LOL.  I mean, I would have realized it sooner or later, probably tomorrow when I look at the calendar for the next week, but NO ONE told me!  Not even Dan.  I have sent him an email every single Thursday for weeks now, “Six more weeks today!…..  Five more weeks today!…”  He never caught on.  Everyone around here said they thought I was just excited and mixed up.  What a great gift!  It also means I have to get off my tail and get things done.  Wednesday is SO much earlier than Thursday.  Seriously.  Thursday is at the end of the week.  Wednesday is in the middle.  There’s a HUGE difference. There’s a rack of beer to be bought, house to make sparkle, banners to finish and hang up, clothes to be washed (his clothes have been in a closet for a year… they need freshening up)…  I think Daniel will figure it out (if he hasn’t already) but Joseph doesn’t have a clue and I can not wait to see his face when he realizes we’re going to pick up his dad.  He keeps saying, “I wish it were the 17th so dad will already have been home for a day.”  It’s killing me.  I’ve never kept a secret so well. I’m going to pretend I overslept and they missed the bus.  I’ve already set up the ground work and keep telling them that Aggie has a vet appointment (I just said, “next week” in case the flight gets delayed) so they won’t wonder why she’s in the car.  They won’t realize until I make a right turn for the Autobahn instead of a left for the school.  I wish I could run a video camera and drive at the same time.  lol.  So please everyone pray for on-time flights, no bumping of  seats and great weather from Afghanistan to Germany so that he actually gets home when they say he is because I don’t think I can keep quiet much longer. 

I gave Aggie a bath and good brushing yesterday.  Can you believe she’s 17 months old already.   She’s grown into such a beautiful little lady.  I use the term “lady” loosely.   She’s really a big pig.  I know it’s hard to believe looking at that face but you can bet that within five minutes of eating a huge belch comes out of that pretty little dog.  It’s hilarious and we laugh every single time.

I cast on the Chick Knits Ribby Cardi a couple of nights ago.  I’m using my favorite yarn, Elann’s Highland Wool which I bought for this pattern over a year ago.  I also bought it in medium and dark blue.  It was just serendipity that the Elann group is doing a KAL.  It’s a perfectly relaxing knit so far.

Okay.  Gotta get to work.  You probably won’t hear from me until next weekend so everyone have a great week.  I know I will!  :-))))))))))))))))

Animals and Nature, Family, Sewing

Hey there, Chickadee

Posted on by Jean

One of my favorite things about being around my grandparents is being surrounded by nature. 

My grandfather built their house up on a little mountain in the White Mountain area of New Hampshire.  I love getting up at the crack of dawn with them, wrapping up in a blanket, cup of coffee in hand, and going out on the deck to watch the woods wake up.

It’s so perfect to see a family of deer or foxes run across their land and listen to the birds.   My grandparents can tell you each kind of bird we hear.  They’ve always had lots of birdhouses and I remember my grandfather always at war with the squirrels trying to figure out a way that he could keep them out of the bird food.  Ever since I was a really little girl I’ve loved Chickadees.  I would actually start crying if the other birds looked like they weren’t letting the poor little Chickadees in the bird feeder. When my grandparents see Chickadees they think of me (there are a LOT of them in NH) .  I love that.  It’s sweet and makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.   Gram’s 81st birthday is on Saturday.  My gift is late because I just found a great book (Backyard Bird Quilts) and knew exactly what I had to make her.  The book just arrived on Tuesday so I dug into my fat quarter stash and spent yesterday afternoon working on this:

I took a little artistic liberty with the colors (that and it was really hard to see since it’s so dark here in the afternoons) but I think it’s pretty dern cute.   

And because I’m feeling so nostalgic lately, here’s a picture of Gram when she was about three or four years old just outside of Boston.

After the whole Mayflower discovery that I wrote about in the last post, I went to the library and got the book “Mayflower” by Nathaniel Philbrick.  I’m into the second chapter and really enjoying it.   I had no idea that they lived in Holland for about twelve years first.  It popped up a couple of times during the research but I couldn’t figure it out.

And finally, we are so close to Dan coming home that I swear the air is electric.  I can’t remember the last time I was this excited about something.  One week from right this very moment, if all goes as planned, we will be on the Autobahn and less than an hour from being home.   YeeeHAW!

Family, Knitting, Sewing

2 + 2 Still Equals 2

Posted on by Jean

I finished the two socks on two circs.  (I don’t normally block my socks but for photo purposes I used the instructions for the sock blockers online by bending coat hangers. The website I found the directions on is gone now.

yarn:  Regia 6-fadig Country Color / color #4758

So here’s my opinion about this method.  This is just my opinion.  It may be great for you.  I wasn’t crazy about the 2 on 2 method.  I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been using dpns so long but I just never got to a point where I was totally comfortable with it.  The one major pro was being finished with both socks at the same time.  I can achieve this by knitting a little of each on dpns though.  The circulars just always seemed to be in my way.   Made it seem faster but I’m sure that’s just in my head.

I really tried not to cheat but after several attempts to do the heels, I did put them on dpns until I got to straight knitting again.  I doubt I’ll ever knit socks this way again.  I originally thought that I’d do at least one more pair to see if it grows on me, but really, I didn’t enjoy it so what’s the point?

And remember this whole mess so that I could knit until I ran out of yarn equally?  What a waste of time. It was all for nothing.  Look how much I had left of each ball.  If I’d knit until I ran out of yarn I’d have thigh-high stockings which would be fine if I was going for the school-girl look but if I were, it wouldn’t be in this pattern. 🙂

So, what took me so long?  I’ve been working on a couple of other things.  One of them I can’t really show you yet, but here’s a hint:

Hardy Stock

After my last post I pulled all my old genealogy files out and joined Ancestry.com.  Wow.  It’s amazing how much the internet helps in the research.  From right here at my desk, I found more in a weekend than I found in all the days and days that I spent in the National Archives and Library of Congress when I lived in the D.C. area.

I’ve mainly been working from my grandmother back.  I got stumped in 1880 because the line I was researching came from Nova Scotia (Campbell and Fraser) during that year and I’ll have to order vital records to get more information.  The 1890 Census records were destroyed by a fire and it’s really bogging up my research.

Since I couldn’t go any further along that line I started looking up another line. I was amazed to find that my tenth great-grandparents are John Alden and Priscilla Mullins who came over on the Mayflower and founded Duxbury, Mass.  I called my Gram to tell her and her reply was, “I could have saved you a lot of work and told you that”.  This is the price I pay for not getting to live around my family in New Hampshire very much. 

So I thought it’d be fun to see if any of you are my long, long…… long lost cousins.  At the end of this post you’ll find my family history to the Aldens and Mullins.  As you can guess, most of them were born, lived and died in Duxbury. Edith Chick Hodgdon was my great great grandmother and her mother, Christiana Soule Chick, was the first to move away… all the way to Watertown, Ma. (a whopping 40 miles away).  This photo is Edith with her sister, Elizabeth. My Gram believes Edith is on the right.  I can totally see Gram and my aunts in both of these women so who knows. Edith’s mother-in-law was Georgianna B. Allan Hodgdon (the great granddaughter of both Col. John Allan and Col. John Crane that I wrote about in my last post).

Family, Knitting, Travel

A Heel Is Born

Posted on by Jean

Thanks for all the well wishes.  I’m back to normal.   The stuffed nose is even gone.  It was kind of nice to sleep for a couple of days.   I’m not a sleeper so on the odd occasion that I do, it’s pure bliss.

Winter has finally arrived here in Bavaria, Germany.   It seems it’s coming in full force.  The forecast is up to 12 inches in the next couple of days. Yesterday I was wearing a thin jacket around.   This morning, I was shoveling a ton of snow so the boys could walk out to the bus stop. I just let Aggie out a bit ago and she didn’t know what to do.  It was hilarious to see her go running to the door only to come to a skidding stop to look at all the white stuff that was all over her yard.  I’m really hoping they call a snow day tomorrow.  The boys have a four-day weekend (not really sure why) so it’d make it a five-day one full of fun sledding and hot cocoa… oh, and shoveling… lots of shoveling.  Good thing I don’t need to go anywhere today.  I can’t unless I go dig the mound out at the end of my driveway that the plow truck left there.  Swell.  I *really* miss Dan. lol.

I’ve been working on the socks on 2 circs.  Still haven’t decided if I like it or not.  Here I am working on one of the heels (I did them one at a time – impossible to do both short-row heels at once):

Here it is finished:

I have to admit that I ended up ripping it back out several times after knitting the other one and something just didn’t seem right (the stripes weren’t even close which led me to believe that I’d knit something wrong).  I ended up cheating and putting them both on dpns to do the heels.  I’m working on the ribbing now and am about 1/3 done.

While I was knitting on them last night I was watching the PBS special (on DVD) of Colonial House.  I LOVE these shows.  I was hooked on Pioneer House so I had high hopes for this show.  I watched three episodes last night and it’s really starting to get interesting now.  And they have Texas Ranch House out now!  Already ordered it so I can watch it when Dan gets home.  Did I mention that’s TWO WEEKS FROM TOMORROW…. but on to my story…

I took note that a lot of the men were wearing knitted hats that looked felted.  They seemed to be brighter colors than I would have imagined the Puritans wearing.   I love it for the scenery as well.  It’s shot in Maine.  Even though I’ve never actually lived there, I’ve visited often and it’s where my ancestors came to America from Scotland (through Nova Scotia).  My grandparents live about 20 min. from the Maine state line, so they didn’t go far. lol.

I especially like the inclusion of the Passamaquoddy Indians.  My seventh great-grandfather was Col. John Allan.  He was born in Edinburgh Castle when his father was there during the Scottish Rebellions.  They moved to Nova Scotia after the war as his father was given land there by the government for his service.  John Allan was a member of Parliment but ended up going against the crown and helping the Colonists.  Basically, his job was to keep the Indians of the Northeast on the Colonist’s side.  If you’re really interested (it is a really interesting story if you like history), you can read more here.   I even have an excerpt out of a diary of a girl that visited the Allan family.  It’s so cool to read about how they played the piano and sang songs to entertain her and how kind they all were.  Nice to know your kin were kind.

Lubec, Maine from Campobello Island (following pics are scans from old film snapshots):

Dan and I met at an Army school outside of Boston (Ft. Devens – I’m so sad it’s closed down).  About a month into the school we went on a trip to Maine.  I was going to see some papers on the Indian Reservation near Lubec that Col. Allan had written.  Dan claimed he wanted to go to see the Pow Wow they were having that weekend.  I was a little slow in realizing he was interested in more than the Indians.   The name of the cabin we stayed in was Blueberry Hill.  😉  We were married a little over a month later.   Maybe Fats was on to something! We went back there a couple of years later with 10-month old Daniel:

If you’re still reading I’ll tell you a funny story.  I knew that Col. Allan lived on an island off the coast of Lubec. There is a monument there where he and his wife were buried.  We went down to the dock and found a man that was about to take his family on a little boat ride.  He gave us a ride to the island and said he’d come back and get us in an hour.  HOW STUPID were we?!  The funny thing is we didn’t realize how stupid we were until we were sitting there waiting for him.  There was a salmon farm a little ways off and we were wondering if the faint figure we could see would hear us if we started screaming.   But the man did come back for us and returned us safely to Lubec…. obviously.

Dan, Daniel and Dallas (I still miss that dog and she died seven years ago) at our Blueberry Hill:

Family

Pride

Posted on by Jean

A beautiful sign that the deployment is almost over.  Time for the awards.

I gotta brag.  Dan was awarded his second Bronze Star.  The first one was for his last deployment to Afghanistan.   I’m glad they recognized him for his hard work and commitment.  Only 26 days… 25 really, today is basically over. 

I’m SO proud of you, Babe!

Family, Knitting

Happy NEXT MONTH!

Posted on by Jean

The new year means a lot to a lot of people.  This year it means one thing to me.  January 1st means that I can officially say my man comes home NEXT MONTH!!!!  Gotta tell you, 2006 pretty much sucked for me.  Don’t get me wrong, good things happened and I’m grateful for them but I’m REALLY happy to say hello to 2007 and all the adventure it’s going to bring.  Dan coming home, moving back to the States (I’ll miss Europe, lived here most of my adult life, but I miss family more), settling in at West Point (please God, let us get housing) and let’s not forget… RHINEBECK!!! 

Let me tell you, that move is going to sneak up and bite me right in the arse.  I can’t believe the movers will be here in about four months.  Right now all my thought processes are just getting ready for Dan to come home.  There’s racks of beer to be bought, banners to be made, favorite meals to be planned out….  a house to clean so that he doesn’t think aliens moved in and took his wife.

It’s amazing.  My mood went from the  doldrums to ecstatic overnight.  I’ve been walking around the house all morning all happy and every now and then I yell, “NEXT MONTH!  IT’S OVER, BABY!” and the boys get this scared look on their faces like their mother just lost her mind (little do they know that happened years ago).  A few minutes ago Joseph said, “Mom, people are going to think we’re crazy.  Please stop that.”  Yeah…  what do you want to bet that by the end of the day he’s the one that’s going to be yelling it and I’m going to be the one asking him to stop.

The boys and I went out to the field next to our house last night.  We have an awesome view of the Marktplatz and church towers of our town.  You can see it here from pictures I took in February (when we had this white stuff called snow).  Fireworks over here is a whole different story than in the States.  You can buy them everywhere for a couple of weeks before New Year’s Eve.  And they set them off everywhere.  I picked up a few stray rockets from our backyard this morning.  I was hoping to capture the light of the church towers in the fireworks but I didn’t get it.  Not a strong enough zoom lens and too far from the action.

I really think that my lack of knitting over the last year can be blamed on depression.   I mean, I picked up knitting again (and reading… which I also haven’t been doing) just a couple of weeks ago.  Dan’s coming home soon.  Coinkidink?  I think not.  Here is the progress on said knitting:

Don’t you hate the way cotton looks all uneven until you block it?  And so much for better photography.  It’s a very grey day here in Germany due to rain… again… not.snow.  Rain, rain go away bring a blizzard any day!  Yeah.  The blizzard will happen the day Dan’s plane is supposed to arrive.  Wow.  How’s that for snarky?  Even though you can’t tell it from that last paragraph, I really am in a good mood.  🙂

Another project I worked on was embroidering polo shirts for Dan and his troops for Christmas gifts.  I ruined the first set of polo shirts and had to order more so they were late getting to them but they loved them.  They also had SA (Special Agent) and their name under the  badge: