Welcome New Sisters! (click for current roster)
Merit Badge Awardees (click for latest awards)
My featured Merit Badge Awardee of the Week is … Katie Wright!!!
Katie Wright (#5600) has received a certificate of achievement in Stitching & Crafting for earning a Beginner, Intermediate & Expert Level Crochet Merit Badge!
“I have crocheted for years and enjoy making scarfs, hats, and even have enjoyed doilies and bags. I do also make dishcloths, but prefer the knit ones to the crocheted ones. I have made some pretty potholders also.
For my Beginner badge, I made a scarf, crocheting it the long way and using up scraps of yarn. It was crocheted in the back of the stitches and made it ridged, which adds to the texture and prettiness of it. I actually made three of these scarfs and have two to send in my box to the Native American Elders Project in Utah, which I mail out each August with hats, scarfs, socks and mittens, and this year, even a sweater.
My scarf turned our very festive, and I worked on it once at my knitting circle so I could show another lady how to crochet. She likes knitting better, but she at least tried to crochet.
For my Intermediate level badge, I decided to make a carry tote, actually making two: one for my library book tote, and the other I am using to take to a friend’s home, where I am teaching not only her, but her two daughters, ages 8 and 6, to crochet. I have crocheted in front of them, and at my knitting circle when I was working on a scarf and also while glamping and a friend came to visit.
My totes are so nice. I used double strands of yarn and also sewed a corduroy lining for them. I used one of them at the grocery store and the cashier checked it all over as she was learning to crochet, so I shared to pattern with her later.
For my Expert level badge, I have been teaching several people to crochet, and have a few more ladies that have asked me to do so. I start them with a chain and then in making a scarf or dishcloth, and then they can move on to a hat. For my project, I again took much leftover yarn, and used some double and some single and made granny squares, small ones, about 4 inches square. Then I crocheted them together into a very long shawl for myself. I put fringe on it, also in multiple colors. It is cheery, heavy, and warm, and I use it when glamping, either early morning just to pop out with my Daisy Dog or in the evening sitting outside by the campfire.
I believe this piece turned out very lovely. I have had lots of compliments on it. My daughter-in-love (yes, love, not law, but she and my son are legally married for 25 years now) is an avid crocheter. She checked it all over when coming out for breakfast one morning recently while I was glamping near the lake. She plans to make one for a friend and use up some of her scrap yarns.”
“Have you heard the latest goodies from the grapevine?” Jane teased with a twinkle in her eye.
Young Woman with Hat and Grapes by Pierre van Hanselaere, 1820, via Wikimedia Commons
Sally shrugged.
Yolanda yawned.
But Nosy Nellie just had to know. She sidled up to Jane with her ears practically pleading. She couldn’t wait to gather the gossip and nosh on the natter …
Quiz:
Knowing what you now know about natter-noshing Nosy Nellie, you might refer to her as which of the following?
Sufficiently stumped?
Well, while Nosy Nellie may, indeed, study fermentation in the processes of brewing and distillation (zymurgist) or perform matchmaking in the old Hebrew style (shadcan), the most apropos label for the lady in this situation would be “quidnunc,” someone who is eager to know the latest news and gossip; a busybody.
We’ve all seen rainbows, right?
Photo by Donald Macauley from Carshalton, Surrey, UK via Wikimedia Commons
I count myself lucky each time I spy a ribbon of colors stretching to touch a rain-freshened sky. If I happen to be with my bedazzled grandgirls, I feel extra blessed, because their young eyes still shine with surprise.
My question to you is …
Have you ever seen a moonbow?
Photo of a moonbow at the lower Yosemite Falls by Brocken Inaglory via Wikimedia Commons
Look closely at the photo—those are stars in the sky. And yet, somehow, a rainbow (no, MOONbow) arches across the scene below.
This marvelous and seemingly mystical phenomenon is not a figment of fairy tales.
“A moonbow (also known as a lunar rainbow or white rainbow) is a rainbow produced by light reflected off the surface of the moon (as opposed to direct sunlight) refracting off of moisture-laden clouds in the atmosphere. Moonbows are relatively faint, due to the smaller amount of light reflected from the surface of the moon. They are always in the opposite part of the sky from the moon,” explain the worldly wizards of Wikipedia. “Because the light is usually too faint to excite the cone color receptors in human eyes, it is difficult for the human eye to discern colors in a moonbow. As a result, they often appear to be white. However, the colors in a moonbow do appear in long exposure photographs.”
As we can see in the photo above and this stunning scene from Victoria Falls in Zambia:
Photo courtesy Calvin Bradshaw (calvinbradshaw.com) via Wikimedia Commons
Oooohhhh …
Personally, I’d be giddy as a grandgirl to get a glimpse of a white moonbow, wouldn’t you?
Our best chance to catch a moonbow would be when the moon is at or very near a bright full moon. Ideally, the moon must be low in a very dark night sky, which is only likely to occur a couple of hours before sunrise or after sunset.
“Of course,” Wiki reminds us, “There must be rain falling opposite the moon.”
And a unicorn in your pocket.
Who knows?
It could happen.
Yestern,
that is to say,
yestreen,
the hills of ye-olde pastoral Palouse
were looking mighty lush and green …
Photo by Bala via Wikimedia Commons
Hear ye:
“Yestern” is an old English word that refers to yesterday.
“Yestreen,” on the other hand, is much more specific, meaning yesterday evening.
Yessiree.
Or, should I say, yessireen?
Buy props used in MaryJane’s books and magazine!
5% of profits will benefit www.firstbook.org, a non-profit that provides new books to children from low-income families throughout the U.S. and Canada.
Here’s how:
MaryJane will post a photo and a description of a prop and its cost along with a few details as to its condition here: https://shop.maryjanesfarm.org/MaryJanesCurations. It’s a playful way to be the new owner of a little bit of farm herstory.
