4 Things & Such

Got this from Stels...consider yourself tagged!

4 Things

4 places I have been on vacation:
1. Disney World
2. Thailand
3. St. Lucia
4. Phoenix

4 things I could not live without:
1. My DH
2. A way to communicate with family & friends (phone, net, letters)
3. Ice water
4. Any kind of craft project

4 of my favorite foods:
(being pregnant, my tastes have changed)
1. Fruit
2. Cookies
3. Hamburgers
4. Green olives minus pimento

4 places I would rather be right now:
1. Illinois with my family & friends
2. South Louisiana with my friends
3. St. Lucia
4. Cape May, NJ visiting Katie & Jamie

4 bad habits of mine:
1. Picking out spelling mistakes that others make
2. Swearing like a sailor
3. Procrastination
4. Inability to turn off the brain at night and get some decent sleep

4 people whose advice I would trust on just about anything:
1. DH
2. Grampy
3. Dad K.
4. Staci

4 things I wish I would have never done:
1. Sabotage friendships back in the day
2. Quit ISU
3. Waited until too late to order my "perfect" wedding dress
4. Let others control my life for so long

4 things I hope to see/ do / accomplish before I die:
1. Celebrate 50 years of marriage to DH
2. Meet and love my grandchildren
3. Spend another Christmas in New Orleans
4. Live debt free and off the grid

4 of my favorite smells:
1. DH's aftershave
2. Bread baking
3. Fresh sheets on my bed at Granny & Grampy's
4. Lilly of the Valley

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In my post on June 30, I talked about the felted heart that I made. It is a fun craft for people of all ages to do. Also great to recycle old stuff. Here is how you felt things:

Felting is easy once you know how. You may have already done it and not known that you did it!

Basically it is throwing a woolen or cashmere sweater or blanket in the washer on the hottest setting and washing it, then throwing it in the dryer on the hottest setting until dry, be sure to clean out the lint trap every now and then, there are a lot of fuzzies that come off while drying. What you end up with is a much, much smaller version of the original.

I like to go to secondhand shops or thrift stores and get sweaters and blankets very cheaply to use for felting. Once I have washed & dried it (felted it), then what I do is just cut it apart carefully at the seams trying to maintain as much of the "good" material as possible. I typically discard the cuffs, waistband and neckband since they usually contain some type of elastic material. Then just use the "good" material any way you want to.

Voila! That is felting. :) The felt is a bit thicker than the kind that you can buy at the craft stores but it holds up better in the long run. I have made the hearts, pincushions, pet beds and am going to make a small hanging pillow and affix a cross stitch piece to it soon.

Vicki at Turkey Feathers did a project where they felted balls last summer to use for various craft projects. I highly recommend visiting her blog as it is filled with "use what you have" type of crafting. It can take a little while to upload though. She is doing a whole bunch of projects using an old wool blanket.

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So, it looks like it will be me, Jo and Carolyn doing the Rainbow Gallery Freebies as a SAL. Ladies, I will email you in just a minute and we can figure out the details. I think that Carolyn & I may have some catching up to do to get to Jo, she is already done with "B". Jo, it looks like you are doing them on the same piece of fabric...? What count are you using? I was thinking of switching mine every now and then as long as they are all the same count, I guess it wouldn't matter.

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I finished "Angels & Demons" by Dan Brown (of The Da Vinci Code fame). It was a good book, not quite as controversial as the ideas he put forth in The Da Vinci Code. He must have a thing for Catholicism, I must say. Again you will find the Church at the center of this book. I do have "Deception Point" on the bookshelf here as well, but I want to wait to start it for a while. So, I started "The Shunning" by Beverly Lewis. It is about Amish Life so far and is fiction. I haven't read much of it.

I would like to recommend a great book to anyone that is looking for a financial plan for life. It is "Automatic Millionaire" by David Bach. It basically spells out for you the steps that you need to take to gain financial freedom. DH & I read it while laying on the beach in St. Lucia. When we got home, we put the steps in motion and also bought another one of his books, "Smart Couples Finish Rich". It was a little difficult at first but now, I forget that we are even on our way, it's automatic. For us, it isn't about "finishing rich", it is about having financial freedom. We want to retire in our 40's and own our own home mortgage free before we are 50. If you follow David's steps, you can really do it. It is all about compounding interest. We also watch The Suze Orman Show every week. Yeah, she can be a bit obnoxious at times and most of what she says doesn't apply to us, but we have learned alot. Like stop contributing to your 401k if your employer doesn't match any of it. If you want more information, just email me or let me know.

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Thanks everyone who said a little prayer for my Grampy. From what I understand (thanks again, Stels for checking for me), he had a stent put in one of his arteries. And he will be going home tomorrow as long as he does okay tonight. That's all I know. I am a bit disappointed that my Mom has yet to call me about any of this especially after the tirade that she was on when Granny went into the hospital. C'est la vie. I am just so happy that he will be okay. My Grampy means the world to me.

Peace :)