Happy 4th!!!!

OOOOOPS!!!!! My mom made these canisters for me years ago. She couldn't even believe I still had them. Guess what mom! I'm getting new canisters :-(


These are the socks I was knitting with the yarn my friend Pat gave me from Turkey. I absolutely love them! I love everything about them, The color, the look, the feel, the fit. They are perfect. I am working on another pair of socks with yarn I bought at "Fingerlakes Fibers" in Watkins Glen when my mom was here. It is gorgeous yarn! I will have pictures next week.


I almost stepped on this little guy! I was at Pat's house walking around the yard taking pictures and I stepped just within a foot of him. He was just sitting there looking up at me. If you can't tell - he is a baby blue jay.


A beautiful rose at Pat's house.



Humming bird at Pat's feeder. I kept telling Pat I wanted to come to her house just to take pictures. She lives in the country and has a beautiful country setting.

What's happening - No more kids!!!! At least for 2 1/2 weeks. Then I am watching just a couple for 2 weeks while their "summer babysitter" is on vacation. I feel so free, what shall I do? I do have plans actually. Some fun, some work.

My husband and I went to a cherry festival this weekend. We went to it last year and enjoyed ourselves, so we thought we would go again this year. It was at The Cobblestone Farm Winery (click to visit the website). They had bands, we got to listen to a couple that were pretty good. They had lots of crafts for sale. Lots of food. We had some ice cream. And of course wine tasting and wine for sale. We bought a bottle of wine and a jar of Cherry Jam. They also had cherry wine that was actually pretty good, (very sweet though) I don't think I could have drank a whole glass of it.

On our "Barn property" up the road from us, we have lots of cherry trees. So we did our own cherry picking this weekend. We have both tart red cherries and black sweet cherries. When we got home I made a cherry sauce for ice cream. Remember my top 5 from last week - well cherries are good on top of ice cream!

Fourth of July weekend my hubby and I are going to our cabin in the Adirondacks. AND... We are going to drive over to VT! My husband bought a new snowmobile trailer (remember he crashed the other one) it is in VT, so we are going to go get it. I am going to look up "things to do" in that area so we can make a fun day of it. It is pretty much right in the middle of the state - a small town called Washington. So if anyone knows this area please comment!

Books I have read - Prep, by Curtis Sittenfeld. This was a good book, I give it about 3 1/2 to 4 stars. At first when I started reading it I thought it was probably a YA book, up until the last third! It got very sexual (graphically) then I knew it was probably NOT a Young Adult book after all. I still liked the book even though I do not like graphic sex in my books (I like to imagine my own, thank you). This book was about Lee, a high school student from a lower middle class family in Indianna who gets a scholarship into a very prestigious Prep school in MA. Lee quickly learns that she is an outsider, and goes to the extreme to fit in. By the time she is a Senior she has created a place for herself, but is this what she really wants?

Contests - "A Sea of Books" is giving away 5 copies of "Off Season" by Anne Rivers Siddon
"Chick loves Lit" is giving away a copy of "Dead Until Dark" by Charlaine Harris
Dar at "Peeking Between the Pages" is having a few giveaways, check out her blog and scroll down to find them all.

Reading through the states -
Alabama- Florabama Ladies Auxiliary and Sewing Circle, by Lois Battle (14)
Alaska- Building from Within, Joan Koponan (15)
Arizona – Whispers, by Erin Grady (13)
Arkansas – Sweet Baby, by Sharon Sala (18)
California – Echoes, by Erin Grady (1)
Colorado- Tomboy Bride, by Harriet Fish Backus (16)
Connecticut –
Delaware-
Florida - In her Shoes, by Jennifer Weiner (2)
Georgia – Wild Card Quilt, by Janisse Ray (25)
Hawaii - Flip Flopped by Jill Smolinski (22)
Idaho – Indian Creek Chrinicles, by Pete Fromm (11)
Illinois - The Perfect Match, by Kimberly Cates (20)
Indiana- Prep, Curtis Sittenfeld(26)
Iowa – The Learning, Love Beyond A Lifetime I , by Ruthann Weaver (3)
Kansas – Waiting for Summer’s Return, by Kim Vogel Sawyer (10)
Kentucky – The Believers, By Janice Holt Giles (6)
Louisiana –
Maine-
Maryland-
Massachusetts – A Year by the Sea, by Joan Anderson (4)
Michigan-
Minnesota – Hit by a Farm, by Catherine Friend (7)
Mississippi-
Missouri-
Montana – My Hutterite Life, by Lisa Marie Stahl (9)
Nebraska-
Nevada-
New Hampshire – Handle With Care, by Jodi Picoult (23)
New Jersey-
New Mexico-
New York - The Lives they Left Behind: Suitcases from a State Hospital Attic, by Darby Penney and Peter Stastny (12)
North Carolina – Scrambled Eggs at Midnight, by Brad Barkley & Heather Hepler (8)
North Dakota-
Ohio-
Oklahoma-
Oregon-
Pennsylvania-
Rhode Island-
South Carolina - Bastard out of Carolina, by Dorothy Allison (5)
South Dakota-
Tennessee - The Ballad of Frankie Silver, by Sharyn McCrumb (24)
Texas-
Utah-
Vermont-
Virginia -
Washington - North of Beautiful, by Justina Chen Headley (19)
West Virginia –Once there was a Farm, by Virginia Bell Dabnay
Wisconsin – Tyler: Whirlwind, by Nancy Martin (17)
Wyoming – Letters of a Woman Homesteader, by Elinore Pruitt Stewart (21)



Top 5 - Plans for the 4th
1. Go to our cabin
2. Watch fireworks over Piseco Lake
3. Go to Vermont
4. Relax
5. Probably get bitten by mosquitoes!