My very first ever giveaway! Do you have visions of sugarplums dancing in your head in anticipation of the coming holidays? No? Maybe you need a little help then. A nudge in the right direction, shall we say. Look no further than this yarn:

Interested? Well, it can be yours! 80 yards of scrumptiously soft candy-cane-colored handspun yarn. I believe it’s wool plied with mohair and a thick-and-thin consistency. Super soft and fuzzy! Enough to make that little something for the girl that has everything, or use it as trim or edging on special handmade Christmas presents.

Spun with tiny glass beads sprinkled through out ...

little “gingerbread” ornaments ...

tiny glass sugarplums ...

candy canes and peppermint balls.

I bought this yarn a few years ago from a seller I was hooked on. I tried her website the other day and it seems that she is no longer selling her handcrafted yarn. I had always planned to use it on something Christmasy, but now I am thinking it would be better off with someone who could put it to better use. So, I am offering it up to a lucky “someone” out there in blogland.

If you are interested, please leave a comment for me and tell me you’d like to be in the drawing for the giveaway. If you’d like to tell me what you could or would do with the yarn if you won that would be wonderful! Leave your comment by Thanksgiving and I’ll draw names the day after.

Good luck!

yesterday was not much fun for me. mommy and daddy got up early and took me to the vet place. i was happy because i don’t mind the vet place. but then mommy and daddy left, they stuck a needle in me and i had to wait a long time in a crate. then i went to sleep and when i woke up i felt real funny. mommy and daddy finally came to get me after ages and ages. they brought me home and i made funny whimpery noises like i was trying to sing a song. mommy and daddy think the pain drugs made me trippy. i did pretty good overnight and just slept, mostly. i had to sleep back in my crate like a little puppy again. mommy and daddy says i got spayeded. i don’t think i want to “get spayded” ever again. mommy said i won’t have to.

this morning daddy had to take me out on a leash to pee-pee. he said there’s going to be a lot of that. doctor’s orders for at least 2 weeks. he said i need to be careful and calm. hah. good luck with that i say. give me a couple of days and i’ll be making trouble again.

To my grandfather (on left), who fought in WWII and loved every single minute.  Known to most as George, or as my grandmother called him “Bum” (not sure why!), he was better known to me as Poppy. My grandmother captured his journey in this lovely hand-painted album. I’m not sure what the significance of this album coming from “Green Cove Springs, Fla.” is exactly. I thought maybe he was stationed there or trained there, but inside the cover there is an inscription that says otherwise. So, that part will remain a mystery. (Although in a footnote below I did find some information connected to WWII there.) Maybe he shipped out from there?

Above is the inscription page and in case you can’t read it here it what it says in my grandmother’s handwriting:

“S/Sgt. George Sherow 32947541 CO. H. 328th Inf. A.P.O. 26
Entered U. S. Army Dec. 3, 1943.
Trained at Camp Wolters, Texas & Camp Shelby, Miss.
Home on furlough May 1944.
Last 12 hr. pass Aug. 14, 1944
Left for overseas Aug. 1944
With the 26th Yankee Division through France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria & Czeck.
Wounded in action Dec. 1944 awarded Purple Heart.
Also holds combat infantryman badge and E. T. O (?) ribbons with four battle stars. (Note: I think E. T. stand for European Theater Ribbon.)
Awarded Silver Star for gallantry in action.
Home after 15 months overseas.
Discharged November 13th, 1945

At the top of the page is written “arrived in States Nov 8 -45. Home Nov 45 on Howard Victory.”

This silly photo is marked “Taken in Texas 1943” on the back, so it must have been when he was first in boot camp. I think the horse is real, but who knows? Eh, caballero!

Here he is with my grandmother. The date on the back is ” May 1944,” so I am thinking this was his furlough.

The album is full of photos of war time events and people. The names, meaningless to me, are written under the photos of long ago war time buddies. Countries are documented as they made their way across Europe.

I remember my grandfather telling stories about the war and having met General Patton himself and what a great man and leader he was. I thought it was interesting how he wrote on these photos where Patton was in these two shots. He’s in there somewhere, we just have to trust Poppy.

Also Patton related were several post cards of the famous Lipizzaner stallions marked “Horse show in Vienna,” and this one marked “Patton’s Horse.”

Now, I doubt this is really Patton’s own horse but there is some reason the photo is labelled that way, both on the back and underneath. Patton did indeed attend a show of the Lipizzaner stallions while in Vienna (and it would seem the two photos above were taken at that very same event!) and was paramount in their rescue during the war.  Here is a link to that story.

A few other pages in the album are worth another look. This one with a ticket from the mess hall stating that the first meal was at 7:30 a.m. and the second was at 4:30 p.m. That seems pretty early to eat in the evening for a hungry soldier! Also on this page, an Army exchange ration card.

One with photos of Austria and a row of stamps with Hitler’s image. Note the inscription under the stamps!

Another page has clippings from the newspaper of his promotions and medals.

Accompanying the album is a small box marked “medals.” I could swear there used to be a paper inside this box that told about his Purple Heart but it’s not there now.

Also in the box is this silver dollar. The note attached to it says “this dollar went with Poppy overseas and came back with him as you can see by all he wrote on it.” It was his good luck dollar, and everywhere he went he wrote his destination.

And last but not least, the box also contained this newsletter which must have been printed on the ship home—The Howard Victory.

And here they are on the ship home. (Poppy is in the middle of the three men.)

I hope you’ve enjoyed your peek into this wonderful album my grandparents left behind. I know I’ve learned a few things I overlooked before.

On this day, thank you Poppy for your commitment to your country. I’m proud of you!

Thanks to all who serve: past, present and future.

Not much going on around here lately. We spent a quiet weekend doing mostly chores. Saturday we finished stacking the two cords of wood, so now we’re ready for colder weather. Our weather over the weekend, however, was balmy and sunny—and mid 60’s! Now, I ask you Mother Nature, why couldn’t you have given us this weather earlier on so the trees would have been happier? Speaking of the trees, that’s another time consuming chore. I ran Johnny over the yard again to mulch the final leaves that had fallen and Rick did leaf blowing duty in various spots. The big oak in the back yard still has leaves, so I’ll wait until they drop to go over the back yard once more and then it will be time for us to change out the mowing deck for the snow blower.

We did take time out on Sunday morning to take the dogs for a walk on the old Jungle Habitat grounds. Not much remains of the old enclosures except some fencing and tall, heavy wrought steel gates. Some of them look like they used to keep T-Rexes and velociraptors captive. You just have to use your imagination. But in reality, where lions, tigers, and elephants used to roam there are now only squirrels, chipmunks, deer and bear, bicyclists and dog walkers. The dogs love it because they can be off-lead, meet other dogs and people. On this walk we didn’t see any other dogs.

I hadn’t realized there was so much bittersweet growing here! It covered the trees. Next time I come I’m bringing my garden clipper so I can take some home with me! I know it’s parasitic but it’s so pretty.

And talking about parasitic ... the vines here are pretty creepy. They take over the trees.

This one looks like it created a loop to catch someone or something in.

The bark of some kind of birch tree glowing silvery-gold in the sun.

A watering hole along the way is always a good thing Bella says.

The moon looks like it’s being embraced by the tree branches, don’t you think?

We do a loop of about a mile and a half. It’s a nice walk along the abandoned road system with some short climbs. The dogs were pooped when we got home and slept while Rick and I did the outside chores. A very full weekend of just “stuff.”