Ice Crystal Phenomenon

Have you ever been out on a very cold night and seen this amazing sight?

My grandson is 20 and leaves for work each morning at 4:30 AM.   The other morning shortly after he left the house I got a text from him, which was pretty alarming because he just left.  Since he drives down a dark county road to get to work, he saw this sight and was EXTREMELY excited.  His text said there were weird lights in the sky...all over the place.  I thought maybe he was seeing the Northern Lights.  NO!! He Texted.   They are pillars of lights coming from the earth.  Well, at 4:30 in the morning, Terry and I heated the car to see what the heck he was talking about.  I had never seen this Phenomenon myself, but looking down the highway, I could see they were coming from lights--some from street lights.

You could see little crystals of snow in the headlights, that could not be seen unless you were looking into the light.  Later in the day the weather man said he had received a lot of phone calls asking why the snow looked so crystally and what the heck are those light pillars coming from.  He explained that when the air is really cold it zaps the moisture from the air which causes tiny little ice crystals to glow in the light.  It's just really a beautiful sight to see. Have YOU seen it?

2016 Project - Temperature Afghan

 I don't troll Facebook much but a group making a crochet Temperature Afghan caught my eye.  I have always wanted to keep track of the temps and weather each year but never have.  This looked like an interesting and easy way to do that AND use some of my unbelievably large yarn stash. (After gathering it all together while selecting yarn to use I actually have 6 totes full!!)   I also thought that I would have an excellent gift for Corey's girlfriend at the end of the year.

Here is a chart for the colors I am using.  The Mint has been switched to Jade because I didn't realize my original Mint choice was Baby Weight.

Here is progress after the first week.  I will use black between the months and as a border.

There are lots of ideas about creating one of these.  Some have gone back to research temps for the year they were born, married or other ideas.

One that I really liked was a mother that used her daughter's school colors which were black and orange.  She crocheted a blanket by stitching a row of orange each time her daughter's team scored a touchdown and a black row each time an opponent scored.  The blanket was gorgeous.  I thought it was really a great gift for a teen.

The Facebook group is HUGE.  Over 4,000 members.  I turned off notifications of posts to my news feed because it just got ANNOYING!!  One pessimistic member posted a comment asking how many do we really think will follow through all year.  So, in defiance to her sarcasm I'll be posting an update at the beginning of each month to show progress.  My blanket should start with these colors and progress to yellow-orange-and purple then back to these blue/greens.  I hope it turns out pretty.  I am doing single crochet  with a "H" hook since there are 366 days this year.  It is as wide as my grandson's arm span and at 366 rows it should be long enough to cover his 6'4" height!

After seeing the stack of yarn totes I have, I'll be thinking of other projects to use it!!

The Revenant and the Wonderland Theater

We don't often go to the theater.  Terry HATES to go.  But from the first time I saw the trailer for this movie I knew I wanted to see it in a theater in full screen and theater sound.  When I brought the movie to Terry's attention he agreed.  We saw it the second day it was released and it was amazing.  Before we entered the building, I heard people that were leaving say it was gory.  Yes, it was a bloody show in places. But it was so very well acted and the cinematography was absolutely amazing.  We definitely agreed that we want to see it again, but will probably wait until we can watch at home.

We are lucky that we have a theater about 1/2 hour drive away located in Niles Michigan called the Wonderland.  Terry and I have been going there for more than 25 years.  Showings before noon are $3, noon to 6 are $4, and after 6 the ticket price jumps to $5.  A large bag of popcorn and two large drinks cost $6.50.  The concessions for popcorn and pop are self serve and on the honor system that you will pay for refills.  I'm not sure, but I think that there are 6 theaters.  You can order tickets on line which includes selecting the seat you want to sit in which I highly recommend.  As you might suspect the theaters are small and if you go when a movie is first released you could arrive and find it sold out.  I think prices in our area for the chain theaters is about $10 per person with a bag of popcorn and a large drink costing $13.

Terry enjoyed it so much, I'm sure we will be going out to see movies more often!!

A Word - More or Less

At the beginning of the New Year lots of people choose a focus word to inspire them throughout the year. I have done that myself.  This year I  even saw a blog hop with a challenge to create a mini quilt based on your word.

From my experience, these "words" are much like New Years Resolutions.  You know what I mean.  At the beginning of the year you resolve to do something better and quickly forget that you did.  Good intentions sometimes die quickly.

So as the new year approached, the thought of selecting a "word" crossed my mind then quickly flew right through.  On second thought, how about a phrase.  Maybe a phrase, cousin to a thought, might be a little more lasting and gratifying.

I've been thinking about "MORE OR LESS".  What the heck does that mean?

I want to SEW MORE.  Which really means I'll watch TV LESS.  And actually spend LESS time with Terry because my sewing machine is in a different room than where he spends most of his time. (I could sew while he naps.  That would give me an hour or two.)

I want to  WEIGH Less, which really means I'll EAT MORE healthy, low calorie food.

I want to SAVE MORE money, which translates to SPEND LESS.

See, you get the idea.  Less is More and More is Less so this year I chose a phrase, More or Less.


1.  Sew MORE so I will have LESS fabric stash.
2.  Embroider MORE so I will have LESS stress.
3.  Crochet MORE so I will have less yarn stash.
4.  Comment MORE on blogs to promote MORE friendships.  OOPS! More is More.

What this is really about is this.  I will have a MORE healthy mindset by using More and giving MORE which means I will have LESS but get MORE.

What do you think?  or as my favorite niece would say:  How do you like me now!!  I love it when she says that!!

Happy New Year.

Google Is Making Another Change

I know, I know. Everyone has a complaint about Google and Blogger. Personally I like Blogger and I hate Google +. I don't pretend to understand why Google makes the changes it does to it's platform. I just try to go with the flow. I have a Nexus 7 tablet and I can tell you I get WONDERFUL support via phone if I have an issue, which sometimes I do, after an update. I simply go to the contact page on my online manual. Fill out a form that includes my phone number and within ONE MINUTE they call me back and help me work through a solution.

I still read my blog list through my dashboard list. I hope they never do away with it.

I noticed that Google posted the following information so I thought I would bring it to the attention of my Followers. It's pretty self explanatory so if it affects you, you may want to open a google account and follow your favorite Blogger blogs using it so you don't miss a post.

Here is what Google said:

In 2011, we announced the retirement of Google Friend Connect for all non-Blogger sites. We made an exception for Blogger to give readers an easy way to follow blogs using a variety of accounts. Yet over time, we’ve seen that most people sign into Friend Connect with a Google Account. So, in an effort to streamline, in the next few weeks we’ll be making some changes that will eventually require readers to have a Google Account to sign into Friend Connect and follow blogs.

As part of this plan, starting the week of January 11, we’ll remove the ability for people with Twitter, Yahoo, Orkut or other OpenId providers to sign in to Google Friend Connect and follow blogs. At the same time, we’ll remove non-Google Account profiles so you may see a decrease in your blog follower count.

We encourage you to tell affected readers (perhaps via a blog post), that if they use a non-Google Account to follow your blog, they need to sign up for a Google Account, and re-follow your blog. With a Google Account, they’ll get blogs added to their Reading List, making it easier for them to see the latest posts and activity of the blogs they follow.

We know how important followers are to all bloggers, but we believe this change will improve the experience for both you and your readers.

Posted by Michael Goddard, Software Engineer