Lily, for those of you who don't know, is my sister's puppy. She's a cute mix of Chihuahua and Jack Russell terrier, we think. The Chihuahua part is obvious. She's a sweet little dog who loves cuddles, and barks fiercely at imagined intrusions into her human's space. Chihuahuas - even 8 pound wonders like Lily - know little fear.

Isn't she a cutie pie?

Recently, however, something has come into the house that has Lily worried.

It doesn't look threatening to me, but Lily sees it completely differently. When it first came into the house, it was innocently concealed in a plastic bag. And then it came out.

Last week, I told you the story of my dyeing adventure. This week, I'm sharing the photos.

Yesterday, we had our twice-monthly spinning get together, and my friend brought my dry and nicely braided rovings with her. I was still laboring away at my bag full of wool, but I'm getting through it. I'm ready for a change, though, so my newly dyed Rambouillet rovings will be a nice change.

Here in Arizona, we have our very own despot - Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

Crazy Joe thinks it's a good thing to feed his fellow humans outdated food (the famous "green bologna"), and to cut costs by feeding them this substandard sustenance only twice a day.

Crazy Joe has his own richly deserved page on Crazyspace. Just take a look at his "friends"!!

Last week, at our twice-monthly spinning get-together, a very nice woman named Amy invited me to her house to learn space dyeing and kettle dyeing. I was so excited! Everything I have learned about fiber arts (other than knitting and crocheting) I have learned from books and websites. This was my first chance to learn a new technique from a real live person.

So Rich and I set out for Amy's house. He wanted to come because he is interested in dyeing, too, though not wool. She lives on the other side of Tucson from us, so it was quite a drive. We waited through two interminable freight trains, battled heinous Saturday traffic, and finally found Amy's neighborhood, and then, her house.

Pizza pie, that is!  

I've spent part of the afternoon making pizza dough, and preparing to have three little girls top their own pizzas.

One, of course, wanted CHEEEEEEEESE!!! And nothing but CHEEEEEEEESE!!!

But, hey - she's six. It's almost a given, isn't it?

Middle child goes for the meat - pepperoni AND sausage! Should I have told her that the Italian sausage was chicken? Muhahahahah! This is a child who will NOT eat spaghetti sauce, or ravioli, or anything tomato sauce-y ... but pizza sauce is okay. Hmmm.

Oldest child, twelve, did a funky combo of the two little kids. Hers was half cheese, one quarter pepperoni, and one quarter sausage.

Kids are strange.

Fellow crafters and DIYers, I hope you got to spend some time this long holiday weekend enjoying your hobby. I did, and get to spend some time next weekend learning something new.

This weekend, we had our usual spinning group meeting, with an extra. We had a potluck! The hostess provided goatburgers, and we all brought something. I got nearly a full bobbin spun, and enjoyed watching Kathy teach four teens how to use a drop spindle. Two walked away with a desire to do more, and their grandma bought them each a drop spindle and some fiber to spin.

This is the document that started the ball rolling, the group far from their ancestral homes who eventually became the juggernaut known as the United States of America.

It's summer vacation time. The kids are out of school and running wild in the streets sitting in front of the TV and computer. Friends are packing up and driving away, off to spend a week with family. We will soon be doing the same thing; the last week of July, we'll be riding over the mountains and through the boring west Texas landscape to visit my brother in San Antonio.

At least Texas Canyon will be interesting ...

Oops! that's in Arizona!

Yesterday, I spent most of the day at my friend Kathy's. I was one of 8 visitors (three male) who came for a spin-in. We set up in her workshop, and I got to watch the wheels & spindles fly.

One of the men was a guest of his sister. She is an expert spinner who likes to spin laceweight. He picked up a spindle for the first time at the spin-in. He did really well, too, making two spindles full of usable yarn while he was there.

Yep, we all scream for ice cream!

Now that the temperature in Tucson has risen to a hellish level, and plans to stay that way this week, my thoughts are turning to everyone's favorite frozen treats.

Here is a fun history of ice cream, dating from flavored frozen snow. Yeah, that's not really ice cream, though is it? Another, more factual-seeming history can be found at this site.

For all you dads out there, and the moms and kids who love them, Happy Father's Day! I hope your family made you feel special and showed you how much you are loved.

On the craft front, I'll bet some dads got hobby materials today. Home Depot has been relentlessly running commercials of men drooling over tools. You'd think men never did any other kind of crafting, wouldn't you?

I spent several hours today with my nieces and their friend. An eight year old, a nine year old, and a six year old, all in a state of heightened excitement at the prospect of a trip to the public library. Oh, my.

They were all in a tizzy, and anxiously inquired whether they needed to bring their purses. They all brought them, of course, but then two decided to leave theirs in the car - asked me, in fact, "Do I have to bring my purse in?".  Uh, no. The neighbor child did bring hers because she was carrying her mom's library card. Works for me.

We had to do the pre-going out litany before we left the house, and again before we walked into the library.

Yep, it happened. You will remember I posted a few weeks ago about Sock Wars and my participation in the event.

Well, I am now a dead sock warrior. My lovely socks arrived just in time for my birthday, along with some very special goodies.

The outer box was a regular USPS Priority Mail box, but the INNER box. Ahhhh, the inner box made me drool a bit.

Sitting by the roadside on a summer day,
Chatting with my messmates, passing time away,
Lying in the shadow underneath the trees,
Goodness how delicious, eating goober peas!
Peas! Peas! Peas! Peas! Eating goober peas!
Goodness how delicious, eating goober peas!

- from the song "Goober Peas" - written in 1866 with words by A. Pindar and music by P. Nutt

Goober peas are, of course, peanuts. Most of us have eaten peanuts all of our lives, even if only in the center of M&M candies! I always loved Planter's salted peanuts; it's what I grew up with (regular roast, not dry).

This winter, for the very first time in my memory, I ate boiled peanuts, the original goober peas. And, you know what? They were delicious! I'm planning some peanut boiling as we speak.

Remember what our friend Bilbo Baggins had to do when times got tough.

"I am so dreadfully hungry," groaned Bilbo, who was suddenly aware that
he had not had a meal since the night before the night before last. Just think
of that for a hobbit! His stomach felt all empty and loose and his legs all
wobbly, now that the excitement was over.
"Can't help it," said Gandalf, "unless you like to go back and ask the
goblins nicely to let you have your pony back and your luggage."
"No thank you!" said Bilbo.
"Very well then, we must just tighten our belts and trudge on - or we
shall be made into supper, and that will be much worse than having none
ourselves."

The Hobbit, J.R.R. Tolkein

In the current environment of rising gas prices, and rising prices on everything that must be transported, it appears that many of us are re-examining our daily lives for ways to "tighten our belts".

If you can call Tucson "Pleasant Valley", that is. Though, if weather is anything to go on, today is about as pleasant as late spring gets here in the desert. It's a sunny day, of course, and in the 80's, which is just glorious. Maaaaybe we'll hit 90 today, but I kinda doubt it.

So, what have we been doing with our glorious Sunday? Rich, the darling husband, got up at the crack of dawn, and started working on vacuums. When he finished that up, he decided it was naptime, and that is where he is now. I keep trying to convince him that he could sleep later and work after he's done sleeping, but it's been a no-go for 20 years. You'd think I'd give up, wouldn't you? But that would be far too easy.

My sister is recovering from a tummy bug, and she's trying to sleep/rest off the rest of it. She's upstairs in bed, and probably snoozing.

and I can't get rid of it.

What is it? It's Yellow Submarine, by the Beatles.

Yup, it's an earworm, one of those tunes that plays on an endless loop inside your brain. This happens to be one of my most persistent earworms (good thing I like the song!), but there are others.

One of my friends gets the theme from Rocky and also the Indiana Jones theme stuck in her head on a regular basis. I also get to hear her sing "Spanish Flea", and this little gem.

Good ones and bad ones.

The bad ones never seem to go away ...

My dear WAYWO-ers,

You all know that I am a soldier in Sock Wars III, and I have been bravely knitting away at my sock. As it happens, my second pair of socks EVER.

Now I have to start all over again. My sock is unworthy to be used as a weapon against my designated target. Errors of all types abound in this sad little ... er, big ... sock.

There's a spot of good news, though. Just a tiny one.

My assassin is due to die tomorrow. Her assassin has announced the impending demise, and I have celebrated in a most unsportsmanlike manner.