440: Coupons for Organic Foods and More.

Hey folks.

I found a cool blog that has a great post on links to coupons for organic foods.

The blog is Affluent Pauper and the post for the coupons is here.

Affluent Pauper also has other cool ways to save money, get free stuff, etc.

Go check 'em out.

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439: Paying the Piper.

Hey y'all.

Mr. Bliss and I have been having way too much fun playing around over the past several months.

Now I'm feeling like we might be paying for our good times for the next 18 years or so.

Yeah.

Stay tuned...

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438: So I went to the yarn shop.

Hey y'all.

I went to the yarn shop.

And I bought yarn.

Expensive yarn.

I tried to fight the urge and it was a long fight. (I was in there for at least two hours.) But in the end, the beautifully bountiful and softly squishy yarns lured me into their knitted and crocheted webs and I was unable to leave the store without some of them.

A few of the fibers I bought were very nice yarn and on the pricey side. But every ounce I bought was on sale so even the expensive stuff wasn't super expensive.

And I used the remains of my Christmas money so I didn't put even a small dent in the family budget.

That yarn store is going out of business soon and I'm sure I'll make another trek out there just to have the pleasure of mingling 'mongst the Malabrigo and nestling 'midst the Noro.

Everything is on sale because everything must go before they shutter the doors and windows one last time. There were silk fibers in the back room that were $72 a hank. I can't help but wonder how low the prices will go on the final day of sales.

However, rest assured that never again will I buy a ball of fluff that costs more than a few bucks. Our local dollar store gets a wide variety of fibers and I've found incredible balls of stuff I just couldn't leave without.

I have several shoebox-sized bins in my craft closet, stuffed with tens of thousands of yards of... pretties, to testify to this truth. There they sit, waiting for Divine Inspiration to strike.

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437: Hard to believe this month is almost over.

Hey y'all.

In three minutes, January will be no more in my time zone. I can't believe how fast 31 days have flown by.

Seems we were just screaming "Happy New Year" and now everyone is gearing up for the Big Game.

I don't know what plans Mr. Bliss has for Big S Day but my Sunday will be full.

Church starts at 10:30 which means I'll be getting up at 9. I'm scheduled to teach my first Religious Education class tomorrow, a task I look forward to with a mixture of apprehension and glee.

Just my luck that I'm teaching the combined middle and high school groups, which includes Baby Bliss and her crew. Hooray.

Thankfully I will share the job with another mom.

Tomorrow is also 1st Sunday Potluck and our Fiber Arts group will meet after lunch.

I don't know what we're contributing to potluck as I didn't buy anything specifically for it and I'm not sure what we have in here that's suitable.

My favorite part of the day will be our Fiber Arts group. We've planned a visit to a LYS (local yarn shop) and I am soooooo excited. I've been crocheting for at least 30 years but this will be my first visit to a yarn store.

Yarn comes in so many yummy colors and textures. The small stash in my office in no way compares to the stashes that some of my friends are hoarding. But I don't have very many "good" yarns.

Before I joined the CPs needlework group, I never paid attention to a yarn's fiber content, just the feel of the yarn. And even that has been a recent preference of only a year or so. Usually I just picked up the colors (and prices) I liked.

For years I picked up bag of mixed yarns at thrift stores. A bag of yarn from the thrift usually had four to six skeins. If I was lucky, two of them would be the same color.

Then we moved several hundred miles away and finding yarn at thrift stores became a chore akin to looking for the haystack needle. But I began to find yarn at the dollar store and Big Lots. Then I began buying yarn at WalMart and sometimes Hobby Lobby.

One day I found huge balls of cotton thread at the dollar store. I fell in love with it and began buying several each time I made a dollar store run. Eventually the same thing happened with ribbon yarn and I still have a ton of both in my stash.

Eventually I began putting more effort into my crochet hobby and voila! Reasons to crochet more (meaning people to crochet for) appeared from every crack and crevice. Then I began to be more discriminating about the feel of the yarns I bought.

Anything soft and reasonably priced came home with me.

But I still didn't know about the "good" yarns. That is my most recent acquired yarn knowledge, courtesy of the CPs.

The "Good" yarns are the natural fibers and their blends: cotton, wool, silk, angora, etc.

Good yarns usually come from mysterious places called Local Yarn Shops, another news item for me because I'd never heard of them or been to one. They have names like Noro and Malabrigo, are often handspun, and come in dreamy colors that make them appear edible.

Initially I felt like a dork, coming in with my acrylic yarns. Then I joined Ravelry.com at the suggestion of some of the ladies. And I began stashing my yarn online. (Stashing is a process where you add all the yarn you own to an online database that's stored in your personal Ravelry notebook as well as one that's for the site in general.)

Stashing online was how I discovered that I too owned some "good" yarns. Aside from the cotton thread I'd been buying from the dollar store (and eventually Hobby Lobby too, when it was on deep, deep clearance), the cottons and wools I had must be leftovers from those mixed bags I'd gotten from my thrift store runs.

It's not very much of it. Just three small skeins of locally made wool and three skeins of cotton made in NY. Don't know what I'll use any of it for as I'm not fond of wool next to my skin and the cotton looks like it will be hard to work with as it's "splitty".

But I'm lookng forward to our LYS fieldtrip after potluck.

One of the Fiber Arts group members got a sales e-mail from the store. It said some yarns are 60% off. The question is 60% off of what?

As much as I would love to crochet something special for myself using a nice Noro silk and mohair blend or eco-friendly organically grown cotton blended with cashmere, I am not paying four or five bucks for a hank of yarn.

My prayer: I will find a baby soft yarn in colors I love and a price I'll be happy to pay.

And so it is.


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436: Pssst... Pass it on! a.k.a. The Small Things Challenge

Hey y'all.

I know I'm late but Happy New Year everyone. Here's to a life of healing and abundance for this new year!

And speaking of health and abundance, wouldn't you like to take a few minutes to help someone else achieve those same ideals?

It's quick and painless and the more of us who do it, the faster we can help others come closer to achieving their goals.

Here's the deal: We can help Intel help raise funds for Kiva and Save the Children by taking the Small Things Challenge and clicking on the link of your choice.

If you want to help for just a few minutes of your time, it's the "We'll Donate 5 cents For You" button. If you have more to give, then please choose one or more of the others as well.

So get clicking folks and remember, pass it on!



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435: My name is not Oprah.

And no, I don't play her on t.v.

But like Oprah, I also have a list of favorite things.

Some of them are new things, some are old favorites. All are good and wonderful. :o)

My current favorite things are:

1. my glass teapot - How did I ever get along without it?
2. my toasty warm and super soft knit slipper socks from WalMart.com - Mmm... like walking on cashmere.
3. glass fish bowls in varying sizes from the dollar store - I'm using mine to re-pot all my plants.
4. Tazo's "Passion" tea.
5. body butter in "Ginger & White Tea" and "Ginger Lime" by Habeebah's Herbals - This woman has managed to put magical bliss in a jar! The scent is divine and the creamy texture of the butter banishes the driest of dry skin. (Mine!)
6. yarn: Bernat Baby, TLC Amore - Ahhhhh... Soooooo soft.
7. Baby Bee Dusting Powder by Burt's Bees - Silky soft and yummy smelling too.
8. two black, semi-sexy, "maternity" dresses I bought at Goodwill - I absolutely love them. They're wash-and-wear, air dry over night, and can be accessorized for day or evening events. Wish I had several in a few shades.
9. sweet potato chips - I have no need for chips from white potatoes ever again.
10. lemon-flavored Perrier - Always on my list.

What about you? What are some of your favorite things? I'd love to know. :o)


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434: Bliss has been crocheting for charity.

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Yep, that's what I've been doing for the past month or so.

It's been fun as well as a learning experience for me.

I've been crocheting for over 30 years and for most of that time, I've had an aversion to reading patterns. I'm not sure why.

Many many years ago, I made a cardigan for a baby cousin. I don't recall any problems reading the pattern and the cardigan looked like a cardigan when I was done.

But since then, I believe I've only made things I haven't needed patterns for.

Until now.

I don't remember how I came across Save the Children's "Knit One, Save One" campaign. After I read all the details, I decided I was gonna dive in and make some tiny little baby hats.

Although I was told that I made a hat for the same baby who got the cardigan all those years ago, I don't remember making one.

My first hat was flat panel that I stitched together and gathered at the crown. The idea of crocheting a circle was scary. I don't know why

But it was a pain doing it that way and I wasn't very happy with the way it turned out. So I made the remainder of the hats following the pattern for the round hats.

I completed nine (9) baby hats and a friend from one of my needlework groups gave me four (4) that she'd knitted a while ago.

The hats had to arrive by December 31. With the Christmas holiday falling in there, I thought I should mail them out at least two weeks early.

Well that didn't happen.

I got them over to FedEx on December 23.

Now I'm making scarves for the 2009 Special Olympics Winter Games. I'm almost done with my first one. I have enough yarn left for at least two more, maybe three. I'm doing a simple long panel, single crochet in the back loop only, to produce a stretchier item.

The scarves are due by January 15. Hopefully, I'll be mailing them no later than January 9 (a Friday).

I am so thankful to have the time, materials, skill, and motivation to work on projects for charity.

So many people have helped me in my life... I'm grateful for the opportunity to give back.

Amen.


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