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Quick & Easy Yarn PomPoms

Have you ever wanted to have those pretty little yarn pompoms pop up magically whenever you wanted them? Well, brace yourself. You positively can, and in a matter of minutes…with no fuss. I mean it–and all you need is yarn and a pair of scissors.

Start by taking a piece of your favorite yarn and wrapping around 3 of your fingers. You can make your pompoms larger or smaller by adding or subtracting one finger.

Keep winding until you’ve gone around your fingers about 50 times…

Cut your thread. Now take a 10 inch length of the yarn and slip it between your fingers. This will be the string you use to tie all these threads together.

Tie a loose knot…

and carefully slide the yarn off your fingers.

Tie the string good and tight around the bundle. Take your scissors and cut through all the loops at the top and bottom of your pompom.

Your pompom will be seriously in need of a trim. I used two colors of yarn here–you know, for dramatic effect.

Pinch your bundle in the middle and trim off all the pieces that keep it from looking round. Be careful not to cut the long string that you tied the whole thing together with–it’s what you’ll hold on to while you trim.

After trimming for a few minutes, hold the pompom by the long string and whip it against your hand to fluff it out. You’ll find more threads to trim….

until they look exactly how you want them to look.

Positively perfect in every way.

:]

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{ Parent Love }

“Above all else, children need to know and feel they are loved, wanted, and appreciated. They need to be assured of that often. Obviously, this is a role parents should fill.”

Ezra Taft Benson

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::What’s Right::

…this very minute.

The first giveaways for the Harry Potter Premiere have begun to arrive. Wahooo!

What’s right in your world this very minute?

Have a good Saturday everyone!

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From Russia…With Love

Just in case anyone wondered–the Bald kid has indeed survived his first week in Siberia–well, whole and happy. He says that they’ve already been chased off a bus by a little old lady screaming that they’re serving Satan. Wow…Satan…seriously? Sheesh.

He also told us that he sang a solo in church–oh, not intentionally, and not because he sings, really. Apparently someone asked him a question in Russian and he thought he  understood and said yes. Next thing he knows, he’s got a hymnbook in his hand and he’s up front singing all by himself. Would have paid big money to see that!

This is the view from his apartment window…a bit grim by our standards, but I’m told it’s actually a very nice apartment. I’m looking for parking lots or something…but maybe that’s just silly.

Here the guys are cooking up some odd looking thing called Palmene. Pretty sure I didn’t put that in his cookbook from home! It’s a little noodle-y thing with meat in it. I’m not asking what kind of meat…we’ll just leave that alone for now.

He says the yogurt and dairy are “epic” but that they are only allowed to drink water that they buy–so he’s thirsty a lot. Wonder how he made the herb tea…hmmm….

Be safe and well my sweet boy on the other side of the world. I suppose it’s best if you have no earthly idea just how badly this mama misses you.

More than you’ll ever know.

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The Mystery Cup

Now I know that I left some of you hanging last week on this little cup thing. I knew that my close friends and family would know what this cup is and the significance it had…to me anyway–but they were banned from telling what they knew. It would have been cheating anyway.

So I’ll tell you.

Years ago, I did some intense research for a book I was writing called, “Ellie’s Gold.” It took place in the year 1897 when the Utah pioneers had officially been in the valley for 50 years. Salt Lake City had a huge Jubilee celebration that lasted nearly a week. The activities included parades, fireworks, games, exhibits, parties, carnivals, and concerts…just to name a few.  I’d read in and old newspaper that in commemoration of the event, the city had a special “Jubilee Cup” made that showed scenes from the “old pioneer days.” If a person wanted one–back in 1897–they had to mail order it for $1.00.  In my book, I had the family send for one. When it arrived, this is what Ellie said:

Now, I’d seen one of these cups in the Pioneer museum many years ago and it made my heart just skip a beat. There it was–for real. I even got so brave as to ask the lady at the desk if I could look at it up close and maybe even touch it…just for a second. She looked like I’d pinched her cat and said, “Why no dear.” She was a terrible sharer.

I was crushed.

So there we were, April and I, a zillion years later in the antique shop and there it sat behind the glass case.

Only this time, the lady said, “Would you like to hold it?”

“YES!” I said. There’s a slight chance I might have screamed a little. But the lady just smiled at me and put the cup in my hand. A real live, 106 year old Jubilee cup, that somebody ordered from the newspaper, and drank water out of for a long, long time and then tucked away in the attic somewhere until it was clean forgotten, for years and years by almost everybody.

Almost.

And it’s my very own now.

If you come over, I’ll let you hold it…

because some people know how to share real good.

:}

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