 Yeah, this is me with my hair drying, reading glasses on, all the things. To start off this week's vlog, I wanted to apologize for giving you guys all the idea that something was drastically wrong. It's not. Ultimately, we were on vacation with the kids and hanging out with a grandson. We didn't film a whole lot, but we did have a good time. There was some stuff going on in the background with Bob's mom's estate. I think it's been handled and taken care of, but we were pretty concerned there for a little bit, as was Bob's brother. And I won't go into it farther than that, but it's been pretty stressful. And of course, I'm dealing with some of my own mental health issues. I have, as you all know, because I've talked about it at White Coat Syndrome and I have a routine doctor's visit coming up actually tomorrow as I film this. And I'm just trying to keep myself busy, so I'm not stressing about it too much. Nothing is wrong that I know of, but I just dislike going to the doctor. It's just a thing. I know a lot of you can relate, so anyway. Yeah, but anyway, it's all good for the most part. There's nothing drastically wrong. We're doing good. There's been ups and downs, but it all got handled and a bonus, the grandson, I don't know if you know, poked me in the eye not long ago and then it got really red and it's finally healing. Yay. I don't have to explain that to the doctor tomorrow necessarily. Yay. Anyway, here we go. Good morning, guys. It is one minute before 11 a.m. on Monday, April 1st, because I forgot to log yesterday, but in my defense, it was Easter Sunday and we went to go feed the grand cat again one more time before his mom and dad got home and we had the other kids over with junior for Easter Sunday and had a nice time and a dinner with the kids and grandson. He does not like asparagus and he does not like grilled steak, but he is only a year old, so yeah. But he loves chocolate cream pie. You know, who doesn't? Anyway, I am here. We didn't do much else yesterday. I didn't do much else yesterday. I worked a little bit on the new Afghan project that I'm working on and that's it. I am going to work some more on it. It's down there. I also have some drawing I need to do, which is up there. I also took, I promise I am going to do a crochet granny square hexagon sweater process thing. I sat at some point, but I took a favorite fitting shirt of mine and I traced it onto some paper to make a basic guideline for assembling these types of sweaters. You want to have a good sense of your measurements, a mannequin or a dress form, which I have. Oh, there she is, right there. Or one of these paper patterns. You need something like that. Otherwise you're going to just end up with something that you're not going to be happy about the fit on. So anyway, I'm also trying to get the computer to do its job so I can edit the vlog, but it's just not cooperating this morning. It's thinking and thinking and thinking. Anyway, I do have some creative stuff I want to do. Anyway, I'm including maybe something, sort of a new project that I might just share here in the vlog and I might not film it as a separate video, but we'll see. In the meantime, I got to get the vlog edited for last week, so yeah, I'll be back. Vlog is editing and rendering back there, yay. I'm going to go downstairs and make myself a little bit of an early lunch. I have a noon phone call video call with my dear friend, Leslie McGrath. She is getting ready for retirement. I am excited for her, yay. And yeah, it's going to be fun to chat with her. It's because it's been a little bit and while I'm doing that, I'll probably work on my blanket, but let's make some lunch so I have something to eat. All right, I'll be back. All right, I just got off a quick phone call with my friend, Leslie. I might talk to her again in a little bit, but I'm going to start a new daily journal, I know. So in this case, it's going to be a combination of watercolor sketching and just journaling, writing. And I have some journals that I made a while back. I used to sell them in my Etsy shop and they have these fabric covers like this. And this, by the way, is a folding clipboard I picked up, I don't know, somewhere. Maybe Daiso, I don't remember. So I'm going to start out at the beginning of the week doing a two-page spread with as many days for that week on it as I can get. In this case, six. And they're going to look something like that. Each little section is a day. And at the end of the day, I'll be doing some writing and or sketching in each section. You can, as you can see, that page is decorated with some watercolor, a couple quick little easy sketches, some stickers. And well, I'm going to do this for at least the month of April and we'll see how it goes. I'm really intrigued by the idea. So we're going to give it a shot. What do you think? If you do something like this, what do you do? I am kind of liking this because I can also like glue or paste in or tape in, staple in. Like if we go to the movies or something, I can put the movie ticket in and stuff like that. So yeah, anyway, what do you do? All right, that's it for the minute. I'll be back. Okay, you guys, it's 621 p.m. on Tuesday, April 2nd. The end of a very long babysitting day. Junior went home a few minutes ago and I've got Hazel, our robot vacuum, working downstairs really quick. It's Polly, this is his birthday, son-in-law's birthday. So they wanted to have dinner together, like go out or something. And so we kept the baby for a little longer than normal. So anyway, it's a good day, but yeah. Almost tired. All right, I'll be back. Hey guys, good morning. It is just after 11 o'clock on Wednesday, April 3rd. Obviously we're getting in the car. Hold on, okay. So yesterday it was 74 degrees and sunny outside. Today it's raining. Welcome to Portland. Anyway, I had counseling this morning it actually went really well. And yeah, all those things. It is raining out, but I will probably try to go out and do some walking later regardless. And what else? I'm gonna go out right now to Trader Joe's really quick. I need some oat milk and I'm not gonna have time this weekend to do it. So we'll do it now. Our Kia order came and Letty is cleaning the house. I think I have an Amazon order coming today. And then just projects to work on. I think that's it for today. The morning is like hectic, crazy, busy. Bob has some Masonic stuff to do, but yeah. I think for me, majority is done maybe. I'll be back. Hey guys, good afternoon. So we are back from running a few quick errands. It's still Wednesday, Letty is cleaning the house. We'd love her so much. And counseling is over with. It was a good meeting. I had some lunch and boosted by some positive reinforcement from counseling. That's the word I wanted. I'm going walking. Yes, it's a little cold. Yes, it was rainy this morning, but I need to get my health back in check, which I've been terrible at since having COVID. So we're gonna do what we can as we can and go for a walk. Now we're gonna walk all the way down to the little resale shop, see if they have any yarn, specifically looking for lavender and green. Can't guarantee we won't do that. All right, I'll be back. Hey, found some yarn for my next scrap Afghan. I had one variegated yarn, a big ball of it, a lot of scraps of different colors of blue, but I needed like green, purple, and I found it like a tealy color. Didn't really need that one, but I thought it'd be cute on the Afghans, so anyway. I knew if I came here, I could find what I wanted for like five bucks, which I did. All right, let's make the semi long walk home and then just rest for a bit. Work on finishing the current Afghan before we start the next one. All right, I'll be back. See you here at the end of the day. It's almost seven o'clock. Realizing I forgot to vlog again today. It's been a really busy week, and I can say it now, because I've decided that you're not gonna even see this until I get back, but we're getting ready to go back to California. This time we're taking a little vacation. All the kids and the grandson are coming with us. It's grandson's first birthday, so we're doing something kind of special. I'll film where I can safely, but his face isn't gonna be on YouTube, but anyway. So it's been a busy week getting ready for that, plus there's lots of stuff going on with Bob's mother's estate and legal stuff and banking stuff and estate, the estate sales this weekend, which is kind of bittersweet, I think. So yeah, we're driving down. We're not flying down, which means I don't have to pack light, which means I'm probably bringing way too much stuff, but I'm bringing lots of yarn. I'm bringing my daily drawing stuff. I plan on finding time, not only in the car, because it's gonna take a few hours to get there, but during the trip while we're there to work on some creative things, along with seeing the area, we haven't been to Lake Tahoe in a bit, and we do love Lake Tahoe. We have a time share there, and I really enjoy ourselves. So looking forward to it, I'll bring you along where I can, and yeah, I'm gonna just catch up on some YouTube here. Bob's out at a Masonic meeting, and when he gets back, we have more packing to do. I need to cut his hair, all the things, so. I'll be back. It is 6.45 a.m. approximately, and I'm not quite awake yet. I've only had two sips of coffee, but anyway. Friday, April 5th, we are headed back to California. Well, after we get gas. Anyway, truck is loaded. We're ready to go, and of course, I've got my crocheting, so. All right, let's go. It's a few minutes before 10 a.m., and we are 99 miles till the Oregon-California border, and a couple hours from stopping to get gas. I have been, of course, crocheting in the car, working on another blanket, so getting pretty far. We found a very nice man running a, sorry, running a charity, running a coffee stand, and he is a veteran, and it's for the Veterans Organization in the local town where we stopped, and so we stopped and got coffee there, and then the coffee's free, you just donate how much you want, and sorry, that, yes, that's foul language, we won't mention that. So we got some coffee, and so we're all good. We'll break some food out in a bit here, and yeah. So anyway, that's it for the moment. It's a long drive, but, and Bob and I like a drive. Do we like this long of a drive? Not necessarily. We don't like having to do it all in one day. I should say that. So, anyway. All right, there's a line for the men's room. I don't think that's a normal thing. Anyway, I'll be back. Guys, it is Sunday. I don't think I filmed anything yesterday. If I did, it wasn't much. Hold on, I need to put these on, it's bright out here. We're up on the top of the building we're staying at and walking around, checking things out, and with Brian, and everybody else is either resting or getting ready. Today is Junior's birthday. He is one year old. Happy birthday, Junior. We'll be celebrating that a little later. But in the meantime, let me show you some pretty views. Up on the roof again. Supposedly, there's a partial solar eclipse happening right now, can you tell? Yeah. Can you see it? Can you see it there? There it is. I see nothing. I see nothing. I just see a sun. Yeah, I see nothing. Looks like fake news. I mean, you know, it's pretty cold too. We're gonna hang out here for a couple minutes and then we're gonna get in the car, go for a drive. Most of the kids are working today. Becca and grandson have other plans, which is fine. And yeah, we're gonna just go around, maybe do a little thrifting. Maybe get some more coffee, because hello, we need coffee. And we'll be back. This is throwing snowballs. He's just a large child, I don't know. Hey guys, it is, what day is it? Tuesday afternoon, four or five o'clock, something like that. Anyway, we're in Rideau, Nevada. The boys are all off at the gun range. The girls and I have been shopping at Barnes & Noble and thrifting. I did some thrifting yesterday with the husband. And I thrifted a bunch of yarn this trip, which is good. I'll come in handy for scrap afgans. So I'll get it sorted and everything when I get home. And bought some books at Barnes & Noble. We were there earlier. And yeah, it's been a fun day. Anyway, I think we're gonna head back to the resort now. I'll be back. Guys, yes, we're in the car. Yes, we're kid-less. In the car again, yeah. We are headed down to Lake Tahoe. We're gonna go find a place to walk around. I think there's a marina down here that we've been to before, but it's been a while and our brains are old and are we remembering this marina or a different one? We'll find out. There's also a maker's market up here somewhere. So we're gonna go see if we can find that and see if it's open. That'd be interesting. And see what else we can do. Probably have lunch out. Three of the kids are working and Rebecca took off with Junior. I think to go find a walking trail. And so yeah, all right, that's it for the minute. I'll be back. So we just stopped at the maker's market in Lake Tahoe and I'll put a link down below. Inside the maker's market, there's a little booth called Knitzenauts and she has a store in Minden too, I hear. That is bigger but scored a couple of mini skeins that remind me of Lake Tahoe and my favorite parts of California. Not all of it is my favorite, but anyway, different conversation. So we'll add them to our bag where we're making our hexi-puffs and our hexagons. Now we're gonna go hit a couple other places and then go find somewhere to sit down and have lunch. I'll be back. I think I forgot to turn the camera on earlier, but Bob and I decided to go out for a drive today to the last day at Lake Tahoe. All the kids have all, we've all separated off to go do different things, but we're gonna meet up for dinner at the marina. Not too far from where we're staying. Right now, Bob and I chose this spot on the north side of the lake to have lunch. Can't say I'm complaining about the view. We're just driving around the lake, which is something we seem to do every single time we come. We drive all the way around the lake. I'm busy teasing him about yarn shopping, but you know, it's me, of course I am. There is one other yarn shop here on the lake, whether we go or not, I don't know, but knits and knots. I would recommend looking them up. I'll put their website below. All right, that's it. And yeah, here's the view. I do have a panoramic photo. I'll put it here. And yeah, it's all good. Having fun. I'll be back. We are in Truckee, California on Donner Pass Road, which is a cute little, you can walk around with shops and restaurants. So we're gonna go do that. Yes, of course, they be our shop. So we stopped at a rest stop in or near Emerald Bay, Vikings home at Emerald Bay State Park. I think we've been here before, to be fair. So we're gonna- I think it's time we're up here. Years ago, before the vid. So anyway, we're gonna go walk around, see what we can see. And yeah, get some pictures. I'll be back. All right, we have checked out and we are hidden the road. I'll get you. 1,000 feet, turn right. Can you tell I've only had two sips of coffee? Anyway, we're hitting the road to head home. Kids are already on the way. And yeah, it's all good. Yeah, we're bringing up the rear as usual. They drive fast. I don't know what to say. Anyway, it's gonna be probably as beautiful a drive as it was getting here. So I'll see if I can film some more clips. We also have, if we have anything on the dash cam, we'll get you that too. But anyway, Lake Tahoe, one of our favorite places to visit, which is why we keep coming back. Turn right on Quaking Aspen Lane. Yep. So anyway, when we get home, I'll book a couple more visits. Yes, ma'am. All right. That's it. I've got my yarn next to me. I've got my coffee. I need to drink that first and let's get to it and get home. I'll be back. Potty break. But isn't this the prettiest rest stop you've seen? Well, or one of them. There's a lake back there. There's some mountains. Rhyming. It's really pretty. Windy too, anyway. All right. Time to hit the road. I'll be back guys. While we were in Lake Tahoe, California, yes, I did some thrifting. Yes, I found some thrifted yarn. That you can kind of see. Yeah, that bag. So we're going to sort it. I'm intending all or most of it to be blankets. So we're going to sort it. I have a few random skeins behind the table that are variegated multicolored. So I'm going to grab those because I like to do a multicolored with the solids to tie everything together or sort of. Anyway, let's get sorting. This is a lot of yarn, but I knew that. Yeah, there's three skeins down here that I was gifted before the Tahoe trip. So those don't really count, but I'm planning on using those to combine with some of the others to make project bags of yarn that's going to be a blanket. And I do already have one that's like black, mostly black because I didn't have enough white to put white in there or gray. I think I have enough now. So let's do some project bags, blanket project bags. Okay, I ran out of bags, but probably six bags of blankets is enough for the moment. And I can put the rest of this on my shelf behind the table and collect some more for blankets as we go, right? Okay, I also need to empty my car bag. I made a few granny squares on the trip, which need to be added to the granny square basket, which is somewhere. And I have just random balls I haven't used yet. So we're going to add those back to the shelf. All right, I'll be back. We've been boxing all day once we got errands done and Bob had some appointments that he took care of. We just kind of sat down and started watching movies and it's midnight. Oops. Oops. So anyway, it's been a good couple of weeks. I didn't film a lot because we spent a lot of time with the kids and the grandson. As I think it probably should be when you're on vacation, you should be focused on your family and not other stuff. And that's what we did. We had a lot of fun. We did take some pictures. If you're watching this bit, you've seen that bit. And yes, I bought some thrifted yarn, a lot of thrifted yarn and it only cost about 40 bucks. And I'm going to get at least five, maybe six blankets out of it. The blankets are so far, for the most part, being gifted to friends and family. I may start donating them. I'm not sure yet, but I'll keep you posted. I do have some ideas in mind. So yeah, it's been good. We had fun. It was a long drive. We did learn that we are of an age that 10 hours driving in a day is probably a little too long for us. It's a long day. Does that mean we won't do it again? No, that's not what that means. But yeah, it's a really long day. Anyway, we don't like to do it in a hurry. We like to be able to stop and stretch. I advise that. Drinking plenty of water, stop and go to the rest stops even if you don't have to go to the bathroom just to get up and stretch. Anyway, all right. I also started the first of the blankets from that thrifted yarn. So this is a really bright one. Anyway, that's it for this week and last week. I hope you guys have had a good one that you remember among other things to spend time doing what's important. And if you're a YouTuber or social media person, put the camera down. Put the camera down. Spend time with your family. Do what you enjoy. That's the most important thing, okay? All right, don't forget to like, share and subscribe. Ways to support the free content here on my channel are down in the video description. Please read it and check them out. I do have a Patreon. They know ahead of time what's going on because they're my patrons and supporters. I also have a private chat on Facebook with them. So if you wanna be part of that, go join Patreon. Anyway, that's it for right now. Go out and have a great day. Have a great week. Do something nice for yourself because you deserve it and I'll see you next week. Bye, guys.