Can you spare a square?

As I've posted at various times over the past few years, Linda, Duane and I knit and/or crochet for various charities.  The one we started making items for is Knit A Square where you knit or crochet 8 by 8 inch squares which are then sewn into blankets for orphans of AIDS in Africa.  This is a really worthy charity and we sent quite a few squares but, eventually, we found the expense of shipping to Africa to be too much.  We also made items such as hats, scarves and fingerless gloves for the group The Humble Stitch for several years but the group has been less active lately.  (Remember, these people are ALL volunteers.) 

We know that we have local groups like Metropolitan Ministries which are happy to receive finished hats, scarves, gloves, etc., but I wondered if there were any groups for basic squares.  I searched the 'net and found Love Squared.  The main address is in Michigan (Linda's home state!) and they will take 8 by 8 inch squares made of any type of yarn and pattern, crocheted, knitted, etc.  They also accept yarn donations.  The ladies of Love Squared sew the squares into blankets for children in homeless shelters.  They also operate in states other than Michigan.  So far, we've sent them one package of squares and some skeins of yarn.  Well, lately, I started making squares again.  It's relaxing to do while watching TV at night and I can crochet or knit one in a very short amount of time.  Below is what I have at this point.

Linda and Duane will be helping out, too, and we should have a nice number of squares to send to Love Squared.  It's so nice after a day of recording and/or editing sound files to just relax and enjoy the zen of soft yarn and the idea of helping others -- even in this small way.   

Catching up!

Whoa.  Long time -- no post.  Things have been busy, busy, busy and I haven't had a chance to string some sentences together to get a decent post on here.  We have hit estate sales the last few Fridays but ended up buying nothing or just a few unexciting items.  Last Friday we did get a little luckier, though.  All three of us found something.  Linda bought a series of Hogan's Heroes on DVD, Duane bought two tiles made in Holland (not Delft but I can't recall the name of the maker) and I found an oil painting that I plan to re-frame.  It's signed and dated (1967) and was purchased in the Phillipines.

Our latest purchases.

On the recording front, I've been really busy.  I'm in the middle of recording a nonfiction book published by University Press called The Next Elvis by Barbara Barnes Sims.  Barbara worked at Sun Records in Memphis in the late 1950s just after Elvis Presley had been discovered.  Sam Phillips, himself, hired Barbara and she has wonderful stories that she shares in this book.  Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, and, yes, Elvis Presley, all make appearances.  I should be finished within the next few weeks.  In the mean time, if you're interested in the print version, you can find it here. 

Next up is a short book called Observations of a Transplanted Southern Belle by Laurie Byrne Smith.  After that I have another University Press book called Spectacular Wickedness: Sex, Race, and Memory in Storyville, New Orleans by Emily Epstein Landau.  Both of these are nonfiction, too, so I won't be back into fiction until after these are 'in the can.'