The Royal Wedding and The Caroline Years

I planted tulips in my herb garden last year and I forgot what color I choose so I was anxious for them to open up to see what I had. I still have a lot of pots with dead looking plants in them. We had a beautiful day yesterday, but back to rain today.  I was going to run errands today, but with the rain I decided it's a good day to stay home.

I'm almost done with the Caroline years and I really enjoyed this book. She goes to Milwaukee to stay with her aunt and uncle and go to college to become a school teacher. What is so fun about it is that she is introduced to this whole lifestyle that she knows nothing about. They have a bathtub with a tap that you turn and hot water comes out. They have a maid. Her uncle owns a news paper and lives very nicely, but he is not wealthy. But it is night and day from the way Caroline was raised. She goes to the Winter Ball in a fancy dress and goes to a lot of other entertainments that she has never known, concerts and so on. They take her to a temperance meeting and an abolitionist meeting. Her uncle is an abolitionist. One of their aunts is a single lady and very modern. So Caroline is exposed to a lot of things, but she is grounded by her upbringing. 

A few years ago I was really inspired by the Tasha Tudor books and I wondered if the same thing would happen with the Little House books. They have really helped me with my budgeting and frugality efforts. I've decided to make a patchwork coverlet for my guest room bed. This is something little girls did in the Little House days. My dd gave me a queen sized bed and I don't have any queen size linens, except for a set of sheets she gave me. I've been trying to use what I have around the house and especially stuff I've stored up in the craft room. I have a lot of cotton fabric, mostly in small pieces that I've been wanting to use so my gd and I got them out and picked out the ones we thought would work in that room. I may have to buy a little to have enough, but I'm just doing simple squares probably about 4 inches. I think this will be a long term project because I find this kind of work tiring. I'll take photos as I go along. I made a quilt many years ago, but I've kind of forgotten how to do it. I know the first thing I have to do is wash all the fabric and iron it. Then I'll find something to make a template with and start cutting out squares. I plan to make it a tied quilt because my poor hands are not up to that much quilting anymore and I don't think I could do something that large on the sewing machine. I've been wanting to do some patchwork for quite a while.

I've added a new list on my side bar that I'm calling history right now, but I may change it to storybooks. I've listed several Little House sites you can find the names of all the books on this one.                                                                                                            

I got up at 1 am pacific time and watched the wedding from beginning to end. I love anything British and this was right up my ally. The hats almost stole the show, but the whole thing was very beautiful. I loved seeing the carriages, but the cars they used were also fun to see, the royal family has quite a collection. I guess there has been a lot of opinion on the brides dress, some like it and some didn't, but I thought it was very appropriate for the occasion and apparently was well suited to her style. It wouldn't have mattered what she wore there would always be someone who didn't like it. They kept talking about how hard times have been in England and how this was really going to lift their spirits and it really seemed to. The people in the streets and the commentators all were very proud and thrilled with the whole thing. I love England. 

Linda