Mid Summer

 

Here we are at the last week of July. You have no idea how hard I tried to get the waves to look like it was washing away July. The waves would only get to here and then would go back out. It wasn't until I put my camera away and then of course, July was washed away. I have lost count now how many days now we have been over a hundred degrees. At least a month. We did get rain yesterday, which is very rare in July.

We decided to drive over to the beach. It was 60 degrees and foggy. It was bliss. 

 

 We had lunch, walked on the beach and just enjoyed our reprieve. It was a nice drive. We haven't been here since 2018. It was hard to believe that it has been this long. So many things have changed in my life since then. I bet it has for you too. 

For the first time in a year and a half, Ron went back to work in person. What was supposed to be two weeks turned into that. It felt like the first day of school. This is a first for me too. First time to be in this house by myself. I have never had a real empty nest until today. I will get used to it but it is different. But isn't life full of things all of the time that are new and different? I remember how I used to think that at some point in my life, things would be normal. Now I have learned, there is never any normal at all. Just putting one foot in front of the other and trying to accomplish something in spite of the changing circumstances that are all around me. I compare it to trying to do jumping jacks on a merry go round. 

In order to sew or hook, I have to be home. Imagine that? I haven't been home long enough to pick up a hook or even a needle. I keep hoping that I will get to that place where I am bored. It has never happened yet. 

I really want to dye some wool. I sat the other day and went through my dye packets, so I am pretty sure I can dye lots of wool and I have wool. So its time to get off my duff and get to doing that again. 

I hope your day is tip-top. Full of lots of nice things. 

Today my life is that big box of chocolates which one should I eat first? 

~Kim~

 

“Promise me you’ll always remember that you are braver than you believe,

stronger than you seem,

and smarter than you think.” (Winnie the Pooh)

Summer in July

 Its just another day in July, a summer day. We have a fire now, so it smells of burning and there is that red look to the sunrise. It is so disheartening when the fires start. When they start the evacuations and all of that. I find my thoughts on the poor displaced people.

When we brought this cactus back it was such a tiny little thing. It just keeps growing and growing. We need to put it in a bigger pot, but there are all of those spikes. We even have the pot and the cactus mix. Just the wrapping it up in carpet or tarp and doing the re-potting. 

I finally picked vegetables from my little garden. Its been really interesting to see if we could. I picked stuff because of the heat we have been having. I am very happy with the fresh goodies so far. We have green beans and some squash coming on. 

Now for my next projects. 

Here are some Maggie patterns I am going to start very soon. I just love working on these patterns. They always make me so happy. 

I plan on working on this today. I really want to get it finished. I don't know about binding though. It might have to wait. Binding when its 111 is just no fun. I just have had such a hard time sitting still lately. I guess its cooler fiddling with stuff in the house rather than hooking. 

I have these two patterns that I got from Saundra at Woodland Juction. My hardest problem is deciding which one to start first. 

 

The first one" Mighty Whale", I have wanted to hook forever. I have always loved that pattern. Then the second," Magdalena's Goat" just makes me so excited, because it is going to be such a challenge for me as a rug hooker. 

Both look like such fun to me. 

That is on my list of things I want to get done. Plus trying to be a better blogger and get my blogging mojo back. 

I hope your week is a good one. Its too hot here to do much outside. So its a very good excuse to stay inside and do inside projects. 

Have a wonderful week,

Kim

 

 “I had not known before that love is obedience. You want to love, and you can’t, and you hate yourself because you can’t, and all the time love is not some marvelous thing that you feel but some hard thing that you do. And this in a way is easier because with God’s help you can command your will when you can’t command your feelings. With us, feelings seem to be important, but He doesn’t appear to agree with us.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Scent of Water

Good Old Summertime

 When I woke up this morning, I thought, Its wonderful Wednesday! I kept thinking of all of the good things I wanted to do today. First, get up and go outside and drink coffee. I wanted to watch the moon before the sun came up. (its a brand new moon.) Then watch the sun come up. (Its over Greenhorn now.) 

I sat and breathed in the summer air. Warm and toasty. No air conditioners were running. So it was very quiet and there was still crickets chirping. I said to myself, you better hurry, Mr. Cricket, better get that wife pretty soon. 

I watered my pots of Chrysanthemum that really should be pulled out but in my mind, I still have that secret desire to make Chrysanthemum tea. Here is what I found about it.

 "Chrysanthemum tea is said to have a host of health benefits, and it has definitely become my go-to when I’m feeling under the weather. It may help you reduce inflammation, serve as a good source of vitamins A and C, and lower blood pressure and cholesterol". 

My tiny herb garden still needs plants. I have been so picky about plants since I moved here. Having a smaller place, I have to really think about what I want things to look like. I can't go all willy-nilly like at my other house. There are things I still miss like my pots of mints. I need to plant things in the fall when it gets cooler. They say we could have temps 113-115 by the weekend. Last time they said that we got monsoon clouds and it never got that hot here. It that hot in the desert. Where you expect it to be hot. 

I got out my camera this week. I had got lazy just using my phone. I think I have the brain power to take pictures again. Wow!! What a learning curve. I forgot everything, even how to plug in the memory card to my computer. I had to fool and fool with it and finally I was able to get pictures I liked. Its going to take a lot of refresher courses on my part to remember how to use my camera. When life is in upheaval I loose my creativity. My life has been pretty crazy the last few years. I keep telling myself, life is never going to be perfect, so you have to be creative in spite what is going on inside of me. Creativity is where my soul settles down and peace happens and I forget what is going on in the world. I keep telling myself, I can't change it so why do I give myself airs thinking by worrying about it, it will help. To live life in spite of the storms that sometimes come from unexpected places. At the first of the year, my words were Enchanted by the Unexpected. Now in July, I hope I can continue to do that. 

I am going to hook today, and listen to "The Unexpected Mrs. Polifax. The books were written by a lady name Dorthy Gilman. That is the first one. I got my books from Audible read by Barbara Rosenblatt. I love when its hot outside to listen to the antics of Mrs. Polifax. What could be any nicer than that? 

I hope you have a wonderful day,

Kim

"In the morning when Mrs. Pollifax awoke she realized at once that a fateful day was beginning. She lay and thought about this dispassionately, almost wonderingly, because to every life there eventually came a moment when one had to accept the fact that the shape, the pattern, the direction of the future was entirely out of one's hands, to be decided unalterably by chance, by fate or by God. There was nothing to do but accept, and from this to proceed, doing the very best that could be done.”
― Dorothy Gilman, (The Unexpected, Mrs. Polifax.)

Happy July

 Happy July! Summer is here! I wanted to show you this picture. A few years ago we brought this cactus back from one of our trips to Tucson. It blooms in June for one day. Then the blooms fall off and it waits for another year to bloom. Some years I feel just like that. I hope this year, I can bloom a bit longer. 

This is going to be a brag post of sorts. I took pictures of my projects. I was surprised how many I have accomplished as I went around taking pictures. First though, last night my daughter in Tucson had her first monsoon in her new house. So much water and the seasonal creek next door to her house turned into a lake and a raging river. But after the storm came the frogs. Where did they come from I keep wondering. 

Her children were catching them of course. One of my grand daughters said to her Mom. " I love frogs more than you, Mom!" I woke up laughing about that still. 

Then Ron brought in a baby toad he found in the flowerbed this morning. I understand completely, baby frogs are just so cute. 

Okay, here is my Maggie Bonomini patterns I bought from Blackberry Primitives:

Of course you can see why I did that top picture. It was all for the chicken. I have had such fun working with wool. I have used my pieces of my wool that are too small to cut into strips so it has been a great way to use those up. 

My current rug. Its from Old Tattered Flag. I am having issues, because of the colors I have chosen. I find its so hard to hook when I don't like the colors. I am going to keep plugging along. Have you rug hookers ever found, once you start reverse hooking a pattern, then like me I  seem to keep doing it over and over. I have made a rule to myself to really watch how much I reverse hook. I  just put the rug away I can go on after a little while without it driving me crazy. I need to get it finished as I have two lovely patterns coming from Saundra.

I made the little flags this week. Such a fun little project. You know how I just have to play with that mantel that I have now. That top board was out in our wood pile and the square smaller boards for the fireworks. I just painted, and glues and I thought it turned out pretty good for just an idea I had. 

See my tiny squash? I was so excited when I found this the other day, I am sure its bigger now. A couple flowers in my garden area. From where it was last year to this year, I really like how its turned out now. 

I always love before and after pictures. We spend so much time outside now. I think a year ago when we moved in I just kept the blinds closed. Its just right I think. 

I finished and made a pincushion out of the pattern by Brenda Gervais, Collector. 

 

Its from Stacy Nash, The Rose Cottage, Sampler Pinkeep. I have been working on it a long time. I think I got it in May. 

When we were in Tucson, we like to visit garden shops, just to see the different kinds of plants they have. While we were there we saw a Madagascar Palm. Because this time we took a plane, we of course couldn't buy one and bring it back. The other day when I went to Home Depot to get sticks for my flags, I went through the garden shop, slowly. I looked in every crook and cranny. I was looking for a Pony Tail Palm for Ron's Bonsai collection and what did my little eyes spy? This, I was so excited. See those tiny thorns coming from the trunk? That is what the tribesmen use in the Amazon and Peru to make blow darts. Isn't that cool? Well we thought it was. So I brought him home. This time of year, the garden shops get such weird stuff. It isn't our zone so they have to spend the winter inside. This is when we always find Desert Rose too. 

I am kind of all over the place today. I was surprised when I decided to take pictures how much stuff I had made. I have really felt like a lazy slacker so I was glad to find that I had been doing something. I hope you have a wonderful 4th of July. Thank you so much for stopping by today,

~Kim~

“Like ghosts the children walked across the lawn on their bare feet. The moon was full. Above the damp grass hung a veil of mist, luminous with moonlight and spangled with fireflies. There was no wind, and the sound of the brook was very distinct, tinkling, splashing, running softly. 

---Elisabeth Enright, The Four Story Mistake.