Journal: Mulberries and Dragonflies and Birthdays

Clematis

Last Monday evening, I posted some photos:  Swallowtails and Cats

A friend noticed that I had multiple photos of Teensy, and only one of Tabby, and remarked, “I can tell which one is your favorite!”

“Naaah,” I answered, “I don’t have a favorite kitty; I love them both.  It’s just that Tabby wasn’t doing anything!  One shot was going to look just like the next.”

Proof:  As soon as Teensy lay down and went to sleep, I stopped shooting him and went off looking for other photographic quarry. 

Tuesday I got my last two patterns ready to post, and then started on the final flower.  Or maybe the second-to-last, if I decided to use the pansies for something else and make a different pansy block for the quilt.  They might look better on the front of a fancy little bag.  Up close, they’re fine.  From a distance (i.e., in a quilt), they’re a bit of a mishmash. 

I drew another flower block design, cut the templates, ironed them onto fabric, and trimmed them.  They were ready to be starched and ironed when I quit for the night.

Lydia came visiting that evening, bringing Larry coconut honey cashews, Ferrero Rochers, and a nifty 3D card she’d made.  Open it, and it becomes a grill, complete with fixin’s.  Jacob and Jonathan were with her.

She was telling a story about some difficulty she’d recently had, trying to lug several cumbersome items, adding, “... and I was carrying a baby, too—”

Jonathan, who’d seemingly been playing without listening, looked up at his Mama quickly.  “It was Ian,” he told her in great sincerity.  She evidently hadn’t known!  hee hee

A friend of ours used to run a daycare.  One day she gave the children a serious lecture on sharing.  Satisfied that they had taken it well to heart, she went to the kitchen to fix lunch. 

A ruckus soon ensued in the living room.  She hurried back to see what the trouble was.

There was the chief culprit, a little boy of about four, tugging hard on a toy in a little girl’s arms whilst looking her straight in the eye and crying, ”Share!  Share!”

The first part of the day Wednesday was spent in a bit of vacuuming, bathroom scrubbing, dish washing, and clothes washing.  I finally headed down to my sewing room in midafternoon, with about three hours to sew before the evening church service. 

I got all the little pieces for the next flower block – gladiolus, this time – prepared and glued them onto the background... and then it was time for church.

Afterwards, we went to Wal-Mart for some better weed and grass clippers.  I may not be able to pull weeds so well, but with good clippers, I should be able to cut them.  I chose Fiskars.

Home again, I stitched down the appliqués.

I didn’t like it.  It was less than stellar.  In fact, it looked less like a spray of flowers, and quite a lot more like a muddle. 

I’ll turn the muddle into a little bag for one of the granddaughters someday.  Granddaughters like muddles just fine, when Grandma makes them.  Don’t they?

Why did the jumble of tulips work, while the jumble of gladiolas did not??

Just about the time I think I’ve learned what will look nice and what won’t, I make something that... doesn’t.  I won’t waste it, though.  It’ll turn into... something!

I took pictures of it and went to bed.  Here are the bad glads; do you see what I mean?

Thursday, I started a replacement block.  I drew new flowers, traced new templates, and cut new pieces of fabric.

I headed out to a backyard flower garden with my brand-spankin’-new Fiskars hand clippers early that afternoon, planning to make use of a pretty day by clipping out all the grass and weeds that have grown amongst the hostas and lilies and hollyhocks. 

Problem:  the silly things kept locking into a partially-open position every time I tried to cut anything!  I removed them from the grass and squeezed the handles ---- and they worked perfectly.  I made sure the lock was in the correct position... I leaned down to clip a weed – and the blades locked, half open, again.

As before, as soon as there was no weed in its talons, it opened and closed perfectly. 

Ah.  Perfect excuse to quit with the weeding and trimming and to go right down to my sewing room.  Aye?  My Fiskars spring-loaded shears and snips were working perfectly, after all!

I turned on an audio book, plugged in the lightbox, and collected a Sharpie.  Then, after retracing the pencil sketch with the Sharpie, I numbered the pieces, scanned the drawing, and printed it onto newsprint.  Next, to trace it onto freezer paper, trim the templates, iron them to fabric, and cut out the pieces.  Let the New and Improved glads be re-created!

When I started trimming double-layer freezer-paper templates, I ran into a small snag.

Literally.

I stopped cutting and took a close look at the scissor blades.

Yep, there was a definite nick in them.

I turned to my laptop, conducted a bit of Important Business on Amazon, and then wrote the following Thoughts and Remarks to one of the quilt groups:

Remember those beads I bought last week to put on the lily block?  a) The package had gold, bronze, and silver tube beads, along with round ones, and b) I bought them at Wal-Mart. 

1.            I never dreamed Wal-Mart sold high-quality glass beads.

2.            Wal-Mart sells high-quality glass beads.

3.            I thought they were plastic.

4.            I tried cutting one slightly shorter.  (Why can I never leave well enough alone?!)

5.            I used my Acme Titanium scissors for this purpose – the scissors I use to cut freezer paper.

6.            They were good scissors.

7.            ‘Were’ was the operative word in the previous sentence.

8.            Amazon sells Acme Titanium scissors.  Big ones, little ones; shears, snips; pretty, pretty scissors.

9.            I like scissors.

10.         I bought some. 

11.         I managed to restrict myself to one pair.  [ :-O ]

12.         I’m more than half done cutting gladioli templates.

13.         Soon, I must decide if it was a faulty design or the wrong fabric choices that made the last gladiolus block look like a muddle.

14.         The fabric is pretty.  Therefore, I shall try the same fabric with this new design.

15.         ‘Gladioli’ sounds like ‘ravioli’.

16.         It’s suppertime.

17.         I’m hungry.

18.         (Fill in the blank)

And that’s all, she wrote!

Later that night, I had a dozen or so windows up on my computer.  Two were actually showing, and were side by side:  an audio book, and Outlook.  After reading an email, I pressed ‘Home’ to go back to the top of the post – and promptly returned to the beginning of audio book, since it happened to be the active window, as I had yet to actually click on anything on the email. 

Arrgghh, that's as bad as (or worse than) when someone slams shut the book you are reading!

Take a look at this... thing... that someone posted on a quilting group (of all things) on Facebook.

I promptly sent the pictures to my daughters, mother-in-law, and sister.

Hannah likes to fix funny meals for her family on April Fools’ Day – but she was all squeamish over a bug cake.  “Shiver me timbers!” she wrote back to me.  “I can’t say I’d enjoy eating that.”

“Me neither, me neither!” I answered.  “But... just think how much fun it would be to serve that up to Bobby and the kids.”

“Wonder how those legs are made?” Hannah wondered.

“Small rodent limbs?” I replied, in an evil effort to make her shiver all over again.

She hasn’t answered.  Maybe she won’t speak to me ever again, after offending her sensibilities so? 

Come to think of it, my sister hasn’t responded either.  Hmmmm.

Lydia wrote in agreement with Hannah:  “How could you even eat that?!”

Hester, being Hester, wrote, “Lololol.  Yum!  :( ”

Friday, I started gluing all the little fabric pieces down.  We would soon see if the New and Improved version was indeed New and Improved.

That evening, we went to Jeremy and Lydia’s house for Jacob’s birthday party.  He’s 7 now, and Lydia, whose birthday was the next day, is 25.  Here’s Jeremy holding Ian, talking to Caleb, and Larry and Lydia on the right.  This area will be the new living room.

Late that night, I appliquéd the last little gladiolus petal in place.  Yep, it’s New and Improved:

Now for a bit of product endorsement:

The front and top of the control panel on my stove, which is behind the burners, has been a bit sticky and grungy for a long, long time.  I’ve tried various cleaners and degreasers on it, but nothing worked very well.  I don’t know why I didn’t think of using Barkeeper’s Friend powdered cleanser and polish on it; I use the stuff on the glass stovetop, after all, and it works great.  But the other day, after wiping off the stovetop, I used the same rag with a damp paste of Barkeeper’s Friend on the top and front of the control panel.  Now the control panel is whiter and cleaner than it’s been for many a moon.  I need to have Larry scoot the stove out and unplug it so I can scrub around the switches and dials without getting zapped.  (Yes, it’s happened before.  Highly unpleasant, to say nothing of dangerous.)

The cats are getting along pretty well with Tiger.  They’re sometimes all out on the deck at the same time, lounging around (though looking around suspiciously if anybody moves too suddenly).  Tiger wanders in and out with me as I fill the bird feeders, hang some laundry, and do some things in the kitchen. 

I looked up some information on scam phone calls, since Loren receives some now and then.  A recent caller informed him that there had been a lawsuit filed against him, and it worried him a bit.  I assured him it was a scam.

I found a whole lot of complaints online about this very type of call, including the following comment:  “Someone has been calling my sister (whom of which we don’t live in the same city) to try to get my contact information.”

‘Whom of which we don’t live in the same city.’  ‘Whom of which.’

Chicory

I’ll betcha when foreign scammers and telemarketers call her, they both wind up scratching their heads!  ‘Whom of which.’ 

Saturday I put all the horizontal rows of blocks for the Buoyant Blossoms BOM together, and the sashing, too.  I didn’t make a new pansy block after all.  As I mentioned before, it’s pretty up close... and besides! – I wanted to sew blocks together, not make another flower appliqué!

Sunday morning, there were two downy woodpeckers on the suet feeder at the same time – one on either side of the cage.  I’ve never seen two there at once before.  One was obviously a male, with its red top of the head.  I peered at the other one, trying to decide which it was.  It turned then, and I saw a mottled red topknot – it was a juvenile.  He was pecking away at the suet block, quite like an adult – but then his father flew around to his side of the cage, and the young’n went to acting like a wee babe, flapping its wings and begging.  WHAM-BAM-BAM!—the father pounded food into its gullet.  Looks dangerous.  :-D

Hannah was holding Baby Ian after the morning church service.  I walked over to talk to Lydia and Hannah – and noticed the baby looking intently into my face, eyebrows up a bit... so I laughed and said, “Do you like that story, Baby?” and he beamed at me.  He grinned so big, he wiggled all over.  J  He’s four months old now. 

After church last night, we took a gift to Bobby and Hannah for their 16^th anniversary – a bug zapper for their yard.

They weren’t home yet, so Larry looked around for a place to put the gift bag.  He chose the flag pole, draping the ribbon bag handles over one wing of the eagle that topped the pole.

“Now lift the pole,” I suggested.

So up... up... up went the bag.

I then sent them a text, saying that I hoped they got home before a bird built a nest in the gift bag, or carried off bag and present entirely.

Bobby soon wrote, “I hope it’s not edible....it’s hard to eat while climbing a flagpole.”

“Depends on how well-fried you like stuff,” I replied, “whether you’ll consider what it produces edible or not.”

We came home and had a late snack:  fruit salad, with a side of pretzel-flip crackers with extra-crunchy Jif peanut butter, washed down with hazelnut coffee.  Now, there’s a good snack, right there.

Victoria used my camera Saturday and again today to take senior pictures for two of her friends.  She used Lydia’s umbrellas and lighting equipment.  I seldom allow anyone else to use my camera.  And you can just bank on it, if I do, there will be all sorts of things I really need to take pictures of, and I have no camera.  Victoria’s photo shoots both turned out very nice, I think.  She was pleased to make a little money, while saving her friends quite a lot of money.

Last night, she and Kurt went off and used the money from the Saturday shoot to buy Lydia an exercise bike for her birthday.  It didn’t quite cover it all, so Kurt made up the difference.  Lydia has been trying to ride each morning, and Victoria stays with the children while Lydia goes pedaling.  But it doesn’t always work out, what with Victoria’s jobs and unpredictable babies, so an exercise bike is a good alternative.

Lilies

It’s 85° here, so my weather app says; but I went out on the deck to refresh Tiger’s water, and it feels much hotter.  Tiger likes to come in the house – he was somebody’s housecat at one time, I’m sure.  We let him in now and then, and he hasn’t done anything objectionable yet.  Teensy is a little more tolerant than he was.  I didn’t want another cat, but it appears we’ve got one!  And a nice one he is.  He seems to be an older cat, and he’s a wee bit gimpy around the haunches.  He’s big...  well over 15 pounds, I’d guess.

One time Black Kitty was in the garage, and she’d gotten into a bag of garbage.  Only her big bushy tail was sticking out.  Larry came walking through, petted her tail (she always liked that), and said, “Hey, get out of the garbage!” 

She started backing out – and then he realized ... the critter had a white stripe up its back and all the way to the tip of its tail.

He commenced to running in midair, but gravity got the better of him.  Once his feet hit the floor again, he got up the stairs and into the house in record time.

Caleb, who’d watched the entire show from the back door, laughed so hard he was bent double, tears streaming down his face.

I just spotted a tiny house wren hot on the trail of something in the grass.  They got closer, and I could see that the critter being pursued had six legs.  That little wren was hopping lickety split after a big ol’ insect half as big as he is.  Must’ve been a cicada.  They had a fierce fight, and the wren might’ve won, but then he glanced up and spotted me at the door and took off like a shot.  That was quite the rip-snortin’ fight, while it lasted!

Did I mention, Victoria has borrowed my camera?  I had no camera, and a wren was having a boxing match with a cicada!  A Common Whitetail dragonfly was flitting calmly about the old-fashioned roses, and I had no camera!!!

Therefore I must cheat, and take a photo from the Internet.  This striking skimmer eats a whole lot of mosquitoes.

Our big Siberian husky, Aleutia, used to love cicadas.  I think she considered them a delicacy – like escargot, or caviar.  Crunchy, crunchy!

One time Larry and I were taking the children for a bike ride.  I had a child’s bike seat on the back of my bike; he was towing a cart that hauled four or five children.  As we rode along, my necklace of large fat beads thumped against my collarbone, and I thought, Bother; why didn’t I remember to take that thing off?!

I reached up to move it a bit ------- only it wasn’t a beaded necklace.  It was a cicada, hanging on tight to my collarbone!!!!  :-O

Well, I couldn’t capsize or bail, because I had a little kid in the bike seat behind me.  So I vewy, vewy ca’fully plucked that thing off and gave it a fling.

But I’m here to tell you, I shivered for five minutes thereafter, and periodically all over again every time I thought about it.

One of these days – tomorrow, for instance – I need to pick some mulberries.  Both the purple and the white ones are ripening; I ate a handful of them Saturday.  Mmmm, mmm... the purple ones are really sweet.  The white ones aren’t as sweet as they were last year; I think we need to give the tree more water.

Friday is the day I need to take things to the Platte County Fair.  Don’t let me forget!

Tomorrow, I hope to get the quilt put together and start on the borders.  There are three borders, and the middle one has lots of triangles. 

Bedtime! 

,,,>^..^<,,,       Sarah Lynn       ,,,>^..^<,,,