This is a paper wasp on a Stella D’Oro
daylily.
A cousin asked, “How can you get close
enough to get a photo like that? I would
be afraid of being stung.”
“The wasps and bees are busy
collecting pollen or getting a drink from a water droplet,” I told her. “If I move slowly, they stay put. I have a 90mm macro lens that works well for
closeups. I usually use a 300mm zoom
lens for butterflies, though, as they’re much more skittish. I’ve never been stung while taking photos.”
Somebody asked me how many different
flowers I have, so I tallied them up. I
have a lot, but not too huge of a variety, as I have done a lot of dividing and
transplanting. That’s okay, because a
big bunch of same-color lilies, for instance, makes a bigger splash than a
solitary lily, or a chrysanthemum, or a columbine, etc. Almost all of these flowers were given to me.
Okay... let’s add them up: 1. daylilies; 2. Asiatic lilies; 3.
old-fashioned roses; 4. Wild Prairie roses; 5. Lily-of-the-Valley; 6. Autumn
Joy sedum; 7. large-leaf hostas with big white flowers; 8. white-edged-leaf
hostas with lavender flowers; 9. lavender clematis; 10. Fireworks clematis; 11.
purple iris; 12. tall bearded iris in multiple colors; 13. peonies, white and
pink; 14. trumpet vine; 15. Sweet Autumn clematis; 16. blossoming chokecherry;
17. begonias; 18. tulips; 19. tall lavender phlox; 20. honeysuckle; 21.
hollyhocks; 22. Double Knock-Out roses; 23. chrysanthemum; 24. daffodils; 25.
crocus; 26. Glories-of-the-Snow; 27. striped squill.
I almost forgot about those last four,
as they bloomed early in the spring. I also
let the milkweed grow and blossom for the Monarch butterflies. I used to have quite a few annuals in pots on
the porch, but our porch faces north, and when storms come through, it hits
that side of the house hard as the winds come swooping over the hill to our
north. I got tired of running outside in
a thunderstorm to try to save all the potted plants. I used to have African violets in the house,
but they croaked when we were gone on a trip too long.
Our supper last Monday evening was El
Monterey frozen, then oven-baked, burritos with shredded Monterey Jack, sour
cream, and picanté sauce, kiwi-strawberry juice, and rice pudding.
Tuesday morning at 10:00 a.m., it was 69°. The high would be 81° that sunny day. I cleaned the kitchen, paid a few bills, and
then spent the next 7 ½ hours making blocks for the Crinoline Ladies quilt.
I paused in the late afternoon to put venison,
potatoes, carrots, and onions into the Instant Pot, and to husk some fresh corn
on the cob. I added peaches and tapioca,
and that was supper.
Here are some pictures Hannah took while
walking with her Australian shepherds along the dike Tuesday evening. Willow (right) posed nicely; but when she
called Chimera’s name, he got up and came toward her, thus enlarging his
schnozz. 😆
When I went out to get the bird feeders just
after sunset, there were more Little Brown bats flying around out there than I’ve
ever seen here. They’re curious things,
and they kept swooping at my head to see what I was doing.
I am quite subject to suggestions. I hear someone on a video mention ‘Gingersnaps’,
and I’m immediately looking for a list of ‘best gingersnaps’, and ordering
some. They arrived Tuesday.
Mmmmm, good.
The brand I got: Archway.
I was afraid they’d be too crunchy for Larry,
as his dentures are sometimes troublesome; but he really likes them, and often
dunks them in his coffee.
I got
several blocks cut and pieced that day. I
might’ve gotten more done, if not for all the fun and interesting conversations
with kids, grandkids, and kuzzins. ☺️
Wednesday
morning, it was 79° by 10:30 a.m. The
high would be 82° on that sunny, windy day.
I blow-dried and curled my hair while sipping this Tiramisu cold-brew
coffee that I don’t quite like. Let’s
add more water!
That last statement reminded me of Bialosky
Bear making cookies. “It needs more
honey!” >>stir stir stir stir... taste...
<< “Still needs more honey!” ((repeat several times)) “Hey?! Where
did all the batter go?!”
I cleaned the kitchen, and then went
upstairs to see how many blocks I could complete before our midweek church
service that evening.
That afternoon, I was discussing restaurants,
particularly those offering Japanese cuisine, with Levi, who likes that kind of
food.
He then sent a picture of Aaron in some type
of... hatch?
“Can you guess what we were doing?” he
asked.
I tried: “Fixing an underground water main in the
middle of Toledo?”
I was wrong.
Aaron, it seems, was entering a
submarine through the top hatch. They
had toured the submarine at the Freedom Park Navy Museum in Omaha a couple of
weeks ago, on an excursion they made especially for Levi’s birthday.
“But I made a really good guess!” I
told Levi.
In addition to the submarine, there’s
a Navy minesweeper at that park/museum, near the river. Admission is completely free, though
donations are gratefully accepted to help maintain the historic ships.
About the time we headed to church, a big
tornado outbreak was occurring in Illinois, Indiana, and Kentucky. It was still going on when we got home that
night. Several places were hit hard,
with numerous homes destroyed.
Thursday, the high would be 79°. It was a sunny, pretty day. I ate breakfast – one of Larry’s scrumptious
waffles – and headed upstairs to my quilting studio.
A friend sent me an article about the
Northern Lights, complete with scientific explanations – and some of my
favorite Bible verses, such as this one:
“The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his
handywork.” Psalm 19:1
Finally, finally, scientists who once
said the Aurora Borealis makes no noise are admitting that, in fact, they do!
I know they do, because when Mama and
Daddy and I saw them up north near Grand Prairie, right on the southern
boundaries of the Northwest Territories, we heard crackling and popping and
rumbling, like a combination of very loud static electricity and distant rolling
thunder. The Lights rolled down out of
the skies like enormous, brilliant curtains.
It was around 11:00 p.m., and there were no other vehicles on the road,
hadn’t been any for hours. Daddy pulled
onto the shoulder, turned off the vehicle, and we all got out and just stood there
looking up at the sky in total awe for around 30 minutes. I was about 11 years old.
Thursday evening, we had Detroit Supreme
pizza from Motor City Pizza Co. for supper.
Here’s the description from the back of the box: “Detroit-style deep dish pizza came to be
when an innovative chef baked a pizza in an automotive parts tray used on the
assembly line (it’s the Motor City, after all).
The high sides gave Detroit-style pizza its signature thick, airy,
buttery flavored crust with crunchy, caramelized edges, and the cheesy,
crave-able corners Detroiters love.”
We’re not Detroiters, but we loved it, too. Mmmm, mmm.
Delicious.
A friend was telling me about teaching a
friend of ours to say “Lamborghini” and “Popocatepetl” when he was just 18
months or so. He’s all grown up now, with
children of his own.
“Lamborghini and Popocatepetl!” I exclaimed,
laughing.
And here I’ve been all proud of myself for
teaching my little nephew Kelvin to say “Mine!” when he was a mere six months
old. I would’ve been seven years old
then.
He was sitting on our couch. I’d hand him a toy, and then, just as he’d
almost get his hands on it, I’d pull it away and say, “Miiiine!” I knew to only do that a couple of times
before I let the baby have the toy, and then I’d say, “Hey! That was MINE!”
That little baby was laughing so hard, he
could barely sit up straight. And then
all of a sudden, he took a big breath, grinned right into my face and
exclaimed, “Miiiiine!!!”
I thought he was the cleverest little genius
ever.
Not sure my sister appreciated me teaching
him that, though. But the baby knew it
was a game.
I loved him so much. Still do, as a matter of fact.
Friday was
grandson Nathanael’s 20th birthday.
I sent him an animated picture of a goat blowing half a dozen party
whistles at once, and a YouTube video of various giraffes with party hats and
sunglasses on, having all sorts of birthday cakes and cupcakes, with
accompanying fireworks and the Happy Birthday song.
I spent an
hour and a half working in the flower gardens that morning. Now the gardens in the front look nice – or
at least they did; hours of rain the next evening and night made a whole
lot of weeds spring right back up again.
It was
nice outside – in the mid to high 60s, partly sunny, with a healthy crop of
mosquitoes, oodles of Little Brown bats working hard through the night notwithstanding.
When I
came indoors at 9:30 a.m., it was 69°, and getting ready to rain. I showered, dried and curled my hair, ate
breakfast, and headed upstairs to my sewing room.
I was speeding
up! It only took 15 minutes to cut the pieces for a block, and 55 minutes
to sew it together. Two or three days earlier, it was taking 25 minutes
to cut the pieces and an hour and 15 minutes to sew them together.
By evening, I had 26 blocks done – I’d
reached the halfway point.
It rained all through the night, most
of Saturday, and didn’t stop until early Sunday morning. NWS issued an areal flood watch.
I cut my hair Saturday morning. Shorter
hair cuts down on drying/curling time by ten minutes each morning for a month
or two.
I continued piecing blocks for the
Crinoline Ladies quilt that day. I was running
low on the shimmery white background fabric, Michael Miller Fairy Frost. I’d ordered more several days earlier – and
wound up with some that has a lot more silver in it than mine does. When I look up the identifying name and number
printed on the selvage, I get a variety of colors, all in the ‘Fairy Frost’
line. There seems to be no particular
identification for each individual color, though the seller described this
silvery stuff as ‘shimmery’. Well, mine
is ‘shimmery’, too, but not ‘silvery’. There
are several different ‘white’ varieties. I tried again with fabric that a seller
described as ‘pearlized’. In fact, I
ordered a piece from three different sellers, as no single seller had more than
a yard. The shipping costs have now made
the cost of this quilt shoot right up.
I looked at tracking, and saw that one
piece of yardage should be arriving that day; it was already marked ‘Out for
Delivery’. If ‘pearlized’ wasn’t right,
I’d try the one someone describes as ‘snowy’. Michael Miller Fabrics needs to assign
specific numbers to every individual color in each of their fabric lines!
I ordered some raw honey from The Prairie
River Honey Farm for a friend. The Honey
Farm is located in a pretty place beside the Loup River about 20 miles north of
Grand Island, 95 miles to our west. Raw
honey often has slightly different flavors throughout the year, especially here
where there is such a different variety of wildflowers on the prairies through
the different seasons.
The honey sounded so good in the description,
I couldn’t help myself: I ordered some
for us, too.
The fabric and the honey arrived at the same
time Saturday.
The fabric was indeed the right color, which
meant that the other two orders would be correct also.
However, the honey is not right.
Instead of a pound of honey, they sent a pound of bee pollen granules! Knowing the bee pollen was quite a bit
pricier than the honey, I checked the receipt.
I’d been charged for honey, which I had ordered through Amazon.
I wrote to tell them, saying I would like to keep
the bee pollen granules and just pay for them.
I then reordered the honey I’d wanted in the first place.
They have not answered yet.
That evening, Hannah brought us a pan of
custard, warm from the oven; and while she was here, Victoria brought a pan of caramel
pecan rolls, also still warm from the oven.
Those were for Father’s Day – and I got to
share them! Mmmm.
When I quit sewing that night, I had finished
the 30th block. 22 more to
go!
Sunday
morning at 8:00 a.m., it was 61°. The
high would be 67°. As I put a few curls
in my hair, I read messages and posts and listened to the news, which included a
new description of the ‘pink
planet’, GJ 504 b. Scientists have decided that the clouds around
this planet are salty. The James Webb
Telescope is an amazing tool that has provided previously-unimaginable
information.
Caleb and Maria gave Larry some lemon curd
cheesecake cupcakes after church.
Another Father's Day gift he shared with me. They were scrumptious.
There was a pair of Summer Tanagers in our front
yard when we got home! We have never
seen these birds around our home before.
The male is a brilliant red; the female is a more subdued yellow. I saw a male Summer Tanager fly into one of
our Douglas firs a few minutes ago.
Photo of the red male tanager is from All
About Birds. Photo of the yellow female
is from Illinois Department of Natural Resources.
As we were getting ready for our evening
service that evening, I heard a ‘ka-bonk’. I stood still and listened, then looked out a
few windows; but I saw and heard nothing for a couple of minutes.
Then a loud screeching began, and I feared a
neighbor cat had grabbed a bird. I
quickly stepped out the front door – and discovered a very young squirrel that
had evidently fallen from the eaves, landed on the big box for packages on the
front porch, and was now screaming his cute little head off.
It wasn’t long before his mother was in the
eaves scolding away. She scrambled down
the log wall, ran back and forth on the porch, climbed pell-mell up the wall
again, and sat atop the porch light chattering away. The baby went on shrieking, and I feared his
leg was injured. He did not seem capable
of climbing back up the wall.
We had to leave for church then, so we exited
the house with care, not wishing to a) step on a baby squirrel, or b)
get leaped on by an angry mama squirrel.
After the service, we picked up a
small grocery order at Walmart. There were
newly-fledged mourning doves all over the place there at the grocery-pick-up
side of Walmart, where there are numerous Blue spruce trees, and fields and
pastures beyond the trees. Adult doves
were stepping through the grasses hunting down insects for their hungry
young’ns.
As we drove along our lane toward our
driveway, lightning bugs twinkled amongst the trees.
Gathering up our paraphernalia, we headed for
the house. It was getting dark, but I
was pretty sure I could see that baby squirrel behind the box on the
porch.
Larry changed clothes, put on a pair of
gloves, and scooted the black box away from the wall.
Sure enough, the squirrel pup was still
there. He carefully picked it up, and
the poor little thing curled up in his gloves all cozy and cuddly. Larry carried it down the steps and set it
down on the sidewalk, so we could determine if it had hurt its hind leg as I thought
it might’ve done.
It stayed put, all in a small huddle. I thought, Yep, it must be injured. (Photo from City Wildlife .org.)
Larry came back up on the porch and scooted
the big box back against the wall. The
loud scraping noise scared the baby squirrel, and it went running lickety-split
to hide under the BMW. It didn’t look
like it was limping at all; I think it’s all right. Hopefully, its mother will find it.
Andrew and Hester gave us double chocolate
chip banana muffins last night.
Do we look skinny, or something?!
The Wild Prairie roses have buds all over
them. When they open, they will be the
lighter pink of the petal tips on this bud.
Once again, there were many tornado
warnings across the country last night, the majority of which were in Indiana,
Kentucky, Illinois, and Kansas.
It was 67° this morning at 11:00 a.m., on the
way up to 73° on this mostly cloudy day. I cleaned the kitchen and did a couple of
loads of laundry.
The other
two packages of background fabric arrived, one a day ahead of time. As expected, they were the right color. I now have enough background fabric to finish
the quilt.
A couple of years ago, I had a package
coming from California, and needed it on a certain date. It had plenty of time to get here. It would not get here in time.
It landed in Omaha within a day or two
– and then it went to New York State! After
cooling its heels there for three or four days (probably touring the Statue of
Liberty and The Metropolitan Museum of Art), it slooowly headed back west, as
if every sorting/delivery person who came upon it spent several hours just
scratching his or her head over it. It
got alllll the way back to Des Moines – then headed back east to Columbus, Ohio,
instead of Columbus, Nebraska.
It was stuck there for several days,
with no tracking info available. It
probably trotted through the Franklin Park Conservatory and Botanical Gardens,
whataya bet?
Next, I discovered it had landed in
Kansas City. It took another day to make
it to Omaha. Hope was just tentatively
raising its fragile head when that package went to Denver.
From there, it suddenly kicked in the
afterburner and, in ‘only’ 12 hours, it went to Omaha, then Norfolk (45 miles
to our north), then to Columbus (7 miles to our east), and finally to my front
porch. The box looked like it had been
through the Second Boer War.
This
evening, Victoria sent pictures of the Winnie-the-Pooh bookends I gave her for Christmas,
which she has now placed in the baby’s nursery.
They used to be mine when I was little. I was so pleased
with them. My mother got them for me around
the same time she got me the original set of Winnie-the-Pooh books.
“Why do they have a plug in the bottom of
them?” Victoria asked me.
“To allow them to be weighted,” I told
her. “You can use sand, gravel, or metal
BBs/pellets.”
“Ahh,” said she. “I was looking for salt and pepper holes in
confusion. 😂”
“If you use sand or gravel,” I added, “you
can get small packets of it already cleaned.
Before filling them, make sure the rubber plugs haven’t gotten brittle.”
“I think I probably won’t do that,” Victoria
decided, “because I don’t need them heavy. They’re not going to be actually holding books
up.”
She then sent pictures of the baby outfit she
knitted a month or two ago, saying, “I put on the buttons finally. I don’t like doing it, so I procrastinated and
started another project instead. 😆 There are 14 buttons in all.”
Here’s
the project Victoria started because she didn’t want to sew on buttons: a scrap blanket. “I have a lot of little balls of yarn to use
up,” she said.
She then sent a picture of Kurt sweeping the
kitchen floor, with little Arnold behind him mopping away with a toy mop.
“Looks like you’ve got all the menfolk well
trained,” I remarked.
“Funnily enough, I didn’t say a thing!” she
laughed. “I think he tracked in some mud
with his work clothes earlier, and is cleaning it up. 😄”
“Your father just did that, too,” I told her,
“after first acting astonished that he could’ve possibly been the culprit.”
After supper, I made us both some of the tea
Victoria gave me for Mother’s Day – Toffee Chocolate Hazelnut. Yummy.
In the Reader’s Digest a few years ago there
was a story about a husband who would have his morning coffee – instant Kava –
while he read the news each morning. He’d
put a spoonful of Kava into his cup, pick up his spoon, and start stirring.
“Tinka-tinka-tinka-tink—” while he read the
news. On and on and on...
One morning his wife had had enough. She hopped up, grabbed his cup out from under
him, poured the coffee into her blender, turned it on high for a few seconds,
poured the coffee back into the cup, and ker-plunked it back in front of her
husband.
“There,” she said. “It’s stirred.”
Whataya know! – tomorrow is National
Detroit-Style Pizza Day! Annnnd... I
just happen to have some in my freezer. 😋
Bedtime!
,,,>^..^<,,, Sarah Lynn ,,,>^..^<,,,
