most recent quilt

here is my wonderful grandboy wrapped up in my latest quilt.  he looks so good in it and seemed to like it so much that it just might be a gift to him for xmas.

the next quilt

i am in the planning process of the next quilt which will be for my grandgirl's 11th birthday in Nov.

she seems especially drawn to greens currently... so that's what it will be... with some turquoise and purples thrown in.  this will be another "quilt as you go" adventure, using the tutorial here

and in a couple of days i should be receiving my order from Dharma Trading of their solar dyes which i will use to dye some fabric for quilting and might even try over-dyeing some of my not-so-favorite fabrics in my stash.

yesterday Pam and i went to Lake Oswego's Pine Needle fabric store for a wonderful day of stash enhancement.  they have the beautiful ombre fabric and had a perfect green (lower left).  if i keep it up, i'll eventually have some of every single color they have... that's my goal.  it looks so lovely in prayer flag type banners and in quilts, too.

this coming Saturday is the annual Summer Hummer at dome central and includes family and friends for an afternoon of bbq, lots of food and wine and celebration of life and love!  the tradition began many years ago as the celebration of the birth of our first llama cria.  the "hummer" part came from the fact that llamas hum a lot, so we had a big hummin' party for the baby.  there were probably 100+ people here, we bbq'ed a lamb, everyone brought food, we drank a lot of wine and beer and apparently all had a fine time.  memory blurs a bit, but the tradition continues, tho we don't roast a lamb anymore we do still bbq something, eat well, drink wine and usually now only have 20 or 25 people here.  so a lot of this week is devoted to getting ready to party.  party on....

from HONY (Humans of New York)

this was posted on Facebook today by Brandon at HONY.  his photos and the stories or quotes with them are something i look forward to every day.  he has a book coming out in october, which i'm thinking about pre-ordering (lower price!)

http://www.humansofnewyork.com

this woman and her poem made me both smile and tear up a bit.

She asked if I wanted to hear a poem she'd written when she was younger. (At what age, she couldn't remember) She then recited it from memory. I had her repeat it several times so I could get all the words right:

"Were I to dream,
then dream I would
of days that have gone by.

Your eyes would gleam
and so would mine,
but joys remembered are no longer mine.

I walk in a garden of memory,
reliving the joys and the sorrows as well.
I walk with a cane down memory lane,
perhaps there, joys remembered will remain.

Perhaps when my hair has turned to gray
and my face is etched with pain,
I'll walk with a cane down memory lane.
Perhaps there, joys remembered will remain."

next up... fabric dyeing

today i got an email from Dharma Trading Co. introducing a new dye product from Jacquard, called SolarFast which sounded interesting enough that i decided to order some!  i'm getting started on the next quilt which will be for my sweet grandgirl's 11th birthday.  we were fabric shopping with her mom when i was in Duvall last week and i noticed she was really drawn to greens... also to flannel.  so the quilt will be green with some turquoise and purples accents, and with flannel for the backing and maybe the binding.  after pulling all the fabrics from my stash which i thought might possibly work, i found a serious lack of greens, both solid and subtle prints.  so, besides going to a sale at Pine Needle in Lake Oswego on sunday, i'll try this solar dyeing thing while we have sun!!  i think this is the perfect plan.  stay tuned.....

	SolarFast dyes from Jacquard are a whole new way to sun print! Create cyanotype-like prints, photograms, continuous tone photographs, shadow prints, ombrès and more on fabric and paper. SolarFast is also great for painting, tie-dyeing, screen printing, stamping, and batik! Available in 14 intermixable colors!

dead tree downing

consulting  before topping the pear/shade tree.  Jim was the only one of 'em wearing a hard hat......














there's a rogue branch cut off and then just hangin'

 after a lot of shaking of the branches by the man in the tree, the branch finally came loose and crashed into the rhodie after grazing the fucshia  basket.  this was the only near-disaster, as far as i know.

that chipper devoured all the debris and branches in no time!

this dead tree was the major target of the day.  the tree guy is up there sawing branches off.

and then he felled it right beside the pieces of the upper half of the tree he'd already cut.  lots of firewood which will make our neighbor happy and keep him warm thru the winter.

very big very dead fir tree

tomorrow the "tree man" is coming to take down this very dead, very dry tree.  and none too soon, say i.  today there were thunder and lightening storms nearby, which i had great fear would come this way.  i think we are ok,  tho, til tomorrow.  this one was planted about 33 years ago and gave wonderful shade til  a couple of years ago.  no idea why it died.  if i manage to get up early enough i'll have photos of man in tree tomorrow a.m.

although i haven't seen any sign of it tonight, that bat is still in the house somewhere.  eeeeeek....

weekend stuff

and here's the blue-footed booby...  i think he's about the cutest thing i've seen in a long time!  wish i could see one in person.  you can read all about him here

my garden did just fine while i was gone.  went to seattle on monday for my sister's wedding, which was awesome almost beyond words!  after the wedding at the court house, then dinner, went home with Chris, Kate and kids.  enjoyed that time, then took amtrak back home wed. afternoon.

oh, yeah... the garden.  there are definite signs that there will be an eggplant crop, which pleases me... a lot!  there are 3 plants and they all have small fruit and lots of blossoms.

tomatoes are doing well and already had several small ones, with one of 'em big enough for making a BLT, my favorite summer treat.

and fuchsias are blooming nicely.  i love this one the best.

love the gerbera daisies, too.  i keep them in big pots so they can winter over in my studio.  also, so the damn gophers won't eat them.

i'm really really afraid of Johnny Depp!  you'd think that at my age i'd be past this kind of stuff... but i may be old, but i ain't dead yet.




and now i really must be brave and go get ready for bed.  there is a bat in the house.  it was flying around my room and when it went out, i closed the door.  now i'll need to make a dash for the bathroom and back hoping i won't get swooped at by a bat.   eeeeek

quilt... finished!!

here it is!  and "finished" trumps "perfect".  and i love it again, even after all the not loving it as i tried to fix the stupid.  biggest lesson i got from this project is i better damn well know what's the next step and how i'll get there before i start cutting!

this was a quilt-as-you-go project and i loved doing the cutting and piecing of the front and love how it turned out!  love the fabrics and the colors and that wonderful ombre fabric!!  and now to figure out which of the ideas running around in my head will be the next project.  am thinking it will be a wall hanging.

coming up.... sunday will be a gathering here of twisted sisters and friends to spin, knit, talk, laugh, graze at the bountiful table of pot-luck (which always far exceeds what we can consume) and, of course, fondle fibers.

monday i'm headed north on amtrak to go to sister Dinah's wedding to her long-time partner, in seattle. will go with brother Curbhead, sister Robin and her "close friend" Chuck.  following wedding will be celebratory dinner, then i'll go home with Chris, Kate and kids for a few days.  Jim and Tasha will keep each other company and i hope my garden will get watered while i'm gone as i want to have some big ripe tomatoes ready for BLT when i get home!  tis the season.

onward

hoping that tomorrow is the end of the "never-ending quilt", after adopting the mantra of "not perfect... but FINISHED, completed, done and over with".  it's been really hard to stick with this project and not just dump it in the UFO pile.  i really love the front of it, but there have been so many detours due to not planning out the next steps before i just dove in and cut/stitched/ added/subtracted.  i've become afraid of cutting or stitching without re-re-recalculating, measuring, thinkin' about it.  but tomorrow i will stitch on the SECOND back, which means requilting it.  even basted the damn thing on, even tho i never baste anything.  photos tomorrow....

have harvested the first big, ripe juicy tomato from my garden, which means that i've had my first BLT of the season... ah, bliss!  and there are several more tomatoes getting really close to pickable.  no doubt why this is my favorite season of the year.

made the first zucchini fritters of the season using the Cretan recipe from our cooking class with Koula in Vamos.  love those things even tho it is so labor intensive.  thinking i'll fry some up for the twisted sister spin-in on sunday.

quilt photos tomorrow..... then on to the next project.  there are so many running around in my head, must bring them into reality.

Tasha&Meika

Tasha&Meika, a photo by twistin on Flickr.

Meika - beloved Siberian Husky.

feeling the need to guard food when other dogs are here.

today was a very sad day here at dome central..
Meika was 4 days short of her 13th birthday, which is a quite long life for a husky, but it's never long enough.

so tonight is Meika's.

 she loved her "bear" and often gave it a bath before resting her chin on it.

forming a heart with Tasha.  Meika was always the "alpha", tho Tasha did often challenge that status.

she was very ashamed after she stole 1/3 of Jim's birthday carrot cake off the table while we were in the tv room.  she ate most of it before we discovered what that noise was.

one of her favorite sleep/rest positions... on her back close up to the wall.

with their xmas scarves.  they don't really look overjoyed to be wearing them.... and having to pose.

this is a fairly recent photo.  such a beautiful dog in all ways and she will be mightily missed.  i can't seem to stop crying.

and p.s. i don't want to hear any shit about a rainbow bridge.

limoncello

i declared the aging process to be finished and bottled up the limoncello.... after a taste test, of course!  it is delicious.  i got 2 bottles this size ... and i just realized that there is nothing else in this photo for size comparison, so i'm guessing it's about 1/2 of a fifth of liquor, or about 350 ml.

i'm thinking the next batch will be with orange rind rather than lemon. i've heard that it's also delicious!

as i posted earlier, you can find recipes for this by googling or binging
on the interwebs.

messy? naw!

this just says it all!

Sisters' Quilt Show and Sunriver

on thursday, Linda and i went over to Sunriver, OR and stayed in one of our VI time share condos, which was wonderful!  since 2 bikes come with the unit, we decided to do some riding on the paved trails.  that came to a quick end for me because i was just too wobbly to be comfortable out where there were other bikes and people walking.  i'd have been a hazard to other living beings!  so we spent time sitting on the balcony reading, snacking (lots!), spinning, knitting and just generally relaxing and enjoying the beautiful days.

on Sat. we went to Sisters for the annual outdoor quilt show which is such a big deal that they shut down the main street (which is also a major highway) and several other streets and have quilts displayed all over the place... outside and inside, and a wonderful and inspiring day it is!  we planned to get there when the show opened at 9a.m., as did hundreds of other people it seems.  about 2 miles outside of Sisters the traffic came to a standstill, then became a scene of creeping along til we finally got there and tried to find a place to park... HA... that took some driving around for awhile before we found a place.  we were early enough that we beat the heat and the heaviest of the crowds and had a thoroughly wonderful time wandering about and admiring the quilts.  these first few photos were from a display based on the book,  The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick (i ordered the book today!!) and it  was all fascinating!  these are all done with stitching/thread, tho there were some gears and clock and watch parts attached to the surface of the pieces.  it looks like a really interesting book... check it out on amazon to see what it's about.

ETA - i ordered the book, received it and it is wonderful!  will now order it for my grandboy!

lots of inspiration in the teacher's tent.  this one was fascinating for me!!

i was especially drawn to the quilts that featured applique and were whimsical.

and then there were the chicken quilts!  i'm in the early process of planning a chicken quilt, inspired by our plan to add a few chickens to my queendom.  these seem to have been inspired by Gwen Marston's "liberated quilting".

a very enjoyable weekend it was!

making Limoncello

i had my first taste of limoncello while in Crete.. and it was love at first sip!  Jim felt the same and was ready to buy a bunch of it.  however, the people we were with told us how very easy it is to make at home, so i set out to make a batch soon after we got home!

i looked on the internet and found many many recipes, each with a variation on the theme.  so here's what i did:  bought 4 organic lemons and scrubbed them well, used a vegetable peeler to take off just the very outside of the skin... none of the white part.  put the peels into a big glass jar and poured in about 1 1/2 cups of raki and 3 cups of 100 proof vodka, shook it up a bit, capped it tightly and set it in the dark in the pantry to age and flavor the alcohol.  after 3 weeks... today i boiled 2 cups H2O and 1 1/2 cups sugar, cooled that to room temp, then poured it into the lemon/alcohol, stirred, tasted and decided it needs a couple more weeks of aging.  wasn't quite lemony enough for my taste... otherwise, wow and yummy!!  the recipes i looked at all said to remove the lemon peels when you decide that it's ready, put into bottles and put in the freezer until you are ready for a treat.  if you want to make this concoction, i suggest that you google it, look at the various recipes and decide which looks the best for you.


the dogs looked so cute tonight lying in the kitchen waiting for a treat... so here they are!  Tasha was kind of grabbing a little nap while Meika kept a hopeful eye on what i was doing.  Meika will be 13 years old this month... that's about 2 years past the usual life expectancy of Siberian Huskies, and it's really obvious that she is almost out of time.  a couple of weeks ago she had stopped eating and spent a lot of time trying to get herself up from the floor after her hind legs slipped out from under her and she did a belly flop on the floor.  it's heartbreaking to watch that kind of thing.  so, i cooked up some hamburger for her and got some canned dog food from trader joe's (she was refusing the ordinary thriftway brand), she started eating, we made an appt. with the vet and came home with prednisone, which is a miracle drug in my opinion!!  after just 2 doses, she regained muscle control, continued eating if it was the special stuff, and was able to make it thru about half the normal distance of the morning walk with Jim and Tasha.  don't know how long the prednisone will continue helping, but Steve the vet said he'd make a home visit when it's time.  damn, that will be a hard decision, but i think she will let us know when that time comes.

saga of the bird nest i found

when we returned home after 6 weeks away, the first outstanding change we saw was the amount of
growth of weeds, bushes,  flowers in glorious bloom (the flowers were the good part!)  So, i started the clean-up/clear out of the area around the trellis next to the house so i could get the hanging baskets up.  big surprise.... there was a bird nest on a cross piece of the trellis about 3 feet above the ground... and a gorgeous work of art this nest was.  covered in moss with a smooth dirt and weed interior... and 4 eggs.  so, i stopped with the clean up and did no more pruning around there.  later, i found a place i could see the nest from a distance so i wouldn't disturb the mama.  and did she ever give me the beady stink eye but i used telephoto lens to get her photo.

when i could see she wasn't on the nest, i'd sneak a peek at what was going on.  i looked on the interwebs for info on what type of bird this is and think it might be a house sparrow.  if anyone has any other knowledge or guesses, please let me know.

looks like 2 babies hatched - scrawny looking, big bulge where there will be eyes

after a few days there was a downy pre-feather covering.  and still just 2 hatchlings

after another few days they had feathers, eyes and beaks and were waiting to be fed.

i wish i'd kept track of the days between when they hatched and the
last day when i looked at them for the last time in their nest.
it surely does not look big enough to make it on its own, but there it
was standing on the edge of the nest and now
they have both left the nest.  there is one egg left in the
nest... maybe the 4th one got pushed out or ?