Short Story Long

Lots of pictures!

osteospermum, African daisy Hopefully this guy's harmless. volunteer sunflower daylily If you check back to my earlier post, In the Garden , you can see how much things have grown.  It's been a great year, lots of rain, lots of sun.  Although several of my neighbors have corn taller than I am.  How is that?  You can't see my corn in this picture but it is behind the chicken wire to the left.  I could live without the 100° days.  We've eaten outside a few times, including last Sunday evening.  We celebrated two birthdays, and Sisterpants and Mr. Sisterpants are moving out of state.  Here we are, shifting the table a few feet so no one is sitting in the sun.  I thought this was funny so of course I took a picture instead of helping.  We had waffles, eggs and bacon, fruit and hashbrowns.  Yum! 

I have a new pattern out!  The Lace and Vine Sock pattern I designed for Bijou Basin Ranch is now available for purchase on their website .  Here's a better view of the vine: Awhile back, I took some pictures for Marly of a piece she'd designed for a magazine.  Designers don't always get their original pieces back, so she wanted some pictures of it before she sent it off.  My sister-in-law modeled it, I snapped a few pictures, and off it went.  As it turned the magazine editors like the pictures I had taken, and asked if they could reprint them!  So in Inside Crochet #8, on newstands now, you can see Natalie wearing the Beaded Belt, which can also be worn as a scarf or on your head like so:  And finally, a few weeks ago I showed you a peek of this sweater that I'd been working on when my dad had a heart attack.  Marly designed this sweater, also for Bijou Basin Ranch, and sent me charts for all the pieces,...

Have you gotten that email about the shapes of food looking like the organs they are supposed to benefit?  For example, the tomato with its chambers is good for the heart, and the cauliflower is good for your brain.  I find it interesting that this plant, agastache, attracts hummingbirds - although we don't have any in our neighborhood.  And this plant, whose name escapes me at the moment, lantana ...notice how the buds look like tiny butterflies.  It reinforces my belief that there's order in the universe.   

Many years ago, we used to do things like go into odd shops downtown (costume shops, old maps, handmade cards, etc.)  Now we mostly go into places like Target or Old Navy, which I like, but they are just lacking the individual artistry that you find at boutiques.  One of the things I enjoy so much about knitting is the expression of one's own vision.  This is true with all art forms, including quilting and sewing, but there's just something about wearing what you made.  We visited the Colorado Renaissance Festival today, which we have not been to since we had kids, and we saw lots of interesting people, including the Burger King and the Mad Hatter (note his belt of threads.)  However, the people that really fascinated BFJ and I were the " steamers ."  There were several groups, most of which we didn't get pictures of.  The tailoring on their costumes were, for the most part, meticulous, and I wish that I knew how to sew clothing...

Monarda 'Jacob Cline' Thanks for all the comments saying I'd be missed, that meant a lot.  Funny, though, it's only been a few days and I sometimes go longer than that between posts anyway.  If you want the long version - and let's face it, that's why you read my blog, right? - I had this program I'd downloaded a long time ago, can't remember why, and it never did anything.  Of course, at the time, I had my antivirus vaccines all up to date, but recently I was cleaning my computer out (so I thought) and deleted that file.  At this point, my antivirus ware was no longer current.  Little did I realize this program was just dormant, waiting for the day I would delete it to completely eat my computer!  Before it really got going, I pulled the plug, literally.  I am very fortunate to have a friend who actually said he would fix the whole thing  in trade for dinner.  He took it for a few days and here I am, better than new.  He upg...

I'd like to know what idiot thought it would be great fun to create viruses and send them out into the world to affect people they'll never meet and will not benefit from hurting.  Sick people.  Since I haven't recently paid someone to protect my computer, I can't currently use it, do to aforementioned viruses.  It might be a couple of weeks before I can post again.  In the meantime, happy Independence Day to all my US readers!