In nets of golden wyres

As I worked on the doll hair yesterday I got an earworm phrase. This is often how art titles come, and whole art concepts with them.

The phrase was "in nets of golden wyres", a canzonet duet by Elizabethan composer, musician, Thomas Morley, a great favorite when I played recorder. There's a series of these canzonets, which just means little songs. Likewise Michael East trios, another favorite song series to play..

As you notice, I haven't named the dolls as if they were people. That's because I mean them as art statements, in a series. But I was still waiting for them to tell me their statements, and to get the idea of the series.

And here they are, after I rummaged through my sheet music

You see the idea of the current doll there, the golden wires meaning her curly hair, which the narrator fell for, it's a love song.

And White as Lillies is the East phrase for the first doll. This doesn't mean I'll search for titles then make a doll that fits, but rather I'll make the doll then the phrase will come. Leap and the net will appear. My lifelong approach, hasn't failed me yet. 

If this thinking is all Greek to you, don't worry, just let it flow over you! I wonder what a Greek would say? If this is all English to you etc?

Meanwhile, back in the workshop, here's the narrative

Cotton roving, which I hope to learn to spin with my supported spindle, now waiting in the wings. It's soft as swansdown, lovely to handle, and I have plenty, so I can use it here to stuff Wyres.

Meanwhile, she has a body, downtime before I make limbs for her, and food is happening. 

Misfits box arrives later today, and I'm using the last of the sweet potatoes. 

Note the recycled bag marked stock. And the little heap of trimmings. I'm going to make vegetable stock from the trimmings from now on for a while. 

The trimmings I've been chucking out back have turned into fertile soil already, hence the sudden appearance of the squash plant, or melon, whichever, and the enormous growth of what was a tiny blackberry plant from out front.

So I will also do this:

Save up trimmings in the freezer, create stock eventually, toss the strained residue out back. Thank you, Leigh, blogger of 5 Acres & a Dream, for reminding me of this possibility.  Still nothing wasted. 

Go read her blog, it's lovely. You don't have to be a smallholder with crops and animals, living self sufficiently, eating what you grow, to enjoy her narrating the life of a couple who do all that.

And today's lunch is roasted sweet potatoes, in olive oil, Old Bay, currently my go-to, seasalt, and a chicken thigh, buttered and rolled in panko. 

I didn't pound this one thin, just left it rolled.

Next,  to empty the sink ready to wash fruit and veggies when the box arrives, and sort out strainers and colanders and cloths for inevitable water splashes.

It's all go!

Sage, honeydew, eating the colors

The sage is blossoming, with flowers like those of antirrhinum, snapdragon. I don't know the botanical name of this flower shape. This plant seems to blossom every other year.

Have you noticed how many herbs and wildflowers are in the blue to purple range? I wonder if it's a default color.

Years ago I read that a good guide to a varied healthy normal food intake is to eat all the colors.  That way you'll eat fruit and veggies, since meats and potatoes are less colorful but can be included. 

I don't like insistence on one way to eat. If it suits you, lovely, just don't be trying to get everyone on your wavelength. This has been a public service announcement.

Don't be like the (then) friend who, about to carve into a ham to cut the small piece I'd chosen on request, waved the ham knife in my face and demanded: dietary or  principle? I felt a little intimidated, as you do with a knife in your face. 

So I try not to put anyone else on the spot. I don't like red meat, but I try not to act as if that's the Chosen Way, nor to get into a discussion of cattle farming practices. I have been getting a bit of pressure on other websites in case you wonder what brought this on. Sometimes friends get a bit carried away.

It occurs to me then that my fun food capers might be read as a message. Noooooo. No food police around here! Anyway I've been meaning to say this for a while, in case anyone wondered. I just invite you to watch the fun.  And I do like seeing a lot of colors on my plate.

I expect there are readers who think what a lot of bother she goes to, before they order takeout. Or well, she never grills a nice piece of meat, she's missing out, poor lady, but I plan on steak tonight. Good! Chacune (most of us are women) a (insert grave accent) son gout (insert circumflex). That saying might have been more trouble than it's worth.

Anyway, there's joy in Butternut Boy's heart, since I tossed out honeydew seeds and rind. And some sweet potato trimmings.

Enough on one sweet potato for two meals

Roast sweet potatoes and a baked egg. A version of egg and chips really. Bunch of fresh thyme. 

The green of the honeydew melon is heart lifting. So beautiful. No need to season.

The rest of the sweet potato will be mashed a bit and included in a mushroom and sweet potato pasty today. Thyme chopped in.

It's as hot as the clappers today, 90s f. Too hot for me to go out. I don't do well with sudden heat. There's a certain irony in my finishing my warm Mitered Squares jacket today, sheltering in a cool house.