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 White rabbits!

I watered all the plants early this morning after one of those two-sleep nights. 

It's where you wake at 3am, ready to get up, have a snack, make coffee, read, listen to an audiobook, then go back to bed. 

Then get up again a few hours later, for a second breakfast and a shower.  Except for the shower, people used to sleep this way. The idea of staying in bed all night is fairly modern.

I'll probably water the plants again this evening, though the humidity is in the fifties, not drying them out.

Very quiet day of reading about the Tudors, bit of weaving 

I'm liking how this is working. Definitely getting a bit of experience in managing warp threads and keeping them uncrossed. 

The shuttle is a pleasure to work with, too, much better than the usual blunt ones I've had. And this weaving doesn't bother my hands at all, unlike knitting. 

I did a bit of painting but found, shock, horror, I have no pilot pens. I use them for writing as well as drawing and I think they're all used up. So I ordered a supply. It took a couple of tries to find a source that didn't charge more for shipping than for the item.

All the daylilies are in bloom everywhere just now so I have to mark that.  This is watercolor crayons and graphite pencil.

Happy day everyone, off to make a roast chicken sandwich with a green salad for supper. Tomorrow Misfits arrives with fruit and other things I'm out of now. I have great sympathy for the drivers this week, brutal heat.

Billie the Pup wonders if these are the dog days. To her every day is a dog day.

 

First bouquet, the gardener revealed, and nostalgia

This morning I went out to mosey about the deck before it got warm, not very hot today but very humid, and picked the first little bouquet of the year.

Daisies and sage, in an antique Trenton Potteries pot, probably 1890s, and the faithful white Herendt porcelain hound.

Newer readers: every year I make little bouquets from what's growing at my house, in a very small area. It's surprising how many flowers there are. 

Soon there will be zinnias which I plant as seeds for my cutting garden, posh term for three containers. I also have various wildflowers coming up in containers. 

And I got out walking not wishing to miss a day before the heat comes back. It's important for my spirits to walk on grass under the trees, and my spirits have been flagging lately, one thing and another.

We'd had a lot of rain so I had to stay on the sidewalk. That worked out fine because I finally met the gardener who created a lovely small area down the street, all kinds of flowers and ideas. 

Cinder blocks lining the walkway with flowers growing up from them, all kinds of interesting containers, great thought put into a tiny area.

She was sitting on the path weeding when I passed, nice very old Japanese lady, maybe with not much English because her side of the chat was smiling and nodding and making modest little hand gestures at my compliments.  But that explains the meticulous care of the area year round. She knows what she's doing and does it.

Another person that's true of is Marion, multi talented YouTuber from my home territory. 

Today she was at a flea market, with great old items, and she chatted with a number of stall holders. Oh, the lovely northeastern voices! It was heavenly to be among them for a while.

Go there if you want to hear the sound of home to me. In this blog, there's Suzanne who's heard me many times, probably too many, on Spoutible pods, so she can tell us if these are my people!

Marion is wildly talented, from stitching and embroidery to gardening and diy, I don't think there's anything she can't do, and she's so good humored with it.

Reading is still in Tudor times, and now Jane's husband and Anne Boleyn are gone, but Cromwell has brought Jane Boleyn back to court as his spy now Jane Seymour is Queen. The plot keeps on thickening. Tudor history has so few names, trying to keep the Janes and Annes and Marys and Thomases and Williams straight.

Happy day everyone, tired day today, but I did get the chicken roasted and the potatoes parboiled ready for quick food, also custard. 

And I'm getting ready to make a belt with these colors 

It's going to be another clasped weft with orange and purple main weft colors and yellow for the warp threads. 

And I'll weave in a slit at one end,  tapestry style, to slip the other end through, to fasten it.  Fancy stuff. If I set this up tomorrow I'll have it ready for being occupied indoors later in the week. Be prepared!  

Happy day everyone, don't be like Gary who cut a bunch of weeds then came running over this morning, to show me, in a panic in case it was poison ivy to which he's very sensitive, and we have a lot of it. Once again I identified it as Virginia creeper, it's usually Virginia creeper, so he went away calmer. 

Planting the back forty, weaving done and other diversions

 I was up and out early this morning, tottering I mean pottering, about the patio, watering, listening to birds, admiring the scenery, lugging about potting soil and planting potatoes.

I did add more soil but forgot to take a picture 

For the nth time I blessed the day we bought this place. It continues to be a good place to live.  It's small enough to be manageable, and big enough to have different surroundings in different rooms.

Speaking of views, Mary will like this. When I changed the bed yesterday I decided it was time to retire the warm quilt for the season. 

So I tossed it over the child's rocking chair where Bear with Custom Boots and Pink Rabbit sit. Then I thought it would hurt their feelings to be all buried, so I set them on top, and they both gave me that well I should think so look.

Then I finished the weaving, cut it off the loom and made a thing. See how the design works on both sides. The fringes run down the stitched side of the thing.

Now I have a hardshell spectacle case to spare, and any suggestions on what to keep in it are welcome.  I'm now studying my next project. And, for my next trick..

Next door a new influx of Gary's family and friends is loading another UHaul. It's a blistering hot day and I saw an older relative wisely get into the shade inside the van and find a chair while the younger generation flung furniture hand to hand.

Despite the weather I fancied a hot lunch, red onions, yellow potatoes and rainbow chard, fried with salt and smoked paprika.

Yogurt and cane sugar for dessert. Pot of tea, little dish of raisins and chocolate chips. 

Then I spent a while with peaceful podcasts on Spotify, about textiles and poetry and pollinators and dogs. Here's a few I like, a wonderful contrast to the State of the World. The poetry on today's podcast is demanding and difficult to hear, but it's not a manufactured anxiety. It's a coming to grips with reality.

Aside from all this I wrote to HUD protesting a new proposed regulation barring trans and LGBTQIA people from homeless shelters and domestic violence shelters. 

Comments open till late June. Please do likewise. These populations need more not less, protection. You can see the reg you're protesting in the receipt below.

Happy day everyone! Do all the things you feel like doing, and maybe a few you don't.