|
|  Yesterday included errands, lunch with a friend, progress on #1 son's quilt, and also the planting of our little back vegetable garden.
My husband and I went to the local nursery, since it's clearly too late for seeds. I had thought I'd buy the plants at the farmers market, but carrying all those plants around in a strong bag seemed impractical.
So we went to the nursery. My husband had decided that we would have exactly twelve denizens in our little garden this year, so we went to the vegetable section and picked out a dozen stalwart specimens. I wanted to get things like Bengal Orange trees and tuberose, but we were firm and brought home tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, and peppers and that is all. The plants were then planted correctly in three tidy rows of four.
Our front flower garden is also tidy this year. My husband pulled out all the perennials that #2 son and I planted some years ago, along with the poison ivy that had infiltrated, last year. This year, he planted torenia and nosy neighbor in neat geometrical rows.
This is the kind of garden he likes.
I like wild jungly gardens, but I've had no garden at all for the past couple of years, so I'm content.
We have containers on the patio that are a bit wilder, though each one contains just one plant. My husband put all the herbs into containers, one herb per pot.
I'm sure it will be quite nice, probably all summer, even at the end when my gardens usually get so jungly that they hardly qualify as gardens any more.
I'm not teaching this summer. If I get all my grading done today, I can begin next week with a sense of calm. I already have a week's worth of work lined up, including some interesting projects. I also plan to finish that quilt binding, and to go to the movies after church with #1 daughter. All this hinges on my completing the work for my Aussies before church, so I'll go do that now. Happy Mothers Day!
| | |
|  I fired the celebrity client, who appears to be a bit unstable, and the government client is trying to figure out how to have their website be the go-to place for journalists, but invisible to the opposition party. I'm reading Christopher Buckley's latest and, while I always really enjoy his novels, I'm finding this one more enjoyable still for having had slight brushes with the kinds of things he writes about.
Slight is plenty.
Actually, I really like the government client, and will be sorry to see them go if they decide that the site we built for them is just too dangerous. However, they have paid for their website and it was a pleasure to build, so they're a success regardless of their future decisions.We have an e-commerce website with tech troubles and we're building a new site for a local business we've loved for years, plus I have another website to work on that sounds like a science fiction movie, or maybe a comic strip. It isn't really -- it's a website for an industrial engineer -- but the products and companies all have comic strip type names.
May I just say that its' more entertaining to do a normal job that sounds exciting than to do a job that sounds normal and turns out to be -- ahem -- exciting? You can tell that I would love to tell the story here, but I am resisting the temptation. 
Meanwhile, I have a whole bunch of papers to grade and the final grades to calculate, and then I have to drive the grades up to the Next County. I've whined about this enough in the past. Today I must also get some work done on my volunteer project, as I am lunching with the chairwoman. There should also be housework, errands, working in the garden, and finishing up of the quilt for #1 son.
Said quilt mostly just needs its binding completed. There are more areas that could be quilted, but I am about six weeks late on this birthday present already, so I think it will just get bound and be finished.
I have a bunch of other sewing projects I want to get to, as well. I'm not teaching this term, and I did buy some work clothing, so I'm not worrying about my wardrobe, but I have fabric and patterns that want to get together and become things. There is also unfinished knitting. And several more quilts waiting to be quilted.
My boys are through with school by now, and "in summer mode," as #1 son puts it. By this he means that he has nothing to do. I remember that feeling of having summer stretching out before you, with some little job or something but otherwise nothing you had to do. It's a feeling of complete freedom. On the other hand, I also remember reading once that the best feeling isn't having nothing to do; it's having lots to do and doing nothing.
I may go with that today, for at least part of the day.
| | |
|  A miniature yellow rose here, but I also have roses blooming in the garden-- way early.
Faust was the winner this year. Gorgeous blooms, but essentially the same as the ones I've shown you in previous years.
The picture below is #1 daughter's new puppy. He won't hold still for pictures.
It's been a remarkable week in many ways: strange experiences. I have a celebrity client who shouted at me over the phone for half an hour, a government client who wants to talk about Workmens Compensation (in case of... carpal tunnel syndrome, maybe?), a couple of sites that should have been safely launched by now and aren't, and way more work to do than I actually have time for.
We finished our season with the Master Chorale, though. Nice concert, and then La Bell and her husband took me to dinner at this place.  Thew website's kind of fun to play with.
The puppy is fun to play with, for our big dogs. Toby pushes him around with his nose, like a ball. It isn't yet clear whether the puppy enjoys this or not, so we're limiting the experience, but I think they'll be friends.
Between work and the concert, I haven't managed to do things like housework, grocery shopping, or laundry this weekend. I assume I'll get around to those things after church today, so that I can start the week with some degree of civilization.
I'd also like to do things like reading, quilting, taking a nap, baking... those are less likely.
| | |
|  There are seven more squares to quilt on the T-shirt quilt for #1 son, and then I'll put on the binding.
He's out of town for the weekend at a trade show. His student job i in retail, for an outdoor goods store, and they're having an Expo at Horseshoe Canyon Ranch. I envy him his jaunt a little bit.
I hope to have his quilt ready when he gets back.
Yesterday, in addition to some quilting, I went with #1 daughter to buy plants and things for her balcony. I attach a picture of said balcony here.
We went to Tuesday Morning, one of those shops where they have stuff left over from other stores, where #1 daughter found a bunch of hanging baskets in wrought iron holders and I found these iron holders for long planters, of which I have several that my friend CD gave to me when she moved. Next year perhaps I'll find planters of just the right size, but for the moment I'm quite happy with these.  This is my porch, which is screened from public view by a couple of big crepe myrtles, and I love to read in the rocking chair in the corner. Flowers will make it absolutely perfect.
#1 daughter was looking for a particular type of planter which she didn't find, so we went on to Home Depot, where we found much higher prices but not much selection, and plants that looked a bit stressed.
So we went on to our local nursery, where we bought not quite enough nice shade plants: double impatiens, fuschia, columbine, torenia, and some charmingly striped heliotrope for #1 daughter, who thinks she might get more sun than I do on my porch.
Not quite enough, as I say, and I think we will have to go back and buy some more pretty soon here, but we have enough to enjoy them, if not to complete all our plans.
 My husband pulled out pretty much all my perennials in the course of eradicating the poison ivy which had gotten a hold in the front garden, so my front garden is as sparse as my window boxes, but I hope it will get lush pretty soon here.
Or at least slightly more lush.
I think #1 daughter and I need to seek out a modestly priced source of ferns for our shady nooks.
The back garden is completely wild, I'm afraid. I have roses blooming and I bought a few herbs, but the garden soil has not yet been prepared. Perhaps when #1 son comes over for his quilt he'll help me dig the garden. It's getting late to plant, but since we usually plant mostly seeds we can put in plants instead and be on time. It's a bit more expensive that way, but worth it to have plenty of herbs and tomatoes and peppers right outside the kitchen. 
I also went to Joann's to buy quilt binding, and while there I saw and succumbed to a length of polyester charmeuse. As a rule, I don't buy polyester, but this is so perfect for the suit I'm making...
I need to back up a bit. Last fall I planned a SWAP in coffee brown and teal, which were major trendy colors at the time. I sewed up about half that SWAP before I headed off to Rome. One of the items I began was a suit in this gorgeous light weight Italian wool. I have a photo of the two fabrics in natural light below so you can get a better idea of the colors.
In any case, I got the major pieces of the jacket put together, saw that it was a good fit and basically quite nice, and stopped, because I didn't know how to finish it properly without its looking home made rather than hand made.
I have since begun taking the online tailoring course at Craftsy, and I see that I did it all wrong. I don't know whether it's possible to rescue it, but I'm going to try.
Granted, by the time I finish it, it will be fall of 2012, and the colors will no longer be le dernier cri, but I love teal and dark brown is still on the fashion horizon, so I hope to continue with the planned SWAP and get it all finished anyway.
Today is another glorious spring day. I have to finish up work for my Aussies and I have church, of course, and this afternoon I will be going with La Bella and La Tenora to see Cabaret.
I hope also to get those seven more squares (or at least some of them) quilted, and perhaps to do some more housework. There was a little of that going on yesterday, but not nearly as much as I had hoped to accomplish.
I have insane amounts of work to do, but I also have lots of non-work stuff I want to do, after having spent the past few years doing pretty much nothing but work, so I'm trying to be firm about taking most of my weekends off.
| | |
|  I got #1 son's quilt sewn together this weekend. Yes, I know the corners don't match properly, but if they did, he would feel as though someone else had made it, and not his mother.
My husband and I got the quilting frame out of the garage and set up, sandwiched the quilt top, backing, and batting, and put it in the frame.
Then #1 son came back from his adventure at Hueco Tanks. This is a climbing area in Texas, near El Paso, and the link goes to a place that appears to be about climbing there, but its main navigation also includes "Capitalism" and "Tyranny," so use your own judgement.
It snowed one day, so they went to the Carlsbad Caverns. In the evenings they went to El Pasito and hung out, and they did a little sightseeing, but mostly it was serious climbing. Sounded fun, assuming thtat you're 22 and quite fit.
#1 son told me all this over a dinner of chicken curry, rice, strawberries, cucumber, and pineapple upside down cake. Then he biked off and my husband and I bedded out a bunch of torenia (clown flower or wishbone flower, like a short snapdragon) and hypoestes (polka dot plant or nosy neighbor).
All in all, a very pleasant weekend. Usually on spring break I like to travel a bit, but instead I worked for 60 hours this week, so a restful weekend was just the thing.
| | |
|
True
