Yellow Day Lily

#wordlesswednesday

Morning Glory

Morning glories grow like weeds around here. I found this one down the street, crawling up a chain link fence.

The Reds

Two more beauties hidden in my neighbors' gardens.

This one might be a buddleia ... a butterfly bush. Not sure. The leaf and stem don't look like the pictures I found online.

This red glowed from deep in the shadows.

Daisy

#sundayserenity

Daily Dose of Dahlias

My neighbors ... beautiful gardens.

Orange dahlias in profile;



and yellow is in full bloom.

Playing with Texture - Part 2

I think this texture experiment may become a series!

This texture was found on our driveway. What is it?



Why, a male Ponderosa pinecone!

Throwback Thursday - 2005 Part 7

Quilted Ornaments

This week, the Wayback Machine takes us to September 2005. I'd been working on these ornaments bit by bit all year, but finished them in September. I made these ornaments so they could be donated to a stitchery shop. Every year donated ornaments are put on display for a month or two, then auctioned off. The monies generated from the sale go to the American Diabetes Association.

These ornaments are from a printed "cheater top" quilt fabric. I'm not sure who started this set, but they were cut out and the stitching had been started, but left unfinished. The previous owner then donated them to a church yard sale. That's where I got them.

I recognized the fabric as the same a good friend had used to make ornaments to sell at a craft fair. I'd received a couple of hers and liked them. Since they are small, I figured that I could manage to quilt them with my limited beginner's skills.

I did enjoy quilting them. The simple stitch and movement of the needle was very relaxing. But the real fun came in deciding what fabric scraps to back them with, and how to embellish each design with sequins, beads, bits of lace, ribbon, bells, buttons, raffia and other trim.

I wish my photography skill were better back in 2005, because the stitching and embellishments are not very clear in these photos. They were fun to make. I'd consider doing this again.

I've now completed another of my 19 in 2019 goals. I've blogged 25 #throwbackthursday posts!

Playing with Texture - Part 1

I found this one in our front yard.



Lovin' lichen.

A Special Spot

I took a walk by the river this morning. Peaceful.



Another view of my giving tree.

Day Lily

So pretty in red.



Thanks, neighbor!

Annie

Our granddaughter Annalee learned to smile (and roll over!) She practiced smiling at Papa and Mimi via Skype this week.

My heart's in a puddle again.

Rainbow Fruit

I haven't put a jigsaw puzzle together in a while. Today I was feeling un-energetic. So I spent the morning listening to The Oath podcast and putting this puzzle together.

Puzzles and podcasts. An ideal duo.



You can find the podcast here or on your favorite podcast app. (I use Pocket Casts).

The Oath
https://www.msnbc.com/theoath

Lining the Path

On a recent walk through the woods, these caught my eye

#flowersforfriday

Throwback Thursday - 2005 Part 6

Today I'll take the Wayback Machine to look at projects made July and August 2005:

WhimZi Rose

Just Nan came out with a new line of small designs in 2005. This WhimZi Rose was a freebie offered on the designer's website to help kick off the new line.

I decided to stitch it using DMC floss rather than the silk fibers called for in the chart. I finished it as a birthday card for my niece.

Inside, my card reads:

Hope you have a 

Bloomin' 

Great Day!

I designed the card myself, using card stock and specialty papers from my crafting stash.

Freckles
Business Card Holder

After finishing the beading correspondence course earlier in the year, I started sniffing around beading websites to see what I might try creating next.

I found this giraffe amulet pouch pattern on bead-patterns.com. This site has beading lessons, many free patterns, and a plethora of inexpensive downloadable patterns. This was one of the latter. The designer called him "Giraffe," but I call this guy "Freckles." I think my name fits better.

This beaded piece is done in peyote stitch. The original pattern incorporated more colors than my piece -- his spots were red, green, blue and orange. It was all those colors that actually first caught my eye. But I wanted to use up some of the Delica beads I already owned on the background, so only bought beads for the giraffe ... and didn't purchase the correct beads.

My background beads have a lot more sparkle than the giraffe beads. The yellow, brown, orange and black beads have a matte finish. The background beads are lined in silver. But it makes for an interesting effect.





Since I wanted to make this pattern into a business card holder instead of an amulet pouch, I had to alter the pattern a little. I left the width the same as the pattern, but added more red and green beads to lengthen it.

Originally, I thought I would do the back of the piece in one solid color, but it was so much fun to do the pattern on the front, I decided to repeat it on the back.

The one thing I'm not totally sold on is the way the sides are stitched together. I used a neutral grey beading thread (the only color I had on hand). When I sewed the sides together, the grey thread was visible. It's tidy, but not so pretty. I tried a couple different bead techniques to cover the edges, but they didn't look right either, so I decided to keep it simple.

I'm quite pleased with the outcome of this piece. I like the idea that it's cute, it sparkles and it's useful! Eleven  years later, I still carry this beaded beauty in my purse to hold my calling cards. It's held up remarkably well.

Jig of the Ladybug

My niece Cheryl finished her degree in Physical Therapy and took the medical boards/exam so that she can practice. I made this little ladybug card for her to wish her luck on her huge test. 

My niece worked so hard and did a great job in school! Now she's been a practicing physical therapist for over a decade. I'm very proud of her. I made the card to let her know I was rooting for her. I used some overdyed floss and star charms to give the ladybug extra pizzazz and personality.

It appears that after these stitched items were finished, I didn't complete any counted cross-stitch for another three months! Instead, my records show I did some quilting, a large latch-hook rug project, and a crafty ornament. I'll blog about those in my next editions of #throwbackthursday.

Hostas!

The hosta beds in our front yard are in full bloom right now. They give me joy!

click for larger image

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Spreading every year, Jeanne helps me divide them and fill in sparse spots.




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The way the flowers reach up high above the plants cracks me up. There's got to be a scientific reason for it. Perhaps some research is in order.

In the meantime, I plan to simply enjoy to color and form.

More Christmas in July

My Ladies of the Evening series continues today with a beaded bag I call Christmas Lass. This charming bag is just the right size for a little girl. She's 8 inches across at the base; 6-1/2 inches across at the opening; and about 3 inches tall. The front is completely beaded and spangled.



The back is plain satin. Her satin handles are about 8 inches long, giving them 3-1/2 inches to hold onto.



She's all wrapped up like a Christmas gift with a base of red, green, and gold seed beads in a random pattern. Her bow and ribbon are made from 3/8 inch red sequins, outlined in gold seed beads.



The "wrapping" is edged in more of the gold seed beads. But this little lady's seams are uncovered.



She's very clean. Her entire inside is lined with more of the red satin. She closes with a simple center snap.



The only blemish on Christmas Lass is this small slightly sticky spot just above the snap at the edge of the evening bag.

I'm fairly sure this was another thrift store find, but I didn't hold onto the receipt this time. I think she's adorable and look forward to giving Christmas Lass to my granddaughter Melody when she is a little bit older.

The Highest Dream

When I was a junior high student, I read this book about a young woman just out of college, trying to figure out how she wanted to live her life. She started her career as a guide at the United Nations. I also remember a love story was part of the plot.

There was something about this book ...

The images in my mind that this book created left an impression long after I read the book, forgot the author, forgot the title, and grew up. I wracked my brain for this title off and on for years. I asked my favorite children's librarian from my days as a kid if she recognized the story. No. I asked my daughter the young adult librarian. No such luck. But last year I asked my friend Google a series of questions that finally narrowed my search -- and found the answer.

The book is The Highest Dream by Phyllis A. Whitney. It's copyrighted 1956 - the year before I was born. I read it about 12 years later.

This is the cover of the copy I had as a kid. I found a large print version online for a few bucks, and bought it. I finished reading it last weekend. Though all the elements I remembered about the book were there, and I'd remembered them accurately, I saw some new things this time.

The main difference I have now that I didn't have as a pre-teen was a sense of history. To me, the United Nations has "always" been around. But when the book was written, the notion that nations of all sizes would send delegates to come together, to listen to one another's needs, to help one another to grow their economies and to provide health care through food and vaccines was novel. The U.N. was formed in October 1945. That's just 11 years before The Highest Dream was published.

This passage in particular struck me as prescient / ironic / sad / hopeful:

Norman, a young man who works in broadcasting at the United Nations, is speaking to Mr. Somers, an iconic newsman, about the young man's father:

"I'm afraid Dad belongs to a school of thought that is, thank goodness, dying out. He feels that the United States is only safe behind its own walls and there is too great a risk in getting into the world's affairs."

Mr. Somers nodded. "It's surprising that there are still those who forget that no walls are high enough today. To live with honor means to take a risk. Yet in our eagerness to get away from this sort of thinking, the United States has sometimes rushed in with too much forceful enthusiasm and tried to change things too rapidly in other countries. I believe the United Nations does a wise job of starting where people are."

"Sometimes though," Norman said, "the progress is so slow that it all seems hopeless."

"That's when we look ahead to all we want to accomplish. But when we look back --" Mr. Somer's eye lighted - "we know how far we've come."

This passage could as easily be written today as in 1956. The U.S. is still talking of building walls and pushing against people that want to join our nation. There are those that still want to take care of just the legal citizens and let the others be damned. In 1956, Phyllis Whitney thought that approach was dying out. I find it sad and frightening to watch its recurrence.

In the early years, the concept that nations can work together to lift one another up was under attack. A world war had just ended. Many nations were licking their wounds and thought they should simply take care of their own within their own borders. Some people rooted for the United Nations to fail, just as the League of Nations had failed at the beginning of the 20th century.

Personally, I'm glad that over seventy years later, the concept of the United Nations is holding. Yes, there has been corruption in the ranks over the years. But the world is smaller now due to travel and technology. If walls couldn't hold then in 1956, they're even less likely to hold now.

The greater U.N. goals of listening to one another and counties-helping-countries has remained. Thank goodness there are times when the U.N. helps the U.S. cool its jets when our power goes to our head.

I suppose I have much of the same optimism as the heroine of the story, Lisa Somers. She sees that there's a lot of work to do to make our world a more fair, just, and peaceful place for all. There's a lot of good that can be done. I can do my little part, while keeping the bigger picture in my mind's eye.

Bucket List - part 3

Here are the last of the photos from my cruise on the Columbia River. What a beautiful day. Besides the daredevils windsurfing and sailboarding and kite-surfing, we saw

Sailing



Kayaking



Racing



Underside of The Bridge of the Gods

Simply heavenly!

Bucket List - part 2

This weekend I'll share a few more photos from my cruise on the Columbia River. They're all photos taken with my cell phone, so the quality may not be the best. But the memories they provoke in me surely are exceptional.

Leaving port



Take the wheel

Nesting osprey: there were two adults and two hatchlings!

All astern