Waiting for fall

I’m sorry, I’m just not a fan of extreme heat.  I’d rather put a coat on.

Because this, my friends, is too much summer.

The garden has gone jungle.  I have made the decision to forego all canning, freezing, etc.

I’m just going to make more gazpacho, since I gave a lot away.

When I wake up to cool breezes through the window, meaning August is over, it’s a great relief. 

I love autumn, every single day of it, right to the first snow. 

I only wish it lasted longer.

This is Sydney, trying to be part of my porch table centerpiece.  Though I think she may have cooled on her love of the screen porch, after getting locked out and spending a whole night out there.

When I woke up and couldn’t find her, I knew right away what had happened.  When I opened the kitchen door, she shot in like a bullet.

Then she clung to me all morning.

So yeah, I think she’s over the porch.

6:30am finds me drinking my coffee in my corner of the sofa.  Naya has been out and fed, now she’s lying at my feet.

Cats have been fed. Chickens fed, watered, let out into their big yard.

And I have no commitment to be anywhere or do anything today.

Ahhhhhh. 

Surely a sign of getting older, when  that one thought brings joy,

Every now and again, I start a knitting project, and get interrupted part way through.

This one was started last August, 2017, and I just found it. Had to learn the stitch all over again, but I finished the one sock, and I’m half way through the second one..

It’s called cherry swirl, the pattern is free on Ravelry.

I’m hot to finish them, so I can start something I’ve been wanting to make for awhile.

The pattern was only available as a kit, it was pricey, but I finally treated myself to it.

I have been weaving with wool silk, a first for me.

Imagine my horror, when I realized the shrinkage rate was 27%. Yes, you read that right.

Sent me right back to the drawing board.  Calculating.

I found something new that I really like, so sharing it here.

You can google it, go to their web site, and they’ll tell you how they make it.

I just know that it makes a fantastic shake, only one WW point.  I use almond milk, frozen bananas, and sometimes a handful of spinach.  Turns out green, but still tastes like PB, one of my favorite things.

I came across this old photo, grandson #1 on the right, and grandson #2 on the left.

Is it just as you get older, that you are blindsided by how fast time has flown?

Here is grandson #1 a few days ago, going to be 21 in a few weeks.

Ah, life. So amazing, so humbling, so very precious.

You live it one day at a time, but then, when you look back, it seems like it went by in huge pieces.

Truth

Naya has probably been a crucial part of my weight loss.   Every morning, she performs a little ritual.

In short, it means, let’s go, Mom.

So sometime after 7am, up to 8:30am, I load her in the car, and drive three miles to the bike trail.

It’s a nine mile trail from  Glens Falls to Ft Edward, and it follows the canal.

This tower is where I start, and on the way back, it’s the sign of the end of a good hour long walk, at Naya’s chosen pace.

I’ve learned a lot.

1. If I don’t go early, thinking I might take today off, by mid afternoon, I’m as antsy as she is.   

I might as well go first thing, while it’s cool.

2. Walking is a great time to clear my head.  I resolve things that are bothering me.  I plan my day.  All I hear is the crunch of my feet on the gravel path.

3. The best part of losing 20+ lbs has been freeing up the space in my head, where daily I worried about it, anguished over it, and beat myself up for it.

No more.

Today I reveled in the cool morning, the feeling of being ok, with a dialed down headache. Days like this sustain me when those not so good days come along.

Got this from a blog I follow, and I love it.

When I got home from walking I started to weave on a project I’ve had in my head for awhile......it’s a 

.l

Wool silk cape.

As I was weaving, suddenly all the harnesses just dropped. CLUNK.

See that cable right there? Yep.....snapped right in two.

The problem......oh, there were several.....but the biggest one was getting that out, then getting another cable, then crimping the end after it was put back in.

Clear as mud?

Now you get it.

After a couple trips to my neighbor, who is brilliant, a couple of trips to the hardware store where they 

probably  hate me...........we finally got the new cable installed.

And it works. Sigh of relief.

I finished what I was weaving, then I made some gazpacho, because that has been on my mind for awhile.

One thing about hour long, daily walks.......it ensures deep sleep at night.

Can you say “exhaustion”?

But it’s good. I’m here, I’m still on my feet.  I still love my life.

All good.

A break

Random pictures, random thoughts.

This is the Kingsbury Baptist church, a few doors down from my house.  I took this coming home one night.

I try to see these little ones every week.  If my daughter isn’t up to the hour drive with small children, then I go there.

I want them to know their Mimi.

I guess it’s working, because now there’s not even a 5 minute wait, before this little guy puts his arms up to me.

Still loving my copycat Remoska.

I had all the brush growth cleaned in front of the house.  I am not fond of seeing the road so well, but it lets so much light in, and now when you pull out of the driveway you can see down the road. So it’s a good thing.

My version of crack.....my potato salad.  I really shouldn’t even have it in the house.

 

The humidity has been much less the last few days, and my head has taken the cue. I desperately needed the break.

Today is clean the studio day. Every now and then, it just gets out of control.

My daughters seem to think I can do anything......and daughter # 1 wanted her window valance redone.  Here’s the end result.

It was a lot harder than it looks.

This was last week’s job...the closet under the stairs.  It was full, and I hauled everything out of it, went through it all, and got rid of a ton of junk.

It’s where the vacuum cleaner lives, and there’s not room for much else.

Years ago, when I worked in the prison, I had this picture done by an inmate.  He was an incredible artist, a very educated man, who got arrested with a very small amount of cocaine.  It as back in the days of Rockefeller, when they threw the book at anyone who had any drugs at all.  He had a horrific sentence, so when he got lung cancer, he declined treatment.  It was very sad.

The other part of this story is that this picture of my mother and her brother, my Uncle Syd, was only half of what I had done.  I had two photos, this one, and the other was of my father and my Aunt Lynn.  

They were taken when my aunt and uncle visited from England, back in the day.

My mother, however, always thought that my Aunt Lynn was a bit too flirty with my father.

So the fact that the other picture is missing is really not surprising to me.

They were in the house we lived in with my mother, for 10 years.  There was a lot of opportunity for my mother to have her way.

And I’ll bet she did. 

Thinking

Another happy day with these two.

I often think about how long I will get to see them grow.

Graduation? College?

It’s a sobering thought.

There’s been a FB post about the issues of using a Keurig.

As I’ve mentioned before, there is some water that you can never get out, and pictures have surfaced of the slimy water that can be found there.

Then there’s the issue of all those Keurig cups ......millions of them....clogging up landfills.

For me it was an easy decision, and I gained counter space that I didn’t have to give up anyway.  It was a win/ win for me.

And the Melitta makes amazing coffee!

The other night I happened to be driving home through the country at dusk.

It was lovely.

It’s a great thinking time.

Although sometimes, I do believe, you can think too much.

Today I went to the local SPCA with my daughter, who is looking for a dog.

They had just rescued 40 puppies from a kill shelter in Georgia, who were scheduled to be euthanized today.

The whole time I was there I felt like my heart was coming out of my chest.

My brain refused to grasp the concept that people are so irresponsible, that all these puppies were even born, and NOW they are going to kill them.

I wanted to bring them all home.

I am still very unsettled and anxious over it. To be honest, I’m clueless about how to make these feelings any better. 

I have to stop thinking about it.

But then, don’t they deserve us all to be thinking about it?

Self imposed stress

Yep that’s me.  Guilty.  Stressing over a list of things I want done, but who made the list?

Yeah.  I did. 

No one is causing me theses feelings but me.

Had to have a rotten locust tree taken down in the side yard, so I now have deep tire tracks across my front lawn.

Trying to let it go.

I am solving the “ what to do with all these veggies” issue, by gifting lots to whoever wants them.

Not pickling.  Not canning.  Nada. No.

We eat what we can.

I made this scrumptious sweet corn zucchini pie.

Delicious.

And some bread for a family get together.

I got a free Kitchen Aid blender with my Sears card points, and I did whip up a little pesto.

There’s nothing quite like homemade pesto.

  My young chickens have started to lay, little eggs at first, but by the end of the month they should be producing  well.

Weaving a little, here’s another Möbi Shrug.

I’m going to clean my outside porch today.  I don’t want to, but until I get it done, it’s going to make me crazy.  The energy it would take to talk me out of that, might well be spent on getting it done.

These two .

Wow. 

They make stress disappear.

Good morning

Time for a break

L and I have been busting our butts with shows. I don’t know if she’s as exhausted as I am,

But truly, I’m fried.

In between shows, I’ve been cleaning, downsizing, and organizing.

Inside porch/dyeing room is looking so much nicer. New flooring.

DH is a hoarder wannabe. He procures minutia and I get rid of it.

It’s a fine balance, ongoing.

This week I said goodbye to another kitty, sweet Jinxie. Always a little  a lot terrified and feral, with some kind of spinal issue that got worse every year, she still had the sweetest way about her.

I already miss hearing her lurch through the upstairs.

It’s the real downside of loving your pet friends.

Made this Spicy Zucchini Soup/Chili that I got from blogger/FB friend Di, it’s awesome.

I just changed it up and used veg crumbles instead of sausage.

I made four of these Möbi Shrugs and sold all four as soon as they were finished.

So you can be sure these are on my list of things to do.

Busy week around here, having a tree in the front yard taken down.  Nerve wracking, close to the house the power lines, fencing.  I breathed a sigh of relief when they were finished.

Yesterday was the last show until the end of September.

This was in Speculator, NY, on Lake Pleasant. Beautiful summer day in the Adirondacks.

Unfortunately, it got very hot in the afternoon, and my head doesn’t care for the heat.

So by the time I got home, I had the HFH, you got it......the headache from hell.

I can’t wait til my appt in Sept to get approved for MM ( medical marijuana)

I don’t want to take it  every day but I would love to have something that really worked when those 

headaches  come along.

Sounds like heaven.

I say it’s worth a try.