Sittin' on a Ritz

It's hard to get back into the rhythm of everything after the heat wave. It's finally over and the temperature is back to normal. It's just hard to pick up where you left off.




Lots of weird things can happen in unusual weather. This is one of the things that happened at our house. It's made of Ritz and pepperoni and toothpicks.

Too Hot

It's been too hot to do much. The computer overheats during the day. Can't use it much. Yesterday Joseph and I went to see the movie Cars, just to be out of the heat. We went to McDonald's for lunch, but it was hot and crowded in there, so we went back to the maul to the food court and it was hot and crowded there too. We had lamb curry and then went back to see another movie: Monster House.

Last week was Cub Scout Camp at Lake Cunningham. That was hot, but not as hot as this weekend. He caught a summer cold, but pulled through to win the Den One 1st place and the Webelos (4th and 5th grade) first place in both BB Guns and Archery. Friday night he developed pink eye and we were on the phone and to the pharmacy within an hour getting eye drops.

Ferm went to the vet on Saturday with lethargy, it doesn't look so good for him, then I spent the rest of the day in bed with a migraine.

There was a grass fire started by heat near Ed Levin Park and a lot of people at Indian Hill were worried for their horses. The Dept of Forestry and the fire dept had the road blocked so you couldn't get to the barn anyway. The only people who could do anything were the people who were already there. The helicopters got the fire out before it got close to the barn. Sunday morning there was still some smoldering. Driving past it was enough to embed the smell into the car for the rest of the day.

Well, Ferm is howling over a fur mouse, so he must be feeling better.

Nancy's Quilt Progress

here it is in a further stage of progress. It is still a little further than this picture shows. It has a border and a machine quilting flange. The flange is a temporary piece of fabric to made it easer to quilt the edges. I will be removed before binding. The binding is selected, but not cut yet.
I had a quilt top from Community Quilts to quilt first. I have not machine quilted in a while and the community quilts piece will help me get my sea legs back.

Janow remains his peachy self and I love him dearly. I'm reaching him to bow, against my better judgment. Everyday I give him a bite of carrot and hold it behind his knee so he has to reach back to get it. I have been doing it in his stall, so he wouldn't anticipate and molest me at other times and places. Right now it is making it hard to clean his stall. Nothing like being in a 12x12 room with a 900 pound pirate who wants 4 grams of carrot that you happen to have in your hand. I guess I need to move this activity to the paddock.

Joseph went to a birthday party as Raging Waters waterslide park yesterday from 10:30 until 5:00. Dave thought this was a long time to be at Raging Waters. Joseph didn't. He had a blast. He knew a lot of kids at the party, and he met some kids he had met at last week's rock climbing camp.

Paula and Chicka pretty mush know their jobs by now. When they have been out long enough and you go out to get them, first you check the food and water in the coop, then get the chickens. They are very likley to go in by themselves while you are fixing the food and water. In August, we will have to add a nesting box to the coop.

I have been looking half heartedly for a Creative Memories consultant to do little informals at The Little Table. So far, no lick. I looked a little bit into stamping up but them heed a water supply and that will not be good. The cafe has is, but it is for food.

Ideas are welcome in the comments section here.

blah blah......

It's up! My gallery for the All-For-One doll challenge for Folk of Art Friends. We all made the ssame doll with the same pattern, just to see how differently each dollmaker would treat the same instructions. The variety is amazing! I didn't even make a doll, I made a skirt.
Click on my banner to see it.


The pattern we used was Pioneer Girl, from AntyMs Garden. She has an ebay store where you can buy the pattern if you like it. It is available as an e-pattern that you can download and print out at home, or as a snail mail pattern that will arrive in your mailbox. Click on the banner to go there.



More USS Hornet pictures for friends and relations.
Here is Joe, getting into a fighter plane. It was just the nose of the plane, but he got to sit in the cockpit.
Fighter pilot's briefing room, fully restored.


On the flight deck with Lou. He really was a fighter pilot. He gave a great tour!


Here is Nancy's quilt on my design wall. It's further along than this, but this is the most recent photo.

USS Hornet

Cub Scout Pack 92 just completed the Live Aboard on the USS Hornet, a WWll aircraft carrier docked in Alameda. It's an historical landmark and museum.

We got to go after hours for many tours, eat in the mess, and sleep in the bunks. In the morning, after breakfst, we got more tours and an award and patch before the museum opened.

It was a great experience!

These pictures are of the flight deck, on the top of the carrier, and the hanger deck, just below it. There are huge elevators to lift the planes, and smaller, but still big elevators, for bombs. The pilots had an escalator.

Wall Eyed

Here is my design wall showing further progress.
This one turns out to be pretty tricky to get the right pieces in the right places. If you know what to look for, you can see some mistakes in this picture that I had to go back and fix.
It's actually a lot further along than this, but I haven't been posting the pictures because of many things, like

--Getting Shanghai- into marching in the 4th of July parade

--Someone else using our computer to actually MAKE money

--Going back and fixing more mistakes in this quilt than the picture shows

--Being Owner/Operator of Mom's Taxi Co., a not-for-profit organization





Oh Yeah, and Wall Eyed, in a horse, is a blaze or white marking big enough to include an eye and turn it blue. I had a horse like this(good ol' Frix), and it takes getting used to. Horses have horizontal pupils, like goats, but usually you don't see them because the eyes have a lot of dark brown pigmentation.
You still can't tell what they are looking at from the eyes, the ears tell all. They can be paying attention to two different things and have an ear swivelled toward each. I guess not having a corpus colosum has benefits.

Misk

Here they are: Chica Chicken and Paula Pullet. They are growing. They discovered worms and how to scratch in the dirt to get worms. Then they discovered daffodil bulbs. You get those from scratching in the dirt where the worms are.

Dave finally figured out that Joseph and I were serious when we said "You have to catch Paula first." If you catch Chica, Paula knows the jig is up and then she is hard to catch. If you catch Paula first, then Chica knows its time to get caught and comes over to be picked up. But....Chica is easier to catch, so Dave always caught her first.
Here is my design wall. This is for Nancy.

Pictures, finally.

Here are the two batiks. Finally I can upload pictures. I don't know what happened, but now it works.

These birds are about 2 feet square. Sort of.



...and here are the two sleeping engineers we came home to.