A Bit Of This And A Bit Of That... It's All About Being Organized... Right?

Besides the apples, I have been working. (Really I shouldn't have to justify myself but I always feel when I haven't been writing, that there's got to be a reason. Mostly it's because I'm in a spell of brain-farty-ness and I really haven't been able to come up with anything good to write about, but I'm going to say in the next sentence that it is because I've been busy... just watch!) I've been doing a little of this and a little of that and been quite busy trying to get things done. (See?) The apples have been keeping me busy as you know.  We seem to have apples and the baking from apples everywhere and I'm sick and tired of trying to find containers in which I can freeze apple juice concentrate. But there's a ton of apples to deal with yet though I do have to say that I was able to find someone to take about 25 lbs of them off my hands. That leaves me with 11 lbs of green apples and I still have a 20 lb garbage bucket of crab apples that Daughter #1 picked quite a few weeks ago. I'll never see the end of the apples and I'm even starting to dream about apples.

While I have been sitting on my duff waiting for the apples to cook, I have been weaving for the most part.  I have stopped working on the 50 hour project for my level 5 homework

These squares are woven with hand spun ramie and eventually will be a table cloth/runner.

and have begun to work on a shawl for the upcoming show at our local gallery. 

These diamonds are being woven with a sturdy worsted wool. 

I have been making plans for a few scarves as well. Most of the shawls and scarves that I made last year were given away for various reasons as gifts.  So I am left high and dry making things at the last minute as per usual. (What else is new... sigh!)

Then I've been getting this bizarre nesting instinct.  I have been wanting to take care of things in the house.  It all started when Mom's and Dad's hot water tank started to give problems.  I also wanted to move furniture around and make the house a more pleasant place to live.... I'm not sure but it may be that the temperatures are cooling down and I know that winter is not far away. My bedroom has been moved around and I'm looking at buying a new coverlet for our bed as well as new sheets. I would also like to get new window treatments for in there since it is several years since we bought bedding for our room and things are starting to look dreadfully shabby. I had thought of making a quilt but I'll be honest, time is not of the essence for a project like that.  Yesterday I got sick of looking at the ceiling lack of ceiling in the sunroom and so I got out all the tiles I had wood burned a few years ago and clear coated them... then when Teapot came home I got him to set me up with the air nailer (gotta love that tool) and I put them up... they look awesome even if I do say so myself.

I still have tons to do but the goal is to finish one tile a day until I get them all done.  I will need 132 tiles and I have 36 done. That leaves me with 96 to go... 96 days... that's not the end of the world.... right!? I should be finished some time in February give or take with problems that may arise.

Meanwhile level 5 is on hold for now. I have to get to the gallery opening and then level 5 will be on the go.

Then yesterday I got a brilliant idea.  I'm going to propose to my guild that we give to our sister guild next year shrunken heads. Now before you gasp in disgust they are not actually shrunken heads. They are felted heads but I have a couple and I hang them on my deck.

This one is felted....

This one is ceramic.

I  know it is weird but I love them... I intend on hanging them on trees coming in the driveway.... my intention is to make a whole bunch more.... (sorry... I can't help being weird, it's just who I am!!!)... but I thought they would be really cool gifts for our guild to make and then we could send them to our sister guild in Whales for Christmas.... I'm not sure what my fellow guild members will think but I guess I will find out.

So for today I plan on burning a tile.... weaving a block or two working on a shawl that I wove last year but never put together and getting ideas for shrunken heads and maybe even drawing a few.  I'm making bread as we speak... it's rising. And I have to cut and cook a pot or two of apples.... first things first I'll cut up the apples.  Then while they're cooking I'll get the pans ready for the bread and put on a movie.... then while I'm watching the movie I'll weave. By that time it will be lunch ti..... hmmm... I won't bore you with all that stuff...

So see ya... I'd better get to work and tackle all these jobs... maybe I really am busy after all! I hope your day is full of good things that keep you busy in a happy way.

The Apple Of My Eye

44lbs

37 lbs left! That's what I have sitting on the counter in the kitchen.  I started out with 44 lbs of apples and I have managed to use 7 lbs of them so far. In between it all I'm trying to weave scarves and shawls.

Do you know what you do with 44 lbs of apples?  No?.... Neither do I. I wish I did.  I'm making apple juice right now and this will be my third batch. It takes two days to make apple juice. Then I'm using the pulp from the apple juice to make apple and cinnamon pound cakes.  I will be so sick of apple and cinnamon pound cakes by the time I finish that I won't want to eat a bight.  Still, I just can't throw the damn things away.  So I persevere. But the house smells of apples and has done for several days. It's a bit disgusting actually.  And while everyone else thinks it smells wonderful.... well, frankly they're not around it as much as I am.... in the end I think it's a bit gross now.  At first I thought it wouldn't be too bad.... I'm now starting to rethink that as my fingers are starting to feel raw from all the cutting. Argh. Need I tell you that a friend dropped by with apples?... no... I didn't think so!

Today is sunny again after three days of cold and rain.... I was listening to California Dreamin' by The Mamas and the Papas yesterday... it seemed to fit somehow.

All the leaves are brown.... and the skies are grey ....

So I am glad to see the sun shining beautifully again.  The wind is blowing and is taking the rest of the leaves off the trees around my place.  It was really strange though since yesterday I took a drive to town and noticed that all along the highway on the way to FSJ the trees were actually still a little on the green side. So for some reason our place in particular loses leaves more quickly than anywhere else.  Weird!

I took a walk out to the paddock yesterday with a few apples for the horse.... she didn't appreciate them either.  I could smell the rich brown smells of rotting leaves and wet soil... While reaping a harvest of apples will probably be appreciated later in winter, right now I feel that the added odor of rotting apples to the already rich smells of autumn would be a pleasant outcome to my apple ordeal. However, Teapot suggests that rotting apples in the garden might just add another dilemma... that of bears. All around town bears have been raiding apple trees and this is the reason for my apple inheritance.  The friends who brought the apples had an abundance in their tree and wanted to get rid of a "few". Little did I know when I agreed to take some off his hands that I was agreeing to 44 pounds. I've even thrown a few in for the alpacas and llama. None of my animals want them. Teapot keeps coming back to the fact that a pig would just gobble them up... so I told him to go find a pig... but he had better not bring it home. (No fleece.... too bad pigs don't have fibre to spin!) 

We are getting a pair of rabbits.... yes you read that right.  On the 1st of October I will be getting two bunnies that are angora cross breeds... which means that they are not pure angora... a good thing since they won't have hair issues on their faces. But they do have nice spinnable fibre on their bods.  Hey! ... I wonder if the bunnies would like apples.... hmmmm!  Some good might come of this yet.

Well, I'm off to strain apple juice... hope the "fruits" of your labour make for a bountiful harvest.

Cleaver T.V.

I just finished watching the second last installment of the Tudors.  I love British history and I love British T.V./movies. BBC and I are really good friends.  And while I love the Tudors... well, it is a little over the top sexually.

I have begun to think that the art of subtlety is no longer among us.  What happened to those directors who knew that the person watching had a brain in their head?  Perhaps I live in the eternal deception. Perhaps I'm mistaken in my belief that less is more.  I'm sick to death of having my head cleaved apart with over the top images both sexual and violent.  Give me something good. Too bad the Tudors is littered with such pointless pornography. It would have been good otherwise though somewhat misleading in their portrayal of British history. (There are blatant changes in the actual history to make the story better... but I ask you what's better than the real thing? I mean in the end Henry the VIII married six women and had no success with any of them... it's a fit story for the soaps... reality T.V. at it's best... why falsify information. It doesn't add to the story.  Instead I have to keep checking the facts to make sure that I haven't forgotten all that I learned in school!)

That's it... that's all I got for tonight folks.... I'll be back tomorrow with hopefully something better. Hm!

The Reason I Love Yellow

I love yellow. I love all things yellow... even mustard..... (Having said that I do think that mustard yellow has its place and that it should be used sparsely).  The other day when I was giving this blog a new look and I saw the background that I'm using here I knew that it was the right one... reason?: 1. Because it makes me feel happy. It makes me feel like the sun is shining down on my head and shoulders and.... 2. It is the colour of the season that we are experiencing right now. Autumn is soooo yellow.

Now, I know all you Easterners know that fall is all about red but here in this neck of the country, the majority of our trees are Cottonwoods or Poplar.... and they turn yellow in the fall (and sometimes, a nice mellony yellow).  We don't get red... or at least much red (some in the underbrush in late fall).  I never felt my skin respond to Yellow until I moved here. Now when autumn (I love the way autumn rolls off my tongue) arrives, I can feel yellow.

Some of you are giving yourself a mental shake now and thinking, "How can you feel yellow?"

My answer to that is, I don't have a flippin' clue, but it's true, I do feel it.  My body is a sponge at this time of the year and it is sucking as much yellow into my soul in an effort to preserve life as I know it through the long months of winter greys and blues. I'm like a squirrel madly rushing around storing pine cones for food... only I'm storing yellow.

Each day I go out into the yellow as much as I can.... I just look around me and absorb it.  This morning there is ice on the sheep's bucket of water. (Yes the sheep are still here.) The new tin roof on the electrical shed came none too soon... there's ice on it as well and it is red-grey instead of red. But as the sun has been warming things this morning everything has begun to turn yellow again. (Except for the red roof).

I know that it is only another couple of weeks that things will feel yellow and then the yellow will fall to the ground and turn brown and the skies will darken to grey and then everything will be grey and blue.... boo hoo!

But in the meantime I'm going to suck up as much yellow as I possibly can....

A post without it just wouldn't be right.....

Wait for it....

They call me mellow yellow.... just butter it!

I'm off to remove my yellow nighty and put on a yellow shirt and take the dogs for a walk through the yellow woods.... see y'all.

The Songs And Dances Of Time (In Other Words Where Did The Flippin' Weekend Go)

Teapot just got the tin on the electrical shed and it is all finished.  It looks great. Life kind of got a little crazy this weekend.  Yesterday, our nephew (who I shall call Wonder Boy) called from FSJ where he has been living and apprenticing with a very large utility company, to say that he was coming for the weekend to go hunting.  He ended up getting put to work... and Teapot got help which was really great let me tell you.  The shakes came off easily since they were so old there was moss growing on them.

Teapot didn't have to work very hard at all at that part.

Even putting the tin on went quickly.... especially with that young 20 something nephew crawling over it like he was spider man....

Then after a nice supper they went fishing but never caught anything.... : (

This morning they were up and gone at 5 a.m. to see if they could get a moose for din din... no luck there.

In between it all I have been spinning ramie.... I finished a nice spool of plied ramie for the level 5 50 hour project and so I am set for another while to weave blocks for my table cloth/runner.

Meantime, the dear Teapot has had a dreadful weekend running back and forth between the parents house and ours with us running out of water and him having to prime the pump and Mom's and Dad's hot water tank giving problems.... he hasn't had a moment to sit... and with being up at 4 a.m. this morning when he flops tonight he will flopppppp if you know what I mean!

So there it is... Sunday evening and the weekend is almost over.... how did that happen... time is flying by... here it is the middle of September and I haven't got my mark back from level 4 yet and I'm still working on the 50 hour project which I wanted to get it done by the end of August.... like how does time do that.... it just keeps getting away from me.

Well Teapot just walked in the door so I had better go cook some supper before night is upon us and it is time to go to bed!....

See y'all tomorrow.... if time doesn't do another song and dance on me....

Little Kids...

Sometimes I miss having little kids in the house.

In Honour Of The Season

There's just no denying it any longer. Autumn is here in all it's colourful glory.

The trees are turning and what's more is that every time we have even a little wind the leaves are falling in droves.  I took a walk under the silver moon last night and the crunch of the newly fallen leaves beneath my feet reminded me that as often as I sharpen my nails, I can no longer hang on to summer. However, I do think this year Mother Nature is giving it a good effort!  The weather around here for the last few days is decidedly warm and balmy.  It makes me think that winter will be upon us soon since I'm sure that we are actually getting an early Indian summer. My Dahlias, which got hit in spring with a late frost, surprised me and came back just in time to bloom when all other flowers were dying off. They look glorious and initiated the new header at the top of my blog....

...you can see that I have been working on my pin loom squares for the ramie table cloth. It just looked so lovely together that I couldn't resist putting the picture here.

Each morning I get up to Autumn's golden glory. I am surrounded by golds and greens and oranges and browns with hints of red in the under brush.  A walk through the woods is filled with scents of rotting vegetation and fermenting berries which the birds are enjoying immensely. I see drunk birds regularly. The bats have left for the year as their diet of insects dies away, and geese fly low on the river following it to the mountains where they will turn south for another year. The horse is frisky in her pasture and runs about with her tail held high.... but I never seems to be able to capture her in a picture.

The dogs arise each morning ready to frisk in the early morning coolth

and Little Monster strolls around the yard as if she has done it for a long time (she was only born in the spring)...

She pounces here and there looking for mice, attacking the pooches bums and climbing trees, and catches the last of the moths and butterflies munching on them as if they were a buffet placed there just for her.  Her mother is not so lucky as she is in jail awaiting the time of her spaying.

After a walk out the driveway last night with the leaves crunching under my feet....

notice the leaves on the ground....

 ..... I sat out till almost 11p.m. watching the aurora borealis in the light of the almost full moon. It was truly glorious and made me feel big... like how great it is to be a part of this wonderful world and at the same time small.... like how insignificant we humans are in all the surrounding glory....

Now the harvest begins...

Daughter #1 picked crab apples with a friend and brought home a barrel... I've pulled some of the carrots and they are as tasty as can be. I think I showed those to you all a few days ago. Then a friend came by with a sack of potatoes from their garden... Yukon Golds and they are delicious.  I must remember to grow them next year.  There are no blueberries this year, though, due to dreadful amounts of rain in the spring that knocked the blossoms off before they got started... which I find is just too sad.  So anyone out there who would like to send us some blueberry jam from Newfy would make it to the top of our favorite people list in very short order. : )

Teapot is having a quick cup of tea before he heads out to put the new tin roof on the electrical shed which is a job that has needed doing since 2008 when we did the renovation on the house.... at least that is how long we have had the tin sitting on the ground measured and cut and ready to go on. I will be helping him as he will need help... So that is our agenda for the day... it seems like a very normal autumn day.... busy in a good kind of way.

Hope you like the new look of my blog which of course is in honour of the season.