Adios to June

We have now learned to "do something" in June.  We used to delay summer events until "later," thinking that summer would dally on endlessly.

But of course, it is over in a flash, so it behooves us all to jump right onto summer with a vengeance and ride it to the ground.

I mentioned in my earlier post that we had taken our trip to Ontario and gotten our theater fix.  It was a wonderful trip in every way.

After that Good Guy went off to Iowa with Brotherbob to watch track and field events in blistering heat.  (I passed on that junket.)  But I had a fine time at home with my sewing machine and my garden.

Speaking of which, I have analyzed that the thing I love about gardening is grubbing around in soil. I'm good with planting, but lousy at harvesting.  Therefore I spent lots of time grubbing and pulling weeds and had a jolly time.

I planted potatoes for the first time and have yet to see any results above ground.  I'm curious, but philosophical.  Nothing ventured, nothing gained.  They seem to take an awful long time.

I'm afraid that baby birds are getting feeding lessons in my garden patch.  Lots of seedlings seem to be disappearing.  That's okay.  I like birds more than vegetables anyway.  I had lots of fun watching mama robin and baby robins hopping around and in the bird bath.

My hummingbirds were plentiful before our Canada trip, but had disappeared when we returned.  Can anyone shed any light on that phenomenon?  Nesting?  I see one occasionally now; about once a day.  (The nectar is fresh.)

I'm still spending online time with my reading/knitting/crocheting friends on Ravelry.  Keetha asks if I've gone over to the Dark Side, meaning Facebook or Twitter.  I don't spend much time on Facebook, though I do check it for pictures of my kids and grands.  (Children and dogs.)

But my Ravelry groups compel me to do good deeds, and that's a good thing, right?

My reading recently has been devoted to some books that have been around for years and years, but have never been on my list.  I enjoyed Anne of Green Gables  (and the visit to PEI, a beautiful place I have visited before), and I also enjoyed Around the World in Eighty Days.  Fanciful, but fun.

I may have more to say in July.  Who knows?  Happy summertime, friends!

Mid Month----June

I greet you tonight from Stratford, Ontario, home of the Stratford Festival theaters, and the Ontario Pork Congress.

We haven't been consuming massive quantities of pork, but it's early days, as they say in British crime detection novels.

Yesterday, however we enjoyed two wonderful productions at the Festival.  One was in a relatively small venue called the Studio theater, and featured music by Cynthia Dale (mostly) with a piano, bass, and guitar, and a male singer who joined her in some numbers after the intermission.

 These performances are crafted to complement the themes raised in the other plays being performed this year at the Festival.  Our own choices this year are Fiddler on the Roof, Blithe Spirit, and Waiting for Godot.

We saw Fiddler last night and it was just wonderful.  I have seen the play before in London in the last dress rehearsal before the opening of a revival with much of the early cast.  I know I enjoyed it then, but not nearly as much as I enjoyed last night's production.  It was just wonderful.  The voices, the energy, the pathos, the joy, and heartbreak.  It's all there.  Scott Wentworth plays Tevye, and he does it brilliantly.

I am always amazed when an actor here who I have seen in numerous dramatic roles turns out to be able to sing and dance as well.  Of course, I should know that in order to "make it" at this level of theater, you have to have numerous talents and amazing stamina. He is also playing Juliet's father in Romeo and Juliet.

So basically, these artists are performing and rehearsing constantly all through the season.  Few  people are in only one production, for some of the younger actors are playing extras and understudying other roles in many plays.

In case you haven't detected it from my words, I think this is such a magical place, and knowing of all the hard work that goes into it all does nothing to diminish my awe!  We have come here almost yearly for decades now, and I haven't been enthralled with everything I've seen, but when I love it, I love it wholeheartedly!

I hope your summer is proceeding nicely.  Do something  fun in June.  Summer goes by way too quickly!!!

Touch Base as You Run By

June---don't you just love spring, when the whole countryside looks like one big park?  The grass isn't long and straggly looking, the leaves are all new, and the flowers are lovely.

We walked last night and it was perfect!  Cold enough to wear a sweatshirt or maybe two, and no wind.  We could have walked forever if we had any cartilage in our right knee.  (grumble, grumble.)

The school year is over here this week, so the kids are excited.  That doesn't affect anyone here but there's a buzz in the neighborhood.

Little Sister worked her last day at her job on Friday and she was one happy lady when she called and invited me to go eat frozen custard with her at Storheim's.  We all went out for supper together too.  The night before her co-workers threw a nice party for her and it was well attended.  People were happy that she gets to retire, and sad to see her leave.  It was a happy combination of emotions.

Good Guy wants to make some plans for things to do this summer.  I'll be happy if I can just get out and plant that garden.  My efforts on Saturday were short, since I was driven indoors by mosquitoes.

If you stop by, leave me a word for summer in the comments.  Today my words are "Welcome" and "Short".  Way too short....

A Few Milestones

I'll hit this spot one last time in May to:

Register my appreciation to the soldiers, sailors, marines, and MASH units of every generation for stepping up and serving.  Thanks, thanks, and thanks again.

 My flag is flying and I'm reminding you that you can send a letter of support.  Get an address at Soldiers' Angels and give someone a smile when that letter arrives.  I hate to think that our people who are serving in Afghanistan feel that they are forgotten or left unsupported.

Plus I'll tell you that we have bought a car.  A brand spankin' new one with the new car smell and the whole magilla.  It joins our fleet of Toyota Camrys.  We are selling the red car and keeping the green car (for me).  It is old and reliable and I love that car.

Our ride over to the car dealer in a nearby town was so pleasant yesterday.  The farm fields are blushing green, the trees are budding, the woods are full of trilliums, and the sun was shining.  It's a beautiful world---if you don't watch the news.

I wish you a pleasant weekend.  Have a cookout and a good time, but remember the solemn reason for the long weekend.

Success!

I took one knitting project with me when we went traveling last month.  It was difficult and I needed to concentrate on it all the time.

It was also a failure.  I tried and ripped it out numerous times and it is, once again, just a ball of lace weight yarn.

When all else fails, read the directions.  I decided to take a Craftsy course on shawl knitting and you have evidence of the power of a good teacher and a persistent student.

I'm always so paranoid about running out of yarn that I was a nervous wreck while I was doing that scalloped border bind off at the lower edge.  I had one ball of this beautiful yarn and it was pretty well used up.  Would I come up short with 1/3 of the border to go?

Who said that knitting is dull?  The suspense was enormous!  Good Guy would ask me, "Are you going to make it?"  and I would just sigh.  Who knows....

I learned a lot, but now I think I need to cast on another one so I don't forget what I have learned.  What do you think?  Do you need a shawl?  I think this will be stunning with my flannel shirts and jeans.

Squeeee!

This marks one of the times in the year when I hate to be inside for a minute---which is saying something, since I'm vying for The Biggest Couch Spud Ever award.

But I love the days in spring when the trees are just leafing out.  After our little sputter of warm weather, followed by some really nice rain, our trees are trembling on the brink of popping their leaves.  I can practically watch the change in the lilac bushes from one hour to the next.

The lilacs are loaded with flower buds, and I hope they don't get frosted, because we had none last year after our early hot weather, followed by frost.  So maybe they'll make up for it this year.  The only down side of that is that lilacs give my sister a headache---so I'll have to meet her someplace else.

One of my sisters is returning from many weeks away during the winter, and the other is counting down the workdays until retirement at the end of the month.  Happy times for us all.

The new retiree announced yesterday that they have plans made until the end of the year.  Good for them, but as my daughter says, "We plan and God laughs."  Or maybe just shakes His head and smiles benignly.

I wish you all again a Happy Mothers' Day.  I can't hug my mom on Mothers' day but I continue to honor her example and her dear self.  I don't mind it anymore when I hear her words coming out of my mouth.  Now and again she was very wise.

Fridays in May

Hello, Mrs. 4444 and you happy band of Friday Fragmenters.  It's nice to hang out with you once again.  (You too can deposit your flotsam and jetsam of "not quite enough for a post" ideas here with this like-minded and kind-hearted group.)  Just click here to link up.

In this neck of the woods we have been greeting one another with comments about the weather for many long months.  It has been a pleasure to hear folks say (at last), "Isn't this a gorgeous day?"
Today is a bit chilly, but the sun is shining so it's gorgeous anyway.

Once it is warm again, the cats recall that wonderful day that they got outdoors and ate grass, saw a chipmunk, ran under the porch when a car started across the street.....  Ah, the life of adventure!  Only one of them goes outdoors to patrol the bird seed bag and terrorize the chipmunks.  The two we got from the shelter are indoor cats 99.9% of the time.  Occasionally they're faster than I and sneak out.  (Very, very seldom.)

My grandson is happy that there has been more pleasant weather for track events.  It's hard to do some things indoors, and he's a shot putter.  When I think of being a spectator at track events I mostly shiver.  That's how I remember them, even in nice weather years.

Our travels have taken us to two wonderful European cities, which I won't pretend is only a 'fragment' of a post.  But it was apparent to me that both were very conscious of energy conservation issues.  Hallways in hotels had motion sensor lights rather than be illuminated all the time, we had a hotel room where the lights went off automatically when you took your key out of a special holder to leave and lock the door.

I think the "engineering" in my home is far from cutting edge.  Just sayin'...

My daughter and I breezed through completing a 500 piece jigsaw puzzle a couple of weeks ago.  In a fit of confidence, I borrowed a 1000 piece puzzle from Saint Beverly, but this one will take us ten times longer to do.  There are multiple pieces that are cut the same shape----(sigh).

I took only one project to knit when we were away, thinking I'd have to stick to it and master lace knitting.  I was one frustrated knitter when I returned with needles and a ball of yarn.  The yarn was really good and strong though.  It still is lovely after being used and undone a dozen times.

But I wasn't a quitter, and I signed up for a lace knitting class online, through Craftsy.  I hope you can get to the site; my cookies take me to my own projects which isn't where you'd need to be.  Anyway, I paid for an excellent class which taught me a great deal.  Including patience.

About time.  So I'll give you fair warning.  If you want to make a lace shawl, get yourself a mess of stitch markers and be prepared to count, count, count.  Don't try to do it when you are tired or will be distracted, or when you're drinking wine, or watching a baseball game when the closer is screwing up.  Ask me how I know.

Well, this isn't a lot, but I have to get my Fragment Feet wet gradually.

And there are lots of other folks to visit.  Thanks Mrs. 4444, you're an angel.  But you still have that mischievous twinkle in your eye!

Happy Mothers' Day, all of you who qualify!  May you hear from all your beloved children.