The Garden in Late June

Due to a late spring and lots of rain, our vegetable garden got planted a bit later than normal.  Things are starting to grow well, but just not as big as in other years.  But now with the very warm weather, they'll grow like crazy--just like the weeds.

We had some lettuce a couple of days ago, and it was delicious.  I wish there was a way to preserve it so we could eat it through the winter too.

Peas, with corn in the background.

A few of the tomato plants, some of which have blossoms already.

 

 Two rows of potatoes.  We have about 6 or 7 more rows.  We like potatoes, fixed almost any way.

More peas growing up the fence which surrounds the broccoli and Brussels sprouts.  We love Brussels sprouts and used to have no problem growing them, but the past couple of years they've not done well.

The vegetable garden is mainly Mr. M's domain.  Now that he's retired, he has acquired an interest in gardening.  He decides what to plant and where to plant.  I help a bit with the planting, but not much with weeding.  We both harvest the vegetables, and he helps me with the canning/freezing.  I used to do all of it, but now I'd rather spend my gardening time taking care of flowers.  So it works quite well for both of us.

We also have four grape vines.  This year, if all the grapes develop, we'll have lots to make juice and jelly.



And now, here are a few flowers to show you.

 

This is a Baptisia (false indigo).  The flowers look like sweetpeas.

A Siberian iris.  These are so beautiful and more delicate looking than bearded iris.

 

Another Siberian iris in pink.

 

This is a species of Campanula.  These plants are so pretty, but almost like weeds, so you have to be careful that they don't take over the garden.

Last, but certainly not least, one of the peonies in my garden.


I gave up growing annuals many years ago.  They are pretty, and can be very colorful, but too much work.  Now I only plant perennials, and since my flower gardens are fairly well established, I only add a couple of new plants a year.  I mostly just divide the ones I already have and put them in new locations.

Vacation

Since I last posted, we spent a wonderful few days at a friend's cabin in Canada.  He has owned the place for about twenty years and has done a lot of work on it.  To get there, we drove a total of about 14 hours to get to the boat landing, then another 5 miles by boat.

As we were driving the last leg of the trip, we saw a moose running down the road ahead of us.  It finally ran off into the bush.  I guess that moose are normally seen at night, but this one was right out there during the afternoon.

A couple of views from his place.

Here is one of several loons we saw.

These are mergansers.

Every morning the lake was as smooth as glass, so there was a beautiful reflection of the trees in the water.  As the day went on, the lake got a bit of motion to it, but not much.

A couple pictures of some small wildlife.

We also saw a caribou the first day, but the picture I took is from a distance and unfortunately is blurry. 

The weather was just gorgeous the whole time we were there.  It was so peaceful and serene that I felt like I could have stayed all summer.  However, after a few days, we were on our way back home.

On the way back we saw another moose running right down the highway.  Fortunately, it ran off before traffic from the other direction came along. 

We also stopped at a falls on the Kaministiquia River.  It was amazing; I could have watched that water thundering over the falls all day. 

This is a picture of the river looking downstream.


So now we're back home and catching up on weeding the garden and cutting the grass, but still remembering the wonderful time we had.

Sewing Room Tour

I thought that you might enjoy having a tour of my sewing room/studio/sanctuary.  Years ago I used to sew on the dining room table, which of course meant that I had to put everything away and get it all back out again frequently.  Once the kids grew up and started leaving home, I converted a bedroom to a sewing room.  Now it's just Mr. M and me.  When we bought this old farmhouse almost ten years ago, one of the things we did was to put an addition on it which included a sewing room.  I used that room for a few years, but eventually turned it into a guest room so that guests would be close to a bathroom.  Now my room is in one of the upstairs bedrooms.  The room is bigger and has a really nice closet, which Mr. M remodeled to make room for fabric and other sewing supplies.

So, here we go.

This corner has my thread chest, quilting books and magazines, some fabric, and a few odds and ends.

Continuing around the room, my sewing machine and ironing board.  In the background is the door to the closet.  I'll show you the inside in a minute.

This wall is a new arrangement.  The wall cabinets are some we bought to use elsewhere in the house, but ended up not using them.  So Mr. M installed them in here; they store lots of supplies such as all my button jars, paint supplies, candles, and ribbons.  The shelves below are some I already had and contain books, yarn, embroidery floss, patterns, and dvds.  This is more than a sewing room, it's like my sanctuary (a woman cave, I guess), so that's why it has a tv as well as radio/cd player and plenty of books.

Going around the corner, in the middle is the entrance to this room.  Just to the right of that is a cd rack I got at a garage sale years ago and painted white.  Now it holds quilt tops ready for the next step.  Next to that is an old Singer portable from the 1950's.  It has a rounded top wood cover (not shown).

In another corner of the room is my recliner.  This is my planning, daydreaming, hand-sewing, reading, and tv watching corner. 

And back to the beginning.   This is a small design wall, made of a piece of flannel, just above the cutting/pressing table.  The quilt hanging there is an applique piece I still need to sandwich, quilt, and bind.


Okay, now for the inside of the closet.

On the left are shelves that hold most of my fabric.

On the right, deeper shelves hold a variety of larger supplies.

In the middle are three rolling carts that hold small pieces of batting, scrapbooking supplies, and more fabric.  Bags and embroidery hoops hang above.



                                     

On the floor below the fabric shelves is where I keep the larger batting.


So, that's my room as it looks right now.  It's been through several changes over the years, so a year from now it will most likely look a bit different.  I'm always moving things around to try and find the best possible arrangement that works most efficiently for what I want to accomplish with this room. 

I hope you enjoyed the tour.

Pressing Table and Bargain Irons

I've seen several sewing studios with large pressing boards and have wanted to make one.  My room is about 13'x15', a decent size, but with everything else in there, I couldn't seem to find a good spot to put one.

Well, problem solved! 

My cutting table is 30"x50".  At first I just thought of getting some plywood to cover and then putting it on the table when I needed to press larger things.  The problem with that is where to put it when I'm not using it. 

The solution:  put 2 layers of batting and the layer of fabric on the cutting table itself.  I wrapped it around the edges and stapled it underneath.  Now I have a nice big area for pressing larger items and I don't have to store it anywhere when it's not being used.

When it's not in use, I just put the cutting mats on top of it.  So now it's a multipurpose cutting/pressing table.  Yea!


I have to tell you about a real bargain I got at a garage sale a week or so ago.  This is a Rowenta  Powerglide iron that I paid $2. for.  Not sure how much they are new, but much more than what I paid. 

I also have this Rowenta Professional iron that I snagged at a garage sale 3 years ago for $5.  This would have been close to $100 new.  Both of these irons work beautifully.

I love garage sales!  You just never know what great things you're going to find.



Later this week, I'll try to do a post with a tour of my sewing studio.

Remembering

Remembering those who have given the ultimate sacrifice for our country.

Gardening at Last!

Well, we are finally able to do some gardening.  Our perennial food plants are up and looking nice.

The rhubarb is almost ready to start picking.  I'm going to try cooking it with honey this year instead of sugar.

 

 

 

A couple of asparagus stalks are just starting to come up through the mulch.  We love to steam fresh asparagus and then add butter.  Yum!

 

Leaves on the raspberries.  We won't have fruit until early August, but fresh picked raspberries are a real treat worth waiting for.  Mr. M doesn't eat them because he doesn't like the seeds, so these are all mine.

 

 

 

This is part of the garlic patch that Mr. M planted last fall.  We use lots of garlic in our cooking, so it's nice to have our own that's home-grown.

 

These are new globe artichoke plants that Mr. M started a few weeks ago.  The first year we tried planting artichokes, they actually survived our winter up here.  They are perennials in warmer parts of the country, but not here normally. Those from last year didn't survive the winter.  These new plants should give us artichokes in a couple of months.  We boil them in water and then just dip the leaves and chokes in butter.  A real treat!


We planted onion sets, peas, and lettuce in the past couple of days.  We also got the fenced enclosure set up for the broccoli and Brussels sprouts to keep out the local rabbit population which seems to particularly love these kinds of plants.  For the first time last year, we had resident wrens eating any cabbage worms that were on these plants.  We saw them bringing the worms to the birdhouse to feed their young.  For the first time, we had no worms on the broccoli and hope the wrens return this year to do the same thing.

Once the soil warms up a bit, we'll be planting the rest of the vegetable seeds.

And, of course, there is the beginning of a nice crop of pretty yellow flowers.  I know that most people do their best to get rid of dandelions, and the plants do tend to grow and multiply pretty vigorously, but I really love to look at a yard full of them.  Maybe it's because yellow is one of my favorite colors.

And after such a long winter with lots of snow even into the first couple days of May, it's so nice to look at grass again.


I love this time of year.  Everything seems so fresh and new.  The grass has that bright spring green look to it as opposed to the darker green of summer.  And the new leaves on trees and shrubs help to reinforce the idea of rebirth, which is what spring is all about after a long winter.

 

 

 

Trip

Another snowy day at our place.  We have about 6 or 7 inches of really wet snow.  Fortunately, the roads are just wet right now and not slippery.


Just a few days ago my friend and I were in Paducah, Kentucky, for the AQS quilt show.  We had been planning this trip for about two years and finally made it.  We did a little side trip on the way down and went to the Fons and Porter shop in Winterset, Iowa, as well as John Wayne's birthplace there. 

While in Winterset, we went to the city park to see a covered bridge.  Winterset is in Madison County (of "Bridges of Madison County" movie fame).

Next stop was Missouri Star Quilt Company in Hamilton, Missouri, then to the Laura Ingalls Wilder and Almonzo Wilder home in Mansfield, Missouri, in the Ozarks.

While in the Mansfield area, we went to visit the Baker Creek Heirloom Seed Company.  This is who Mr. M and I buy all of our vegetable seeds from.  It was fun being there and seeing the little town they have set up, called Bakerville.  There are several old buildings such as a hotel, general store, and apothecary, besides the store where they sell their seeds.

We saw so many beautiful redbud trees in bloom in that part of Missouri.

We arrived in Paducah, Kentucky, a day early, but that allowed us to become familiar with where the quilt show and other attractions were before the big rush.  The quilt show was wonderful; there were over 200 vendors plus so many absolutely beautiful quilts.  I would love to show you some pictures of the quilts, but we were only allowed to photograph them on the condition that we would not put them on the internet.

We spent a few hours at Hancocks of Paducah, especially in their backroom sale area.

One day we took the Dogwood Tour, which usually happens earlier, but this year we were lucky enough to be there during the later time the dogwoods were in bloom.  Many people have lights shining on their trees and they enter the contest to see if their dogwood might win as best of the year.
This picture is not only a dogwood but a beautiful wisteria as well.

Eleanor Burns (Quilt in a Day) was in Paducah all four days of the show and gave three 1 1/2 hour shows of her own each day focusing on quilts made from her new book.

It was a lot of fun; she's such a wonderful, down-to-earth person.



We also spent a while looking at the murals on the flood wall.  Paducah is on the Ohio River, right where the Tennessee River joins it.  They've had some pretty bad floods in the past, so several years ago a flood wall was built.  Then an artist painted several murals on it about the history of the city.

Look at the wonderful cobblestone street; it looked like it might have been original.



We were in Paducah for five days so we had a lot of time to enjoy the beauty of the area, but were also very impressed by the friendliness and hospitality of all of the people we met there.  We had heard that those who live in the South are so very nice, and we found it to be true.

We had such a great time and may go back again someday (or maybe to another quilt show--Houston, next time??), but it's nice to be back home, too (even though we have snow and no leaves on the trees or flowers in bloom).