Connections

I'm on a ferry heading for home. The good news is that it's a beautiful, sunny day and there is just the barest of swells. The bad news is...there is no bad news.

I've spent the past week visiting friends and family. I had a fabulous time.

I started off by visiting my Dad and his wife. We had a great time, but it was too dang hot in the city. I was relieved to escape to our little slice of heaven.

My long-awaited and much anticipated visit with Son1 was fun and informative.

He's become quite skilled at skinning flounder.

The family reunion was a blast, and so well organized. The festivities were capped off by a fun concert of folk music with Blaine Henshaw. http://blainhenshaw.bandcamp.com/  (Sorry for the picture quality, all I had was my cell phone.)

Now I'm heading home, back to the real world. I'm already looking forward to coming back to my native land next month.

Oh, to cap off a perfect trip, we're now being given an impromptu live concert of fiddle music!

Our little slice of heaven

This doesn't need much explanation, right? The weather was lovely. The only noise was the twittering, cawing, squawking of birds. And the buzzing of deer flies. Ouch!

Blueberries

I generally like all fruits, some more than others. Local strawberries cannot be beat when at the perfect stage of ripeness. Strawberry shortcake, made with biscuits (of course) and vanilla flavoured whipped cream, is heaven.

My favourite fruit though is the blueberry. This is a life-long preference.

It all started while spending summers on the island where my mom grew up. Blueberries grew wild in the field behind the house in such an abundance that it took but an hour to pick enough berries for a pie. Even making allowance for my rule of "one for the pot, one for the mouth", it never took long to collect enough berries for a batch of muffins. I have vivid memories of sitting in the hay amongst the berry plants, filling up on berries warm from the sun.

Bliss.

We had a little dog, Penny, who liked eating berries right off the plant. Some people thought that was strange, but it just meant she was smarter than the average dog.

Here's a recipe I tried yesterday that made good use of the frozen berries from last year. I need to make room in my deep freeze for the coming bounty.

Try it, you'll like it.

http://www.hungrylittlegirl.com/1/post/2013/07/lemon-blueberry-muffin-cake.html

Oh, the sweet smell of summer.

We were skunked last night. 

There I was, blissfully dreaming about…well, something, when an odour pervaded my senses. I believe the first, brief sniff of skunk has a certain sweetness to it, so I awoke thinking about perfume. 

But then the full olfactory barrage hit. 

I pulled the blanket over my face. Too late, the smell had lodged in my nose. All the windows were open for cooling breezes and the room quickly filled with the stink that lingers. 

I swear I could still smell Monsieur Le Pew when I got up this morning. I definitely smelled the musk when I opened the basement door to let the cats up. I’m thinking that little stinker must have targeted the house. I just hope he/she doesn’t decide to stick around. 

Here are a couple links to some interesting skunk facts.

http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/skunk/

http://voices.yahoo.com/25-interesting-facts-skunks-6973600.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lsQfTaStcs

They are darn cute though, eh?

Sultry, and not the good kind

Did anyone besides me almost melt this past weekend? I live in the Northeast of USA, just about as north and east as you can get before hitting Canada, and it felt like the tropics. 

The worst part, in my opinion, was that the air   did   not   move. The Egyptians were on to something when they used large fans for cooling pharaohs and other mucky-mucks. As were all other cultures who made use of fans.

Is there a culture that doesn’t/didn’t use fans? Either hand-held or fixed?

If the air moves, you feel cooler. I’m sure there’s a physics lesson in there. I didn’t take physics in high school or college, so I’m stymied. Be that as it may, moving air is more pleasant than still air. I could live without air conditioning, but I’d suffer terribly without a fan. So, who else melted last weekend?

Allergy season approaches.

And to that end, old-fashioned handkerchiefs, aka hankies, may be making an appearance in my life. I’ve been thinking about them for a while now, given my love of reading historical romances. Everyone has a hankie in those stories, from the large, white squares of the gentlemen, to the dainty, embroidered bits of linen of the ladies.

With spring around the corner, and the advent of pollen, I predict an increased need for a moisture collector.

In my hunt through the sewing cupboard for buttons for my recently finished knitting project (huzzah!) I came across a box of handkerchiefs that had belonged to my mother-in-law. The box itself is a piece of history – shallow, with a hinged lid and a quilted cover. Something you’d leave on top of your dressing table so a fresh hankie would always be at hand.

Anyway, I pawed thru the collection of hankies and became lost in the patterns of the printed cloth, the delicate lace edging and fine embroidery. Some of the hankies would be suitable for only a tear. Literally one tear, with no nasal involvement at all. Others would hold up to a few good blows.

 So I’m thinking of giving a few of the hardier variety a launder and a press, and tucking a couple into my handbag.  So much classier than digging a wadded up and tattered paper tissue from my pocket, don’t you think?

When I'm not writing, I'm knitting.

I'm so close to the end of knitting my sweater, I can taste it.

Not really, I've yet to chew on the yarn. Bruno-the-cat quite often attempts to eat the strands as he plays along with me - it's evident that I'm having great fun playing with all that yarn. And there are two sticks to bat at, and catch, and chew the ends of. Of course he wants to play too! Mogget-the-cat doesn't get involved until I lay the work down, and then she promptly claims it as her bed.

The picture is of the two sleeves, worked at the same time, so I won't have to walk with a weird slouch to camouflage any row counting mistakes.

Not that I make mistakes. Nope.

I've four inches to knit on the sleeves, then I assemble the parts (back, two fronts [it's a cardigan], sleeves). At that point I'll pick up stitches along the neckline (oy!) and knit a shawl collar.

By the way, my favourite colour is purple.