Archive | June 2024

This year…

Jun17

Is it just me or is this year even stranger than the last few? Weather wise it’s more than halfway thought June. 40 years ago the last frost date for our area was June 1, a few years back it jumped back a month to May 1. Yesterday and tonight we have frost warnings, all the frost sensitive plants are already in the garden! I can only hope they have exaggerated this warning. But it is cold this morning. Well, I am getting old, 46 is a long way from freezing but I was almost thinking of building a fire this morning! lol Instead I just bundled up in housecoat, afghan, and a warm purring cat on my lap! After a couple cups of coffee I was warmed up a bit so managed to get dressed and make breakfast which warmed up the kitchen, too. Sour dough French toast & applesauce. It was good. Himself drowns his in syrup, of course. I like a little real maple syrup now and then but rarely buy it because he does, too, and I hate it when his plate comes back to the kitchen with a pool of expensive syrup on it, so he gets the cheap stuff. He doesn’t care, he just likes a lot of sweet. My applesauce I make with apples and a bit of water and it’s plenty sweet. But now I need to make bread again!

Yesterday I got the patchwork yoke assembled. Today I have to full it in the washer and hope it does not shrink too much! It’s kitchen cotton so that hope is slim. It’s the first time I’ve used that for this project. It’s a little on the heavy side, too. It may not work so I’m not sure what will happen then. I hope it does, I’ve got these two shirts that I bought a few years ago for this purpose and they as still waiting. It’s not that I don’t have plenty of demo woven 7″ squares I could use. It’s just one of those things I’ve been putting off.  I wove these squares out of Rosy’s stash while I was up there. Something to do in the evening while she slept. So probably not a rational choice for this project, but it’s done now. I’ll let you know how/if it works!

Our fellow residence was back this morning for an easy breakfast of pumpkin seeds. These Stellar Jays have been nesting in the trees and bushes at this cabin since before we bought it from Randy’s dad who bought it from his grandparents. Their line may even go back to the gold mining days of yore! We enjoy watching the young ones grow up. I can’t tell one from another but I know they are mostly ‘our’ babies. Some people don’t like them, say they are noisy and chase off other birds but there was a pair of new comers, Robins, the other day trying to chase the jays off!  And if the grackles are nesting around the yard or garden, you’d better watch your head and they will try to run everybody off, no matter species! lol And the jays have personality & like crows and ravens are quite smart. We don’t have crows here and we try to discourage the ravens who only come around in the spring when there are nests to rob. Yeah, everybody has to eat, but they can forage in someone else’s yard.

Randy is cleaning the cabin this morning, brought me a pile of sheets and towels. The young men who just rented for the weekend had a great day fishing in the lake on Saturday morning and headed to Whiskeytown Sat afternoon to try there and nearly had a disaster.  A hot rodding boater nearly ran them down in their kayaks. He swerved at the last minute just barely missing one but his bow wake swamped them and he kept going. I call that hit and run! They lost equipment, including  the drivers car keys, into the lake. We were concerned when they didn’t come back that night but got a message later that they were okay but stranded. They came back up Sunday afternoon, we offered them another night as it was not their fault they missed one but they declined as they both have jobs but said they’d be back. Our cabin guests usually say what an interesting time they’ve had here but  it is not usually as “exciting” as that! They’d better stay with Trinity Lake, now that it has water again!

Well, it’s nearly 9:30 am so I guess I’d better get started on my Monday.  I seem to be blogging more now that I don’t have Rosy to email with. I still find myself wondering when she’ll be back from her “trip”. It’s weird. But my other sis and my daughter have been emailing and I do enjoy hearing from them.

It’s warming up a bit out there but the wind is blowing again. It’s cold enough that Katt has come back in. He usually spends most of the day out and only comes in to snack and at dinner time. So it’s not just us old ones who think it is cold for June!

      

Hope you’re staying warm. But not too warm!

Hazel

 

It’s June already

Jun8

Well, this month didn’t start out well, with sis dying on the 7th. Ten days before her 78th birthday. The day she shares with my son’s 56th. Well, life does not go as it ought, does it?

But we went to Fiber Fusion in Monroe, Washington, and did well. I taught two classes and had 15 students altogether, all of them quite enthused about learning to weave and learning more about weaving on their square looms. Marion, who is vendor chair, took time off from her busy days to take both! Thank you Marion, I’m glad you found the time for some fun in all your hard work for us!!

 

The trip went well except for a couple small adventures. Every trip needs at least one of those, right? On the way up there was a loud crash-bang and we were showered with glass! I thought we’d been shot at! Randy pulled off the freeway and we discovered that a tiedown strap had broken and the buckle had hit the back window of the truck. It took out the whole drivers side slider. So we ended up with a garbage bag and some cardboard as a back window for the rest of the trip. And sometime during the return trip the brakes started malfunctioning. They worked, but not like he thought they should but we made it home safely and when he took it in to the shop yesterday they found the problem and fixed it. On the way home he ordered the new window, so we ought to be back in working order before Black Sheep Gathering the end of this month.  The only other thing of note was that when we left Monroe it was 63degrees and raining. when we got to Coffee Creek it was 99 and bright sunlight! But we’re adjusting!

We stopped at sis’s on the way home. I promised to help BIL with Rosy’s stuff. Started cleaning out her pantry. Rosy was a adventurous cook and there are products and seasonings that he will never use, some even I had never heard of. I brought some home  and some will be offered to his neighbor who has been cooking for him now and then but what David doesn’t want will be offered to the food pantry. And I picked up a fleece that I want to get ready to try to sell at BSG. There are a LOT of fleeces, Rosy was a Spinner. I loved that as I got a lot of very nice yarn. She knit and wove some but spinning was her first love. She was generous with her yarn, too. Her wheel is a Schacht Matchless double treadle and she has all the accessories to go with it. She has even more things to go with it than I guessed! And she has an Ashford traditional as well. We’ll have to pick up the wheel on our way up to Albany as the trailer was full on the way home. I still need to deal with her clothes, too. I’m putting that off. So if any of you are interested in these wheels and are going to be close enough to pick them up at one of the shows, let me know. I’ll figure out a price meantime.

Since we got home we’ve also been working on the getting the garden in. It’s late this year. but it is what it is. Or will be. and yesterday a doe got in the yarn (somebody left a gate open) and ate off my prized and babied tomatoes so all I have left of this is a stalk with one leaf each. Not a happy camper! They may come back but very late. I started these from special seed and we took them along on the trip to make sure they got enough light and water. They were doing fine so I put them out in the yard in a partly sunny spot to harden off. Very not happy! But I got a lot of other things planted today. And pulled my kale. I just planted it this spring, had not gotten one cutting and it has gone to seed. It was a new variety but should not have done that, so I guess I’ll go back to my old one, if I can remember what kind that was.  I don’t think I saved any seed but maybe there’s a couple volunteers out there, I’ll look this evening once it cools off.

Okay, enough of The History of Our World Part I. I hope your summer is starting out better than ours and will continue in a happy state!

The yard got a bit overgrown while we were gone. It’s  not a traditional Lawn yard, anyway, it’s our meadow but still usually a bit neater than this! But everything is blooming and happy so I guess that’s okay.

 

On the right is where our houseplants spend the summer. Usually safe from marauding herbivores.