This and That Through the Unplanned Blog Break

If you follow along on Instagram, you may have seen that I ended up having my gallbladder removed almost two weeks ago.  So the feeling sick before and recovery after stopped the blogging world.  That, and kids home for the summer!  This is a post surgery selfie with my little girls. (And, I'm doing great post surgery now)

A brief Tank Garden update:

Of course this space needs some attention.  So it goes.

I found a great variety of herbs in the garden shops this year so added the three rusty buckets you see here in front of my other herb tank.  Plus, I have herbs scattered in other tanks and baskets too.  I so enjoy smelling them.  (And, using them!)  I have a jar of tea dried so far and should begin to harvest some basil.

This guy was visiting the garden last night.  He still has duck weed on his shell from the pond, that's quite a trek he made!

And, I didn't see when this visitor was in the garden, but he left me a gift.

Chamomile and annual baby's breath.  

Our little girls each wanted their own space in the garden this year and I caught this one in quite a stoic gaze as she took a break from hoeing.  (She wasn't the most effective hoer, but she tried!)

On a side note:  Those overalls were thrifted  a number of months ago for her to alter into a skirt as a 4h project.  When she put them on, she loved them and didn't want to cut them up!  So, we went back to the thrift store and found a skirt to convert to a bag. The skirt is way too big for her so no worry of her wanting to keep it, ha!

4H update:

Our club went on a tour of a small cheese factory and a produce farm.  I just loved seeing all the lush vegetables growing there.

These are cucumbers being trained up vertically and they had tomatoes being trained the same way.

Beautiful leafy lettuce.  (He said it was actually too big now and was going to be pulled out)

He sent us a head of this leafy lettuce home.  

You can see the gorgeous cabbages here I posted on Instagram.

(Our vegetable garden looks pathetic compared to this farm! Oh well, I still enjoy it.)

A shot from the cheese factory.  The smell was a bit overwhelming and one of my girls had to go out, so I didn't get the whole tour.  I think it'd be interesting to try once to make cheese at home.

You can see in this Instagram photo that we are underway with some 4h projects.

Update from the sewing room:

I played a little with some scraps.  All of it is still works in progress though.

A Family Update:

My second to the youngest turned 10 on Monday, so Sunday we went to Omaha to celebrate her birthday and Father's Day with lunch out, a movie, and then cookies and presents at a cafe.

My daughter and granddaughter came for the day yesterday and we sorted buttons!  I had just picked some up at a garage sale that morning.  When I asked my granddaughter if she remember what we did with buttons one time she was here, her face lit up and she said "lined them up!"

All the photos are from my phone.  Sometimes that's all you have time for....what a blessing to have that convenience though.

I hope you are enjoying your summer and that you don't attach too many expectations to it.  I have to work on that every summer...to let go of too many expectations. 

I hope you all are well!

Moss: Up Close and Personal

All on a stick about 1 1/2 feet long on my back step. I put it there as I liked the way it looked and all this extra moss grew.  A little world of beauty that you could almost miss. :)

Have  a great weekend!

Depends on How You Look At It

I asked my husband to cut me some peonies from the farm last Friday.  I'd forgotten there were even bushes up there and hadn't really seen them in bloom.  I was so excited for a bouquet of them.  When he brought them home I have to admit I was a bit disappointed.  They are a single petal variety and really were just floppy and not very pretty.  I had them in various stages of open-ness and am trying to keep some buds in the refrigerator to see if they can be stored.  Just for fun.

But, as the day went on they began to open and although not gorgeous blooms, it was really fun to watch them open.  And, now fully open and dropping their petals, they were fun to play with.

I found some garden fairies in those blooms!  When I asked my younger daughters what they saw on my board, they both said "flowers"....huh?  And, then I realized they were looking at them from the other side.

They did indeed see flowers with yellow root balls.  :)

So I asked them what else they could imagine and one pulled a little bloom from the chamomile I also had in a vase and said:

"A little fairy microphone!"

Three fairy microphones!  The other two fairies were way to shy to sing with theirs.

And, as I was putting petals in jars....some were shaped like hearts! They were a little darker than the others and really photographed darker.

Jars of flower parts.

I'm hoping we can experiment with dying fabric with these flower parts.  The yellow stamens are so bright! I know nothing about dying fabric and want to just boil some water, pour over the pieces, throw in my fabric, and see what happens.  But, I should probably do a little research first. Or not.

And, of course I have no idea if I can keep these in a jar for later use.  I assume so, but maybe they will mold.  We'll see.

I welcome any advice on using them for dye.

So, that not so pretty bouquet actually ended up bringing lots of enjoyment!