Fall Garden Peeping

Hello everyone! It's a gorgeous sunny breezy day today. Let's get out of the sewing room, office, the kitchen---no closet cleaning today! (Okay I admit I did a smidge of closet cleaning earlier. Mel and I have a project! Had to find my beads...).

November is one of my favorite months here. It's usually so autumn-y, like how we expect October to be. Crisp days, chilly nights, lovely for sleeping, but not cold enough for flannel sheets. Apples and cheese--brie, cheddar, Stilton?, white wine, hot Earl Grey tea. Scents of cinnamon and clove, even woodsmoke. One of the neighbors must have lit their fireplaces.

We're a bit short on beautiful red and orange trees, tall leafy trees are rare here, just pines and shrubs. The color comes in the marsh's verges, red creeper and poison ivy, orange bittersweet, amber plumes on the phragmites, school bus yellow golden rod. Now and then a hint of lavender peeks out, the fall marsh asters are blooming.
But today is not a marsh walk day, instead we'll take Mo and amble around, see what's blooming in the neighbors' gardens.

The grass is still so green. These pics were taken while we were training Mo to wear his costume last week.

Checking out the beach alley. The tiny marigold hedges are at their best now.

My friends' dahlias finally have bloomed.

Roses and begonias, happy at last.

Morning glories thrive in the cooler weather. I think these are called Flying Saucer. Must have next year, maybe I can harvest some seeds?

Volunteer MGs abound. The climate is too harsh here by the ocean, though; they won't become invasive.

And what are these adorable tiny brown-eyed yellow morning glories? Very cute, a climbing vine

The ornamental grasses are in the glory days. The seed heads nod and glow in low amber sunshine.

The hydrangeas like the rain we finally had, looking very pretty in in mostly shades of old rose and bronze.

A few confused bushes sporting bright midsummer blue.

I snipped some heads here and there, with permission, of course. They'll dry in my crocks all Fall.

Now let's swing by Mo's bench, a five minute rest, a treat, a drink of water. I have cheese and peanut butter crappy crackers in my pocket, and a few of Mo's ''healthy'' treats.

Say hello, to the Kitties at the house being reno'd....

Back home Mo must try on his winter clothes. Oh the humiliation! Will things still fit? Or have we outgrown our clothes? We all know that season change dread and sympathize.

Mo's Puppias and Bumble Bee sweater fit but he is a big boned Pug, with a broad chest.
Later we found a last hour of sunshine to sit on the deck and sew and/ or chew on a toy.

I watched that solo sailboat all afternoon. He was either becalmed or out of gas, or just having a lazy day.

The sunset comes too soon but is beautiful.

You'd know it was November even if like Snow White you suddenly opened your eyes after a hundred years.

Tonight's candle scent is "London", scented of black tea and bergamot. Lovely. Mo is snuggled now with his new dolly, Smelly the Skunk. Poor Smelly has no stuffing, but his tail crinkles. lol.

Goodnight!

love

lizzy

gone to the beach...

PS We also have visited the Goose Family recently. Sadly they were dressed for football, instead of Halloween. And yeah, Baby is naked again...

Summer Porch (P2) Sewalong Update.

Hi! Oh it was hard to tear myself away from Lori [Humble Quilts]'s new doll quilt project...

...and refocus on her full sized quilt sewalong that we've been working on for maybe six months now. This month's P2 assignment was pretty big! One large block and some filler blocks, AND we were supposed to sew together the entire lower third of the quilt. Wow. I did it!

But before I show you my project I want to share this darling kitty made by my blog friend Lise.

Lise is somewhat modest and says she is not a trained needlewoman, but I think her work is exceptional! The Kitty is from P1, A Little Porch Time, by Lynda Hall; we made it here online in 2013. Lise made only her kitty, with wool applique and embroidery. The Tree and Autumn Leaves are her own design. I love the whimsy, and the texture of all those french knots.

Back to P2~
Here is my lower third section.

This time I was extra careful, measured, measured,and trimmed before sewing and the parts went together better than my usual hair-pulling disaster.[Just goes to show, that old ''measure twice, cut once'' works well if handled with patience.]

I took the section of the quilt outside for good pictures, good colors. Howling wind, note the 35 mph gusts. And the weather station is on the mainland, so picture right here on the oceanfront.

...but it looks so pretty. I am pleased.

This month's large applique block [left, above the watermelon] was a big birdhouse with an even bigger bird. That didn't appeal to me, so I drew up my own idea, drawing on memories of summery porch days with my best friend Anne. We'd be so excited when the Bookmobile would bring us books! We'd sit on the front porch of her big yellow Victorian house and pore over each week's stack of new books. Anne was older---we were maybe 7 and 9 or so?--- but I was the best reader, so we read more or less the same things.

Besides reading books on her porch [my house had no porch], I remember her mom making us lemonade or KoolAid, and funny bland lemon wafer cookies. We played a lot of jacks, too. And later cards, board games. My mom didn't approve of games like that so it was an exciting thing for me. Last night as I sewed my quilt together I had fun remembering those long ago hot summer afternoons---the porch was shady and cool, with a dark green painted cement floor--- and I looked up our street on Google Streetview. Haha, her house was pretty, but NOT a big Victorian after all.

Small bunglow in real life. It did have the extension of the porch and a bathroom in the upstairs dormer with the round window, but otherwise it was / is exactly the same as the small house I grew up in. My dad added a lot to this house, so it got bigger than it looks, maybe. And it now has a small porch! Both are still pretty, to me anyway.

So my substitute block for P2 is a stack of books, with one of my kitties sitting on the top. Her name was Polka Dot [aka Pokey],

I loved her dearly. She was tamer than my other two male tomcats, though I loved them too of course. The design of the books block was inspired by the border of a Gwennie Medallion Quilt [project also by Lori, she's a busy lady!], the border was designed by a French quilter named Katell Renon. Katell kindly gave me permission to use her idea/ design for my quilt. [Merci, Katell!].

I waffled around about how to make the book titles: hand embroider, machine embroider? Computer printed titles? Books I loved back then, or, lasting lurking memories like Moby Dick or Bleak House, eeew? In the end I used words printed on the selvages of fabrics in my stash. This appealed to my found object/ serendipitious finds mind set the most. I even found a Lizzie's Journal.

Pokey I simply drew from watching my feral cats here, the Twins.

I gave Pokey a star to wish on, instead of having her facing the Bird on the Basket.

Then there were the spacers, to the right of the Books. I added a small Basket to the line-up, the pattern called for just a blank square.

Fun and summery, isn't it? But instead of summer, outside we had the high winds, blowing flocks of tiny birds overhead. Some rain, and finally cooler.

cold front coming in

Mo is snuggly, the beach is turning golden. Dinner will be pork chops with cinnamon apples, Thai coconut rice, steamed Fall asparagus. The apples sauteeing in their pan smell delicious.

Hope your weekend was wonderful too.

love

lizzy

gone to the beach...

Post script~ Anne and I stayed best friend always, through grade school and high school, different colleges, and family moves. Her dad introduced us to antique shows, took us always even as very tiny girls where we'd ooh and aaah over the French and German be'be' dolls and Civil War era ''ear bobs'', like Scarlett O'Hara wore. I admired Anne because she could sing and played the piano, was even taller than I was, and her mom sewed.  I designed and made Anne's wedding dress, and a gingham rainbow [Trip Sround the World?] quilt for her baby daughter. She and her husband renovated an old schoolhouse for their home; they raced dog sled husky dogs. Separated by time and different lifestyles, we wrote often. We never forgot each other.
She was the best friend ever.
Sadly Anne passed away in her early thirties, a young wife and mother, felled by brain cancer. She fought well, though; she had a happy , optimistic soul.
I loved her. The Kitty and Books block is for Anne.

Be sure to see everyone's quilts on Lori's Blog: Humble Quilts