Gone To The Beach

Friday, May 5, 2023

May or November

Good afternoon. On this cold day the light so autumnal---sullen grey clouds lately with intermittent bursts of rain.

The Japanese maple is the first tree here to produce leaves, brilliant Fall red when the sun peeps out to light the dark maroon into Pantone Color of the Year Magenta. Mo and I have been visiting this tree for all his nine years, watching it grow quickly from a knee-high sprout.

Add in the chilly air and wind, spooky full moon hovering behind wispy black clouds ---and it all just feels like Autumn. Not that I mind! Fall here is usually hot and sunny, so a bit of November in May makes me happy. I even picked up jackolantern seeds for a little girl who is making her first garden this spring with her daddy. Wouldn't it be fun if a pumpkin for her to carve actually grows.

Indoors the house has morphed to blue and white. The blue striped textile on the coffee table was a gift from a friend who said it is handwoven vintage Japanese indigo fabric, gifted to her from a Japanese friend.

And I'm adding flowers everywhere.

Trader Joe's still or again has hyacinths, maybe early Mothers Day?

Sidewalk snippets after last weekend's storm.

More blues for my lizzys_blues hashtag #lizzys_blues on Instagram. Mr Woebegone has the blues! Waiting for his walk despite the rain.

Wish list blues for my brother, if he gets to Springfield Extravaganza show in a few weeks:

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In the little quilt room: I am waiting for more blue plaids to arrive for borders. Started the inner border's words.

And here is my Sun: "Here come the sun, dadadada..."

Have a great weekend.

love

lizzy

gone to the beach...

Flower Moon, after the clouds cleared at midnight yesterday:

With ships and planes. The ships are anchored 10 miles out to sea, awaiting their turn to dock in NY Harbor to the right.

Fun outing to a tiny Italian deli, always has yummy pics on Instagram. We order their antipasto platters for special holidays sometimes. The original store burned down during Covid lockdown. They stayed in business by delivering pizzas to the local beach clubs and catering for [carefully distanced] outdoor meals during the pandemic. The new shop is tiny but the food is delish. They are even expanding soon to have a bakery and small eat-in area next door. It's great to see a business determined to succeed and doing well. Oooh that eggplant rollatini, yum!

This is the nature/ seasons book that the May header of this post was taken from. Fun though very out of sync w the beach seasons here, as it was written by an Englishwoman. Lovely illustrations, I think are linocut prints.

I'm in love with these pansies, from second batch I bought.

Must try to save seeds though have never raised pansies from seed.

Saturday, April 29, 2023

April Showers & Miscellany

Good morning! It's April still, so no surprise it is freezing cold [40*s], very windy, and pouring rain. Just now I peeked out, steeling myself for Mo's walk, and noticed a large fat Mr Robin hopping about in the rain, looking for worms I guess.

Mo and I were hoping to find a dandelion in bloom for my new perpetual nature journal, but I don't think that's going to happen. Mostly because dandelions are ferociously removed on the small lots of public lawns near me. I do see my neighbor has a few in his tomato plot, maybe he will share? [web pic/ inspiration, below]

Journals update:

Earlier April scribble journal was more collage and pressed leaves than drawings. "It is what it is...," as my old production guy would mutter, explaining why that dress has three sleeves, one carefully and neatly sewed into the neck, hahaha.

rough draft from notebook.

The second page for April is drawings.

I do need to step up my bird drawing ability if I am going to include them.

rough draft:

Often the reason I draw the scribble sketches is to remind myself of things I want to mention on my blog. Here you can see Mr Sparrow and his giant feather that I described last week.

I thought you might like seeing where I stash these little pages:

Other pages may be random collages of important to me quotes and ideas I want to take note of.

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Perpetual Journal....some random recent pages and their inspirations.

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Recent pocket treasures. The dime is 1975. Not sure if that is ''old'' or not as I rarely have coins or look at their dates unless I find them on the street.

Finding coins supposedly means a ''departed loved one'' is spiritually nearby.

Huh. Mom?

I'm pretty sure my dad isn't tossing out money from the Beyond, he was, politely---a frugal man.]

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Despite Covid's resurgence here, I have been getting out now and then. Trader Joe's for flowers and cheese.

For color and profusion even out of focus. Some woman shoved my cart/ me.

Quick stop at Home Goods to get a small gift for a friend and some shelf paper, but no. Its Messy Hallmark Store look is still going strong.

Sweet glass birds but either not plant stakes or not hens:

Still wishing for a yellow hen.

These tall skinny mercury glass vases were very cool. Tall as my knee or more but slim. I had no use for them but kinda wish I'd bought one. $12.99.They were not only silvered but weathered and rough like seaglass.