I'm happy to announce that my dear friend Louise has at long last finished knitting her first pair of socks in many a long year. Yay, Louise! Since you've already seen part of this project, I insisted on photographing them, both on and off her feet. I know they look rather square rather than particularly foot-shaped, but in fact they fit her perfectly. She obviously has feet shaped like my dear husband's.
Aren't they great? I'm really pleased for her, and even more pleased that she's since embarked on pair number two. The yarn is a Noro, I think, though I don't know what kind.
I took these photos as we sat together chatting under a willow by the soccer field and I couldn't resist taking some photos of the magnificent old tree. I've never had a close relationship with a willow and our yard is too dry to support one.
So beautiful.
At this time of the year, trees become so much more than part of the landscape: they become critical to one's well-being because of their gift of shade.
Last weekend, my dear husband and I had to spend a day in town to pick up new glasses and do other errands, one of which was to visit the farmer's market. I couldn't resist a snap of this colour hit.
Or this one, in a hanging basket beside the irrigation store.
Rather than stand in line at a local restaurant, we decided to buy a picnic lunch at the grocery store and take it to the city Park for a picnic. We were on the river, but you can't see it here.
The maples lining the path were again a welcome source of shade. As I sat on the park bench, I tipped my head back and took this shot overhead. I just love the intense, glowing greens of backlit leaves. And dappled light is pretty wonderful too.
Another reason for our trip to town was so that dh could scout out good places to put his pontoon boat into the river in order to fish. This was one good candidate.
The mock orange in the foreground is just a tiny bit of the profusion of blooms of this lovely scented shrub that we found everywhere as we drove around. Back up on the road, mock orange cascaded down through the trees.
And look at this lovely purple vetch, growing along the dirt road and the railroad tracks out by the old Doukhobour settlement east of town.
This was another good place, though not on this side of the river. Fortunately, the highway runs close to the river on the other side and access is easy (that's the Trans Canada Trail you can see running parallel to the river). As dh pointed out, this must be a favourite swimming hole, given the path that's been worn in the bank down to the water.
We ended our day out by driving up the Granby River, one of the two rivers that meet in Grand Forks (hence the name of the town). We crossed here, at Hummingbird Bridge.
And came back across the river at the next bridge up. The bridge gave me a great vantage point from which to enjoy the dappled light on the water.
We came home through the bush along the Brown Creek - Eholt road, most of which was once a railroad bed. A good day out.
The next day was another "town outing," this time to Kelowna. We didn't take any photographs but we did take advantage of the weekend sale at Opus, browsed through Mosaic Books, a great independent bookstore that has survived the competition of a large big box bookstore up the highway, and took a look at the OASIS annual juried art show hung at the Rotary Centre for the Arts, a marvellous facility. My dear husband had two paintings hanging in the show, and we were pleased that they showed well. Of course we absent-mindedly left the camera in the car but it doesn't really matter because I showed both the paintings here last month (the rainbow trout and the fisherman at Waterton Falls).
Still, it was a relief to get back to our green and quiet yard, to walk in the woods after dinner and listen to the birds, the dogs' panting, our feet scuffing through the undergrowth, and the breeze in the trees. I'm thrilled that once again the pond has produced a crop of frogs. I try to approach the pond quietly (good luck with that, what with the dogs plunging into the water) and I'm usually rewarded by spotting at least one frog. Can you see it? Neither could I, for several minutes, and then suddenly I could.
It's in almost the exact centre of the photo, between two clumps of grass, just below the edge of the water. He (or she) never moved, despite my changing my position to get a better view.
It's nice to find the tracks of wildlife, such as these deer tracks, in the margins of the pond. One of the reasons we increased the size of the pond was the hope that we would attract more wildlife, and that certainly seems to be happening.
We are growing a magnificent crop of buttercups in the damp north of the pond.
Since I took these photos, it's turned blazing hot here, as it has for much of southern BC. My studio is an oven by early afternoon, so I retreat to the house, where dh is usually at his easel working on another painting. Because we are a very low tech house (as you may recall, our only source of heat is our wood stove), we don't have air conditioning, so we're grateful that a deep porch on the south side of the house combined with lots of trees means the house stays more or less comfortable even on the hottest days.
But the heat reminds me that years ago I made a summery sort of quilt that I gave to my sister, and it occurs to me that I've never shown it here. You'll see a strong link between this one and the Stripes and Stars quilt I showed you a few weeks ago: both of them use a collection of blue and white striped shirting fabrics as a foil for brighter and more complex patterns. And you may also remember my Circus quilt, where I used a background of these fabrics to set off Dresden Plate blocks from vintage pieces of fabric I found at the thrift store.
Here you can see the pieced backing (and Sass in her salad days).
I quilted it with a floral design that I dreamt up, and I'm happy with how it turned out. I enjoyed sewing the smooth curves and didn't find the backtracking for the veins in the petals at all difficult.
I was in a Kaffe Fassett frame of mind when I put this quilt together, and this was exactly the kind of cheerful mashup of florals I enjoyed in some of his quilts and wanted to end up with in my own. To my mind, the crisp white and blue strips set off the florals perfectly. I'm pleased that my dear sister has been using this quilt ever since I gave it to her. She is, however, long overdue for another one, so I've been working on a palette of fabrics that might suit her spare room. Now we just have to get together to muse over the possibilities.
And I have to start getting up earlier so that I can get some serious studio time before the heat of the day. Ah, summer.
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