Happy Halloween

This is my third year of celebrating the Day of the Dead.  This year's innovation is  a slightly elevated altar.  There is some candy in case some ghosts and goblins come to the door. Perhaps I'll also have to gobble some of it up myself.  Happy Halloween, dear readers.

Water over the dam

We've been having rain!  The lake is spilling over...

I've been thinking about my carbon footprint, which I can't photograph, so, after splashing in some puddles, I took this:

The persimmons are orange-ing up:

 

Here is the first to ripen. Yum!

Madam Spider, perhaps disguising herself as a persimmon?  She used to be yellowish.

Lately I've been working on the farmcloth, hoping to finish soon.  Here are some details...the edges are nearly all done, then I have to back it with flannel.  At first the denim was trying my patience, but now I take each stitch slowly and individually; not surprisingly, we're getting along better!

The Watusi

Well, last weekend we had another big adventure.  First, Agnes had her portrait made by our photographer friend and former student Dorothy:

Then, we went out to the farm to celebrate yet ANOTHER birthday, this time Farmer Kat's:

Here is her  stitched card (sorry, the colors aren't very accurate) with lots of special indigo fabric from Glennis and with some fabric weaving as learned from Jude and a picture of the donkeys as printed by the Pixeladies:

And THEN, we all went for a ride to see The Watusi!  He is a special breed of bull, which originated in Africa, who is presently living in a field with the Texas Longhorns.  I hope I am not stretching my credibility too far, but we saw this amazing beast with all of our eyes...no photoshopping!

And here, in case this brings back dancing memories, is the Watusi song:

Moving through reality.

Here is Agnes deciding to go home with me rather than with the group of less shaggy dogs who are more or less in her size range.   Since this picture was taken some of her hair was shaved off to help with a skin problem.  She asked me not to include a picture of that.

This is a small cloth I started when it looked like my beautiful sunflower was not going to last very long, due to the sly, cheeky squirrel.  (I was right.)  But it's been fun working on this...the base is made of silk batting with a layer of gauze on top.  I've been incorporating ideas from Jude's workshops. There's a long way to go still.

This is the sunflower now.  Sigh.  That's Molly the dove in the background.

It's a long story, but before my return to sewing, I spent many years creating images on the computer. They turned into a series that revolved around a horse character, O.P. (Opie)  I used to sell them at Farmers' Markets, but not lately.  SO!  I'm going to try putting some of them in the Mostly Threads Shop. Perhaps the Nurse Series will also become cards.  We'll see how it goes, but here's a picture of the first one, in its cellophane package; it's in the shop.

The Mystery of the Sneaky Harvester

Yesterday, I went out to the farm in the Valley and passed a field of pumpkins, waiting to be picked:

Today, I was working a little on this:

 

and this:

When suddenly I looked up at the apple tree, and saw THIS lying on a branch:

Then, looking over at my beautiful sunflower, my first EVER, I saw this:

Someone has been harvesting my sunflower!  Maybe it was that cheeky squirrel who quarrels with Agnes. Or maybe it was the crow who hides out in the liquidamber tree singing strangely percussive chants.

Whatever it is, I thought I better quick put up a couple of photos of my sunflower whilst it is still partially around.  Here it is as a very very young sunflower blossom:

And here is what is thankfully still there:

Happy October dear readers.