Weaving, wool and wild turkeys

On this day of Equinox and Full Moon, after reading Jude's posting about weaving, I noticed many many web weavings in my neighbor's yard.  The spiders had been busy...almost every available space was  taken...a mine field for flying insects.  The webs glistened in the sunlight like gossamer dinner plates.  Here is one:

Baa baa black sheep:

Then, I went to visit the pigs and chickens and geese at the Little Farm nearby, but they were all inside for the night. The wild turkeys were stopping by to see what they could glean.  Here are some feathers:

And here is a turkey portrait; she has stirred up the pebbles with her beautiful feet, hoping for some leftover seeds:

Happy Autumn, everyone...

Wild creatures and the farm cloth

While strolling through the park one day, I photographed this duck because he looked so funny and squat.

Then this fellow and I startled one another at a curve in the path...he bounded off and we considered each other at a safer distance...

I'm making the farm cloth for my farm friends and this week I added their house and began to applique their pictures on...

Alex, upper left, is 96 now.  This week his older sister Louise died.  She was a very dear friend.  Although she was 98, good-byes are hard.  The family is gathering now for the memorial...

These fish are appliqued to the bottom of the farm cloth.  Alex has fought hard for California farmers water rights.

A pansy, a parade and a beast

This year I managed to grow some flowers.  This pansy plant is still hanging on despite the cool summer we've had.

Today is the day of the annual street fair nearby...thousands of people come from all over to walk up and down Solano Avenue.  There's a parade...

The music continues all afternoon, with bands stationed at fairly close intervals...the sounds and rhythms all merge and swirl around in my little back yard.  The delicious food smells also waft about temptingly.  I could not resist...why even try?

Here is the bumblebeast...I started him before learning from Jude about patchwork beasts, and yesterday, feeling I was neglecting him, I added some stitching.  Oh and the nurses have been getting restless, so I put a couple of them in the shop...

Three creatures

The highlight of this week was a trip to the Honkey Donkey Farm...we saw many many miniature donkeys...they are very sweet creatures, healthy and quite affectionate.  Although they are small, they bray like a big donkey, and that is probably the main reason it wouldn't be wise for me to have one here.  Well, the flies would also be a problem, and it would be better to have two, so they wouldn't get lonesome.  So, it doesn't look like any mini-donks are going to be living here, but here's a photo anyway, thanks to my friend Susan, who invited me on this wonderful outing and took the picture:

And here is a baby spotted mini-donk:

I'll bet you knew this was coming...here is the Spotted Pony...he is floating down the Nile:

(not finished yet, but coming along)

Switching gears

Yesterday we drove out to visit my dear friends at the farm.  Lunch is always amazing but this corn particularly so.  It was so sweet and so Yellow...I wish I could capture the color...pure sunshine.  Oh my!

I pulled off the road on the way home to take this picture or maybe just to linger a little longer. It's looking west in the Central Valley toward the Coastal Mountains.

Am going to get back to work for a while on the Farm Cloth...here's the project:

And here's another one that I stitched on the train going East and need to do some more work on.  It's of a mysterious island nearby:

So life is not boring, but all that driving is kind of tiring and here's Agnes at the end of the day:

What, more nurses??

Yes, a couple more, at least for now.  This first one is the Queen of the Nice Nurses.  I'm working a little bit with faces, thinking how important they are, and how changeable, like the seasons.

And this one is called " 'You'd make my job a whole lot easier if you'd take your meds." nurse'.  I'm not sure how to punctuate that.  I was working on this in my doctor's waiting room and someone asked me about it, so in the course of the conversation, I mentioned the title...a couple of the patients looked a little alarmed, or embarrassed, but the woman who'd asked about it, I think she was a caretaker herself,  nodded her head.  It's not completed yet and includes some hand-dyed fabric from Heike's shop.

Update on the Nurses

Here is Nurse #1.  She's almost done...just needs something around the edges.

And here is Off Duty Nurse.  She's been having a good time and just needs a little more stitching and a cover-up for the back.  There's another Nurse in the works...maybe two, and I'll do a new posting really soon, I think. 

I've been experimenting with the font size, wanting it to be easy to read...so far there haven't been any complaints, but I'd welcome feedback...

Enjoy these last few days of summer everyone...:)