quilts, kids, and critters . . .

Still slogging away in the new un-normal.  I don't know about anyone else, but it all still feels so surreal. Work is normal (hours), so there's that, but nothing else feels the same.  Strange.

I've been working off and on in the Nook.  Our stitcher's group collaborated on a quilt for one of our ladies who's been diagnosed with breast cancer.  Everyone contributed blocks (á la Lori Holt), one of our very talented ladies (and one of my affirmation group besties -- Sarah) did the layout and made it into a marvelous flimsy, and another of our talented ladies quilted it. Then I got to do the binding on it!  I love doing binding!  The entire process is soothing.

Doesn't everyone stow their 'to be stitched down' binding like this?!  LOL! The quilt itself was scrappy, so I did a scrappy pink binding for it, which I'd never done before. I was really pleased with how it turned out!

And the quilt itself is a stunner.  I just adore this layout . . . 

My SASSY! group (Sweet Affirmation SisterS Yay! -- there are three of us; Sarah, Gail and me) is currently into sheep and lambs.  We share photos and videos of sheep (and all things Welsh & tea) and we're planning a field trip to local 1818 Farms to meet this pretty little thing . . .

Her name is Baby Girl and she was born this year.  So cute!! Anyway, one of us found a quilt advertised with sheep on it . . .

which (along with the heart quilt) prompted me to be inspired to create . . .

Bleating Hearts (EQ concept).  Coming soon to a Nook near me.  ♥

I'm missing my California crew.  They're able to get out and about a little bit.  Kim sent me this sweet shot of the kids berry picking . . .

I think they grow faster because I don't get to see them often enough.  Liv had her first tap recital this week . . .

Holy cow -- when did she turn 16?!?  She's a natural performer and I was able to see video from the show.  She stole it!! ♥

My local crew paid me a visit at work this week.  Since I knew they were coming, I was able to provide a little surprise . . .

Everyone loves petit fours, right?

Right!

Things have stayed very slow at the camp.  The majority of our summer bookings have cancelled, so it's been quiet.  On the human front, at least.  On the critter front, it's been pretty busy--probably because of the lack of humans?!  We've made friends with a grey fox couple (they mate for life), who visit regularly . . .

Aren't they beautiful? I want to pet them so badly.  They're my 'puppies'.  They have a den (or two) nearby, and I've seen kits, but they haven't brought them to the 'feeding station' yet.

We also see the raccoons pretty frequently, but this juvenile has decided to make himself very much at home.

LOL!  Brazen thing.  He spent three hours one afternoon hoovering up all the bird seed. In between rest stops.  Ha!

When he was finished, Mr. Squirrel came in as the clean-up crew.

I don't believe a single bird ate seed I put out that day.  #truth

Lastly, still working on my Peppermint Purple blackwork SAL.  I'm behind about twelve weeks, but still plugging along. 

I love the way the colors move through the designs; it's so pretty!

Keep on stitching!

:)

weekend wanderings . . .

Busy weekends and busier weeks (gearing up for our annual meeting at work) make for longer gaps between posts.  But I am pleased to note that I've surpassed last year's number of posts by five, with this post.  It's the little things, right??!

Todd and I did make time to take the boat out this past Friday. It was the first time I'd been out on our boat since prior to the surgery. I'd missed it ... but I was a little anxious about it, too.  Turns out I had nothing to worry about . . . except how many hexies I could baste up while Todd fished. What do you know?  Sunshine on my shoulder really *did* make me happy! (Thanks, John Denver.)

You can just make out one of my four shoulder surgery scars ... he glued them closed, so they're faint and hard to see, which also makes me happy.  ;)

It was a lovely day, and Todd had launched in a place I'd never been before, below the dam (Lake Guntersville). 

You can see the dam from behind us. It's pretty impressive and the launch is fairly easy. We Todd wanted to fish the bluffs, so that's where we headed.

Easily 100' or higher. But you can see where the fish were running the minnows! 

It was pretty exciting. Todd thought so especially . . . 

His final tally of the day was about 26. Mostly strip and spots.  It'll make good eating either way.

My final tally of hexies was 24 . . .

So I guess he won!  LOL!

But I was the one spotting all the waterfowl (and friends) as we tooled around and explored . . .

These buzzards (sitting on the rocks) were all hanging out for something we could smell but couldn't see. LOL!

Caught this heron mid-flight.  They were all over the place

And then we sited not one, but TWO bald eagles! Pretty cool.

Mid-afternoon, a small summer shower came up fast on us . . .

We rode it out and then enjoyed a really lovely afternoon.

About as pretty as can be!

Saturday morning I had a guild workshop ... which I'll (hopefully) share more about later.  I got home just in time for second half of the Alabama vs. Texas A&M game. It was a fairly comfortable game by this point, so I could sit (relatively) quietly and prep my next set of hexies . . . the last set . . . my yellows!  Roll Tide!  :)

After getting them all clipped, I even got a few basted.  The rest were my slow stitching for today.

I've got about a dozen more to baste, and then it's on to whipping them together.  I've really got to decide how I want to go about doing this.  I'm thinking I'll whip up the individual flowers, by color, first, and then put them together.  And I've finally settled on a name for this piece.  FINALLY!

Linking up to Kathy's Quilts Slow Sunday Stitching and the HeLP post over at Sarah Did It!

Have a great week ahead!

:)

turtle, turtle . . .

Generally, box turtles dig in and hibernate when the cooler temps arrive . . . but down here in the "Deep South", hibernation time happens a little later.  We're still having temps in the 70's (and sometimes close to the 80's) so we're still seeing turtles out and about in the sanctuary!  Wednesday was a gorgeous warm and sunny day and at one point there were sixteen (out of about twenty-something) walking around!  Thursday morning it was cooler and misty/rainy, but still we had turtles out!

Here's a panographic photo of the sanctuary . . .

Clicking on the photo will enlarge this one -- it's a really beautiful space.  We love to sit out in the screened room (on the left hand side) and have coffee and watch our turtle friends and just relax!

That Thursday morning we had one super-athlete turtle out and about.  When we first spotted him, he was doing laps in the pond . . .

When he climbed out, he climbed up the "beach" and headed straight up the rock waterfall.

You can do it!

BAM!

One of the things that I really love about the turtles is their ability to hide in plain sight.  Let me demonstrate:

Sometimes they're under ferns.

Sometimes their buried in leaves with their heads sticking up (watching me -- always watching me)!

Running the metal track.  Again . . . watching me.  Their necks are super long!

Under a log.  This is one their (and my) favorite spots!!

Under a limb . . . but if you look closely, you'll see he's really not *that* far in!

On *top* of a pile of leaves!  Really, I walked by this guy two or three times before I realized he was there!

Aren't they fun??  Daytime temps are supposed to stay mild through the next week, so I imagine we'll continue to see them out and about.  

Maybe they've got one more story in 'em before hibernation time!  This is one of our sweet little females -- she likes to be petted!  The males' eyes are strikingly red (go back up and look at our athlete turtle), while the females tend to have browner or duller eye color.  There was a lot of *activity* out in the sanctuary before things got really chilly, so maybe we'll have baby turtles next spring/summer??!!  And just so everyone knows, these are turtles, not tortoises.  The difference between the two is the turtle is a water critter and tortoises are land critters.  Box turtles are actually related to the water critters (hence our swimmer at the beginning of the post)!

Fear the Turtle!  (Reference??)

:)

summer camp life for the hosts . . .

What with the incredibly mild (albeit rainy) summer we've had, working outside has not been uncomfortable in the least! Which is really good -- especially for Todd, who's been working very diligently on a prototype project since he retired. We have one trail in particular, that we'd really like to turn into an educational trail -- one that can be used not just for scout troops, but also for school field trips.  

A trail with tree markers and bird houses and that sort of thing . . . as well as a turtle sanctuary up at the pavilion.  We'd seen a small one at the local Botanical Gardens -- in the Butterfly House -- and thought it would be such fun to have one here . . .  

But before he did that, he wanted to try a smaller scale sanctuary area to see how it would best work, to get an idea of materials and expenses, and to give *us* a little bit of the fun in our caretaker's corner of the camp.

Isn't it gorgeous?  I love watching it and could sit and listen and watch for hours!  Todd's done an amazing job with it!  It's really quite beautiful, but looks very natural as well.

I love the sound of running water, so this sweet pond is just music to my ears!

Todd built a stacked slate and rock waterfall at one end, which flows into the shallowest part of the pond. Then at the deeper end . . .

There's a resin turtle with a heavier duty pump to keep water (and oxygen) moving.  Todd watched last week as the first turtle walked down and climbed into the pond.  I think he walked down there because he thought the resin turtle was real and was so embarrassed when he realized it was fake ... that he jumped into the water as if to say, "That's *really* why I came down here -- not to check out a fake turtle."  I imagine, anyway.  ;)

It's filled with fish and crawdads -- all indigenous to the nearby water sources (creeks and ponds) and is about fifteen feet long and maybe about eight feet at it's widest.  And probably about eighteen inches at its deepest.  With very few exceptions, Todd's done a great job of using plants and bits and pieces--like slate from the creek and ground cover (with the exception of a dozen plants we purchased from the local nursery) that he's replanted from other areas in the camp--to really make this mini-ecosystem very 'camp' natural.

Of course, we did purchase the waterlily to go in the pond.  It's so fun to see it in there!!  It took about two days for the first pad to pop up to the surface -- and about two weeks or so for the remainder of the pads to catch up.  I can't wait until it blooms, though -- it's got beautiful pink blooms!  I'm thinking we may need one more to give symmetry and balance.  ;) 

Here's the view from the back end, near the waterfall. There are some other 'fun' things in the mix, too. Like a lit aerator in the pond, which keeps bubbles floating and also a floating solar light that changes colors. Both are especially fun when we're watching the pond at night. I'm standing under the outdoor camera that's mounted so we can even enjoy the pond at night from inside (you can see it on the corner of the shed, two pics up). It's also connected to the 'net, so we can watch from afar, too. The idea is to have one connected to the Camp's website, when it's the real deal. A nature ... or "turtle" cam, if you will!

Of course, as I mentioned earlier, turtles aren't the only thing in residence. We've put several toads in the area, but aren't sure in they're able to get out or not (as in climb over the fence) -- we haven't seen any. Todd put in a baby horned toad this evening! And of course there are frogs and tadpoles (which means eventually more frogs) and even more frogs!

This fine fellow stayed put my entire time in the sanctuary.  He wasn't worried about me a single bit!  He was pretty stout, too.  I love frog serenades on summer evenings!

The 18" fence goes around three sides and at the back, it connects to the regular split-rail fence that already existed (and is hidden in the huge holly trees).  It's covered with hardware cloth wire that also folds at ground level and continues for an additional 15"-18" under the ground cover.  And at that back end, Todd built the 'living quarters' for our turtle guests . . . 

It's constructed of concrete blocks and logs and other stuff and topped with pine straw.  And if you look real closely at the center of the photo, you can just make out one of the turtles (we have two, as of right now), stepping out for a bit of fresh air.

I think this is the second one we (aka, Todd) found, which means it's Sam. (The first one was Mr. Frodo and third and fourth turtles we add will be Pippin and Merry, respectively.) I offered Sam a carrot but he snubbed it. He also stayed very still when I climbed in the pen and chatted with him, but I think the more you do that, the more used to folks they are and likely to be....ummm....sociable. Whatever that is for turtles.

We also got two hydrangea bushes and planted them.  Lowe's had them on sale for $5 a plant.  I love them and they do tolerable in shady areas, which is what we've got.  The patches of sunlight you see in the pictures are mostly early morning.  By afternoon the area is largely shaded.  

In the front, alongside the driveway, Todd added an extra board so that we can set some potted plant along the top rail.  Mums are just making their way into the stores here and they are my favorite fall flower -- it should be gorgeous when they burst forth into glorious color!  This is essentially the view from the RV. Pretty sweet, huh?!

* * * * * * *

As an aside, evidently our 'turtle' sanctuary is also a POSSUM sanctuary.  Todd was sitting there watching the area and watched a possum crawl out of the *turtle's* living quarters to the *turtle's* food pan and then crawled back into the *turtle's* living quarters.  Some animals just ain't got no respect!!  LOL!

Man's best laid plans and all that . . . !!

:)