It has been a long time since I showed you an impressionistic shot from the toy camera. Here you can see the Windblown Shadows quilt, with the completed center and the first border, reposing over the back of the couch. Well, no you can’t see it. The black and white thing at the top is a cat. The apparent halo surrounding the cat is entirely misleading. She is an essentially selfish and rather naughty cat. You can’t see that, any more than you can see the quilt.
And that is a shame because it is a thing of beauty. The colors — the eucalyptus green with the soft rose and yellow shades, and then the surprise of the tea-dyed sheet music print border echoing the shading of the trees in the vineyard print as well as the sheet music print in a wine shade — well, I’m sorry you can’t see it. Here, though, is a detail, stray threads and innacurate corners and all.
I am piecing a second border, and then there will be a solid border of the sheet music print, and finally a border of the eucalyptus green to complete it. Or possibly a deep border of the green and a narrow binding in the sheet music, set on the bias. It will be tough to decide.
Some other things have been decided, though.
Here is the fall choral piece I am going to be working on: Vaughn Williams’s Dona Nobis Pacem. La Bella and Egypt say that the director of the Master Chorale is a lot of fun, so I’m going to give it a go. There are about 100 in the group. I have never sung with such a large choir, so that all by itself will be a new experience. And I am an enormous fan of Ralph Vaughn Williams, and I have friends in the choir, so it should be a pleasure all around.
That is Monday nights. Party Girl and I will be returning to our Tuesday night class, and of course Wednesday night is always church choir practice. This is quite enough excitement for a slightly agoraphobic woman of my age.
Actually, I know a woman who is a bit older than I who goes out dancing most nights, but she is single. That makes a difference.
My husband goes out with his fellow ex-pats a couple of nights a week. They play pool. My husband has trophies for his skill at billiards, and owns these pretty cues that you can’t quite see on the right. I stay home on those nights, to be with the kids, but frankly the kids go out a lot themselves these days. Thursday and Sunday nights are our family nights in.
The mornings are scheduled, too. I get up early to have my tea, read the news, and IM my daughter. Then I feed everyone, do the housework, drive #2 son to school, go to the gym, and come home to get ready for work. On the 29th I will begin the HGP, which will consume the remaining time before I leave for work.
You will notice that I am not complaining. I could not do all the things I want to do, and also have a pleasant home life, if I didn’t schedule everything. And I have come to experience the routines as rituals instead of mere routines, with the meditative pleasure that word implies instead of the irritation of sameness.
But after summer, it is a bit like putting shoes on when you have been barefoot all weekend — you want to put them on, but your feet still don’t feel quite at ease at first, do they? Today, the last day before the return to the school year schedule, I intend to enjoy a final uncommitted stretch of time. (Oh, of course I am going to church, and the boys have supply lists to shop for, but apart from that —) I shall be piecing a quilt instead of climbing a tree, but I will still strive to remember what summer means to children. To save up a bit of that feeling, as we capture summer berries in a jar of jam.
What I can see of the quilt looks wonderful. I imagine that even the clearest picture of the cat would not reveal her naughtiness; we also have a selfish, naughty cat, and she is dreadfully cute. It’s the secret to her success.
Today is my last day before school starts. I have to spend the day cleaning. I could devote it to fun and laziness and a pedicure if I hadn’t put off cleaning for so long.
….and you can’t see the hint of psychoticism in her feline eyes…
Over here we have seems to have wandered into Spring a little earlier than usual. Blossom trees out (although that is a little misleading, some of the silly trees were showing their finery at the beginning of last month) as are some of the rhododandrons (or their near cousins whose name I can’t remember at the moment). The air is starting to smell scented (in a pleasant way – Winter freezes the scent molecules and Summer fries them I think – except in the US, I could smell flower scents during high summer over there). Down here the birds are starting to sing pre-dawn and you can see the sparrows flirting with potential mates or the older ones starting to gather resources for their nest building. If our weather follows its normal non-pattern we will get a winter blast just as the first lambs are born early next month but I will enjoy the balmy pre-spring while it persists.
cup full of life…full…
Autumn is lovely over here as well – if somewhat less picturesque than where you are – but it always smells good over here. One day I will come to the US in Fall. I don’t really mind our winters – it’s just icy roads I can live without 🙂 I Wouldn’t fly to the States in winter – too afraid of planes’ wings falling off because they are frozen – not even sure I’d like US winters – perhaps just a little too much snow in some places – Was told by the cab driver in Colorado Springs that they usually only get 3 or 4 days of snow during most winters – he reckoned that about once every 10 years a blizzard would blow on through – the other 9 yrs are pretty good – the mountains protect them from the worst of the weather.
Perhaps kitty really does have a halo… it’s simply being held up by the horns? The quilt is gorgeous, I particularly like the sheet music fabric. Unfortunately I can’t seem to see the vineyard as such, it looks like dots… Pretty dots, but dots. Colorwise it seems to do quite well with the sheetmusic print. 🙂