Weekend

The weather was cool and damp and we spent some time bustling around the house. We cleaned out Del's closet and found a whole bunch of pants he has shrunk out of, some of them still had the tags on. Some big guy will get lucky at the thrift store. We also gave away a still nice jacket that is now several sizes too big for him.
Because of all the rain and humidity we have some problems with mold around the house. I needed to move the laundry hamper from where it was and I have not yet found a new spot for it, so for now it gets kind of pushed around from room to room and with a little luck and a bit of cooperation from the weather it will be empty soon (for a glorious five minutes or so) anyway.
I started reading "The Source" by J. A. Michener and discovered that my eyes are not happy with the very small print. Geez, getting old is not for sissies. ;-)
I also had an unfortunate accident in which I got my foot caught in the fan cable and tore off half the nail on my big toe, luckily no blood and not very painful.
A friend of mine directed me to a website (and FB page) - Vintage Vienna - with old pictures of Vienna and I spent quite some time there on Sunday morning, taking a stroll down memory lane (which is not always a pleasant trip).
We had pizza for lunch on Saturday and I baked bread again. I really miss having a garden and I am making plans for a new beginning next year or maybe a little bit for fall planting, we'll see.

Feline Friday

I was so busy all day around the house, taking advantage of the lower temperatures, that I almost forgot about Feline Friday. So without much further delay, here is my boy Jack enjoying the cool breeze on the pantry window.

No new projects yet, it was too hot for anything this week.

Feline Friday

Best buddies.

Or maybe not?

Knitting

Have you ever done a 'MY-YN' project? A friend's daughter fell in love with this yarn and because she does not knit she asked if somebody would be willing to do a 'my-yn - my yarn - your needles' with her and I decided that it sounded like fun. The yarn is 100 % cashmere and is lovely to work with, the pattern is the Rick-Rack-Scarf by Purl Soho, much easier to do than it looked at first. I am almost finished with it and as soon as it comes off the needles I am going to start a brand new Summer sewing project. Stay tuned.

In other news: The weather forecast calls for a heat index of 100 this week so I am going to take it easy, no baking, no housework, cold dinners and a mandatory nap for myself and the furry ones (as if they need to be told to take a nap). Did I mention that our A/C is not working?

'Cool' Weekend

Oh yeah, the temperatures were down and I slept really well for the first time in quite a while. The cats were livelier too and ate more. I have noticed that they eat a lot less in hot weather than they do when it is really cold. In Winter I had to buy an extra bag of cat food every other shopping weekend, now I can skip one instead.

I took advantage of the cooler temperatures on Saturday and baked bread and scones and made pizza for lunch.

I took Sunday off from all housework except cooking 'whatever' stew for lunch. Beef stew with whatever else I can find to put into, this time it was potatoes, carrots, beans and lots of different spices and herbs, it was good.
I spent some time looking around blog world to see what other people are up to and came across this BOM which looks very nice and very work intensive. The patterns are in German. Wo die Liebe hinfaellt.
I found some nice blogs from fellow Austrian quilters and crafters as well. Lots of ideas and inspiration out there.
Del mowed and weeded and now the back yard looks a little less like jungle and a little more like a garden again..
The next few days are supposed to get very hot again, yikes. I just hope they will be dry so I can work off my laundry back log.
Hope you all had a nice weekend.

Feline Friday

My paper towels!

 

More Muffins

This week: Rice Pudding Muffins - my favorites so far.

Weekend

Fresh peaches from the farmer's market, a peach cake for our afternoon iced coffees. Time for knitting and reading. Hot and humid weather with thunderstorms and plenty of rain. Grass too wet to mow. Good food, homemade strawberry ice cream, playtime with our cats and plenty of rest and recovery.

New week, here we come!

Feline Friday

Leo & Jackie

Baking

This is the muffin book I am trying to bake my way through. Although I must confess so far I got stuck on just a  few recipes that I keep repeating because they are so good. Like the Peanut Butter Chocolate Muffins I made on Tuesday.

Cross Stitch

These are the two cross stitch projects I am working on. The stitching part is done, now I want to frame them with the fabrics that inspired the whole project and quilt a little bit to make small wall hangings out of them.

Knitting

Hurray! I was able to convince my camera to let me take a few pictures this morning. The light was not very good but I think you can see what it is.

This is a very small shawl that will work well as a neck-kerchief next Winter. The pattern is 'Cassiope' and it is so small because I used lace yarn (Patons Lace in Dove Grey) for it. Maybe I'll try it again with a thicker yarn sometimes.

And this is my current knitting project, a scarf called 'Summer Spleen'. I am using lace yarn again, this time with sequins (Patons Lace Sequin in Peridot).

What's Up?

Well, not much really. I am having problems with my camera and not being able to take photos has sort of taken the fun out of blogging for me.

I finished a knitting project and started a new one, I am working on some hand stitching projects and a quilted wall hanging. I can't show pictures of either one of them which makes me mad. I have also pulled out my "Dear Jane" quilt in progress and plan to work on that a bit more. I should really make it my goal to finish it.

The weather around here is crazy, hot and humid during the day followed by the daily thunderstorm. Rainy days are bad for doing laundry so I am creating quite a back log in my hamper. Luckily I used to hoard towels and kitchen towels back in the day so we are not going to run out of either any time soon. ;)

The cats are doing fine, just trying to keep cool like the rest of us. I find keeping the bedroom dark and the fan going makes it bearable and the cats agree with me by spending a lot of time in there. Summer - the time when the house appears to be littered with dead cats.

Despite the heat I am still baking bread at least once a week, sometimes twice and I am trying to bake my way through a book with yummy muffin recipes. I have 'summerized' our weekly menu, our bed and the sleeping places of the cats.

The weeds in the garden are doing very well and the grass grows at least an inch after every rain. Yesterday I discovered that there is now kudzu growing in one corner of the garden. Lovely, I hope we can get rid of it before it takes over everything. I am planning a completely new and different garden for next year. It has to be easier to maintain and not quite as work intensive. We are getting rid of the beds and we will switch to containers and downsize the whole operation.

Photo-less blogging is not much fun, keep your fingers crossed that all my camera wants are some regular batteries instead of the re-chargeable ones.