Gardening

First quarter 2015

March 30, 2015 by Sue Leave a Comment

I’ve been busy so far this year working on my One Little Word, EMBRACE. I spent all of February focusing on re-lighting my love of scrapbooking by participating in an annual event I’ve wanted to do for several years called LOAD. The purpose is to create a layout a day for each day of February. The overarching theme was Once Upon a Time and our connection with books, and each day the host, Lain Ehmann, gave a different prompt that we could use for our layout. These included design principles, color combinations, or a topic sentence, all from beloved children’s books. I managed to do a layout all 28 days of the month and I had so much fun. My output has slowed down in March, but I’m still working.

I did a layout showing the entire month’s work, which included a few extra layouts on some days for a total of 34. I count two-page layouts as one layout. Because I mostly stayed with the daily prompts, I had to do some layouts about me, which is a first, and also not chronological, which was fun and very freeing.Here are my two favs from the month, both of which were color prompts:

This year I also signed up for Ali Edwards’ One Little Word class which gives monthly activities to help keep our word visible and in use in our lives. I did the prompt for January which involved a lot of reflecting and making goals and got those all in my album but haven’t finished some of the daily life pictures from January and none from February or March. Need to add those pages to the album in the second quarter. February’s prompt was to make a vision board and I had so much fun cutting up magazines and gluing that all together. It’s now hanging in my sewing room.

I’ve been doing some sewing, too. My new threesome quilt group is doing a 1930’s quilt this year and have several blocks done and I’ve posted about those already. My regular twosome quilt group made a Schoolhouse table topper that needs to be hand-quilted as soon as I finish the Candy Shop quilt, which is almost done. We are now working on an Arrowhead quilt, but it’s a secret project so I’m not posting much for now. But it’s looking mighty awesome so far. Other projects in the works include the following:

I’ve spent a fair amount of time getting some pillowcases sewn up for the Festival of Trees gift boutique in December. Some of this fabric has been waiting around for two years for me to get it done, so I thought this was the year to get them all sewed up and off my plate. They turned into thirteen lovely pillowcases.

I’ve only been out in the garden once so far this spring and it looks like it needs some major cleaning up. But Scott and I were asked to be in charge of a youth play at church and since I wrote it and am directing it, it’s taken up a ton of time this quarter. I have to spend a lot of time planning and organizing in order to utilize the limited rehearsal time and make it all seem effortless. The performances are this week and I will get some time and energy back.

We’ve also spent a lot of time discussing, planning, and researching the possible addition to our home and it’s amazing how time-consuming that’s been with very little actual progress to show for it. But lots of knowledge in our heads.

As part of my One Little Word this year, I made a list of things to get done. I’m working away on the list and crossing stuff off which is making me happy. Organizing my quilt patterns, cleaning up my scrapping studio, reading some magazines then moving them out, and reading books for my reading challenges. I’ve kept up with the two that have monthly goals and made progress on the others, and I’m eleven books ahead of schedule on my goodreads annual challenge of 104 books/year. Plus my dishwasher has been broken for most of the quarter and I’m washing dishes by hand, which takes time but lets me listen to audio books. Trade-off.

Here’s to the second quarter of 2015: may it be productive. EMBRACE the future!

Fall is here

September 27, 2013 by Sue Leave a Comment

It’s been raining here for a couple days and yesterday I woke up to find that the mountains right outside my living room window have snow on them. One of the peaks was snow-free for only about 9 weeks this year. It hasn’t gotten quite cold enough at night yet to freeze so my annuals are still hanging on, although some of them are looking tired. A few perennials are still blooming and I have some lovely roses blooming late this year. Hurrah for Liquid Fence! I’m a believer, as the deer have mostly stopped nibbling now that I’m fanatically spraying our property. They pass through but don’t stay to eat. So for the first year ever, I have fall-blooming roses because the dang deer didn’t eat off the buds.

I’ve gotten some reading in and finished another challenge: the goodreads.com 2013 Challenge. I set mine for 104 books and reached it in September. Still three months left!

A friend and I have scheduled some quilting time together so that we can encourage each other and make sure some work gets done, so this week I started the quilt I’m making for our family Festival of Trees space this year. I have until Thanksgiving to get it done, but really before then as I’m having this one machine-quilted for the first time instead of hand-quilting it like I do my others. I’m shooting for finishing the top by Halloween. It’s chocolate and lime with some turquoise and has a fun rectangular repeating block in a scrappy fashion.

Except for the week when I was laid up with a sprained foot, I’ve been walking pretty regularly around the neighborhood and listening to audio books. I really like being out and walking. With the weather turning cooler, I’ve been going later to enjoy the warmth, but this week it hasn’t helped much because it doesn’t warm up. I might need to get one of those ninja masks people wear in the cold for fall walking.

We went to see our niece, Nika Fazulyanov, in “Shrek, the Musical” at the SCERA theatre where she played Young Princess Fiona. She was great and looked cute as a redhead.

Brian’s car was broken into and had the passenger window smashed in. Trust me, that makes an unholy mess inside the car. He was shaken up but not hurt and nothing really valuable was stolen, but I sat for 3 1/2 hours yesterday at the dealer while they replaced the window. Things like that make it easy to get lots of reading done.

That’s about all the news. Hope we have an Indian Summer on the way because I’m not quite ready for winter.

What’s Blooming…

July 2, 2013 by Scott Leave a Comment

I just got a new camera and wanted to try it out, so Sue and I spent a few minutes taking pictures of what’s blooming in her flower gardens right now. Click on the pictures to see them larger. Enjoy!

2013 so far

May 4, 2013 by Sue Leave a Comment

I’ve written about six jillion blog posts in my head since January 1st while driving, showering, vacuuming, etc., but unfortunately for you, gentle reader, you are not in my head and haven’t been able to read them. I have often thought that I should get them on the blog but life keeps intervening and when I’m on my computer I’m answering email, keeping up with political stuff on Twitter, reading other blogs, and occasionally glancing through Facebook. So I know about your lives, but you may not know about mine. So I’m going to start at the beginning. Warning: reading marathon ahead. Now, who remembers January?

January 2 was Brian’s 22nd birthday and he got some presents, then the gang was there to celebrate at Tucano’s. Mark, Lauren, Jack, and Scott (plus me and Brian) all gorged ourselves on yummy food. Oh, how I love that grilled pineapple!

Mark cropped

Two days later was Mark’s 24th birthday and we went with him, Lauren and Brian to the India Palace for lunch and had breakfast food at home for dinner.

Mark got a Tres Leches cake made by me and Brian and decorated beautifully by the fiancee.

I returned to the Utah Legislature this year in a completely different role and it was super fun! I was asked to write some guest posts for the influential blog, Utah Moms Care, and had myself a grand old time writing about whatever struck my fancy. I also continued to tweet about political stuff under my own moniker. I went up to the Capitol once or twice a week, and the other days I listened and watched at home with my feet up and commented like crazy. It was so fun to be able to say what I wanted, hang with my political friends, and stay in the fray without the stress.

Scott’s been working a bazillion hours all year and hasn’t had time for much of anything else. He gets up at 3 am, so by the time he rolls in at 7 or 8 pm, he’s pretty darn tired. I lobbied hard and the first weekend in March we made a trip to Springdale for his birthday. We went a couple weeks late, but it was the soonest we could go. We’ve done this two years in a row; does that make it an annual tradition? I hope so, because going down for hiking in Zion NP and relaxing in the sun during our cold Alpine winter is glorious and rejuvenating.

Mark got to play at “The Wall”, the new venue at BYU for local bands to perform, so we went on down to see him do his thing. He played in a friend’s band on electric guitar, then played his original music with some friends helping out. The fiancee was engrossed. 😉 On a personal note, their Italian sodas are super tasty!

cropped

Lots of time has been spent in planning and preparing for the upcoming wedding. We are doing an Open House in Alpine, so there’s some decorating to do. In an effort to save money I spent some time in April scouring second-hand stores for mason jars, cotton doilies, and candlesticks, all of which will be re-purposed and decorated. This should be fun! We’ve also been testing lemonade and flavored popcorn recipes and have almost settled on the finalists. Suits and dresses are ordered and purchased, but we’re still working on shoes. Lots of packages have arrived this week due to my internet shopping, like pink candles and pink and white striped straws. So things are coming along nicely and Scott and I are adhering to the timeline in true Carey fashion. Go us! Also, my book club BFF’s are going to help at the Open House and my visiting teacher is helping as the wedding planner and waffle bowl maker. Thank goodness for true friends! (I do everyday).

April brought a little gardening between rain and snow storms and lots of seedlings going under the furnace room lights. Last night I set up the “theater greenhouse” in the garage (you can read about that here) and so some trays are out and now more Jiffy pellets with germinated seeds can be transplanted to pots and put under the lights downstairs. It’s been so cold here overall that I’m way behind and there’s no way stuff is going to be hardened off and ready to plant in the next couple weeks. I’m trying to grow lots of calendula in trays and Shirley poppies outside from seed to cut at the Open House. We’ll see how that goes-don’t know if they’ll be blooming by then with the cool weather.

I’ve gotten some Christmas projects done which makes me really happy. My cards and neighborhood gifts are all finished, and I have a stack of crafts ready for the Festival of Trees gift shop. This is called thinking ahead, something I do occasionally.

I finished the hand-quilting on my Tall Tales quilt but haven’t done the binding yet, and I’m 2/3 done with the hand-quilting on my pinwheels quilt. My sewing machine is all tied up with a secret project that must be done by June 1, so I’m hard at work on that, although not hard enough because it isn’t finished yet. I’ll have a reveal with pictures when that’s all through. I think it’s going to be awesome.

Mark and Brian finished the semester and are both out of the country. That seems so weird to say that.

Mark is touring China with the BYU Young Ambassadors and will be gone for three weeks. He’s in the middle of the front row in his techie black at Tiananmen Square in Beijing. In related news, Brian made the 2013-14 Young Ambassadors as a performer and we’re all very excited about that. Prior to that, however, he is spending the summer in Cardston, Canada appearing at the Carriage House Theater doing three shows in repertory. We’re hoping for a trip there after the wedding and we need passports. In case you’re wondering.

So that’s the news from the first third of the year. I managed to get it all in one post and I’m sure you’re totally exhausted from reading it. Thanks for sticking it out. I’ll try to do better about writing more often and keeping them shorter.

What’s blooming today?

June 12, 2012 by Sue Leave a Comment

It’s June and the daffodils are done but the late spring flowers are on. Here’s a sampling of what’s going on out in my flower gardens right now. They’re starting to look pretty good now that all the seedlings are finally in the ground and it’s warming up. I have 5 varieties of penstemon blooming, 3 varieties of poppies, and several different gaillardias. With vigorous spraying, I’ve managed to keep the deer from eating the rosebuds, so they are just starting to open on some of the bushes.