Saturday, June 11, 2011

How does your garden grow?

We are finally getting some bettter weather and the garden is starting to catch up.  Things that normally bloom in May are in full blossom now.   One of my lilac bushes is planted under my window, put there on purpose, and the scent of lilacs and sweet iris has been drifing into our bedroom at night.  Only sweet dreams can come from falling asleep kissed by a sweetly scented night breeze.  This has to be my favorite time of the year.  The roses are just starting to bloom, and the first peony opened today.  There is such a happy hum in the garden as the bees wander from blossom to blossom.  It brings to mind a poem I memorized in high school:

To make a prairie takes a clover and one bee,
one clover and a bee,
and revery,
Revery alone will do, if bees are few.      - Emily Dickinson

Here are a few shots of spring in my garden.



I appologize for the problems with the spinning video in the last post.  I didn't insert it correctly into the blog so you couldn't access it.  I have fixed the problem and you should be able to go back and watch it now.  Enjoy!

Friday, June 3, 2011

Spinning

I am still here and quite busy.  We've had a lot going on for a month or so, including a wonderful visit from family.  I have also picked up a new hobby.  Thanks to a wonderful friend, and enabler I have my own spinning wheel now and am learning to spin.  I started with a drop spindle last year:

A spindle works for creating yarn, but I find the process rather slow.  I have dreamed of owning a spinning wheel for quite a while and never really thought that I'd get one.  Enter wonderful friend who happened to find a wheel for me at a garage sale - and I wasn't really thinking of getting one at the time.  I picked it up on a Monday afternoon and took it with us as we went out of town.  It's a Lendrum wheel (made here in Canada) and she spins like a dream, she's been named Lizzy.  Here's a brief spinning demonstration that was done at my quilting group on a Thursday morning.