Winter Wonderland

 The temps dipped down to 22 at our house in the morning on Monday. The Mister has decided that the colder air sinks down into our  area as we are lower than some properties around us, so we are about 5 degrees colder than neighbors just up the hill. 

Our sprinkler system ran in the night. We are only allowed to irrigate on Mondays. (As a former Master Gardener I will put in my two 'sense' that we do not have enough natural moisture in the winter to support plants without irrigating at least twice a week.) It was fun to discover the winter wonderland when I got up to let the dogs out. 

Sparkling threads of Spanish Moss*

A Crepe Myrtle looking like it is strung with spider webs

Frozen Muhly Grass

Ice designs in the bird bath

I almost felt the joy I recall from childhood experiences of walking across crunchy grass...almost!

*the teacher (and Master Gardener) in me requires that I tell you (in case you didn't know) that Spanish Moss is not a moss at all. It is an Epiphyte. This means that it is a plant that grows on another plant, but is not parasitic. 

Not a Sunny Sunday

As was predicted, we did get rain on Sunday, about 1/4". The temperature at the beginning of the day, when we were uncovering the plants around 7 AM, was 57. It dropped as the rain came to 46. We are going below 32 again tonight, so after the rain, the blankets will go back on the plants. 

The dampness made the day feel especially cold.

The stag horn did not like the cold....

but it did appreciate the rain!

I stayed inside almost all day....and I loved it! 

I did some of the PT exercises for my back.

I cut some fabrics, and sewed some others, to work on blocks for the Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt. 

And I got back on the computer for my long arm machine to try to get the computer to stitch what I wanted and where on this small quilt. It is still taking me a long time to translate my ideas to language the program understands. After a few attempts I was able to tell it to stitch a design around the pineapple. I struggled with communicating where I wanted it to stitch after I had to move the quilt. I will figure that transition out....and some day I will look back and laugh at my ineptness! 

(You really can't see it, but the background of this piece has been quilted.)

The pineapple design was stitched in a class I took in the spring 0f 2019....

I guess it's about time that I finished it! 

I still need to decide how to quilt the pineapple itself, 

but that will be done on my regular machine...I think!

Fifteen Years Ago

Do you know where you were, and what you were doing, 15 years ago? Thanks to blogging I know....and can actually show you!

Here's a post from 15 years ago, today:

Doc's Diatribe

We were just returning from the southeast - which was an annual thing at that time.  We were living in Colorado, but the Mister's family was in Florida. 

I was introduced to blogging by a neighbor in 2010. I didn't realize at the time how valuable blogging could be to me personally. I now appreciate being able to search on my Blogger feed to find out when, where or why I had done something. There are many times when the Mister and I are chatting and one of us will ask, "When did...." or "Where were we when....".  A quick trip to the computer...and ta da! There's the information. 

I was a frequent blogger for a few years, but then my posts grew fewer, and farther between, hitting a low of 5 posts in 2021! 

Part of the slowdown in my blogging was the platform itself. Uploading pictures was more challenging, and when we were traveling and had sketchy Internet, there were days where I couldn't access Blogger. Additionally I caught the bug to capture my life by sketching and writing in a journal. 

Somehow, in 2018 I was introduced to an online "Sketchbook Revival" through an email. The 'revival', coordinated by Karen Abend, offered two videos a day, for about 2 weeks, showing how different artists use sketchbooks. I was instantly enamored with urban sketching as presented by Liz Steel. I wanted to be able to do THAT! 

So I bought a few sketchbooks, a small watercolor set and a few pens and began practicing! 

We had a European trip planned in a year, and I wanted to document the trip in a journal with my sketches. What a fun challenge! The pages on the left are from that trip. 

My journaling has morphed through the years. I only write in it occasionally, and rarely take out my paints. I fell back into blogging on this platform instead.

I'm not sure which 'platform' I prefer.....if I were to stop blogging....maybe you'd know I was using my journal and paints again!

So, that's the past. And the present?

It has been cold. We actually hit a low of 22 a few days ago. Our southern plants were not/are not happy! We covered many of them - some we just shrugged our shoulders and let them be; they had already been damaged by a previous cold spell. We used a lot of bed sheets and some moving blankets. I know, one is supposed to use fabrics made for covering plants...but we have never bothered to purchase them. 

In the wee hours of the night I was thinking about the coming day; we are expecting rain - hooray. We need it. But wait!!! There are felted blankets and sheets on many of our plants....what a mess trying to dry them out. I didn't get up at that hour....but first thing in the morning we were both up, dressed and outside gathering the plant coverings. 

Let it rain! 

Have You Ever Seen...

 ...an X-ray facility decked out for "The Year of the Horse?"....or for Christmas, or for Halloween?

Sadly, I didn't take pictures when I visited the orthopedic offices previously, where one of the technicians went above and beyond when decorating the X-ray suite. 

I began the process for the revision of my thumb joint in October. The Halloween decor was magnificent, with ghosts hanging from the ceiling and all kinds of ghouls all over. My November visit revealed an inflatable turkey and other delights. During December there was a Christmas tree and there were ornaments and icicles hanging from the ceiling, as well as Hanukah decorations around the x-ray suite. 

Each time that I came for x-rays it was always fun as I was escorted "down the hall to the last room on the right" for an x-ray of my hand. I couldn't wait to see how the room looked each time! 

I won't go as far as to say I'll miss going to x-ray....but the care someone took to make the room look special certainly made my visits memorable!

Me and my BIG Mouth!

I belong to a small quilt group/guild that meets near my home. The Citrus County Crackers Quilters have about 65 members, and usually over 40 show up at the meetings. I think that is great attendance, and speaks for the value ladies find in attending. Each meeting has a few drawings for prizes, offers a chance for folks to show off their current quilts or quilted objects, offers a few classes, taught by members and has a few fun events through the year. 

One enjoyable event is the annual challenge. The Challenge is presented in February and members have until the Christmas party at the end of the year to create something to address the challenge. I wrote about my work on the challenge for 2025.   I enjoy the process, and I have always enjoyed presenting a challenge for my students, way back when, and for my friends. Some of the past challenges for the CCCQ, I've been told, include having ladies pull 3 crayons out of a bag, and their creation must include those colors. Another time they were given magazines and had to open to a random page, and use colors from a picture on that page as colors for their quilts. And, this past year's challenge was called, "Red on Red" where we had to include...red! 

The woman who ran the challenge this past year chatted with me after she had asked to have someone else do the challenge....and I raised my hand! Of course I did! She told me that she had planned to use "Winter White" as a challenge. She felt that if you make the challenge easy, more people will participate. I understand that, but I also think a challenge should inspire the folks to try something new or different. 

I did look online to see what other clubs have done. One idea I liked was,  "Never ever have I...." where sewists could pick a quilting technique they have never used, or make a quilted garment or a quilted bag. The other idea I liked was having folks up-cycle different materials to use in a project. 

The hand sewing group met the other day. I shared the ideas with them. They weren't sold on them. We chatted about other ideas, when somehow the idea of using a map to select an area in the worl

as inspiration for a quilt was voiced. For example, China or the Netherlands. We started laughing at the idea of using a 'pin the tail on the donkey' method for selecting your country. As most of the ladies are in their 60's and beyond, we decided that might not be safe... even if we didn't turn folks around first! 

At that point, one of the members of our little group practically jumped up and reminded us, "It's the 250th birthday of our country. We should use a US map." From there, bouncing ideas back and forth, we decided that folks would draw a slip of paper out of a hat, with the name of a state on it. Their quilt/project must depict something about that state: state flower or bird, industry in the state, the motto of the state...well, you get the idea. 

So, why am I chastising myself for stepping up to the plate? It's not the idea of running the challenge...I got that. My eyes are rolling because my predecessor always shared an example of a quilt/project that met the requirements of the challenge....a different one each month! Yeah.... 

Occupational Therapy

Tomorrow will be my last OT visit for my hand. 

I've enjoyed the sessions, but not the 45+ minute drive to and fro - I've become spoiled by having most of my needs met within 15 minutes, or less, from home. 

I tried to find services in my area. I was having PT for my back and asked them about getting OT for my hand at their facility. They told me they had lost their occupational therapist about a year ago. Later I was told there are no occupational therapists in our county....by the former OT herself! It turns out that she lives down the street from us and had recently retired! 

My therapist is a nut! 

No, he's not planning to hit me with the hammer.

He has me 'hammer' back and forth, slowly,  and then twist it side to side. 

He does some deep tissue massage to make sure that scar tissue is not adhering to anything in my hand. 

Then he holds my thumb in different positions for various stretches. 

Besides the hammer, he also has me use various weights and flexible resistance bars. 

Even a simple rubber band becomes a therapeutic device to help strengthen my thumb. 

I'll kinda miss this kooky guy! 

 

Winter - Florida Style

 It's winter. My representational snow flake "barn quilt" is on display. When I took a picture, the camera thought it was a QR code! Funny! 

As we are in central Florida we do experience some colder temperatures than when we lived near Ft Myers. But, on average there's only about a five degree difference.  Later this week we are forecast to have a low of 27 one night, and the rest of the week our lows will hover in the mid 30's. 

We have nothing to complain about. 

Here's my post from January, 2011, in Black Forest, CO. 

The weather was a tad bit different!