I WILL Survive

 One of the things I truly love about our home is the clusters of trees found throughout our yard. They provide dappled shade, and in the heat of the Florida sun, it just looks cooler.

The trees on the left side of the house were growing toward the open sky. In a storm, their branches could impact (literally) our roof/house.

They removed only 5 trees, in a stand of a dozen or so. It opened up the space directly next to, and above that side of our house 

I recently noticed that the trees, in a last ditch effort to survive, have sent up suckers form the remaining trunks.....

... and evidently from the root network as well!

These trees certainly have the survival instinct!

For the Birds

 Several years ago our neighbor had a moving sale. I had always loved her wall of bird prints, and despite not having a place to put them, I bought them.

Now I have a wall. 

But how should I hang them?

Random placement?

Nope. None of those appealed to me. 

This was my final choice:

Next step: Determine what to do with all of these!

Going Batty

I buy batting for my quilts in rolls. In my other house, I had a bathroom off of the sewing room and the tub was an excellent storage space for my batting roll. I tried storing the batting on the bottom pole of my long arm sewing machine, but I prefer to tuck carts with baskets for threads, rulers and fabric under the long arm table. 

Picture from Internet

How I double down on storage - no room for a roll of batting

While browsing online I saw a clever way to store quilt batting by standing it on the base of an office chair. It holds batting upright, taking up less space, and you can move it around with ease. No more hugging and lugging.

Off I went to find a chair. Someone was on my side when I pulled into a local thrift store. They had signs on the windows and doors, "Going out of Business",  "Closing", "Huge Markdowns". As I pulled up to the front door I noticed just the sort of chair I needed on the sidewalk, in front of the closed, locked doors. 

Evidently the establishment was already closed. As I got out of the car a woman at the other end of the building came up and asked if I needed something (remaining items from the shop were being loaded on a trailer). I mentioned my interest in the chair, well, actually, just the base of the chair. Fast forward....I drove off with the base of the chair in my car having donated $5 as a donation for the ministry and thanks for the fella who took the seat off and just handed me the base. 

After a little finagling I was able to remove the bracket for the chair from the base, discarding this piece.

I was able to put my roll of batting on the post that remains.

Now it's ready to roll into my new sewing room in a few weeks!

But wait....she's naked! She really needs a dress. 

But wait...she hasn't a suitable name! A woman of such bearing and stature, who stands demurely in the corner observing all that goes on surely needs a name. 

What shall I name her?

Oh, I know the perfect name for her,  meet "Sewphia", the sewing maven!

 

(or am I just going batty?!)

This was Thursday

7:03 AM

7:33 AM

7:44 AM

7:45 AM

7:46 AM

10:55 AM

2:00 PM

2:00 PM

We still need to fill holes, caulk and paint the baseboards. But, we also need to paint the walls - so that might wait! 

The dresser is on skids to make it easier to move it for this task.

 Oh, and the sheer curtain stylin'??

Pay no attention to the dog behind the curtain!

It's so much more fun to bite at each other through the fabric!

 

A Quick Visit to San Antonio

We drove through San Antonio yesrterday. I've seen the signs on the highway, and always wondered. Oh, not the one in Texas, the one in Florida! (Betcha didn't know about this one!)

Here's the Cliff Notes version of the history of San Antonio:

Catholic influences are found throughout the town of 1577 folks. 

I grabbed a shot of the Garden Club gazebo as we went around the corner of the town square....

I kinda liked the suggestion of speed and reckless driving this suggests! 

This private school for pre-kindergarten to 8th grade offers a faith based education to approximately 200 students. The school opened in 1884. 

 San Antonio City Hall 

According to Mr. A. I (n)-stein: 

The City Hall building in San Antonio, Florida, is housed within a historic concrete block structure, originally known as St. Scholastica Hall. This building, completed in 1912, was part of a larger complex constructed by the Benedictine monks, including the nearby St. Leo Hall. St. Scholastica Hall served as a school building for Holy Name Academy

Panco Villa's Mexican Restaurant looks like it could be the real deal, in San Antonio, TX.

Can't you just imagine vaqueros with guns on their hips hanging around outside, ogling people driving by?

I enjoyed our quick side trip, on another beautiful day sunny moment in Florida. We will probably have our normal afternoon thunderstorms - it seems to be the thing around here. 


 

Do you Wordle?

My day usually begins with a quick game of Wordle. It's so popular it becomes a conversation starter with so many people. Once I was working on the puzzle at a restaurant and my waiter commented that he had already finished the puzzle. I've entered into discussions in line waiting to enter a building, on the elevator and on public transit. It seems to be such a world-wide practice. 

Three friends and I share our scores on a message app daily, and make appropriate (and sometimes not) comments to each other.

I share my Wordle, Connections and Mini scores with my son and his wife, and two of their friends.  

I was curious about the approximate date I might have started playing the game, given the statistics.  Certainly I've missed days at different times if I was sick, traveling or just busy. Unbelievably, I received at least 6 different dates that were 861 days ago! How can computers come up with so many different answers (6)?! Had I only played 861 days, I would have begun playing the game at the end of 2022 or sometime up to April, 2023. 

In reality, I first played the game when it was put online by the creator, Josh Wardle. Somehow I had been introduced to the puzzle by a friend in late 2021. Josh fine tuned a game he had created early on, and named it as a play on his name. He began playing Wordle with a friend during Covid. After they played the game and shared suggestions for improvement, Josh made the game available in October 2021 on a site in the UK. Doing a little research I found out that he had 90 users after a month, 300,000 a month later and only a week after that there were 2 million people playing the game! Wow! The New York Times bought the game shortly after, in January 2022. The number of users is approaching astronomical in my opinion! 

So...do you Wordle?

Ugh! Bugs!

 I found bugs in the dog food....again. We had an experience with these beetles last summer. They were in a bag of dog food we had recently purchased. I called the feed and seed store and they refunded my money. Apparently the beetles were a problem at their shop, and the food may have been on their shelf too long. 

     

          Copra Beetle

    

Earlier this spring I found some in another bag of dog food. I discarded the remaining food. Now, I have a third bag with the beetles. I called Purina and chatted with a customer service representative. He was very informative. I thought the eggs of beetles are common in dog food when you buy it, and eventually hatch into larvae. He assured me that this can't happen as the food is cooked at such a high temperature, any eggs that might be in the meal are killed. The source had to be at my house. 

Larva

I finally realized that the first buggy bag of food I had was stored in a closed garbage can in the garage. At that time the garage was often warm and humid, and the bugs thrive in that environment. The bag may have sat outside the can until I finished the previous bag. That would have allowed bugs to enter the bag and begin eating and breeding. Or, it is possible that the infestation started at the pet food store that I use. 

I didn't think to wash the garbage can once I had disposed of that first buggy bag, so it would seem logical that there were eggs in the garbage can. I thoroughly scrubbed the can and I'm now storing the new bag of food in the can, in the house (until my sewing room and utility closet are complete). 

Customer service at Purina was very nice. He asked about where I bought the dog food. He asked about how I stored the food. He asked if I still had the bag and what the UPC symbol was (there was also a sell-by date in November).  When I went to get the bag to get that information I noticed the bug crawling up inside. I asked if he wanted pictures, and he enthusiastically said, "Yes". I scooped up some food and found one of the larvae and sent along that picture. He suggested the I keep the food in an air conditioned area and he offered to send me a bag of food, or send some coupons.

 I opted for the coupons. Two free bags of food, and two coupons for $1 off! I am happy with Purina's response. I guess they hope that customers don't decide to switch brands and by having coupons, one is more likely to stay with their product.