Folk Art

It is wonderfully curious how many similarities there are between folk art traditions. Being curious about Canal Art, I did some Googling.

First I want to show you some Russian Lacquer work pins. They are similar to the three I found on Friday. Two of the three I found are signed. Scroll down to see the selection of pins. Click on an individual pin to see an enlargement of it.

Canal Art is very similar to tole painting in the US. We tend to think more of tole painting on metal but it is still tole painting if it is done on wood. Here is another website with lots of information about canal art.

Bauernmalerei is the traditional folk art of Bavarian Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

Rosemaling is traditional to Norway. There are three main styles of Rosemaling but within the three main styles there are variations and hybridizations.

All of these art traditions have shared qualities and I am certain a little research will produce much information about other folk art traditions. Just as certainly, they will have similar qualities.

I have had training in rosemaling and have picked up Bauernmalerei.

It is a rainy Saturday. The rain began during the night and has continued on and off since. It is hard to complain about the rain because it is so dry and we need it so much.

Yesterday I acquired three Russian lacquer- ware pins. I am certain they are quite ordinary but I like them.

Yes, Penguins

I had completely forgotten about Christine and penguins. Maybe with her password "gentoo" I should send this book to her but I am still in love with it.

I did a little research. I am not certain that I can identify these penguins more specifically than they are probably South American penguins, Humboldt, Megallanic, or Galapagos. All three species are similar in appearance.

Another Gorgeous Day

What more can I ask for? The sky is blue and it is going to be a pleasant spring day. The other morning I saw a rabbit sunning itself on the east side of a small hill in the park. The birds are beginning to sing as I leave the house about 4:30 a.m. The spring peepers and frogs and peeping and croaking their songs. On the way to the grocery store yesterday morning I saw a pheasant, 3 wild turkeys, and a goose.

A couple weeks ago we went to a sale where I picked up these two books. Unfortunately Amazon.com does not have pictures of them. But I took pictures. :-)
I am not certain I can find very much information about either one.
Cross Stitch Designs for All Seasons
My copy is also copyright 1983. I wonder why this one is listed for more than 90 USD. I paid 3 USD for mine. The 1984 copyright has a lower range of prices.
Cross Stitch Designs for the Home

Right now, I have the third of three angel food cakes in the oven. I will use them to make dessert for the family dinner that concludes our tutoring program for this school year. I will miss the children but the truth is I do need a little time away from all of them.

Spring Is Wonderful

I am still amazed by our gorgeous, early spring. The cherry is blooming and so are the creeping phlox. I should have put something beside the creeping phlox to give you an indication of their size. It makes a beautiful carpet, especially in the spring but the flowers are small. I like the stars in the middle of the pink variety but then I like the periwinkle variety too with its dainty center.

It was very interesting yesterday; we got a telephone call from the Wilder Found- ation. It is a very highly respected human services non-profit. The woman calling wanted one of us to partic- ipate in a survey about public health issues. Because it was the Wilder Foundation, I said that we would. The person in the household with the birthday closest to the day, yesterday, was targeted. That was Roger. Some of the things he talked about were quite interesting. Just this morning I read an article in one of the local newspapers about homelessness in the area. A Wilder Foundation study on homelessness was cited in the article. I wonder when/if we will see the Wilder Foundation cited in an article in the future dealing with public health issues.

Still in the Garden

Yesterday was a repeat of Friday. I took off more winter mulch and dug up more spring weeds. I also dug out one each: chive and snowberry sprout. Although I could tell some weeds had grown overnight, I know that I just missed these two the previous day. My body feels somewhat worse for the wear and my hands definitely look beat up. This morning I did a little hand washing with the hope my hands would look a little better after soaking in the soapy water.

It happened again. Our neighbor goes into his backyard to talk on his cellphone to his friend Dan or to another friend about Dan. The topic of conversation is generally our neighbor's stock trading strategy. I am not certain if he goes outside because it is quieter than in the house or because he does not want his family to hear his conversation. I cannot remember how many children they have but there are a least four of them. It could be noisy in the house.

Next time, I think I will bring the radio outside and hopefully there will be an opera on. I can turn the volume up high. If someone complains, I can innocently claim to just be affording our neighbor a little privacy, with the accent on the second syllable.

In case he is outside because he does not want his family to hear his conversation, we thought that in addition we could make an occasional comment that would carry across the fence, a somewhat related non sequitur à la Gracie Allen. Or we could be a little nasty and ask each other why his wife takes in daycare children if he is making such a killing on the stock market.

Oh My Goodness

I just checked back in my blog archives. My first post was 17 April 2009. I posted a picture of a white crocus. It looks like it is at its prime. This year, the crocuses?, croci? have bloomed and are gone.

The chives, snowberry, and yarrow have escaped and are running free in the garden. After taking away some of the iris covering, I turned my attention to the unruly plants in the garden. The worst of the lot is the chives. Although I know more will show up, for the time being we have just the primary plant. While I like the snowberry with its white berries, its growing habit is very untidy and it is way too aggressive for our garden. We took it out last year but left behind some of the roots. Surprise, surprise, the roots are sending up new shoots. I dug them out but know more will return. Last but not least is the yarrow which sent some feelers out into a Siberian iris. For now, I did the best that I could to remove them but will dig up the iris after it has bloomed and remove the yarrow from it. At that time, I will dig out some of the yarrow clump.

Following this, I turned my attention to less targeted, general weeding. I wonder how long I will keep this up. It was surprising to discover how warm the soil is.

Monday I hurried to wash at least some of the sheets so I could hang them outside. While I was outside I was amazed to see so much growth in the gardens. Between Monday and now we have had varying amounts of rain. I can hardly believe this. Most of the trees and bushes have leaves. The apricots and some other stone fruit trees are in bloom. Daffodils and tulips are looking gorgeous. All of this is happening before our last possible day of frost. Tech- nically we could still have snow. I hope we do not and I fervently hope this is truly an early spring. I think part of the reason the tulips and daffodils are looking so spec- tacular is because we have not had our usual long, cold spring. This year, our spring seems more like what is typical of areas to the south of us.

As I hung sheets to dry Monday, I heard a woodpecker working in a nearby tree. My curiosity quickly got the better of me; I just had to see who was there. It was this little downy woodpecker. It even gave me enough time to get the camera and switch out the lens for the telephoto one.

May is almost as busy as December. My mother's birthday is always within a week of Mother's Day. She and my sisters live in California, half way across the country from me. One of my sisters primarily cares for our mother.

My sister told me at Christmas time that our mother's sweatshirts had become tattered and she could not find any that were similar. That was a not-so-subtle hint to me to look for sweatshirts in Minnesota and particularly so since I had gotten most of our mother's sweatshirts for her. I had no luck finding exactly what we were looking for.

Shortly after the first of the year, I sorted through some of my fabrics and organized them a little better. I found this yellow sweatshirt fabric and matching ribbing. This week I pulled out a sweatshirt pattern. When I traced the pattern, I made the sleeves two inches shorter. I think I should have make the body of the shirt two inches shorter too. One of our sons thinks it will make a marvelous tunic that will go almost to my mother's knees.

Currently I am packing a box of gifts to send to my sister. She will be able to tell me if I need to make further alterations to the pattern. Once it is adjusted, I will be able to make sweatshirts out of regular sweatshirt fabric and fleeces.

Looks Like Spring

The tomato seeds are looking good. This is how they looked yesterday. Today there are more seedlings. I need to find a way to make a plastic wrap tent to give them a little more headroom. Maybe I need to find the florescent plant light tube to give them more light.

Friday I decided to shorten the shell that I had gotten Thursday. It was a good thing too because I was com- pletely involved in the baking on Satur- day. When I finished the hem, I moved on to piecing the panel for this pocket. I could have never concentrated on it Saturday.

Yesterday I thought that I was just going to insert the panel into the outside of the pocket. It went together so easily that I continued to work along with it. I actually finished the entire pocket last night. This time, I decided to try a button and ribbon closure.

Easter Greetings

I think that is a fair title as we are in the season of Eastertide. Now for some pictures.

First is my new Easter Egg out in the crocus bed.

Then some fancy daffodils. They have split coronas in two colors, apricot tones and sunlight tones.

Next is my narcissus cyclamin- eus, daf- fodil, probably "Jack Snipe". It faces down and fares best in an early, warm spring.

Last but not least are the Rutgers tomato seedlings in one pot. The ones in the other pot have yet to put in an appearance. These simply could not wait any longer. Mooch remains trustworthy with the tomato seedlings. :-)

After two days of extremely above average temper- atures, this morning, our temper- ature more closely resembles normal for this time of the year. Literally overnight lilac leaves began to come out and my daffodils began to bloom. While it is nice to see these signs of spring, I am a little concerned that their appear- ance may be a might bit to early. If the temper- ature stays around normal, everything should be just fine. Once again we are in a dilemma. Should we uncover the iris and risk loosing the flowers if we have an overnight freeze or should we leave them covered and risk breaking the brittle stems and leaves later on, loosing the flowers that we break off. We are continuing to opt for the latter choice and hope we have made the correct one. Here are spring pictures from the yard and garden.

Today is a baking day, bread and a cake.

Mooch has not gotten into the tomato seeds we started earlier this week. For a cat, he is extremely obedient. We are still waiting to see some sprouted seeds but that could take more than a week. I may have used too much water on them. I hope that mold does not grow on those cute little newspaper pots and that they do not tear apart because they are too wet.

Here is the Quaker motif with the stitching finished. I will use the floral print beside it for the finishing.

Yesterday I went shopping for a new spring outfit. I wanted a dress or a co-ordinated skirt outfit. Since I have nothing that I can wear from spring into summer, I decided it was time to go shopping.

Shopping can be such a demoralizing process. I went into shop after shop looking for something. The clerks would show me dresses and my only response could be, "That would make me look like a mother-of-the-bride. Since I have no daughters I would not want someone to make that mistake." From there it would become even worse. I could hardly believe my eyes with some of the suggested choices. Frequently my only response was, "I am old enough to be your mother if not your grandmother. If I were to wear that, it would make me look like a superannuated hooker." Then I would go through the criteria again:
1. Spring colors
2. A dress or co-ordinated skirt outfit
3. That means not a pant suit.
4. A little dressy is okay.
5. Very casual is not okay.

I really wanted something in pink or blue but did find something in lavender, a floral print skirt with a co-ordinating lavender lacy knit sweater. I thought it might be nice to have a new white shell to wear with it. It was a good thing I slipped the shell inside the sweater because I have to shorten the shell by about two inches.

Emulating little Mooch who is a very pleasant and agreeable cat with a very nice disposition, I can truly tell you I liked the outfit more when I brought it into the house than when I took it out of the shop. I like it better today than I did yesterday.

It is April Fool's Day!!

We have been busy and so has Mooch. Monday we took the plant shelf out and assembled it. We also found the little mold that forms the newspaper pots.

Yesterday we started the tomato seeds, four pots of San Marzano plum tomatoes and two pots of Rutgers slicing tomatoes.

Our primary question was how soon would it take Mooch to discover the seeds. The answer is before I could even put the camera away. The seeds are in the lower tray because it gets the most sun. Obviously it is also more easily accessible to Mooch. We wonder if the seeds have a strong enough tomato scent for Mooch to detect it. He is especially fond of tomatoes. When we cut or slice one, we absolutely have to give Mooch some. So far he has not gotten into the seed pots. But then, it has not even been twenty-four hours since we put out the seeds. :-D

Mooch reminds us very much of a three-year-old child.

Yesterday I thought it would be fun to tease you with the picture of the back of the ornament.