Old Towel Turned Into Kitchen Apron

Well, I haven't put much up here lately as I've been really busy busting through the fabric pile and finishing several big scale sewing projects. One of the smaller, quicker projects was a re-cycle or re-use of part of a green towel that got frayed out on one end and was really raggedy and headed for the landfill. But no, I just had to turned the untorn half into something useful. So I hacked off the torn up part and made it into an apron using some left-over green bias tape to make the ties more interesting and to bind the pocket. I always put pockets on my aprons for cell phone or keys or candy or something.  I've already used this green towel apron a lot, hence the stain on it already! But it's totally washable as it's an old towel!

And The May Garden Is So Different

Candy Geraniums

Yellow Irises

It's almost a month later from my last blog about all the flowers in my garden and now everything has changed. Gone are the tulips and daffodils and it's all irises and budding roses and geraniums and peonies.
It's a lot of pink and yellow and even blue and very exciting to see everything coming out blooming again.

King Peonies

Pixie Queen Irises

Miniature Blue Iris

I've been growing these flowers for years now and it's always a lovely surprise when the leaves shoot up and the buds form and then -- usually after a few days of sun and heat -- the flowers start to unfurl.  Each year the flowers are different, either a bulb has doubled and there are more flowers or somehow the plant is making bigger flowers, or in the case of the Queen Elizabeth rose bush, smaller flowers seem to be appearing, but a lot more than usual.  I've spied about 20 buds there! And for some other reason the miniature blue irises doubled and are a huge mass this year.  Just so delightful!

Queen Elizabeth Roses Budding

Striped Amaryllis Just in Time for Christmas

Each year while doing some Christmas shopping in November, I usually pick up an amaryllis bulb and plant it in the kitchen hoping, God willing, it will bloom in time. Well, I planted this one and forgot it was called a Candy Stripe and so was very pleasantly surprised when this started blooming with four lovely heads in bright red with white stripes.  Candy stripes! Christ stripes! I think this is why I like this type of bulb so much.  Of course I've put in some hyacinth and tulip bulbs for next spring, but it's these stunning giant bulbs that come out at Christmas time that I just marvel at every year. This year it stands almost two feet tall and the four flowers each are as big as saucers This one's been blazing away for almost a week now and it's such a delight to have on the kitchen table sharing breakfasts and suppers with us!

No, Virginia, the Gingerbread House is Not on Fire!

This was not the winning gingerbread house in the workplace competition, although this is clearly "a winner" due to the number of lighted and fast-burning birthday candles stuck into the roof and grounds of this candy house and due to the speed with which our team whipped this together in about 30 minutes.  The icing glue stuff wouldn't stick very well so the roof pieces kept sliding off so I used (unlit) cake candles as prostheses to hold the roof up. And, knowing no other team used candles, I stuck about 8 candles on it and lit them up so that there was an extraordinary effect.  My team -- of the three teams that participated in this "holiday party" activity -- squeezed in the making of this gingerbread house in between teleconferences and other end-of-year tasks we had to execute so it's surprising we got so far. In fact we were so busy with our regular tasks, the team leader didn't get to even stick on one candy! But, between the green jelly sweets, the raspberry chewy candies and other bits and pieces of sugary doodads, it at least looked somewhat like a gingerbread house when we'd finished. The other teams started DAYS before and spent HOURS working on theirs in comparison. I'm not showing their final products as ours takes the cake, in my humble opinion!  I should mention that during the "holiday party" itself  I smelt plastic and sugar burning and quickly came out into the office lobby -- where all three team's gingerbread houses were displayed -- and discovered that the birthday candles were burning down and starting to light up their plastic holders and the gingerbread house itself!  SO, before there was a need to call the fire department, I quickly blew out all the candles, but only AFTER photographing it for posterity's sake with the miracle of my cell phone. Thank God for silliness, cell phones and sweets!   

Related articles

• Condemned Gingerbread House (thejourneymom.com)

Google This, Kim Kolchiak!

Well, if Kim Kolchiak can sing a song called "Google Me," then I can certainly post a photo taken in Google's DC office when I was visiting once, using the miracle of my cell phone camera.  I sort of like the fun decor and bright colors and the plant, but you do have to sign in electronically at the nice young receptionist's desk on some great long form that no one really takes the time to read but is probably some sort of non-disclosure thing. There's candy to eat too as well if you like as well as a screen on the wall which gives an electronic picture of where all the Google searches in the world are taking place -- beams of light of higher and lower density coming up from a map of the earth. It really does reveal where or where there isn't electricity on the planet (e.g., there's not that many people googling from the middle of Africa).  Then it sometimes switches to another view, showing all the keywords that people are searching on all across the world in all the different languages. I'd be real surprised to see my name being searched, that's for sure! But I bet Kim Kolchiak gets searched a lot and I wonder if Google likes her new cute song?  Someone told me that the most common things googled for are religious things, like people use Google to search for all kinds of things in the Bible, or when they start looking for God.  Now that's awesome!

Halloween Leftovers

This morning on my way to catch the #G8 bus to work I looked down on the sidewalk and saw the remains of Halloween candy scattered about. Of course this was just the empty wrappers of Milk Duds and Snickers, and a candy carrying bag and not the chocolates or candy that the kids had gobbled up already. At first I was kind of annoyed that the neighborhood streets were littered with more than leaves and nuts and other seasonal debris until I realized that these wrappers were seasonal debris and paper wrappers are just leaves and nuts in different form. So then I thought how great it was that kids could freely walk about in our neighborhood and knock on the doors of strangers and ask for tricks and treats and only get treats. In fact I can easily recall when it was not safe for most of the neighborhood kids to go out on Halloween as the drug sellers and buyers were messing up the streets too much, leaving their litter of little crackie baggies and cigarette lighters and occasional needles and condoms. But that was over ten years ago and seems like ages ago. And so it's a good thing -- that children go out and do this.  I also felt sad that I wasn't at our house to give out candy this year as I had to go out of town unexpectedly. I rather enjoy putting on a witch hat and cloak and opening the door and seeing all the angels, princesses, Spidermen, Supermen, bumble bees and spooky characters that ask for candy each year. So this year we ended up giving all our candy to my neighbor to give away for us. Thank God for little kids knocking on strangers' doors and wearing strange costumes!