Monday, May 12, 2008

The Weekend Rounds

Wow. I'm tired this dreary Monday; I must simply grumble about it. I had a busy weekend. I started it by creating a stovepipe bonnet for my friend Tara. I usually have few issues with them; but I guess when I'm making one specifically for someone else, the laws of the universe change completely and the most basic tasks end up being the biggest challenges.

That bonnet fought me from the beginning. I'm still angry at it. I can't look at it for the accomplishment that it is, but for the unending issues it presented to me. From the angle of the brim to the fabric I chose, it was a pain in the butt. The only thing that made the project redeemable was the cost (which was disgustingly low... the most expensive things were the feathers...) It still has issues that irk me. If Tara doesn't like it, it's going on ebay; and maybe the next one won't be such a pain in my rear end. I'll post pics of it soon. I still need to figure out how to deal with some flaws. Urgh.

I did manage to take a stroll around my garden this weekend to take a 'growth' assessment. At my elevation, I'm about 2 weeks behind the Portland area; so things are still in an earlier stage of growth. I was pleased to see that all of the mason bees had hatched out of their straws and tunnels. I was hoping to be quick enough to remove the straws this spring, because they're ugly, but the bees have already started repopulating them with their egg-cells, so I guess they'll get the straws for another year.

Mason Bee house with straws



Hubby made them a whole new house; a foot-long length of 4x4 peppered with holes. They are busy, buzzing all around my head when I'm out there, sweet, quiet little black bees, going about their business. They have some sources of pollen; the cherry blossoms have fallen, but a few other plants have put out flowers, and I planted some million-bells last week (gasp... I actually spent money on annuals... a whole $6!!!). I never normally even look at annuals at nurseries, but I wanted a little punch of colour for my window boxes to enhance my sedum-scapes.

I saw some hummingbirds about on Saturday, and we have new visitors, huge band-tail pigeons have started to frequent our feeders. They're giant; like a good-sized crow almost. I like their cooing, it's really soothing. They show up in couples on the most-part but we got a flock of them Saturday afternoon. They're pretty funny-looking, with little pin-heads and big bodies with huge orange feet. Cartoony almost.



Sunday, we did the mother's day rounds. My mum is 3,000 miles away (thankfully); and she was taken care of with a phone-call. My husband has his mom, grandma and sister to consider; so we made visits most of Sunday. I then watched 'Cranford' on OPB (Oregon Public Broadcasting); and then a few episodes of Buffy (I'm doing the annual Buffy-Binge... The Jane Austen marathon comes after that...). I went to bed late, and am now suffering for it. ::yawn::.

It was a busy but uneventful weekend; and obviously this post is quite dull because of it. ::hee hee::. I get few quiet weekends anymore where I can just stay home and craft. Hubby complains too much about my crafts taking over the house.

No comments:

LinkWithin

Related Posts with Thumbnails