The dog days of summer ended, and I missed it

Apparently, the Dog Days of Summer ended on August 11th. I looked it up. The term refers to the hottest days of Summer, which lasted until a little over a week ago around here. The change was quite dramatic in our garden. We went from close to 30C to 20C daytime highs. We were getting sun from around 10 a.m. as it appeared over the buildings to hit the back fence, then as it moved, the rest of the garden would get time in direct sun until close to 8 p.m. in the evening. This last week it is now starting to hit the back fence around 1:30 p.m. and a strip of around four feet of ground along the fence until 4:30 p.m. Everything stuck in all-day shade in the rest of the garden has reverted to Autumn shutdown stage.

I did a bit of clean-up by removing summer squash plants that haven’t been productive and are stuck in 100% shade now. Even though they were blooming, all the flowers were male so no fruit. The last of the zucchini has several small fruits on it but they’ve been the same size for around three weeks! Not sure what’s up with that. Also pulled out done flowers and other vegetables, pruned the plum tree (apparently they need to be done late summer, not while dormant,) and have started cleaning up planters.

The cucumbers are in a perfect spot up high on the wall and are still getting all the sun – and being productive. And I move my peppers around to follow the sun as they are in pots.

Mini cucumber

Hot peppers

4 mini cucumber plants in planter

I’ve finally been able to make pickles!! Refrigerator pickles as I’ve no inclination to do actual canning – an issue of space for storage really. They’ll get eaten fast enough.

I was not able to find PROPER sour dill pickles here in the UK. So I made my own and they are fabulous! Salty and sour with garlic like I was used to getting in Canada. Everything here in the UK is sweet… EVERYTHING. It is crazy.

homemade refrigerator pickles

homemade refrigerator pickles

I had six pint jars which worked out well for the amount of room I had available in the fridge. I’ve already consumed most of the cucumber dills from my first jar. I made four jars of pickles so far, with a fifth jar that is just brine, ready to add the next batch of cucumbers to. And if my hot peppers ripen I’ll pickle them too!

One jar is just cucumbers from the garden; one is “recycling” a jar of gherkins that weren’t sour enough for me with added red pepper and some mushrooms; one is recycling supposedly “New York Deli Style” pickles that in no way resembled deli style dill pickles (I couldn’t bear to throw out perfectly good food product!) with green and red peppers; and one is asparagus. I’m quite happy now. No one else in the house likes pickles so they are all mine!

I’ve been on a baking kick this week making cookies. I’ve been trying new “keto/low carb” recipes I’ve found online. They all need tweaking to suit me better, but are tasty nonetheless! I made a Tahini Chocolate Nib cookie and a Almond/Peanut Butter Brownie cookie. I substituted things based on what I had – using chocolate nibs instead of chips, using some peanut butter as I only had half the required almond butter, etc.

Almond & Peanut Butter Brownie Cookies

Tahini Chocolate Nib Cookies

The Tahini cookies need more tahini (recipe was half butter, half tahini,) needed to be flattened, less time and lower temp. The Brownie cookies need more moisture (I will probably add cream cheese next time) and need to be a bit flatter. But they did turn out and are not crumbling in my hand.

I am painting my bedroom. Last Sunday I did the front wall… almost died. I was up most of the night with vicious cramps in my upper thighs which I think were from balancing on the step ladder. Not fun – took almost four days for the tightness to ease. BUT, am happy with this wall. Anne is going to paint the opposite wall for me – says she’ll be MUCH faster and can cut in better than me. I won’t argue!

I managed to match the paint colour with my curtains without taking the fabric along to match – I’ve a very good eye/memory for colours. I had an ink & watercolour I did a couple years ago that is a perfect piece to go on the green wall so I got a frame for it.

Before

Matched the colours

Not bad on cutting in

Finished with curtains back up

Ink and watercolour work

Framed art up now

This wall painting project is making me frame up a lot of the art I kept and get it on display. The new paint is making the other walls look bad, but I’m not up to painting THAT much. I’ll just cover them with lots of art.

Oh yeah… today is my one year anniversary of arriving in England! I can’t believe that much time has passed already. And we still are dealing with the bloody pandemic. At some point I hope I’ll be able to start travelling around Europe on short trips like I had been planning for the last seven years! I am not comfortable with the travel situation (virus, delays, unrest, etc.) so will keep occupied locally.

August 27, 2021 – Arrived at Heathrow (the mask stayed on until the car park!)

April has been busy

I love Spring. All the shades of green start appearing, flowers start blooming, babies start arriving out on the moors… and the gardening at home gets underway.

This year I helped with a massive back garden overhaul and reconstruction which has been extremely satisfying. It is your typical terraced house walled and fenced back garden… approximately 20 x 22 feet so not all that huge, but we’ve got a lot of things in and are really thrilled with what we’ve accomplished.

We took 4 or 5 loads of stuff to the tip, put a lot in the regular household waste, and got rid of other things. Some things are being repurposed. We also scrounged up some paving bricks and stepping stones for free. And spent quite a lot too, on paving slabs, lumber, plants, seeds, etc. with some more spending coming in the next month when I have to pot up the summer plants.

Neither of us thought to take before photos, which is annoying as we were planning this serious project involving removing soil and sod, pavers, laying new pavers and moving others, adding concrete and generally building new things and doing repairs. But there you go. I am the worst about remembering to take photos of things.

I pulled out a large dead cedar shrub, yanked out other large shrubs and plants, and pruned a couple of boxwoods within a inch of their lives and a lot of other plants were seriously hacked back as well. We hauled out old plastic mini-shed, old planters, wood edging from around all the beds, metal, broken swing, etc. Anne tore up the old sod and dug out where it had been in order to lay new pavers – we filled up dozens of rubble bags with that. She also repaired the shelter roof which had been torn off in the winds storms back in Feb/March.

I had to dig out two manhole covers – storm drains apparently. I cleared away the dirt and other debris that had built up on top of them as access is supposed to be available. Well… Anne stepped on the top of one and the lid flipped up and down she went! One leg, down the hole. She was spectacularly bruised, but no other injury, thank goodness. They are now each covered with a large, heavy, paving slabs with a water fountain sitting on the back one. We filled the area with gravel to level up the slabs. Hopefully Anne won’t end up in the drain again.

We bought lumber to create new edging for the flower beds – I directed and Anne cut and screwed it all together. I moved pavers that I uncovered buried in various parts of the garden, cleaned them up and paved other areas with them.

I bought a large raised planter, more pots and lots of seeds and plants. We’ve spent close to four weeks all told and I’m calling Phase One complete now. The rest of what is planned is summer planting – so we have to wait for the warmer weather at the end of May.

The photos start looking out of the kitchen door, then work around to the dining room door, then towards the back fence.

My herbs and vegetables will all be in planters, including the large wooden trough against the wall – that’s my salad garden. The fish pond has been cleaned out, new filters in, new pond weed and the fish seem happy.

Anne bought a heated propagator . the heat was NOT required, but we didn’t realize that until the giant cucumbers and squash started pushing the lids off 4 days later! We’ve named them Audrey Three through Fourteen. We now have them in larger pots and recycled coffee cups… we won’t have room for everything that needs potting up! We can’t put the rest out until the end of May at least.

I’ve been productive out at the glass studio too this month, making more sunflower items – bowls, clocks, etc. We’ve been very pleased with the response to our Ukraine Appeal fundraiser – 50% of the sale price of all sunflower themed items is donated to the DEC Appeal/Red Cross.

Large Bowl (sold)

Small bowls in progress – second batch

Small bowls – two still available

Clock faces – hands and mechanisms will be added this week

Tealights, hangers and parts of a mobile

Mobile, laid out… awaiting the chain to link it all together

Spring has also been productive out on Dartmoor! All the babies bounding about, blocking the roads -but really, who minds waiting when you can watch a lamb or foal nursing?

The bluebells are out now too… but I haven’t managed any flower photos… yet.

Hope you’re having a good Spring.

It ain’t pretty, but darn it… I darned it!

They don’t make things like they used to – really, I mean it, “they” don’t. And most people don’t take the time to fix or repair their belongings anymore either. If something breaks or tears it is tossed.

I admit to sometimes replacing things that broke – like multiple VHS VCRs over the years… when it costs less to buy a new one than to get the old one fixed, that is simple economics. The beta machine I bought survived for over 20 years, to be donated on while still functional – that was a well-made machine.

With things like clothing, how many people take the time to repair items? Themselves?

I remember I once fixed a hem on a skirt that had completely come undone during a work day – I used masking tape to put it back in place. It was a heavy polyester so the tape stuck to it well.  Then I forgot about it.   The amazing thing was that tape held for years! Through the washer and dryer multiple times too. I did eventually notice and redid the hem properly – before donating the skirt in one of our regular closet culls.

Hand-me-downs were normal for clothes, toys, furniture… pretty much anything including cars, when I was growing up. Family, friends, neighbours, anyone you knew would pass along things they no longer needed to you if had a need. Like baby clothes if you were expecting, or furniture if you had moved, toys for the kids to be passed along, dishwashers when they got a new one, a microwave, etc. Before anyone got rid of anything or donated to charity, they would check with the people they knew to see if anyone needed or wanted it.

My mom made most of our clothing, right through high school. And she would fix hems, repair tears, and convert old clothing into something new. There were four of us to keep clothed and not a lot of money, so things made their way through the family.

I remember repairing a greatly loved flannel shirt myself. It was teal and yellow plaid and it was so comfortable. But it was wearing out. Mom actually wanted to toss it – she had repaired it multiple times, and refused to anymore. So I started to mend over her mending. It had up to four layers of patches and mending in spots. I actually don’t remember if it completely disintegrated or mom removed it, but it did eventually vanish.

I routinely fix hems and seams. A lot of clothing that is available now is poorly made and you wear it once and discover holes in seams, or unravelling hems, or other flaws that need fixing. Securing buttons is a big one on new clothes – so many seem to be hanging by a single thread.

Case in point – last week I pulled a pair of heavy winter socks out of my drawer. I had not worn this particular pair yet, even though I’d had them for a couple years.

When I took them off I realized that the heel “patch” had completely separated from the body of the sock along the bottom – grey sock with green toes and heel. The weave had completely separated, if indeed, it had actually been attached at all.

I didn’t want to toss them as they are new and warm, and I’m on a budget. So decided I would darn them.

I’ve done it before but my hands are not what they used to be, neither is my eyesight.

Darning isn’t rocket surgery but being able to see helps. Even though I probably had dark green yarn, I used up some scrap yarn and floss I had sitting around from a project I finished a couple of weeks ago.  As it was different colours I was able to see what I was doing… sort of.

I didn’t take photo before I started repairing them as I hadn’t thought about posting the process, but you can see my fingers through the hole in the heel after I’d started.

How darning works is that you go through the loops of the weave that is still solid all one way across the hole, then, you go across anchoring the same way and weaving your thread through those first strands, to fill in the gap in the fabric or to pull it back together.  At least that’s how I do it. It isn’t hard BUT is fussy.

In the old days they had hard balls of bone, ceramic or glass that they would put in the heels of socks to shape them and make it easier to pass the needles through without poking yourself. I really could have used one. An old incandescent light bulb would have worked too, but none to be found around here. I tried stuffing a jar and a couple other things in there, but nothing fit or was the right shape, so I just stretched it out with my hand.

I don’t claim to be an expert and I’m sure there are probably neater ways to do this, but it worked.

Looking at these photos I feel like I sewed Ed the Sock’s mouth shut!

I turned it inside out to check and it looks not too bad. Hole is gone and mostly closed up. Ideally I should probably have pulled the two sides completely flush together, but there appeared to be a gap in the heel area – which is part of the reason I suspect the hole was there all along.

I now have a functional pair of socks again – Darn it!

Last week of this semester!

Just finishing up my third semester in my Fine Arts – Advanced program! Actually, the semester isn’t over until this Thursday, April 18th, but I’ve finished all assignments, projects, papers and tests. Only have one drawing to hand in on Tuesday which I finished yesterday.

I admit to being hyper-organized: I plan out my time to complete everything based on course descriptions. Anything that I can do in advance gets done to allow time towards the end of term to work on the art projects which consume massive amounts of time! Particularly as I tend to take them a couple steps beyond the stated requirements.

The Coral Reef installation that I blogged about last post got tweeted out by the College President last week! We are super stoked.

We chose such a good location for this, lots of comments on the “guest book” that is mounted beside it and we always see people taking photos of it as we walk by.

Our first paintings of the semester in Painting Studio class are now on display in the college. Mine is the “Blood Moon” with the ghost ship. These will probably stay up for a couple semesters – based on the previous displays.

The submission forms for the Annual Juried Student Art show were handed out last week. We can submit up to three pieces each, created within the last year. Last show I entered my Serpopard sculpture. This year I am entering a painting and two multi-media pieces.

I’ve mentioned before how I am not sure I have a style… I am beginning to think the multi-media thing is it.

I have a tendency to use materials at hand to embellish my work, regardless of the medium/technique the assignments call for. I’ve got decades of experience in creating props, costumes, accessories, wearable art and competitive body painting. Doing those projects involves building embellishments using recycled material, odd items that I have lying around and repurposing previous work. In the ladder collage I used old watercolour paintings and pencil crayon drawings from other projects, as well as work specifically done to use in it.

I used a lot of materials and techniques in my projects and have had to explain to some of my studio instructors what I am doing. I’ve used acrylic paint in a small squeeze bottle to create dimensional textures on flat work; used dryer sheets to create 3D items in a form of cloth-mâché; paper tole work in multi-media pieces; I’m always using Mod Podge for various purposes; and even applying gold leaf. I’ve even used make-up because I had a rocking metallic colour pigment that I couldn’t find in artist brand paints!

This photo shows what paper tole work is. You cut out multiples of the same image, and then layer them with spacers (I recycled heavy card stock from another class project for that in this one!) When you get to the height you want, you then start to cut out sections that you want to add more dimension to. In this I cut out the wing, the legs/feet and eye, to create another level of depth. It is fun, but extremely tedious! Hand cramping is always involved.

I find it satisfying to use what I have on hand and make things in a different way than expected.

In my final drawing project I have, again, gone multi-media. That will be my next post as I haven’t handed it in yet.

I love Jars!

Where I live we don’t currently have a glass recycling program so, being a responsible recycler, I try to reuse and re-purpose as many glass containers as I can.

I’ve been ramping it up lately by reorganizing my kitchen and craft areas – the more glass jars I end up with, the more plastic I recycle.

A friend takes the recycled jars and adds handles to the lids making them quite decorative. I have a couple in my guest bath.

And another in my kitchen (I know what will be going in it, I just don’t have any right now.) And that pasta is just a decoration!

I use jars for small things like buttons and beads.

And as everyone in the world must, the Danish Butter Cookie tin!  This one is full of zippers.

I use them to hold tools in my studio.

I used a decorative jar to save my graduation corsage in – these types of jars work really well for keepsakes.  I think this one came with candy in it, but you can reuse candle jars too.

And I love mason jars!  They are perfect for food storage. The ultimate recycled jars – people give them to you full and you have them forever!

I store my nuts and baking supplies in the mason jars – it is so much neater than a bunch of bags or other containers.  I can see everything clearly in the cupboard.  I also store tea bags in jars – I cut out the name from the box and stick it in the jar.  The jars help keep the tea fresher longer.

I’ve also have some larger jars for things in bigger amounts – my almond and coconut flours, my homemade nut cereal mix, and snacking peanuts.

I also reuse spice jars of all sizes: glass and the larger plastic ones.  I like to make my own spice mixes so it is handy to have some spare jars on hand.

I have some can shelves and a large spice rack mounted in the stairwell to the basement, this is right off my kitchen and really convenient for me – I just take a step or two down and all my spices are at eye level!

I just stick labels on the recycled jars.  I buy bulk to refill the commercially labelled jars. And yes, the bottom four shelves are in alphabetical order…

I’ve discovered a really excellent sauerkraut, Bick’s Bavaria-Fest – and it comes in a nice squat wide-mouthed jar!  And it was on sale with bonus Airmiles… I have stocked up and have a plan for the jars once I’ve emptied them all.

If you’ve got a glass recycling program available by all means use it, but also remember that glass containers are extremely reusable, and in many more ways than I’ve mentioned above.