Nature compliments with her favours

Yesterday it rained. A big black cloud alarmed me so much, with how dark it made the interior of the house, that I had to look outside to see if we were having a solar eclipse that no one told me about!

After the rain, the garden looked so happy.

 

The zucchini leaves looked happy!

 

Don't you think these heirloom tomatoes look jolly too?

 

The tender green of tender peas in their tender green pods,

 

the beets just bursting out of the ground,

 

and whoops! I ate another one.

 

In the foreground, the spiky-leafed artichoke has been loving the hot dry weather we've been having.

 

Here is the wonderful broad-leafed Ligularia Dentate or what I prefer to call it, "Midnight Lady".

It produces its flowers inside a pod

like this! 3 flowers bursting forth

 

Hens and Chicks, that very popular rock garden plant, a desert succulent,

 still sits in its original container.

Potbound, it has sent forth this ridiculously tall stalk of fuzzy flowers.

 

a close up of a fuzzy blossom

 

Our bird bath has to be checked regularly for mosquito larvae that squiggle about like tiny tadpoles.

This leaf lays partially underwater, brocaded with the most amazing pink spots.

 

Meanwhile, the 3 apples we thought we had left have magically turned to 4!

 

How funny that we couldn't see the 4th apple for so long.

 

With another month or more til they are ripe, I find this a terribly magical time.

There is something wonderful about watching your own apples grow...

 

The peaches still number 3. They don't hang like an apple but cling very tight to their branch

 

They, too, need some time to ripen, but a hint of their peachy colour is starting to show.

 

And here's something peachy I enjoyed doing, using a photocopy of one of my Artist Trading Cards in this collage made with dictionary papers with definitions starting with the letter "E"(a gift from a fellow Mermaid Circus classmate and ATC trader) and some washi tape (a Japanese decorative paper tape) with a cut-out of some clams from a can label.

 

I finally got it into my head that there are other beautiful things to paint besides mermaids!

 I enjoyed doing this little watercolour with mixed complementary colours for the greys.

 

Let's make "complimentary" the word of the day.

 

last days of July

My enthusiasm was flagging last week for a number of reasons.

The crazy heat was getting to me too, and then...



this lovely thing happened...

I received a darling handmade journal in the mail from someone I barely know, possibly a real life angel, in the online Mermaid Circus class I've been in since (I can hardly believe it) April.

 



The first few pages I filled were awkward and clumsy, indicative of the mood I had been in,

but then I came to the watercolour paper and decided to go back and work with the original design I made for my first ATC at the beginning of the month.

 

And this is where I stopped.

There are still a few days left for anyone who might want to do a trade with me.

You can see the details HERE.

 

And here is a picture for my niece who I promised to show an update of our garden.

See how well the aluminum pie plates are growing from the trees?

With 3 apples and 3 peaches left on each tree, I can't say they've done the best job of discouraging the deer, but at least I'm getting used to their tinging in the nighttime breeze.

 

It is cooler today and overcast with a possibility of rain.

I hope wherever you are the weather is kind to you

and that you are kind to yourself.

 

Hay Bale the documentary

Well, it never occurred to me that I would be doing a photo essay on haying, but on Sunday, the farmer was back in the field, having let the hay dry somewhat through Friday and Saturday. I could hear his tractor so I went out to inspect.

and found this amazing Lupin gone to seed at the edge of the hayfield out behind our house

 

And sure enough, as I looked to the south, there was the tractor with the baler on the end of it

 

Like toys, this poor shot captures the primary colours of the

 blue tractor and the red baler on a yellow field

And so the baling begins

 

Hay Bale on a Rolling Sea of Hay

 

and that's how I left our rural scene in the heat of the day as I scurried back into the cool of the house.

On Sunday morning I looked out onto the early morning haze of dawn, around

6:10 a.m. ....

 

I looked out the bedroom window, between the outbuildings and through the laundry line onto this idyllic scene

and scurried to get out while the shadows were long

 

the field was now strewn with hay bales

 

each with their own character

Wally called them Muffets, after the old cereal name for a type of shredded wheat

 

Behind me, to the east, the sun was just rising over the treeline

 

of course I had to play with the colour

 

just a little bit

 

It's only coincidence that these 3 bales got dropped so close together as the baler spits them out when they are "done

 

As I turned I got this different shot of what our property looks like from behind

I do feel awfully romantic about the whole thing, that this should be our new life

 

it makes me feel super strong

I only discovered the texture of the tire tracks as I came to colour correct this shot

I call it Circles and Chevrons

 

Self Portrait on a Hay Bale

 

a kitschy Monet needlepoint

 

and here is a shot of my sketchbook which shows how I used it for a work surface while making all those Artist Trading Cards I've been showing you

 

When I photocopied some for my records, I realized I could mount them beside their original sketches, something I'd never done before; a kind of historical documenting.

 

Today the weather is more temperate, a balance that I much prefer all 'round in life.

Balance is key.

 

strawberries, then the sea

 

It's July already!! How did that happen? And such a dreary end of June and start to July with rain and humidity and warm temperatures to make you think you were in the tropics. It's great for the plants though. They love it.

a big cabbage patch in the valley

 



Last Thursday, Wally found an organic strawberry farm for us to go picking. At $2.50 a quart, it was worth the effort. We picked 7 quarts so that we could freeze some for later. I forgot to take pictures, but here are a few at the same farm just east of Canning.

 

the twisted branches of an old peach tree

 

The chickens don't like that barking dog

 

the rooster finally goes off to inspect

 

We brought the coolers for the strawberries so we could dawdle on the way home.

Here we have arrived at the beach at Kingsport at low tide where the seagrass grows lush

 

Further down the beach, you can still see that wonderful red house from the photo before.

Fortunately for us there was a sandy, drier side to walk around these rocks.

This giant mushroom of concrete was possibly part of the old pier.

 

Those pesky barnacles attach themselves to everything, even whales I've heard.

Intergalactic Barnacles...up close

 

We found this poor little crab and decided to rescue him

 

 

So off we go to the incoming tide.

 

Along the way we find all sorts of treasures

A fabulous opalescent mollusk shell

 

Wally holds it up for a closer look

 

Speaking of mollusks, a mussel's shell still intact

 

a poor little eel stranded

grossed out like most people, they are, after all, only another kind of fish

 

a gorgeous mussel shell still in the water

 

Number 6 drawn by a welk

Funnily, I have just listened to Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony, his #6

and now Jean Sibelius' Symphony is playing on the radio

 

Have you ever seen such a thing as this?

Some kind of primitive plant growing out of the sea bed

 

Welks, barnacles and seaweed cling to a rock waiting for their mother the sea to reclaim them

 

Closer to shore we find the remnants of the old pier

and more old wood sheltering more welks

and good-bye to this deceptively barren beach overlooking the southern end of Minas Basin

 

Passing through Canning we spy one of these ubiquitous wild rose bushes that grow clusters of beautifully scented of white flowers. This one overshadows the hydrangea snowballs that grow behind it.

 



and do you remember this wonderful house I call the Grand Olde Dame of Canning?

I had to take another picture of her from the moving car just so I could have another look

 

Now we are in Port Williams. This darling old shed was probably somebody's home at one time.

 

We had a quick peek in at the great old antique barn on the same property

 and this lovely cat came to greet us

 

Parked in the barn was this fabulous roadster

 

Wally had to be careful not to bump his head,

but it was me who did. Ouch. There's no give in those monstrous barn beams.

 

And as promised, a mermaid, my unlikely centrefold

done on an acrylic background with Prismacolour pencil crayons for her body and paint pens for the lettering and doodles around.  She is the 2nd mermaid I consider to be finished, though I find I keep wanting to come back to finished pieces to bump them up some more.

 

A wish for our happiness, for making choices that are investments in our well-being, like seeking out a local farmer who doesn't spray their strawberries. We bless them and ourselves when we make informed choices.