Stitching on a Sunday, Fallen Branches and a Pear Tree.

 It's been a busy couple of weeks with all sorts of things going on.  I'm happy to say I have hired a new lawn service to cut my grass.  I interviewed the company on Thursday and they were kind enough to point out a fallen tree branch in my yard.

Luckily it didn't fall on the house but a bit too close for comfort so this week I will be looking for a tree service to either trim the branches or to remove the tree entirely, which I would like to avoid.

The photo above shows where the branch snapped off and fell from, quite high up. Unfortunately one of the problems with the Water Oak tree is branches tend to drop off and trees have been known to just fall over.  Before we moved here our previous house had a water oak in front of the house and branches fell off all the time.  I would never hear them fall but when I would step outside there it would be lying in the driveway.  I didn't hear this branch fall and I have no idea when it fell. 

On a positive note the new lawn service cut the grass Saturday and did a wonderful job trimming around the boulders along the driveway.  So that's one thing out of the way that needed to be done.  One other positive note is the pear tree has quite a few pears on the branches.

I am quite happy to see so many fruits, though I didn't really have much hope for them because whoever planted the tree never gave the location much thought because the big oak tree and surrounding trees have blocked out most of the sunlight, however, in the autumn my neighbors cut down most of the trees in their yard so more sunlight finally reached the tree, and I gave it a bit of fertilizer in the autumn. 

So all those lovely March flowering branches gave way to several pears appearing on the branches.

All the leaves have now been blown away by the lawn service and the flagstone now shows through, eventually I will snap a new photo.  I am hoping once the branches of the oak tree are trimmed more light will get to the pear tree and next year she will fair much better.

I found some time to do some hand embroidery, I worked on both the Moon Flow and the Greenman pieces.

On the Moon Flow piece I stitched more of the light colored moon phases. While stitching them I noticed I didn't finish the little flowers in the center, I stitched the stems and leaves but forgot all about the flowers.

On the Greenman piece I stitched more of the Ivy leaves, not much progress but those few leaves took me more than an hour to stitch, but any progress is progress and I will be stitching more on the greenman today for slow Sunday stitching

I will be linking my post over at Kathy's Quilts today https://kathysquilts.blogspot.com/2022/05/slow-sunday-stitching_0384173884.html

This week I drove over to the local library to pick up a book waiting for me, Traveling with Pomegranates by Sue Monk Kidd and Ann Kidd Taylor, it's a large print book so I can see what I am reading.  Too often I pick up a book and the print is so light or so small I can't see it even with my glasses on so when a large print book is available I check it out.

It's been a very quiet Memorial Day weekend so far, the weather was supposed to me lots of rain, but it came early on Friday and rained for several hours non-stop, tomorrow is Memorial Day here in the United States, the unofficial start of Summer.

 

Mid-May: Here's What I Have Been Doing

 Mid-May, a Full Flower Moon and fairly nice weather has been with  us for a little over a week and just starting to build the humidity with the evening rain.

On Mother's Day my son, daughter in law and I took a lovely hike to the Marjorie Harris Carr land bridge, which crosses over Interstate 75 located here in Ocala.

The weather was perfect with lots of sunshine and a breeze all along the walk, though it was hot the breeze made it pleasant.  There are lots of wild flowers and wild berries along the path.

The landbridge begins with a stone wall, then has the iron bars to get a view of the cars along I-75

We didn't see any bears along the walk which was good cause I don't think I can outrun a bear at this stage of my life.

We did see a number of emergency markings along the way, quite a few cyclist were on the paved path.

On out way back we saw a few gopher turtles going about their business in different areas of the park

To end the day we stopped at Ms. Steve's for ice cream, I had a root bear float, much needed after the walk my water was almost gone and the sugar helped.

I also received some lovely flowers and a sweet Mother's Day card, I love Snoopy and the pop up card was perfect.

A few days later the first Lily opened 

This weekend I was finally in the mood to pick up my hand embroidery and get some stitches in on my Moon Flow piece from Cozy Blue.

The moon phases are just about done, I will be glad to have this completed. I think this is the longest I have gone with a not in the mood to stitch mood.  I've learned when I get that vibe if I do ignore it I wind up ripping out all of the not quite right stitching.  These moods don't hit me often but when the do it's quite frustrating.  I love hand embroidering and usually the project I am working on but I think my mind gets clogged with too many other things and I can't concentrate on the task at hand.  It happens with other crafts and reading too. 

I purchased two lovely tin signs by Cheryl Baker recently, I love her art work and I love dragonflies so these were I have to have them moment.

Yesterday I picked up the Greenman embroidery and put a few more stitches in him and plan to work on him later today.

I am linking at Kathy's Quilts https://kathysquilts.blogspot.com/2022/05/slow-sunday-stitching_0132310321.html

 

An update on what I have been doing lately.

 Here is an update on what I have been up to, this is a photo heavy post, mostly where I talk about my recent walk.

 I’ve been doing some online shopping, recently I purchased a new mandoline to slice vegetables and when it arrived to my surprise it was a mermaid incense burner. Now as much as I love mermaids I have no idea how to slice veggies with it. So back it went to Amazon and I purchased another. When I moved in 2019 my mandoline went into the donations bag since I hadn’t used it for a few years. It’s always the case, but I still donate stuff I haven’t used in a year. 

 I purchased this lovely tin dragonfly sign from Cheryl Baker Arts, I love dragonflies and thought this would look wonderful displayed somewhere around the house.

I ordered some tea from Twinings, it arrived on Tuesday I put the box aside and finally opened it Thursday morning. I bought 5 boxes of tea, mostly black tea and 1 citrus herbal.They were kind enough to toss in some sample tea bags and a sweet little card.

At Christmastime my sister made up gift basket which included a Twinings tea sampler with about 50 varieties of tea, I passed the green tea onto my daughter in law because I haven’t been able to tolerate the taste since I got sick back in March 2022. Anyway, there was English Breakfast tea with lemon and English Afternoon Tea I loved both so much I tried finding it at our local Publix, when I couldn’t find it I went directly to the source. I bought English Breakfast (decaf), English Afternoon, English Breakfast with lemon, English breakfast with probiotics, and Lemon Delight herbal tea. If you are wondering why so many boxes of tea and why so similar? Aside from drinking a cup or more a day I’m planning to make iced tea which I usually make by the half gallon so the tea will be gone in a flash.

While I was refilling the bird feeders in the front of my house I snapped a few photos, the gardenia is putting on a beautiful show, these blossoms have such a sweet scent some days I have to take a step back because it's so strong. I love when the Mexican Petunias grow among the gardenias. I cut a piece of the cactus yesterday so I can try my hand a propagating it, it has to sit for a few days while the cut end heals over then I can place it in soil.

The reason I cut the cactus is it's growing through the fence, it was in my yard originally a former lawn service provider mowed it down, and last year I noticed it grew under my fence into the neighbors yard, it didn't grow much then this year I noticed not only did it grow taller, it was beginning to flower. I'm hoping I can get it to take root and grow.  I haven't had much luck with cactus rooting but I'm giving it a shot.
 

Last week I did a long walk at a local park trail, the day was lovely though I started my walk later in the morning than I had planned. Some of the sites I saw along my walk,I usually walk this trail in the late autumn and winter because there isn’t much shade, there were wild flowers, giant thistle and flowering cactus, wild berries, pine cones and a fuzzy caterpillar for my great niece because she loves crawly things. 

 Tomorrow my son Nick and daughter in law Megan are taking me on a hike for Mother’s Day, at the Ocala Landbridge, I have wanted to take this hike but illness and recovery, surgeries and more recovery since March 2020 made it just about impossible. Yes, it’s the day before Mother’s Day however, last year I had the happy couple for Mother’s Day so this year they will spend Sunday with Megan’s Mom. Anyway you can be sure I will snap some photos and post them here. I’m looking forward to this hike and hope it’s as pleasant a day as last year. Here is a link if you are interested.

https://www.floridastateparks.org/parks-and-trails/landbridge-trailhead