Snakes and swans.........

I got a little carried away at Home Depot last night. I came home with the mother of all snake plants. That's it above. Now that it's transplanted into a new pot, I can't carry this thing, and am wondering just how I'm going to get this to my upstairs apartment. This is something I maybe should have thought about before I transplanted it! I could carry it in it's original container. It's beautiful! It's been sitting out in the sun at Home Depot, so the color is washed out of the leaves. They will green out again, once I get it indoors. If all else fails, I just need to make my daughter feel guilty enough to help me carry this thing in and up.

While I was at Home Depot, which is full of wonderful plants that were calling my name as I walked by, I got three annuals to plant in my mother's swan planter. I have no idea where my mother got this plastic planter. It's another thing that no one but me wanted. My mother used to plant geraniums in it. What I have in it is a mystery, other than the purple petunias hanging over the tail. The others, a tall pink something or other and a viney purple one in front, I haven't a clue. But they're pretty. My mother would love this. She was a fan of purple flowers, too.

The hot weather of June....

June, hot weather, and the living is easy. Or so some people would say. Not where I grew up! On a farm in central Wisconsin, there was nothing easy about June and hot weather. That's because it was haying time. According to my dad, we had to fill that big barn with hay for the winter, not a concept I really understood at all at age eight.

Eight is the age I learned to drive a team of horses on a hay wagon. And on the hay fork. The hay fork was a huge iron spider like thing that picked up loads of had, then was pulled by a series of ropes and pulleys up to the peak of a barn. Then it clicked into place and rode a rail into the hay lofts. When it was where dad wanted it, he pulled a little rope, tripping the fork and dropping the load of hay.

Something had to pull that huge load hay up to the very top of the barn. And that something was me and a team of horses so big that from behind, where I was stuck, I could not see their heads. Dad said it was easy. Hold two leather reins, and steer the horses in a straight line. Oh sure, I understood that perfectly. The horses were hooked to a wooden gizmo, that thankfully, I forgotten the name of, then the rope was on a huge iron hook, that hooked into the wooden gizmo.

When the horses pulled, the whole thing tightened, and rose up in the air a good four feet off the ground. Way taller than I was. My dad would be yelling at me to get away from that thing. "If the rope breaks, it could kill you!" So why was it, you have an eight year old kid driving these monstrous beasts with a rope that is pulled so tight it is four feet in the air?

God, I hated that job! I loved riding horses, but I never developed a love of the huge horses my dad kept on the farm. When other farmers had bought tractors, he was still using horses for some things. And haying was one of them.

Once we moved to a much bigger farm, dad bought a big tractor and a baler, and there was no more hay fork. My sisters and brothers never had to live in terror that they would be killed by a flying rope or runaway beasts of horses. Baling isn't any better. It's hot, sweaty and just plain miserable! I hated that too.

There's a reason I live in a city. And it has to do with spending my entire childhood and teenage years working on the farm. There was nothing else. To live on my dad's farm was to work on the farm. No excuses, no escape. School because the law required that. Other than that, it was work.

There are good memories too, not near as many as I wish there were. This hot weather we're having right now, unfortunately brings back the not so good ones.

Pic from the demon camera....

It seems the camera has a faulty switch. If I put batteries in the camera, it will stay on and take pictures no matter what position the switch is in. It will not turn off. So I put batteries in it, take pictures and take the batteries back out again. Works for now, until I can decide what to do with it. Probably replace it, since it isn't the newest digital camera around.

This is the second Knot Ugly Shrug from Stitch & Bitch, The Happy Hooker. After a lot of frogging, adding a few rows and stitches here and there, I finally like the way it turned out. It's from Bernat Cottontots, a worsted weight yarn that is a little bigger than Caron Simply Soft. It also does not stretch as much. This shrug came out bigger and hangs a little longer than the one from Simply Soft.

I made the ties longer, using 31 stitches instead of 14. I like the longer ties. I also tapered the ends of the ties. On the edging on the sleeves, I increased the 4 rows to 10 rows. Now it hangs to the top of my hands, covering my wrists. I like this length a lot, since it covers my arms which are not the most beautiful in the world in the summertime. I am allergic to the sun, and can't always stay out of the sunlight, so I have some lovely red marks on my arms. This shrug will be great for covering that.

I'm considering trying this shrug again. This is one pattern in this book that I really like, also the only one I've made. At the rate I'm going, I may not get to any of the other patterns! I'd like to try it in Simply Soft and a smaller hook for my 8 almost 9 year old granddaughter. Then maybe one in a sport or baby yarn for the 5 year old. Shrugs are in this summer, and both granddaughters are already wearing purchased ones.

Right now I've started the Bell Sleeved Sweater from the Tahki Stacy Charles Spring book in lavender Microspun. I love the way this is looking so far. I've tried a couple of different yarns for this, but the Microspun looks the best. It's an easy pattern, so I hope I can finish it fast.

The Possessed Camera....

I have been having camera issues for the last few months. I have a Kodak Easy Share which is easy enough for a camera idiot like me. It's always worked well. It seemed a few months ago, it was going through the rechargable batteries I use in it much more often that it used to . Then it decided it really liked the Energizer rechargables, and a set of those lasted over a month. Not that I take that many pictures, but I was able to take quite a few in that month.

Although a couple of days ago it was fine, today it decided not to work. So I changed the batteries, and took these pictures of my daughter's flowers before the baby rabbits that live in the garage decide to have them as a midnight snack. Brought the camera back in and uploaded the pics to my computer. Then I turned the camera off and set it off to the side on my computer desk.

I was reading something online, when a flashing light caught my eye. It was the camera turning itself on! I checked the little setting on top, it was definitely set on off. Camera was still on. Little flashing light turned green and sat there for awhile. I thought, well, okay this is a little strange. And it got a little stranger when the light started flashing again, and it turned itself off! I tried turning it on, then off again. Still it would turn itself on, then off, and finally refused to turn off at all. I was waiting for a column of smoke to rise and for the entire thing to explode. That didn't happen either. Fortunately.

As long as it was determined to stay on, I decided to take one more picture. Of the duck rock I talked about in my last post. Might as well see if anyone else thinks this rock looks like a duck, since my daughters don't seem to be that impressed with it. I wanted a picture from each side, but the camera objected and quit working altogether.

I decided just to park the thing for awhile, since it appeared to have died completely. Left it on my bed for an hour or so. When I went into plug in my cell phone, which I've yet again forgotten to charge, another story having to do with my extremely short memory for technical things, the camera had turned itself on again! And it was staring at me, again! (It was too!) Apparently a little nap does wonders for a camera.

So I uploaded the last picture. This is the one at the top of the post. And it does too look like a duck! No one can tell me differently.

I'm going to consult my camera book to see if there is a remedy for a possessed camera. I'm not sure that is covered in the little book. Since I prefer not to have a camera staring at me and blinking it's little green light when the switch is not on, I'm going to remove the batteries. If this thing comes on when there are no batteries in it, I'm taking it outside and tossing it as far as I can. Then run inside and lock the door!