This week June 19-25

I am a day late, I know. I blame the full, longer than normal day of training yesterday.

Last week:

  • 3 more repeats on the sides of tibetan clouds, I have 3 repeats done on the first side. I need 8.5 before the final border charts.
    • I did this, and then promptly put it down to cast on ALL THE THINGS!
  • Clean out work bag! It’s a desperate situation at this point, I can’t find anything.
  • Commute by bike once this week. (Maybe this time I’ll get it done?)
  • Deep cleaning of the bathroom. I’ve been neglecting it. Mr. Ink has been doing so much planting that scrubbing down the walls feels pointless, as the next day there’s mud on them again. Sort of like the fridge door. But, this is NO excuse to fail to get the job done!
  • Some weeding of the rose of sharon garden bed? JUST SOME? Maybe the issue is that it feels overwhelming so I don’t even start.
    • The advice of starting with 2 minutes a day was highly effective. Almost every day I spent about 15 minutes on it. On one day I spent quite a bit more time on it, including laying a little more mulch
  • Get photos of all the trees for 2017, and put them in an album for comparison next year.
    • This is done, but I also want to take additional pictures. Some of the ones I have are just utilitarian. I kind of want to get a few pictures of some trees where the garden is also in full bloom.

I have pictures to share, but no crafting photos. I will have one tomorrow.

It was a pretty good weekend, and Sunday was certainly a day with Miss Butterfly. She really does color our world. And I think you’ll be able to see that in this series of photos.

Miss Butterfly and I began our Sunday with chores after breakfast. We got quite a lot done. Mr. Ink had decided that he wanted to go to Golden Corral for lunch on father’s day. (*HORK!*) So, at some point we had gotten hungry, and wandered out to see what he was up to. He was busy making a larger cage for his weeping redbud. Of course Miss Butterfly had to get right in the middle of that.

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I told Mr. Ink it was the perfect father’s day photo, he’s building her a cage!

After annoying him for a bit, we went out to lunch. I can tell you one thing I HATE with a passion are buffets. Miss Butterfly had never been before, well, neither had I and it’s too bad I couldn’t keep it that way. To me, it’s like feeding cattle. Everything is done as fast as possible to consume as much as possible with very little nod to good food. The plates are inevitably dirty and wet and you are stuck inspecting your silverware as well, just in case. It’s distasteful.

Miss Butterfly loved it. Most specifically because she could get cotton candy.

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I think Mr. Ink was pleased too, and I guess that’s what counts since it was his day. Though….I told him that from here on out every time he takes me to a place like this, I am going to require that we also go to my favorite little french bistro. I think it’s a fair trade.

We went to a garden center, of course, just to look around. Then we made it home with JUST enough time for Mr. Ink to fix his bike, and then head off to our next adventure. Which turned out to be an adventure even getting there. A couple years back I purchased a bike rack that holds 3 bikes. We finally, for the first time, put it on my honda. Then we loaded the bikes. And then….we realized that 3 heavy bikes makes my trunk warp. At that point we were already supposed to be on the road. I took the bikes off the honda, and Mr. Ink pulled out the truck. Then we had to unload all the large rocks that were stored in the truck bed before we could put the bikes in. Then we loaded the bikes and were on our way.

You see, it’s college world series time here. And being a decidedly non sports person, this has done nothing for me but make traffic terrible and interfere with my work life when I cannot get a guest a hotel room. But, a dear friend of mine organizes bike parking downtown, run by volunteers. I tend to not volunteer for that. But I got a text from him saying that his wife’s grandfather had passed away and they had to head out of town for the funeral. (Unfortunately, funeral is a word that seems to keep making a regular appearance on this blog, it would be great if that would stop for awhile.) So, he was desperate to find some help for the weekend, help he trusts, so he could travel without concern. He said “I know this is super not your thing, but please?” And I said “The whole family will be there.”

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We all went down and checked in bikes in front of a completely open and terribly loud bar, across from the very busy ball park. It was super not my thing. But I got to knit. And spend time with my family. And get a little bike ride in, as we parked far away and rode in together.

We stayed up too late, but everything went smoothly, we didn’t have any issue with people failing to collect their bikes at the end of the night. We didn’t have to make any phone calls. And the weather was downright perfect, not hot, not too cool, breezy, clear.

And then I went in early for work the next day for a full day of training that was ridiculously boring, but I finished some knitting that is currently blocking, and did some more knitting, and when I got home I was so grumpy that Mr. Ink thought something terrible must have happened at work. But no, it was just that I was SO tired and headachey and just wanted to go to bed. So, Miss Butterfly and Mr. Ink stayed up and watched a movie together while I was in bed by 9:15.

I’ve got a few garden photos.

Day lilies have begun to bloom. The one on the right is from my actual day lily garden spot. The one on the right is from the holding area. I knew that most of what I put in the holding area would be of the ditch lily variety, but I ALSO knew I had some pretty colorful ones in there. So, I lined them all up by the fence and waited a year. I am not disappointed, there’s at least 3 in that area I’ll move to my regular day lily garden. Now I’ll flag the lilies that are “good” and wait until they are done blooming to move them.

I thought I had a photo of our balloon flowers blooming, but I guess not! I’ll try again later. After all, that garden bed is about to be in overdrive. It’s SO CLOSE to fully blooming.

Anyhow, the list for this week:

  • Finish the first side of Tibetan Clouds stole, and complete the set up for the second side. (I’d really like to have the entire stole complete by July 1, but I am not sure that’s going to happen without hating the project.)
  • Keep up on the daily tiny bit of weeding, it’s so effective!
  • Get Miss Butterfly packed up for her second week of camp.
  • Start thinking about packing her up for her trip to visit my parents. (The turn around time between second week of camp and her trip east is disturbingly short.)
  • Work on getting my step goals again, I’ve been falling down on this particular job lately.

That’s about it from here, it’s going to be another busy week and weekend. I’d love to stop saying that, but it’s looking unlikely any time soon at this point!