I like #129

Welcome to another week of things to be grateful for.  We lost power for 24 hours this week after a major thunderstorm, but thankfully didn't lose anything from the freezer.  I'm super grateful to the OGE people who worked so hard to get it restored and hope they get everyone's back on soon.

I got to spend the weekend in Dallas with my sister for my nephew's birthday.  I took hardly any pictures but we had a blast.  We had a party for him on Saturday morning in my sister's backyard (it's really the funnest backyard ever). She baked him an amazing amazing birthday cake-  it was super delicious (alternating chocolate and white cake layers filled with peanut butter chocolate mousse.  She covered it with home-made fondant and sculpted all the fabulous pokemon decorations to go on it.  It was really one of the best looking and best tasting cakes I've ever seen. 

The dogs had a blast too;  Blue got to play with his friend Auto a ton.  And Bentley was thrilled because we put all the other dogs in the separate dog yard during the party, but Bentley is calm enough to stay out, so he got pretty much constant loves from everyone at the party. 

My dahlias are hanging in there, no flowers this week, but at least they're still alive.  I took this picture of my mother of thousands a couple days before the big storm and I'm glad I did because after the storm it sort of uprooted and also all the little babies were washed off the leaves.  I think I got it back safely tipped in its pot so that's lucky.  It's gotten so big, that it's very top heavy.

I finished the big quilt I've been working on since the spring, hopefully I'll have a chance to post about it soon.  Just as a palate cleanser, I started this small project last night-  it's fun to work on something different for a bit.

I hope you all had a good week!  Click over to LeeAnnas for more fun!

I Like #128

Sort of a short list this week.  The heat of the summer and lots of stressful things going on.  But there's good there if I look.

1.  I liked this grasshopper!  He sat on my studio door for a long time so I got to take several pictures.  Maybe someday he will work into a quilt.  There was also a really cute medium sized spider running across the floor this morning.  He ran into a giant tuft of dog hair (Bentley is shedding), and a whole bunch stuck to him (he was kinda furry).  I felt sort of bad as he ran off in the other direction with a cloud of dog hair surrounding him.

2.  I like movie night with friends.  We got together Saturday night and it's always a lovely time.  I worked a bunch on my never ending giant crochet shawl-  I'm so ready to be done with this, it's such a boring project I haven't even taken any pictures of it.  But it will be snuggly next winter.  I started it to have something mindless to work on, and boy is it ever.  We did get to watch one of my favorite silly movies ever, the 80s comedy Adventures in babysitting.  If you haven't seen it, definitely check it out.  It's pretty silly, but tons of laughs.

3.  My sinkhole is going to get fixed.  I'm trying to find a silver lining here, but it really is a good thing.  There's a giant dangerous eroded out sinkhole around my sewer line access in my backyard that's been getting bigger and bigger.  I called out the city a couple years ago and they blew me off but it's big enough now that I insisted.  Apparently it won't be too hard to fix and theoretically they'll call me next week sometime to schedule.  So that will be good.  Bentley did not like the utilities man, though Blue was super excited to have another new friend.

I hope everyone has a good week!  This weekend I'm headed to my sister's so that will be awesome.  Head on over to LeeAnna's for more positive things!

I Like #127

Welcome to another (late) week of things to like!  It was a rough weekend around these parts because my house AC was out and we're of course in the peak heat of summer, but I had an AC person out and it turned out it just needed a new filter and some coolant so that was an unexpected blessing.  I do need a new system, mine is from 1991, but at least I can wait until the fall.

Still some really fun things to like!

1.  I love crabapple leather!  I've always just made jelly from crabapples (rather than pies or dried apples or cobbler or apple butter or applesauce) because they're too small to core and with jelly you squeeze the juice through cheesecloth so you don't get seeds etc.  But I already made enough jelly this year so I googled what other people do with crabapples and there were lots of people who made applesauce and crabapple fruit leather and crabapple butter.  Come to find out, all you need is a food mill, which pushes out pulp without seeds/stems/peels.  IT was super easy, I didn't even have to chop the crabapples.  Just cooked them whole, put them through the food mill to make crabapple sauce, and then spread the sauce on top of lined trays in my food dryer.  I like things really tart, but plain crabapple sauce is really too tart to enjoy, so I added just a little bit of sugar.  The fruit leather turned out so delicious.  Chewy and flavorful.  Like the very best kind of fresh sour fruit candy.  Sooo good.

This is the food grinder.  The front side spits out these little goose-poop like things made out of seeds and core and skin, while the sauce pours out the back.

And here's the crabapplesauce before drying

And after drying.  So fabulously bright from all the good stuff in the crabapple skins.  YUM.  Also the end of the crabapples for this year so that's good.

2. I like doing my own DIY projects!  I DIYed drop leaves onto my home-made work table this weekend to make it wider and convert the whole thing into an ironing surface.  I'll probably do a whole post about it, but it was so gratifying to figure out how and build it all myself.  Hooray!

3.  And in the continuing construction mode, I installed a small hook and eye outside the sliding glass door.  That way when I go into the building I can keep the house door shut from the outside so Bentley doesn't AC the backyard.  Five minute fix I should have done years ago.We'll see how it holds up,  I think it will be enough to prevent him from opening it.  He's gotten to the point now that he won't even go through the dog door (he just opens the door with his big bony head) unless I'm gone and the board is in the inside of the door so he can't open it.  He's like oh- it's easier to just open the door than hop through the dog door.  But of course he doesn't close it behind himself....   Precious precious infuriating dog.

Have a great week everyone, and head over to LeeAnna's to check out more positive stuff!

I Like #126

Well I'm super late to the party this week, but I suppose better late than never!  It's hot and muggy here but that's what summer's for I suppose.

1.  I like quilting!  The air conditioner in my studio (a metal building) went out and it's roasting hot out there, but I've still been making progress on my quilting.  I get pretty quickly drenched in sweat, but as long as I wear a bandanna, I don't typically drip on the quilt.  Hopefully the air conditioner situation will be resolved within the next couple of weeks.  Keep your fingers crossed!

2.  I love hiking!  My friend Linda and I went down to the Wichita Wildlife Refuge last weekend to go hiking.  We hiked a new-to-me trail in the Charon Gardens area that was just exquisite even though it was a fairly warm day.  Really fabulous rocks and scenery.  We saw several Oklahoma collared lizards-  they are so beautiful, an intense bright turquoise with gold heads.  I put my phone away for most of the day, but I did get a couple of pictures.  We had two bison encounters-  One with this big guy who was just wandering right down the road at us- I had to back up several hundred yards with the car until I could find a place to pull out far enough that I wouldn't be in his way  (I took the picture from inside the parked car).  Then there was a whole herd of bison right on the hiking trail-  we detoured off the trail quite a ways to make sure not to disturb them.  In spite of waking up the next day with a million itchy bug bites (I'm praying they were chiggers from the hike and not something living in my house) we had a really lovely day.

2.  Blue got a new collar!  All he'd had before was the blue one he had from the shelter, and it was a pretty color but very plain and getting very faded.  I got him this cool personalized southwestern one from etsy. 

And Benley is a napping doofus.

Just a short list this week- no new flowers (everything is looking a bit wilty and sad), but goodness all the same.  Hang in there through the heat of the summer and click over to LeeAnna's for more things to like!

I like #125

Things to like this week!

Over the weekend Becky came up and she and Anna and I had a girls weekend.  We had an absolutely fabulous time together.  On Saturday we went down to the boathouse district.  It was really cool-  I'd never been there before.  Anna was absolutely amazing.  She went with us on all the activities, including climbing with us to the top of the six story open structure ropes course.  It was super fun and I was so proud of Anna for being so brave!  No pictures on the ropes course because no camera/loose items allowed, but really cool.  And then she climbed to the top of two different climbing walls-  here she is climbing one of them.  Phenomenal.

Then Becky helped me make a bunch of crabapple jelly (super tasty, and I'm still making it), and then we all made crowns/headbands together out of beads.  Becky made one for me that used some of the extra polymer clay teeth from Seymour, and it turned out really cool.  I actually wore it to work Monday (the teeth aren't too obvious.  All in all a great time.

On Sunday I did a bunch of quilting on my big quilt, but I don't really have any pictures to share.  It was nice to get a lot done though.


The dogs are being their regular selves (DOG!), and Blue had a good time over the weekend with Auto. 

Auto was here to visit for the weekend.

The flowers are still blooming.  One of my dahlias that's had big creamy white flowers now has a creamy pink flower!  Cool and weird!  We've also had a ton of wonderful butterflies and dragonfly things that are not actually dragonflies lately.   Also super cool!

I hope you are all having a good week and staying cool!!  Click over to Lee Anna's for more things to like.