Winding down

August is in it's last week. Our temps here are in the 90's during the day and 50's at night. Very bearable.
Had a teeth cleaning appointment today. Why do I dread this so much? It doesn't hurt. The hygienist is very gentle (chatty but gentle). But I 'white knuckle' it every time. No cavities. Hooray.
A friend sent me a website in which you enter your name (or any name) and it finds people that match your search. There appears to be another Leonna Bowers in MO. What are the odds? Same spelling of both first and last. Wow. Then I looked for a former pastor in Hawaii. Left a message with my name while in Hawaii (he wouldn't recognize my current name) and soon received an email from a solicitor in Nigeria trying to "clear an account" of a deceased Chinese National. Hello. That message was immediately deleted.
Completed another little project to enter in the Fair. Have to get a couple more ready by the 5th of September. Piece of cake.

Today was the 'Cat' party. We played pin the tail on the cat, painted pet rocks, blew bubbles, played balloon stomp, broke a Cat-yatta and ate cat cupcakes.
I think they all had fun. Lots of giggling. No fighting. Success!
Sydney didn't have a guest but Casey had two, so she shared.

It's all about Sydney

Here she is, our little actress. She had one line in the play "Newsies", so her name was in the program.
Being on the small side, she was most always in the front row.
I videoed the whole play (33 minutes) so didn't get any still shots of her on stage.


She is very proud of the Quilt (lap robe size) she made this summer. She saw that I had some 3" squares cut out and has just been plugging alone day by day. She even did the quilting. We laid the top out on a piece of polar fleece and she stitched over the top of all the seams. Then turned the white edges under and top stitched all the way around. She even cut all the fringe. Way to go girl.

Cat Party plans

Today Sydney will be presenting a little play with the rest of her drama camp. They have been working on "Newsies" so it should be lively.
Next Thursday we will be having a Cat Party to celebrate the first anniversary of Ben Ben the cat adopting them. We are working on "Pin the Tail on the Cat" (I drew a cat & a separate tail); Catyatta (have to get a balloon and fashion something resembling a cat); we will have cupcakes decorated like a cat's face (haven't figured out how to do the ears yet but that will come), and maybe we will draw cats on the sidewalk. I'll take pictures next week.

Anniversary

Today I celebrate three years of being married to the kindest man I know. I can honestly say we have not so much as had a cross word between us. It is truely a joy to be in companionship (especially in my later years) with my soul mate. Happy Anniversary to us!

Bonsai

I've been reading up on how to start a Bonsai tree. In none of the books does it really give specifics like guage of wire to ancore the tree, type of screen to cover the holes in the pot, age of the tree when training begins, season of growth to begin. I went to several nurseries and found one lady who was into Bonsai who gave me some great tips like get it out of the ground now so as not to encourage root growth but put it back into the one gal. pot after triming it's roots and then wait a couple of weeks to trim the top back. I was given a card at another nursery (Spokane seems to be very lacking in Bonsai gardeners) of a couple just this side of the Idaho boarder who run a nursery with Bonsai emphasis. He was great! He too told me to get the tree out of the ground but only trim the roots three quarters of an inch and put it back in its one gal pot. In the spring take it out of the pot and trim another three quarters of an inch off the roots and put it into a one quart pot. Not until two springs from now do I put it into its Bonsai pot. They offer classes at the Idaho community college in October. I intend to take their class.
I have also sent in my registration to the Inland Empire Bonsai Society. Maybe I have another way to keep busy (lol).

Busted

Living in a Condo I should have realized that before one plants anything one needs the OK of the group. I knew that. I ignored that. I figured everyone would love to have an ancient Ginkgo tree growing in their yard. WRONG! One resident is very anti tree. Where I planted mine will distroy his view (in 20 years or so). Big time fuss. Condo meeting next Tuesday. I have appologized to him for my thoughlessness. He has agreed not to distroy the tree until the meeting.
In the mean time I am thinking "Why not just Bonsai the tree?" So, I went to the Library and picked up several books on the subject. Mine may not look as pretty as the ones in the books but it will still be mine and I'll grow it on my porch, in a pot where he has nothing to disagree or grumble about. I'll get that done before the meeting on Tuesday. Wish me luck on this project. I'll post pictures of the finished project.

Ginkgo is planted

I finally got the hole dug and my little plant in the ground.
You can see how much river rock is at the street side of the condo. Thats our place on the lower level.




I want to show you how my garden is growing. Those are sunflowers in front of the ugly gas meters.



The roses bloomed nicely once and have not been producing since.
It does look like a little secret garden tho, doesn't it?

Fast week

My this week went by fast. Nothing really happened, just stayed busy. Still do not have the tree in the ground - maybe tonight. Did finish a sewing project or two. Still more of them to go. Started thinking about what I should enter in the Fair. Entry forms are due next Tuesday. Nothing quite like procrastinating.
We had a broken sprinkler head that the repairman came to fix. I wanted to talk to him so I slipped on my clogs and walked across the river rock which covers a great deal of our street side property and stepped down a small incline of lava rock. Twisted my ankle just enough to be annoying. Also threw out my whole allignment. I can feel it as I lay down to relax and this sholder "yips" and that leg "yowls" and the middle of my back "growns". Ahh the fun of aging. One cannot just jump down a small rock incline like one could when but a child.
My swim group of ladies (8 of us) have been attending the Coeur d'Alene Summer Theatre this year. Our fourth and last gathering is tomorrow - "The King and I". We shall probably be comparing to the movie but still enjoying the event.