Quiet Day

Had a very nice breakfast at a local diner with two of my friendship group this morning.  Then went to a quilt shop where I successfully filled out the needed fabrics for a quilt that's been bouncing around in my mind.  When will I start it?  Well, that's always the question, isn't it?

There are more quilts waiting to be started, continued, and finished than there are hours in a day, and more keep springing up in my head.  This is something I don't really worry about although maybe I should.  I just think that I am lucky to have so many creative possibilities hanging around waiting for attention.  It means I have choices.

Is it the same with my painting?  Close, but not as many projects crowding my brain.  Does it disturb me?  No.  I'm still trying to master the how-to part of painting, and I've been sewing for almost my entire life.  That makes a big difference.  I know that's pretty obvious; it's just easier to create when the how-to doesn't get in the way.  More practice is needed in this area, that's for sure!

Funny.  When I started this entry, I thought I was going to apologize - again - for no photos because it was a quiet day without much that was notable going on.  Instead I wind up discovering something through the writing that I haven't articulated before, something that explains why painting, which has been a dream for so long, has seemingly taken a back seat to sewing.  No back seat about it; I'm simply at a different point in the process. 

Back to New Orleans

In class today after some discussion of both the painting featured in yesterday's entry and the New Orleans painting, I got to work.  As you will be able to see, I added the background figures which begin to punch up the colors a bit; actually, I guess one could say they actually add color where there was none.  I'm quite happy that they are finally visually clearer and set the tone for the musicians (ha!).  

While looking at this as it is now, I have to keep reminding myself that lots of things will be tweaked as I get nearer to calling this one finished.  For example, just painting in the "audience" has made me more aware of the need to add to the window but also aware of the need to wait before I do so.  The background behind the "audience" is dreadful - flat and wrong, but that too must wait for the musicians to move to center stage (oh golly, another play on words!).  

My next move will be to set in the rest of the lone young man to the left of the drummer, and then, oh hallelujah!, I will allow myself to start on the skin of the musicians.  Once, skin color is there, I can choose colors for their clothing.  It's been hard to hold off on the focal group, but I knew I had to.  You see, I am learning!

Now just a word or two about yesterday's lake-but-not-quite-a-landscape.  Sharon was delighted and most encouraging with the use of washes and loosely suggested background for the main figure.  She had read my blog, realized my intent, and has wholeheartedly adopted the role of guide in my journey.  She, too, is trying to "loosen up" in her own work so she will be using her own experience while helping me.  What a bonus!

Not Quite a Landscape

Several days ago, I talked about how I want my quilting and my painting to move on from where is it now to where I want it to go next.  Soon after that I began a new painting that I mentioned in an entry on September 10th.  There was no photo to show you at that time, and I didn't have the opportunity to paint again until today.

This is the painting today.  Watercolor as you can see and the lake.  Even though far from finished, you can tell it isn't my usual landscape.  The focus isn't on dramatic scenery.   I'll probably have to paint it several more times before it will be as I want it to be.  Some things need to be sharpened and others - well, less focused.  At the moment, though, that doesn't matter to me.

With this painting, I am trying to let the water work for me (that is, the water one uses on the paper not the water in the lake!), and I am trying to be looser.  

The other thing I hope will happen is that the viewer will discover the story - if there is one - in this painting for herself.  

  

Arachnophobics - Don't Look!

If you suffer from arachnophobia (fear of spiders), you may wish to click out of this entry immediately.  I am sharing some photos I took of an orb spider who spent several days hanging under a railing on our front porch.  

Please meet the Black and Yellow Garden spider, Mrs. Argiope aurantia:

She is large and a bit scary looking because of her size (body is about 1"), but she doesn't inflict any damage to humans (unless we sit on her, and I think a bite caused by that would be forgivable).  She like to live in quiet gardens where she can lure edible insects into her web for lunch; for them her bite is poisonous.

Her babies are born in late summer but live in the egg sac until the following spring which is a smart way to get through the winter!  

She's quite amazingly lovely and doomed.  According to what I read*, in this climate she will probably die after the first frost.

Actually, I had planned to talk about the lovely time we had visiting daughter and grandson this weekend, but realized I couldn't share any photos from his baseball game as they are videos, and I don't publicize his photos anyway!  Too bad!  He made some good plays, but the outcome of the game was disappointing (the other team tromped them!). 

He also went to a bonsai show with his grandfather where he solemnly looked at trees and stones.  He met many people whom he charmed with his good manners.  At the end, when my daughter and I had caught up with them and we were leaving, my grandson turned to me and said, "I really feel sorry for you because you have to come back here next year!"  I thought I'd fall over laughing!

He made comments like that throughout the weekend, and I discovered what a grand sense of humor he has.  Another sign of growing up.

Site for more complete information about the spider:

* http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/accounts/Argiope_aurantia/

A Learning Curve

Here's rectangle AB with the curved insert that I mentioned yesterday.

I hope you can see why I am so pleased.  Next time I won't cut the exact size I need before cutting the curve or curves.  If you look carefully at the pattern, you can see one white tree on the left of the green line but nothing below it - no trunk at all.  I might have been able to avoid that if the fabric piece had been large enough to shift about without losing size I needed instead of the exact size.  Well, this is a learning curve - ouch, I'm sorry (though my mother would have loved that pun)!

Quilters, can you tell what this is?  The background won't help you, but the fact that the fabric was folded in half might be a hint.

ME, you can't tell!

Courage from Supportive Friends

A huge thank you to all of you who responded to yesterday's blog.  You were understanding, supportive, and encouraging.  Wow!  You gave me the courage to start acting on my decision.  

I started a new painting, but I haven't had time to take a picture.  It's a painting which based on a photograph which evokes strong memories for me, but a painting which I hope will allow a viewer to supply their own memory/story/interpretation.  As I was working on it, I realized that it will be easier - perhaps - to take this new direction in painting than in quilting.  But even there I made some inroads today.

While I have patterns that I am committed to make, I can change patterns even if only in very simple, superficial ways.  Today's alteration?  I bisected a rectangle of fabric (color A) with a sinuous curved line, took another fabric (color B) and cut the same line, then sewed the two edges together creating rectangle AB.  Finally I added another piece of A to the rectangle.  Basically it looks like a rectangle of A with a slender curving river of B meandering through it.  [Wait.  Did I just write a math problem - rectangle AB???]

Doing both painting and sewing made me very happy.   Thank you!

A Transformation?

Some things are beginning to coalesce in my brain - things that have been rolling around up there just bumping into one another and caroming off another wall or getting wedged into a dark corner with other marbles, yarn scraps, and bits of lint.  Well, I never claimed my brain is a tidy place!  Anyway, I had two experiences today that started to pull some of those stray thoughts out of the corners and away from the walls to the center of a place where they can begin to interact.

I have become more and more aware of my restlessness with traditional quilt patterns of late.  There are many I still wish to make, but I want to infuse the traditional with my own perspective.  Using quilts to tell a story is something I've been experimenting with for a while, but now the notion of using quilting in a more poetic way where the reader (or the viewer) can plug in her own interpretation in intriguing me more and more.  

This fragmentary, elusive wisp of an idea started to settle in today as I was asked to help a friend choose fabrics for a quilt.  I love doing that; it was a part of my job for the brief time I worked in a quilt shop that filled me with joy.  Discovering what a person loves, what a person wants the finished quilt to do or say or be was exciting and still is.  At that time, I limited myself to the designer's pattern and her hues and values while still encouraging the customer to plug in her favorite colors and her notion of light and dark was a delight.  But my focus was on maintaining the integrity of the design as set forth in the pattern.

Today, my friend had more helpers than she really needed.  There were too many people trying to guide her.  When I realized that my hackles were being raised by someone who pointed out that the pattern had a different value in a particular area of the design than the fabric my friend was looking at lovingly, by fabrics that were perfect for the job but just dull and lifeless, I had to walk away.   I knew that there was nothing wrong with what was being suggested, and the fabrics were perfectly acceptable.  I was the one out of sync.  (I should say here that my friend sent me a photo of the final decisions and the choices are wonderful!)

Then later in the day I purchased a watercolor magazine because the cover painting had indistinct humans (which I need to paint in the work I'm doing right now) as well as a totally different and freer, looser style than I have.  As I read this magazine, I found another article on a painter who has a cubist style and  who includes writing in his work, and my brain went "Sssproinggg!" like a cartoon bed spring!

What I want to do, if I can articulate it so it makes sense, is take a pattern and stretch it beyond its limits, to pull it into a different shape that has personal meaning.  Think of it like a story that starts out with two girls who are going on a trip when suddenly they're a fox and a hummingbird in enchanted forest.  What were their suitcases have become a Victorian music box balanced on the fox's back and a medieval chateleine around the neck of the hummingbird.  Both items have magical qualities.

And I think that's what I want to do; I want to put magic in my quilts and in my paintings.  I want to combine traditional blocks with poetry in such a way that the viewer decides what the story is.  I would like my paintings to be less defined so that the viewer has the chance of figuring it out for herself instead of me.

Does that make any sense?  Time will tell if I can do it.  It's taken long enough for this to come together, and it's bound to take longer to become reality.

Autumn Beauty

This has been my favorite time of the year for most of my adult life; I'm sure that when I was a child summer reigned supreme - but no longer.  I love the blue of the sky in fall, the colors of the leaves against that sky as an unintentional complement to that amazing blue, and that crisp cool air.  Wow!  

Here's a photo of early autumn flowers that have had a banner year in my garden (everyone else's, too!).  There are a couple of orange marigolds in a small vase  I don't think you can really see.  The little table mat on the bookcase was made by my first quilting teacher, and I treasure it.  It comes out for display every September.  Can you see the stencil on the wall behind the vase?  It's a red squirrel, oak leaves, and acorns.  More fall - but oh my, those acorns are plentiful!

I hope your day was full of the glories of this season.

Six Hundred and Fifty Entries

Oh my, this is the 650th entry in this blog, and I should be writing something momentous or whimsical or at least interesting.  But I'm too tired tonight to do so; I'll natter for a bit and then toddle off to bed.

The weekend has been busy with household tasks and some work on the quilt.  The latter didn't get as much attention as I had hoped, but all the trunks of the palm trees are finished.  Also, eight and a half palm trees have their fronds stitched - only six and a half to go.

Today I had a grand time at the sewing club I lead.  Personal reminiscences of auto mishaps told by a couple of the members had all of us in gales of laughter for most of the time so I can't say I did much "leading"!  After that ME and I stopped off to visit a dear friend we haven't seen very much of lately and that, too, led to laughter and sharing conversation with good friends.

I know I've mentioned it before, but I truly think that one of life's greatest gifts is friendship.  

That to me is a good 650th entry - thanks to all my friends!

Window Sketch #4 Segues into a Final Version

The fifth version of the shop window was painted today - in the blank space waiting for it.  Yes, the empty window behind the musicians now has items on shelves.  No photo to show you yet, but that will come soon.  Instead I'll tell you a little about it.

First I painted a fourth version, one I really liked almost completely.  Then I decided to strike while the iron was hot, and worked on the actual painting.  Funny thing is, I still like the fourth version best, but the fifth version does exactly what it should do at this time.  This version is very subtle and subdued; one barely notices it is there.  And, as D said when he saw it, "It doesn't draw my eyes.  It doesn't steal my attention."  Thank you, D!

Yes, I was thrilled that he said that because that is my intention.  However, as I told him, I may have to intensify it when all is said and done.  When the painting is "finished" I'll ask for opinions and give it my final once over, too, then I may find that it is too retiring.  Then I can make the window come out of the shadows a little way.

Two Paintings: Window Sketch #3 and a Vermont Potting Shed

After a successful morning at painting and a frustrating afternoon chasing down tiles (again), this will be a short entry that will focus on the pleasant part of the day.

During the first half of class, I worked on a third sketch of the window that will be behind the musicians in the street musicians painting.  Writing that list of things I ought to do really helped even though I didn't look at the list once I was in class.

• enlarge this area of the photograph in order to help me see what's in the shop if at all possible.  Tuba or hat or???  Items on the shelves? I did take an enlarged photo to class, and it wasn't the tuba.  It appeared to be draped shimmery fabrics and balloons (yes, balloons!).
• make the size of the window the correct shape instead of just dividing my practice paper into sections that have no real relation to the window I'm sketching. This I didn't do. I just used the size I had.
• use the same watercolor paper I'm using for the "real" painting for the practice sketches. It made a difference!  Although I didn't make the piece the correct size, I did use the "good" paper, and I'm very glad I did.  The paper and water and paint reacted differently to each other.
• turn off the overhead fan!  While I felt much more comfortable ceding control to the water (I knew the items seen through a window would be indistinct), but due to the fan, it dried too quickly.  Even though more water can be added, it stops the rhythm of the work. Ha!  There is an overhead fan at Sharon's, but it didn't appear to make much difference - possibly because of the paper.
• practice! Yes, I did, and here it is.

Hmm.  Certainly isn't something that one would leap up and say "Wow!" about, but it's closer to what I want behind the musicians.  Will I do another practice sketch?  Probably.  To me it doesn't look like shelves in a store, so I think I paint more familiar objects (teapots and mugs and tins maybe? certainly not balloons!) on the shelves.  It's worth a try.

I did have time left after that sketch so I went back to the plein aire sketch of a barn/potting shed I started in Vermont.  

We'll have to wait and see if this amounts to anything interesting; it's too early at this point to tell.

Update on Painting of New Orleans Musicians

Back to the second New Orleans painting that I started writing about on July 16, 2014.

While we were away in mid-August I was able to do a little work on it:

The colors are washes I laid down to begin to define the background.  Oh, and I should say that the yellowish outline on the figures is a masking fluid that keeps the watercolors from flowing into places it's not welcome.

I took this preliminary work in to class last week thinking I might be able to start on the figures or the musicians; actually my fingers were itching to start on them - there was no brain involved at all.  It's obvious that the background needs more work.  See the big blank space behind the tuba?  That's a store window, and that's what Sharon told me needed work before I went on to anything else.    As usual I had no idea how to approach that window - complete with a reflected figure.

After Sharon gave me some ideas how to paint the window, I took out a piece of scrap paper and began.

This is what I had at the end of class.  Strangely enough, I liked it even though I knew I was far from being ready to add something like the above as the window in the painting.  I had let the water control me rather than the other way around! My  plan was to continue with that freedom while painting another three or four practice passes before the next class.

Three or four?  Try one. It's all I had time for.  However, this sketch is better than the first attempt.  The colors are more subdued, objects in the shop are more clearly items on shelves, but the reflected light isn't there at all as I inadvertently painted right over the blank areas I initially left for reflections.  Sigh another note to self.  The big white area on the left is where the real tuba is (check the first painting), and I just realized that instrument might be the reflection in the lower right hand side of the window!  I  had thought it might be another hat on a stand on the window sill inside the shop, but now . . . .  What do you think?

Things need to be corrected and practiced a few more times.  Here's what I know I need to do:

• enlarge this area of the photograph in order to help me see what's in the shop if at all possible.  Tuba or hat or???  Items on the shelves? 
• make the size of the window the correct shape instead of just dividing my practice paper into sections that have no real relation to the window I'm sketching
• use the same watercolor paper I'm using for the "real" painting for the practice sketches - I just forgot to do that today.  Different papers and water interact differently.
• turn off the overhead fan!  While I felt much more comfortable ceding control to the water (I knew the items seen through a window would be indistinct), but due to the fan, it dried too quickly.  Even though more water can be added, it stops the rhythm of the work. 
• practice

A Quilt and Brain Games

Just to give you an idea of how one builds in difficulty in what might otherwise be a relatively easy project . . . the quilt I am working on includes palm trees.  Don't even ask why; I just thought they would add the right touch to the overall composition.  Silly me.

Anyway, did I have it all planned out how I would make those palm trees before I took the quilt to the quilter?  No, of course not.  I had machine appliqued the trunks of the trees, but that was all.  This week, now that the binding is done and the two sleeves have been sewn on the back, I decided to deal with the trees before all the other embellishments I want to add.

I started with two trees.  My decision was to embroider the palm fronds, and I did it free hand with no markings on the fabric.  Two trees completed in one night.  I hated them; the green thread was too dark against the dark blue sky.  The next morning I took out all my stitches, spent some time on research (memory isn't always accurate), did a few sketches, and then that evening I changed thread colors and embroidered those two trees.  I hated them; the thread still wasn't right and the stitching while palm-frond-like still wasn't effective.  The next plan was applique.  I would cut out fronds from green fabric and applique them on the sky fabric.  I gathered the fabrics I thought would work, but I have to say I wasn't happy about the many hours of work this plan would entail.

The next morning I woke up with the correct solution sitting there in my head as though it had been there all along and was just waiting for me to find it.  Boom and it was there just smirking at me.  Wool.  That was the answer.  Wool and fusible batting to give it that little bit of three dimensional quality.  So I drew a pattern for the entire top of a palm tree, copied it on the computer changing sizes so I could fit big and little trees, found my wool and batting, and started cutting.

Tonight I blanket-stitched one top and started on the second (it will speed up as I get accustomed to shifting the entire quilt around on my lap).  I love it!

Thank you, you sneaky little brain!

Busy Evenings

After sending out a quick email, it occurred to me that I hadn't written an entry - again.  My apologies and an explanation because it will probably happen again.

I am spending my evenings doing the embellishment on a quilt that has to be completed for the October quilt show.  There is a lot to do, but I am trying to limit my work on it to evenings.  Daytime can be quite hectic with frequent interruptions - not good for concentrated work.

Question - can one be an art quilter if one's original quilts are representational "story quilts"?  Paintings are considered art and many are representational; does that hold true in the quilting world?  I don't know.

More of the Lake

Well, I was right about today.  We spent the bulk of our time scurrying around plumbing supply and tile stores hunting down items ordered weeks ago that were inexplicably not available.

Ah well, this too shall pass.  But I am tired and was not able to take pictures of the other paintings I didn't show you yesterday.  

Consolation prize - something even better than paintings.

This is what we believe is a one year old merganser duck and probably a male.  We think he's a male because he swims alone; he's too old to stay with mom and has been sent out to live on his own. You can see that his head is beginning to show signs of the rusty orange feathers.  Doesn't the lake look wonderful?  Now that's water to paint!

Here is possibly another painting.  I'd probably lose about a quarter of the left side to concentrate on the old boarded up window and the forgotten sail boat in the shallows.

And this is just because I like it.  The clouds lifting from the mountains, the still lake sliced by the fishing boat, and the sail boat impervious to it all in its calm water.

Back from Vacation

What a wonderful time we had - not that that's any surprise.  It was, after all, vacation with family in a well-known, well-loved place.  There were no surprises.  This year the weather was cool all week, and the lake at 58 degrees was too cool for me even to dip a toe into let alone my entire body, but that, too, posed no significant problem. 

Actually, it left time for reading (D did more of that than I), sewing (of which I did a little - though not as much as I thought I would), walking (an estimated three miles every morning), eating (far too much vacation leeway there), searching for bonsai specimens (D, of course - and he was successful) and painting.

What, no parenthetical comment after "painting"? you ask.  No, because I did more painting this year than any year before which made me very happy.  It made me so happy that I will share with you what I did so no need for parentheses.  While I worked on three paintings, I finished only one sketch, and that is what I will share today.  First, it's being shared because it is finished, and second, because I haven't photographed the other two, yet.

This sketch was done "en plein air" - which means I painted while sitting outside looking at my subject.  I haven't done a lot of that (this may be my second), but I have drawn en plein air frequently.  Again, my hesitation over exposing my awkwardness with watercolor inhibited me.  This year, I decided to just jump in and do in.  After all, I had E and brother D who are experienced with both painting outside and with watercolors, to help me.  And help they did.  The sky in this sketch is lumpy-bumpy looking, but you should have seen it before brother D told me how to make it better!

This experience really helped me tremendously. I overcame a long-standing reluctance and found I truly enjoyed the experience.  And I learned.  Yes, brother D helped on this one and E on another, but I think I finally internalized my biggest fault with watercolor.  I HAVE TO STOP FIGHTING THE WATER!  Sorry for the capitals screaming at you there, but I am screaming at myself (in my head, of course) because it's easier than knocking one's self "up side the head".  

Basically, it's the same thing I did one year with acrylics and one year with oils.  With acrylics I spent a year producing darn few dreadful paintings all the time disliking what I was doing because I didn't like the paint!  So I switched to oils which I truly love but spent a miserable first year painting rocks because I didn't like the brushes! So I switched to palette knife which has been remarkably liberating.  

Now it's been one year with watercolors - not miserable, but not joyous either - and my epiphany has just occurred.  I know it will continue to be a struggle, and I'll have to fight my urge to micro-manage water (ha! what an image that is!).  But I think I may have cracked this year's barrier.

Errands and Not Much More

Today was another day almost completely taken up with necessary errands that took all morning.  However, since those were important and went well (one was picking up a finished quilt from the quilter), I am not complaining.

Once home, I did have time to do some preparatory work on the quilt I cut out yesterday.  I almost finished marking the squares to create triangles so when I start sewing, I won't have to stop to do that semi-tedious task.

Then, almost before I knew it, D was back from his errand, it was time for dinner.  We're off to NYC to a ballgame and will be home late.  I am 99.75% sure I won't be awake enough to write an entry tomorrow night so I'll wish you a happy weekend now -

Relax and enjoy!

Daily Doings

It was a painting day, and I went off with my practice exercises which consisted of initial washes of color.  In class I began still another using some tips I was given, and worked on adding a second layer to last week's works.  There's nothing worth showing although, if I get photos taken, I probably will.  It's a good way to keep track of progress or no-progress-beyond-mere-changes.

At any rate, I felt good about what I'm doing and learning, and plan to continue working in the same way this coming week.  An important finding was that I really don't care for the paper I'm using.  Naturally, I prefer the far more expensive kind.  Since I am reluctant to use that as practice paper, I plan to try some middle of the road paper this week.  It's not a favorite because it doesn't have the texture of my best paper (which is bound in small sketch books), but I don't think it will show the pattern of weave through the paint as what I've been using does.

After lunch at home, I went up to the studio and put away painting gear so I could cut material for a new quilt (my cutting table serves as a watercolor painting station as well).  That's what I did this afternoon; I cut out fabric for "Scenes and Ladders", a pattern by Karen Gibbs.  My version uses a variety of fabrics I collected before the FG shop went out of business; the focal piece is a Robin Pandolph design of pink roses on a medium blue.  Why I thought it would do for the guest room, I don't know, but it will do as a quilt for a friend of our daughter's.  She likes blue and flowers.  I think I've enough different kinds of fabrics and colors to keep it from being overly precious or cloying.  We'll see.

While we watched the TV this evening, I spent another night on hand piecing.  This particular wall hanging is taking a long, long time (started last summer) because I haven't worked on it consistently.  It progresses by fits and starts as I am easily distracted by other hand work - crazy quilting, knitting, hand quilting, wool work - well, you know how it is!

Poof - and They're Back!

Yes, that is exactly what happened - Magic!  Yesterday I opened my pictures and sitting there as smug as can be were my Saratoga Track photos - snickering quietly and nudging each other over the trick they had played on me.  Well, I let them have their moment because they had well and truly snookered me.

So before they decide to gallop away again, here a few I took last Thursday:

One of my favorites - the horse all stretched out and the muddy splashes.

On the last walk about before heading back to the gate. 

A young woman with a camera dealing with the mud.

Thought I would try this function on my camera.  I like it - all except the head in front of me!

After the race - the mud is all over rider and steed.

So it's time for a shower - for the horse,  of course!

I like the juxtaposition of live action with videoed action behind.

The track workers dealing with the mud after the tractors went through.

A well-deserved break.

Not the expression and body language on horse and man with snap on something or other.

Sometimes the worker horses show a bit of temperament, also!

I came home with approximately two dollars in winnings; D lost about that much.  Big bettors we are not, but it was a grand experience.

Monthly Garden with a Bi-Weekly Update

Oh well, you probably knew it wouldn't last.  There's no way I could resist the temptation to show the way our gardens have changed in the last two weeks.  This is that time of year when the perennials are still blooming and the annuals are coming into their own.  It's why I can't imagine having a garden without both to carry one on a wave of blooms from May until September.  The older photos were taken on July 15th and the new ones on July 31st.

This first one of the front yard looks as though it hasn't changed, but everything is simply fuller, more lush than two weeks ago.  I notice it the most in the hostas.

Here is the front porch and the fernery below as it was two weeks ago.  It looks good, and it was well on its way.

July 15th

Now look at the difference just two weeks makes.  Compare the porch railing planter with the photo above.  Then look at the two hydrangeas on either side of the tallest fern (in the center of the fernery).

  

July 31st

Here's the way the white garden looked in the middle of the month.  Keep your eyes on the lilies on the left of the photograph.

July 15th

See the 'Casa Blanca' lilies now and the white gay feather (liatrus) in the middle of the garden?

These lilies are usually very fragrant, but I think the cooler air and the breezier weather is keeping their aroma down.  They're the fullest they've ever been though.

You haven't seen any pictures of the daylily border before today because there simply wasn't anything to see.  The first one is the lower end of that border, and you may notice some of D's largest bonsai-in-training among the daylilies.  I haven't been out dead heading as we were away this weekend so the bed looks a bit scruffy.

I may have shown this shot of the upper end of the border before; I didn't go back to check.  I do know I mentioned that the birds have gifted us with all these wonderful Turk's turbans.  No, we didn't plant any of them.  Unfortunately, I will have to take most of them out as they are obscuring the view of the daylilies, and more than likely, they're also crowding them too much.

The following photographs were all taken on July 31st, and you'll either have to scroll back to the June 15th view to see the huge leap since then or just take my word that there has been such a leap.  Below is the "hot" portion of the garden in which I deliberately planted reds, oranges, and yellows exclusively.  We have an almost straight on view of this part of the garden from our back windows.

From the "hot" section above, the garden stretches across the backyard.  The Alberta spruce that looked so awful after the winter is coming back.  That spruce forms a rest space between the eye-popping hot section to a more varied and larger section, but they are all part of one garden (even though I tend to speak of them as separate and distinct).

If you look carefully at the birdcage you can see a few nasturtium blooms in it on the right hand side.

I am quite pleased both with the large black pot and with its contents this year.  And the black-eyed Susans are back!  Where they have been these last few years, I don't know, but here they are.  And the cone flower, too.  The white "false dragon head" are taller this year, and the bloom seems more sparse, but they are just starting.

There is another view of the farthest left side of the garden, but it doesn't want to be uploaded (quirky blog issues, I think).  It, too, shows evidence of great growth, But I suppose you'll just have to take my word for it!