A Matter of Perspective

On my way home from work yesterday I stopped at the local farm stand for fresh lettuce. They had it right inside the door and the gal said it had just been picked. I grabbed one of those plastic store bags (you know, the ones we aren't supposed to use) and thought I would stuff three different kinds in one bag so as not to waste plastic and make my summer salad mix. I thought there were several bunches of romaine sitting on top of the pile, but when I went to take one, it was just one bunch! It was so huge that I could barely cram it into the plastic bag! I said to the checker it must be on steroids - LOL! The next bunch I grabbed was a red leaf and it was just as big, but not quite as heavy as the romaine! Two were enough for me - the third variety could wait until next time!

Look below....I tried to get some perspective on their size for you by placing an enormous cantaloupe between them, but I'm not sure you can tell just how large they are! (Sorry for the shadow, it was late afternoon)


Here is a slightly different view....the bananas are also oversized! I got on the scale with the Romaine - it weighed 4 pounds (I won't tell you what I weighed)!
Below are three of the six one-gallon bags of lettuce (stuffed full) that I got out of the two heads, which cost a total of $2.50! For six, 5 oz bags of lettuce at the grocery store I would have paid about $22.00!! And mine will last much longer than the store lettuce!
I almost forgot to show you a photo of the completed new "beach" at the Squash House! The garbage can won't be there permanently - it normally goes behind the fence. I had to stand in the shade of the dogwoods as it was nearly 100 degress when I took the photo!
Click on the photo below for a larger picture of the flag we found in the laundry room stuffed behind the furnace! What a bonus!

Back in the Swing of Things

We returned from our week at the Squash House on Sunday. What a busy week - we worked a lot in the garden, around the house and rather than fly fish in 90-100 degree heat, we scouted out a lot of new places to fish when it cools off. I made a promise to myself not to post until I got caught up reading my bloglines and I finally am! I'm amazed at all the wonderful summer projects I'm seeing in blogworld!

Friday we learned of a quilt show that was taking place through the weekend in Milton-Freewater, OR. I decided to take a quick drive down there on Saturday and have a look. The first place on the list was what I thought to be a quilt shop, but no, it was a little hole-in-the-wall alterations business. I walked in the door, didn't see anyone around, but heard a machine running toward the back. When I got to the source of the sound, I found a very elderly woman sewing away and managed to startle the dickens out of her! Once she calmed down (whew!) we had a lovely, very long chat. I asked her where the quilts were and she explained each of 6 shops had a quilt. It was so dark in her shop that I couldn't see the quilt hanging right next to where we were standing way at the back of the shop! This quilt below was made entirely from scraps and really well done!

She then told me to go next door for another quilt in a local artist's gallery. The very nice proprieter came out to greet me from her apartment in the rear and another very long chat ensued! I was beginning to think I was the only one to visit these stores. And by the time I left, I didn't dare visit the rest for fear I would be keeping the poor shop owners company all day! This quilt below is a mystery quilt. I liked them both a lot!
The 4th of July festivities went on all day Sunday at the park a block and a half from the Squash House. We walked down early in the day - it was going to be another near 100 degree day! The first thing we came across was the local quilt guild's raffle quilt - yes, we bought tickets!
Here is a photo of the community band that played on and off all day long!
This is the bandstand which celebrates it's 100th birthday on the 9th!
What a treat this was below....the community theater gave us a preview of their upcoming production of Grease! It was really crowded - I took a lot of photos, but this was the only one that wasn't squeezed between lots of people!
Finally, yesterday's mail brought Denise Sheehan's new book "A Graceful Garden" that I won recently on her blog! This is a beautiful book - wonderfully photographed and filled with gorgeous projects! I'll be spending a lot of time wrapped around these pages! Thanks, Denise!

Happy 4th of July!

Wishing you a very happy Fourth of July from W² !!

Immortality!

In my last post I mentioned that Mr. Squash was calling at me from the doorway - "It's time to mark the Squash House". He was outside talking with Ted who said the concrete had set up enough to write in it! In case you thought it had anything to do with cats like Anne did, well, not quite - LOL!

Here it is - the Squash House is now immortalized in concrete! Let me say that it isn't easy at all to "write" in concrete! I was using a stubby little pencil and trying not to mash in anything around it! So it has "character" and we rather like it!! Saturday, the throngs of folks walking past on their way to the festivities at the park will surely wonder what this means!!

Last evening while eating our grilled Walla Walla sweet onion sausages on the patio, we had a visitor over the neighbor's garage! There are always so many wonderful surprises here!
Today after more work in the garden, we decided to check out another fishing hole. The weather has been in the 90's - so any work outside has to be done early, then it's too hot to go fishing, so we've decided to "recon" all the rivers in the air-conditioned car instead!

Mr. Squash has always said: "The best fishing in Washington is in Oregon".!! He's right - anywhere we've gone just outside the Washington border has always been better! We drove to a park at the headwaters of the Walla Walla river in Oregon. How exciting this was for us - it's the closest thing we've seen so far in this area to the kind of river we like to fish! We decided to brave the heat and walk a ways up the trail. There was a heady fragrance all around us. We went up to this plant and sure enough - smelled just like Freesia! It was everywhere - small and large bushes!

Here are some photos of the river. In the one below I was standing right in front of a wonderful pool where there surely must be a few large trout hiding in wait!
Here was the remains of a bridge that must have spanned this part of the trail at one time.
I don't have a good enough connection here to edit photos, but if I could you would be able to see how clear and wadeable the water is here!
We went back to Oregon this evening for dinner and saw a flyer for a quilt show that's in town right now! I may head back there again tomorrow for a peek and show & tell!

Sweet Lavender

Yesterday we drove out to the Blue Mountain Lavender Farm. What a treat this was! Out in farm country, yet less than 20 miles from town is another slice of heaven. Jean-Paul, from France, and his wife, from Kirkland, WA, began their farm in 2000. You can pick your own lavender, take various classes and shop in their wonderful boutique.

Below is how some of the rows look up close and personal! Each row is labeled for its variety - either French or English - whether it can be used for culinary purpose or sachet, etc.

Below are the owners two horses.
Here is where the owners relax after a hard day on the Lavender Farm! Can you just imagine yourself sitting there with a cup of lavender lemonade, the heady scent of lavender filling the air and the sound of the bees gathering pollen for lavender honey?
Well look who it is! Ms. Terri taking a rest amongst the lavender! We were so surprised to see her there! My but she does get around....Race for the Cure, working on her kaliedescope quilt and picking lavender from one side of the country to the other!!

Here and there you find California Poppies! This was an entire bed right in the middle of the picking fields!
As we walked out to the field, we saw a gentleman working in this lovely vegetable garden. We complimented his work, then he came out and introduced himself as Jean-Paul! We had a nice chat with him and he gave us a few tips about growing in this climate! Below is another view of the garden, complete with grape vines and day lillies - Stella D'oro! I asked Jean-Paul which lavender would be best suited for my uses - I will be planting English Lavender - Sachet next spring. It's useful for both sachet and culinary.
I bought this lovely bundle of lavender sachets in the boutique along with The Lavender Cookbook and some culinary lavender.
Mr. Squash has just come in to inform me it's time to "mark" the new driveway! More on that later....

Pepper

We arrived at the Squash House on Sunday afternoon to find we now have a new sidewalk in addition to the driveway (oh, excuse me, I mean Mr. Squash's beach)! We saw Ted, our contractor, briefly and he explained they would be working on the approach and street section Monday readying the forms, then pouring again on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Ted and his son Justin were out early yesterday morning along with their Australian Shepherd, Pepper. We've fallen in love with her! She comes over every day with her frisbee - ready for a few tosses and of course some loving! She's so sweet and gentle. We think this is the dog for us when we move over here permanently. Ted says she likes to fish with him and is a wonderful companion!

Below is what the guys were doing yesterday. Look at Pepper following Ted with her frisbee!
Here are Justin and Ted this morning as the concrete truck begins to churn out the street portion. Pepper is ever at the ready! You can't see it, but her frisbee is in front of her! By the way, Justin (on the left) is Ted's son. They work together - something you don't see much of these days!
Yesterday I worked like the dickens in my garden! I think I should re-name my blog Squash House Gardening! Our yard is nearly 1/3 acre and its all landscaped! This has been my dream - and I can't wait to move here so I can plant perennials, annuals, veggies and just plain putter around in the gorgeous weather! I was so tired last night that I could barely move, but it was a good tired and I'm ready for more today! Tomorrow we plan a day of fly fishing - and a well deserved rest!

Potholder Fun!

Some time ago I participated in a potholder swap hosted by Adrian at Hello Yarn and Maritza at Knotty Bits. What fun this was! We had to make five crocheted potholders in either cotton or wool, and we would receive five different potholders in return from the other swappers. Mine arrived in the mail the other day. Aren't they great?!

As you can see, I've made some changes to my blog's background. I still have to figure out a better text color, but all in all, this is the direction I wanted to go - something really earthy and Fall-like --- my favorite time of year. The great folks over at The Cutest Blog on The Block helped me again. Alicia Alee Design did the backgound - she is quite talented!

Mr. Squash and I are leaving tomorrow for the Squash House! We're spending the entire week there through the 4th! I'll have my netbook along and hope to be able to keep up as well as post. We're going to do some fly fishing, working in the yard, and a lot of just plain kicking back in the sun☼! (Thanks, Anne, for the great link to symbols!) The park down the street from us does an incredible July 4th celebration which we're really excited to see!

Mr. Squash's New Beach!

One of the reasons we went to the Squash House last week was to check on the progress of the new driveway. Below is a photo as it looked right after we bought the house. So many changes since then - even the two large blue spruces behind the house are gone from the windstorm! Also, in case I haven't mentioned it before, the house looks very small from this view, but as they say, a picture does not tell the whole story! It's actually much larger and has a full lower floor! Anyway, I digress. At some point, the driveway, approach, and sidewalk on either side suffered quite a lot of damage. The previous owners had removed the old driveway and placed ugly black rock down as a surface. We knew it would have to be one of our improvement projects.

Here is the progress as of last Sunday! Our contractor has been working really hard in between thunderstorms! There is enough room to park three vehicles when we have company over!
The concrete is a full 6 inches thick to withstand the cold winter temps! Mr. Squash has decided this is his new "beach". He's going to put a chair with a little umbrella and a pitcher of iced tea out there and listen to the waves - LOL!!

This week the sidewalk and approach will be poured and we hope by the time we return next Sunday that it will be completed!

Whenever we spend time at the Squash House, we try to go somewhere new in an attempt to familiarize ourselves with the area. Saturday we heard about a nice place to fly fish not far from there. We jumped in the car to scope it out, but while trying to decide what was growing in a field next to the road, we missed the turn! We had never been on this particular road, so we decided to see where it would take us. We drove a long way on a very pretty two lane road in the country, and before we knew it - we were in Oregon on a very small two lane dirt road in the backwoods - da-da-ding-ding-ding (think duelling banjos)!

We turned around back toward town and saw a sign for a park. Deciding to check it out, this is what we found. This is a portion of river that actually runs into town and back out again. There is a bike trail/walking path on either side and a footbridge across the far end! We can't wait to take our bikes over and try it out!

Tiles and Smiles

Look what I got in the mail today! A while ago I gave away some flannel scraps and fat quarters I knew I would never use. Donnelly was the recipient of those scraps, and this is what she made to thank me! It was wrapped up in this delicate, pretty tissue with the nicest card!

And see what's inside - a lovely, handmade, tatted doily! There aren't many people who practice the art of tatting anymore - Donnelly's work is outstanding! And she said: "I used a vintage Coats and Clark size 30 that I picked up at one of our local thrift stores. I love the feel and colors of vintage threads. The spool still had the original $0.19 sticker on it!" So stop on over to Donnelly's blog for a visit!
Here is what greeted us when we arrived at the Squash House on Thursday - the frosted beach glass tile in the kitchen is installed! I am so happy I can barely contain myself! It is exactly as I envisioned and the installers work is incredible! Already the kitchen feels warm and cozy! There is only one more thing do to in there - new cabinet and drawer faces. We're having them custom built by a local contractor. See those two upper doors on the right side? They will have clear, hammered glass inserts and open from the center out. They will also have hidden European hinges and can be opened without hardware - although I will add it at some point just for decoration.
Here is a closer view of the tile against the stove.
Below is the new sink and faucet. I can pull the nozzle out and fill a pan with water as it sits on the stove! The sink is extra deep at 11 inches (maybe too deep - we shall see). That little fixture to the right of the faucet is a built-in soap dispenser.
And here is the crowning glory - my Maple Bar finished and installed! We had them use the same stain as on the butcher block counters, but because they are two different grades of maple, the stain is slightly darker on the burled maple. That's what I wanted, though - something unique and different! Oh - you can also see that I haven't replaced the switch covers yet. I think I'll use enameled porcelain covers, so I need to look around for different options.
Here is another view - looking the opposite direction.
This is a close-up of the maple burl stained and finished.
More fun things to show you tomorrow - stay tuned!

A Very Pleasant Surprise!

I'm still here in case any of you have wondered where I disappeared to last week! Between spending endless time sending countless emails back and forth with a new blog designer and work suddenly turning busy, I had no time for anything else! Plus we planned to leave for the Squash House on Thursday and I needed to prepare for that. Many thanks also to those of you who emailed because you were concerned why my blog wasn't "working"!! As you all probably know by now, I registered my own domain. I'm still posting through Blogspot, I just have my own web address now!

We left for the Squash House around 2:00 Thursday afternoon for a long weekend. We wanted to check on the the tile installation in the kitchen, get a new thermostat installed, check on Ted's progress on the new driveway, and get some estimates on the final kitchen project - new cupboard and drawer fronts.

Coming into town we turned down a street fairly close to the Squash House, I saw the words "Stash" in a window as I drove by! That could mean only one thing!!! A new quilt shop!!

It was late and we were tired from the long drive, so I sort of thought maybe my mind was playing tricks on me! I decided to go back the next day, and sure enough - it was a new quilt shop! Below is the other side of the front. The outside of the building is not quite done, but there is no mistaking the shop!
I had a really nice chat with Kathy, one of the store owners. I told her how elated I was that we now have two quilt shops in town - as did everyone else who came in the store while I was there! Kathy even wrote down the address of their blog for me! I asked if I could take a few photos for my blog and she happily agreed!
They have a wonderful array of different fabrics and designers - so much of what I saw was totally in my taste range! There was even fabric by designers I did not yet know - and I can't wait to explore some more!
Now I love Masterpiece thread for piecing, but I also like Presencia - and they carry the full line in the store! I also told Kathy about Lecien's new Cosmo embroidery floss line - she'll be looking into that soon as well!
So many nice displays!
And check out the basics and solids!
Everywhere I turned there was something I wanted to make!
I have lots more for you this week - more peeks at the happenings around the Squash House among other things! I'm also still working on changes to my blog design - just not sure at this point how much or what. I'll be doing my best to catch up this week on everything you all have been doing as well!