Is Anyone Still Out There?

I never intended to be away from blogging this long and I've missed it terribly.  My goodness, it's been over an entire month since my last post!  I hope you have all been enjoying your summer as much as I have.  Over the last month, I have spent lots of time visiting with friends and family.  I can't wait to tell you of all my adventures.  First of all, I went to visit my best friend from high school.  We have known each other about 33 years (that tells you how old I am!).  We spent a lovely day together, taking a hike, wine tasting, shopping, laughing and finished it off with a lovely swim.  We packed so much into one visit.  Here's a picture from our walk in the Sierra foothills.

We had a lovely walk along the irrigation ditch.  It sounds funny, but it was absolutely beautiful out there and in the heat, the shady path was welcome.

Back here in the bay area, we have had unusually cold weather, and though it's been pleasant to work in, my poor vegetables are not liking it so much.  We still have produce, but much less than normal.

These are our favorite of the cherry tomatoes.  I believe they're Sungolds.  They turn a deep orange color when ripe and are just soooo sweet.  We've been having lots of tomato salads lately.  I combine tomatoes, lemon cucumbers, red onion, boxwood basil and sometimes some fresh mozzarella, sprinkle it with some balsamic vinaigrette and salt and pepper.  Oh, it makes my mouth water just thinking of it!

I'm very worried for the larger tomatoes and eggplant.  They are certainly pining for the heat.

I'm thinking maybe October these will be ready??????

As for crafting, I've done a little.  I have millions of ideas swirling in my head, but just haven't found a lot of time to craft.  I have one card to share with you.  I did a great deal of paper-piecing on this and I'm really happy with the way it came out.  What do you think?

The stamped image is from a retired SU set called Favorite Friends.  This set had lots of tiny images, which I found a bit difficult to watercolor.  So, I decided to try stamping on some yummy DP and paper-piecing most of it.  I did watercolor the little mice, cut them out and popped them up to highlight their tiny features.  The sentiment is computer-generated and I used some black seed beads and a black glaze pen to add more detail.  I'm dedicating this card to all the wonderful friends I have spent time with this summer.  You're all my BFF's!

I'm itching to get started on some fall and winter craft projects.  Have you seen Michael's lately?  They already have the Christmas displays up.  Can you believe it?

Anyway, sorry for the long post.  There was so much to catch up on.  I would love to hear about your summer adventures, so please leave a comment or sign my guest book at the bottom of the post.  As I sign off, here's some pictures of our begonias.  They are loving the cool weather.

Til next time,