A stormy day in Paradise

I woke up this morning and checked the weather via the internet, I am a weather geek, I love checking the weather. It was 6C with a 20 km/hr wind yikes....good thing I had filled all the hole is my house last night with newspaper, there was a 1 inch gap all around my door frame. Luckily for me my house is 14 x 14 and it does not take much to heat it up, we had had some heat yesterday and the brick seemed to have held it overnight.  You could probable heat this place up with a few candles. I can’t imagine how hot it is for the locals living in these houses during the hot months, it must just be smouldering in there. As I walked over to my bathroom I was almost blown away by the wind and got 2 eyes full of sand. I had made plans to met a friend on the mainland in Centro, so I dressed warm, longjohns, pants, 3 long sleeve t-shirt and a coat and a scarf (what I wore when I arrived here) if I would have had a toque I would have worn it too. I choose to take the tourist boat out of here this morning because from the other side I can take a bus right to Central whereas if I had taken the village boat I would have had a bit of a walk. However, I had not factored in the wind, I walked along the beach (as this is the shortest way), I discovered that walking on a beach in a wind storm is not pleasant, you get your eyes blown full of sand and that stings, it was not a pleasant walk. I also almost got hit by a flying tent; one of the restaurants tents got lifted out of the ground and got tossed into the ocean...just missed me. It wasn’t until this happened that I realized that I was walking all alone on the beach in the middle of a very bad storm, good thing it was a low tide because the ocean was wild and loud, I had gone to far to turn back so I just kept going.  I was the only one at the dock but he didn’t make me wait, he took me across right away. The poor captain of the boat was so bundled up and still looked so cold (I need to knit hats next year for these guys)  Despite being cold he was still very friendly and we both laughed at this crazy weather. Once on the other side I had planned on taking a bus but it was too cold to stand there and wait so I just started walking and then realized it was only 5 blocks to the Plaza so I walked the whole way, by now I shielded by tall building so walking wasn’t so difficult anymore ....I sure was thankful I had put a scarf on, people I met walking were all bundled up as well. Once at the Plaza I treated myself to a 48 peso Vanilla Cappuccino (my first coffee here) it was so good but the wind was miserable making it not quit as much fun as I had hoped. My friend and I wandered through a few fabric stores and ohhed and awed and touched everything I think, oh the possibilities of new projects were just endless, but of course I have to keep thinking of the luggage restrictions. I actually stuck to my list that I had brought and only bought a few table cloths and 2 metres of yoga mat.....yup you can buy it by the metre here. It also makes a nice soft swishy floor mat, and warm on a cement floor on a day like this. I may just go back and buy some more and cover my whole floor....but surely it’s going to warm up. From there we went to the market and picked some things there, we parted way here and I went to the bank and then over to my favourite pedicure place on Serdan and she was closed, although the sign on the door said she was supposed to be open. This is typical here but yet annoys me, this happens to me so often at her shop. I decide to have lunch at a nearby place and tried again in a ½ hour later...still closed. I had no other business here so I head back to docks, the village dock this time; I am not walking on the beach again. As I walk back to my house I pass a new little manicure/pedicure place that has just opened, I hesitate, I think Rocio on Serdan does an amazing job on my feet,  regardless of how bad they are she always takes her time and cleans them up perfectly. I have walked on the sand lots already and so a lot of the hard skin has already worn off so they aren’t too bad right now. I decide to give this new place a try and even managed to get an appointment for tomorrow. I feel bad, I have been loyal to Rocio for 5 years now, maybe I’ll get her to cut my hair in a few weeks.

I get to my house and am surprised to see what the wind has done, garbage everywhere, leaves everywhere and sand has blown in, there are sand dunes in my backyard, what a mess......and it’s still blowing. I see the trailer park people have lost some umbrellas and a tent has blown down. Nobody is outside.....everyone is holed up inside, which is my plan now that I am home. My house is surprisingly still warm. I hear the tortilla truck comes, and the dessert truck, but I don’t even want to venture out to get anything. Poor guys, sales will be down today. As I sit here typing I cringe at the sound of the wind and the ocean once in awhile, it sounds so terrible....I tell myself that it is well past hurricane season....right? Plus, this little house survived hurricane Rick last year, we will be ok.

Internet is down and I am expecting power to be down soon too, it already flickered when we were in the fabric store. My candles are ready.

PS: Here is a link to the local newspaper, the stormy weather has made the news, this is a serious storm blowing through. It may have already cases damage to the corn crop and has closed the ports to small boats and all beaches are closed, even here on the Island. Today is was 2C at 6 am with a feels like temperature of -2C. I will not be leaving my house today....I may not leave my bed. 

http://www.noroeste.com.mx/publicaciones.php?id=658818

The Stone Island Freeway

The beach in front of my house is busy busy everyday with all kinds of traffic. I never get tired of just sitting and watching the traffic go by.

Farmer guy

Fisherman guy

Dud with the horses

Another farmer delivering a water tank somewhere

Even a loader

Cowboy taking his horses to work (horse got to work here too)

.....and coming home from work

and he loses the pony again, poor little guy can't keep up and then when he loses sight of them he cries and runs in circles. Cowboy never looks behind him until he gets home I think. He comes back towing the mare and the reunion is so beautiful I almost tear up.

One day cowboy decided mare and pony need a bath

I was surprised to see them jumping the waves. I thought the little guy would get knocked over but he stuck close to mama, this was not their first bath in the ocean

All clean.....then cowboy jumps on mare and tears up the beach kicking up a sand storm....what good was the bath? 

A crab slowly slowly going somewhere.

And so it goes all day long. The other day the police got stuck on the beach (I didn't have my camera) It took about 10 guys pushing and grunting to get them out. One guy came with a wooden ladder to put under the tires as traction, they also used what looked like body boards under the tires. One day I saw 2 kids on a quad, one was facing the front and steering and the other was facing the back and holding to the handles of a wheelbarrow that was bouncing along behind full of coconuts. Last weekend Eli from Benji's Pizza catered to 80 golfers at the Estella Del Mar Golf course (3 miles up the beach). He loaded his stove up onto his truck and drove up the beach to the golf course......I wasn't home, I missed this. These people are never stuck, there is always a way to get something from one place to another. I passed a guy on the street today carrying a wooden bed on his back, later he passed me again carrying the mattress on his back. Very resourceful people.  

I have arrived.....on Stone Island, Mexico

The view was a bit foggy the first few morning......but so wonderfully familiar, like home

The welcome balloon that was in my house when I arrived....it is the same house as last year

Today it felt like my first day even though I arrived 2 days ago. The first day is always a write off because by the time I get here it’s always late. I Picked up my stuff out of storage and just pulled out the bedding and towels and wiped the furniture up a bit. Went to the nearest place to get some food and toilet paper...note to self...leave some toilet paper next time, I would have been shit outa luck had I arrived on a Sunday, imagine having to go to the neighbours to borrow toilet paper.  All these little things that I need to take note of from year to year. I think I am going to write myself a migration manual and up date it as I learn more about having two homes.

The second day was spent unpacking and organizing and making a list of thing I need from the mainland. For some reason I didn’t leave behind my electrical adapter so I couldn’t even plug in my laptop, I had one last year and don’t know what I did with it. My clothes pins also have disappeared as well as my clothes line. I set off for the hardware store, first I wanted to stop at my friend Kathy’s house to pick up her adapter so I could show the guy at the hardware store as I could not find the right words for it in my dictionary. Before I get there I pass Daniel’s mechanic shop and he asks where I am going, I tell him and he says I don’t need an adapter, I tell him I do, he says no, I try to explain what I need to plug in my laptop, he doesn’t know what I am talking about so he comes with me to the hardware store. He thinks I am talking about a surge protector, I show him how my laptop has 3 prongs but the plug in in the wall only has space for 2. Ohhh, he says, no problem, he will just cut off one prong, he says you don’t need it because it is just the ground. I feel it is important to have a ground and I want to buy an adapter, finally the hardware guy catches on to what I want and gives me an adapter. Then I notice that it still just eliminates the ground...oh well, I have an adapter now. Daniels tells me he will come and put up my clothes line manana (tomorrow) and put some valves on my water hoses (they disappeared too from last year). Then on my way to the grocery store I pass Nina’s house and she invites me in and we chat for a bit and then she gives me some screen and some screws to put in my one broken window to keep the bugs out, I haven’t seem any bugs yet but maybe they just haven’t discovered that there is fresh blood here yet. She tells me Daniel will come Manana to put it up for me. From there I go to Kathy’s house and we catch up on the last years happenings. I finally get to the grocery store and can’t remember what I wanted there so I wander around and end up buying an onion, 2 eggs, and laundry soap (in hopes I get a clothes line soon) I head back to my casa and spend the afternoon puttering around the house, taking my long sleeve sweater on and off as the clouds move past the sun. It was 21C in the afternoon but the locals say they have had a north wind for about 2 months now which makes 21 feel cold unless you are sitting directly in the sun, even then it is comfortable with long sleeves. A few friends stopped by to see if I needed anything, all wondering if I had prepared for this cold. I had, I have good blankets and a sleeping bag, I had even brought some hot water bottles to snuggle up with but I was plenty warm without them. My house is so small it doesn’t take much to heat it up, during the day I open the windows and let the sun in and at sunset I close them, it takes awhile for brick to cool off once they’re heated up. I can’t imagine living in this little house in the summer when it is stifling hot.

After supper while sitting in my sun porch I had to put on pants, socks, sweater and a scarf.

Today I started of by sleeping until 6 am, had not slept that late in a long time, I did wake up at 4:30 as usual but managed to fall back asleep. I Sat outside with my tea until sun up, at least I think the sun was up, it was hard to see through the fog. Fog in the mornings has been a regular thing here for awhile now...most unusual. After showering and a breakfast of an egg and toast (didn’t buy fruit yesterday) I sat around and read for a few hours. I am reading “A world without end “ by Ken Follett and am really enjoying it...can hardly put it down sometimes. Kathy and I had decided yesterday we would make a short road trip to a greenhouse by Villa Union and pick up some plants. Some of my plants from last year did survive my, climbing vines are doing very well, but a lot also died. Can you believe my tomato plant is still alive and has 3 tomatoes on it? Unreal, it’s a year old. We took off at about 10 am, one of her family members came along as well. We have both been adopted, it is quite usual that if a Mexican family gets along very well with a north American that the whole family will adopt that person. Nina’s family, the Cardenas family has adopted me, they treat me like family, the whole family, the mom and dad, the kids, their kids, the aunts and uncles, cousins and nieces and nephews....I am considered family. Kathy has also been adopted by a family. We both feel honoured and I must say I feel very humbled that this family would treat me this way. I feel I don’t do enough for them, I keep my eyes and ears open to try and see where I can help.

We had a great trip to the greenhouse and back, I came back with a Bougambilia and a Hibiscus. On my way back to my house I meet my produce guy (Salvador), I know I can’t carry to much due to my surgery but I would really want fruit for breakfast tomorrow so I ask if he has a papaya, he does, but it looks sad, I am sad, he give it to me for nothing because he can’t sell it anyway and promises me wonderful papayas for tomorrow. He also promises me that even though most of it is garbage the parts that are still edible will be very sweet...I’m excited for breakfast. Back at my house I find out that Daniel hasn’t been here yet to fix my valves and put up my window screen..Oh well, there is always manana.

For supper I met up with some friends from the trailer park and we went to Benji’s pizza on Goat Island (not really an Island either) they had planned on hiking to the top of the hill after supper, I wasn’t sure I was up to it yet, I know walking is good for me but wasn’t sure about hiking up a mountain. I didn’t have to make a decision because they all ate too much pizza (I had fish) and didn’t feel like hiking plus it was close to dark by then. We all decided that we would do it another day and time it so we could watch a cruise ship leave port. If you’re halfway up you are level with ship and then you have a nicer view.

On a little side note here; Benji’s Pizza has Skype, you can Skype him and then he delivers to your door, apparently the people in the trailer park have been doing this.....are we modern here on the Island or what?

Tomorrow I will head into Mazatlan for the first time to pick up some things; I have a list, let’s hope I remember to bring it.

Next day

First thing in the morning I got up and started doing laundry, you have to have the laundry on the line early here if you want it to dry in one day and lucky for me it wasn't foggy this morning. I’m still amazed how I love hand washing my laundry...still. It is so satisfying when it is all washed and dried and ironed (line drying requires more ironing) and put away, because it is truly an accomplishment whereas at home laundry gets done with so little effort it is not even very satisfying when it is all done. 

I laughed at the sight of my longjohns waving in the wind with the ocean and palm trees in the back round.....hey I came from the north, that is what I was wearing when I arrived here.

I had a breakfast of fruit and granola.....lots of fruit, an apple, a banana, a pear, ¼ of a papaya (they are big) I love the fruit here and always miss it so much when I go home. 

I can’t decide if the morning is my favourite time here or if it is 4:00, both are great times for people watching. In the morning everyone is off to work, the farmer, the fisherman, the cowboy, the beach vendor, the life guard and all the other people that pass by that I don’t know where they are going. At 4:00 all these people pass by again on their way home....exciting times.

So after breakfast and seeing that everyone got to work on time I set off for the mainland with a long list in my pocket (13 items) I decided to walk to downtown from the docks, a walk I have done 1000 times. I have to admit that this year as I am walking I do think of all the violence that is going on here, I have read the newspapers and do realize that Mazatlan is not what it was 10 years ago when I first started coming here. I used to walk from the docks to downtown at anytime of night all alone but I don’t think I will be walking after dark this year. Most likely after being here for a month I might become complacent and end up out after dark anyway.....especially if I stop reading the news. Mind you, the increased amount of federal police and narcotic cops driving around with their AK47s drawn might just be all the reminder that I need that there is a drug war going on. I do feel very safe and sound once I get on the Island...no narcos here. People here leave their doors to their houses and cars open, windows too. Not saying there is no crime, we have crime but it’s not war, people aren’t getting shot and decapitated and no car theft.

I managed to get almost everything on my list, one item was a blender. The kitchen supply store where I bought the rest of my things didn’t have one; they sold all the parts (you can buy all the parts of a blender separately here, and I think that’s great) but not the actual blender. Every Mexican home has a blender regardless of how poor; they do a lot of blending. Blending is very important and I have found I can’t life without one here either, I used to always borrow one but it’s time I buy my own and I am giving myself one more suitcase of stuff for storage so I feel I have space for a blender of my own. (And a few other things) So I stop at a taco stand and ask the lady where I can buy a blender close by and she tells, and I even understand all her Spanish and I even find the place and I even buy one..Yeah! I’m so excited I start heading home, on a bus this time because I am starting to look and feel like a pack donkey. It wasn’t until I get home I realized I hadn’t made it through my list...dang. Oh well I got 10 out of 13 items and that’s a successful trip for me. Soon as I got home the electrician came by, he was supposed to come manana 2 days ago. I did not have hot water in my shower just luke warm, he explained to me, and showed me, that if I have it turned up all the way the cooler my water will be, pressure takes heat way, so less pressure more heat. Sure enough...it’s hot now. Yeah again! Such an easy fix this time. My water problems are all fixed now.....and I have a blender. Daniel didn’t come to put in my screen (he dropped off my clothes line) but then he was supposed to manana as well....that was only yesterday.

For the rest of the afternoon I sat on the beach and watched my laundry dry while I read my Spanish/English dictionary ... it’s a good read. Of course at 4:00 I had to watch and make sure everyone went home on time. Shortly after sunset I had to put on socks and a sweater and head into my house...it is so cold here after sunset, gone are the days of sitting outside and enjoying the evening breeze. The locals were saying the weather would change after full moon which was a few days ago, but we did not have fog this morning so I guess that was a change

A little update: 3 days later a guy came by my house with a little truck full of all kinds of household things, including blenders. Had I been patient I could  have saved myself from schelping a blender from the mainland. If you need something on Stone Island, just be patient and it will come to your front door.

Mary Mary quiet contrary how does your garden grow.....

If I had a toonie every time someone has said that to me in my life I would be rich....oh wait, I am rich.....or at least I was this past summer, rich in vegetables anyway.

Last fall I was inspired to have a greenhouse built, inspired by a lady in California who blogged about her small raised garden bed in her backyard. I couldn’t believe the amount of vegetables she got out of her tiny space and I started imagining what I could do with my backyard, which is a lot bigger than hers. I knew I could not compete with her long growing season in California unless maybe I had a greenhouse. So I hired a dud to build me a 10x12 greenhouse with 4 12ft x 2ft beds in it. 

I started plants indoors in March and in May I moved them out to the greenhouse; I had to heat it up with a space heater until the weather warmed up in June.  I also built 5 4x8 and 2 2x8 raised beds and had them filled with a ½ and ½ mixture of old cow manure and topsoil. I did not like the topsoil and will not use it again, when it got wet it got very hard and lumpy, from now on I will use compost which I found out later that I can get free at my local landfill. In April I transplanted everything except the tomatoes, cucumbers, watermelon, cantaloupe and peppers out into my bed and planted the seed vegetables. There was still frost in the mornings at this time so I covered my beds with my leftover plastic from my greenhouse for a few weeks just to be safe. This is so easy to do with raised beds; I found my raised bed so much easier to manage than a large garden plot in the ground. At the top of each raised bed I had built a trellis to train my plants to grow up to save some space and this worked great, I ended up with a green wall across my backyard made up of, beans, peas, sweet peas, pumpkin and squash. 

It looked like the green lush California garden that had inspired me to begin with; it was the look I was looking for. I discovered that I love to grow creeping and climbing plants like cucumbers, watermelon, cantaloupe, beans, peas and my favourite of all...squash. I only had spaghetti squash this year but want to experiment with a few different kids this year, and I also want to try eggplant.....I hear it likes to climb as well. I had a great beet crop and fell in love with beets. Beets had never been my favourite, I would eat them if I were served them somewhere else but have never bought a beet and cooked it myself, I have been missing out, they were so good. I loved them just boiled and then lightly tossed with butter and salt...so easy. I peed purple all summer. I have since learned that they are great raw, shredded into salad, and add a nice flavour to vegetable juice. Beets are on the list again for next year. My carrots were great, there just was not enough of them, same with onions, didn’t have enough. I didn’t get a lot of cucumbers, I think that was due to it being too hot in my greenhouse for them, next year I will start them in greenhouse and them transplant them out, the tomatoes however loved it in the greenhouse, they became a huge jungle in there, I had planted them too close together I think, it was a tangled mess but it produced a lot of tomatoes. I ate tomatoes from June until September when I finally just stopped tending to everything.

 I had a little bag of baby tomatoes in my lunch every day. Not sure what happened to my peppers, did not get a lot of green peppers, my chilli peppers however did quite well. I had great corn but again just not enough of it. 

This is a 2x8 bed that is completely overgrown with corn, squash and beans

I had even planted some popcorn which was awesome but...not enough again, it popped up so white, it was beautiful. Another vegetable that I feel in love with again is Rutabaga, I hadn’t had them since I was a kid, it brought back memories of raiding grandma’s garden. I would cube it raw and munched on it at work on my tractor, never cooked it, ate it all raw. It is defiantly on the list for next year.  Of course it wasn’t all a success, my cantaloupe got smothered by heat in the greenhouse, I ended up with 2 cantaloupes the size of a big apple that were good but I had hoped for a bigger crop. The watermelon got smothered by the pumpkin, the pumpkin went crazy, it was the garden bully, and you could almost watch it grow. I ended up harvesting 5 small pumpkins, which was the perfect amount for me. 

I lost my whole cabbage crop to bugs (worms) I battled it for a while and then finally gave up. The bugs also attacked my broccoli and cauliflower, but I did manage to harvest a bit off them before I gave them up as well. Since these are known as the buggy plants, I will grow them in a separate area next year and cover them with row covers as I do not want to use pesticide. I had nice onions and garlic as well but again...not enough. I think I smothered my strawberries last fall, I covered them with grass clippings in the fall I think that was not the answer, I used dried leaves this year, so I hope to have strawberries this year...more than a handful. I also planted some raspberries bushes and they died too....I forgot to water them during the hot time, so I need to replant.

I really really enjoyed by garden, the whole process from seed to tending it, and the harvesting, I loved it all, I couldn’t wait to get home at the end of my work day to check on my garden. It was the first thing I did in the morning....wander around  my garden with my coffee and it was the last thing I did before I went to bed...wander around the garden with my cup of tea. The absolute most thrilling part (yes I said thrilling) was go out with a bowl at supper time and gather my supper and my lunch for the next day. I had either stir fried, steamed or boiled vegetables for supper....my favourite is lightly steamed and then tossed with different flavouring, and my favourite is steaming them in my homemade chicken broth. 

I have a new plan for next year, I plan to freeze chicken broth in ice cube trays and then put in bags in the freezer, and then when I want to steam my vegetables I can just put one cube in the pan. I also plan on making my own tomato bouillon as well the same way, in ice cube trays.

I discovered that having a meatless meal was much more satisfying then coming home from work famished and gorging on a meat heavy meal, it always left me feeling so bloated and lazy. I still got my protein from either a boiled egg, or cottage cheese or beans. I did eat meat as well, just not as often and not as much at a time. I found this way I still had energy after supper instead of just wanting to veg out for the rest of the evening. Making lunches for work as also thrilling, it was so much fun to go to work with a Ziploc baggie of tomatoes and a bread bag of cut up vegetables to munch on while on my tractor. This was not my lunch, it was my snack. It was not hard to get my 5-10 servings of fruit and vegetables in a day; this was usually done well before supper...which is why I felt I could treat myself to having a bag of chips and a Pepsi for supper sometimes. Makes sense to me.

Here is a summary of what I learned this summer in my garden

-         A greenhouse needs vents, not just a window (even in the north)

-         You cannot grow buggy plants without row covers (unless you want to poison yourself)

-         Pumpkins are garden bullies, give them space

-         Corn and beans love each other

-         Squash is beautiful....it can build a green wall

-         Popping your own home grown popcorn is very thrilling

-         Starting your garden indoors in March is too early

-         Peas, when growing upward are fun to pick

-         Eating a raw Rutabaga makes you feel like you are 6 again

-         Gathering your own supper makes you feel rich....like you won something

-         Squash and pumpkin soup is amazing, and can  be cooked in so many different ways

-         You can freeze spinach

-         Freezing tomatoes is not complicated, wash them, put them in container of your choice, stick your hand in there and smooch them, put a lid on it and stick in freezer....leave 1 inch head room.

-         You can never have too much compost or cow manure on hand

-         You never get tired of eating raw vegetables when on a tractor for 12 hours s day

-         Eating beets makes you pee purple

-         If you want lots of onions you have to plant lots of onions...it’s a one for one vegetable.

-         Vegetables are very tasty if you don’t over cook them

-         You can never have enough tomatoes....so many things you can do with them

-         Collared greens are goooood

-         Loved eating the peas raw in the pod...never shelled or cooked a single pea

Plans for next year;

-         Already expanded my growing space last fall, built new raised beds

-         Don’t put slow growing plants beside fast growing plans....they get smothered.

-         Plant more stuff that can be stored over winter, beans, cabbage, squash, potatoes, broccoli, onion, garlic, corn, tomatoes, peppers etc...

-         Freeze my spinach instead of letting it bolt if I can’t eat it all

-         Plant my buggy plants at the community garden (with row covers)

-         Not start so early in doors....maybe not start indoors at all, just start heating the greenhouse earlier

-         Plant a variety of squash and eggplant

-         Try planting sweet potatoes

-         Want to grow some fruit, maybe a few apple trees, and replace the raspberries that died

-         Encourage and help someone else start a garden

-         Green is beautiful

The green green grass of home......my second home, the golf course. Sharp crisp cut lines in the grass thrills.

 I planted squash in a raised bed by the 11th tee box at work, can you believe there are only 2 squash plants in here. I am going to use some more empty space at the gold course next year to plant vegetables......eatable landscaping they call it. The dirt in here is 100% old horse manure. 

And then came spring...finally

Just a wee bit before the first sign of spring I made a walkway to my greenhouse

I finally learned the secret to beautiful compost, it is a combination of patience, making sure you turn it often and  lots of brown organic matter 

I started some plants in small trays

and others right in the ground

In my greenhouse I used newspaper as mulch and it worked very well for me ..... no weeds

My garlic was planted last fall

Holy Moly peppers were my favorite, they did very well

I ordered my garden seeds in February , this was very exciting for me

A brief look at my winter in High Level, Alberta

It was frosty and cold of course

but I still managed to get out and do some snow shoeing 

On a sunny day the snow can be almost blinding

Living up north you soon learn that sunglasses are a year round necessity  

Don't think you can buy these anymore, I love them

Went camping up north .... yes there is more north than me. I Like to go on a  camping trip to Hay River  just before Golf season starts, once golf season starts I usually don't get to leave town.

My little cabin that I rented for 5 days

It has everything that I needed

I brought some books

and a box of wool....and no, I did not get that much wool kitted up

This is how much snow there was, that is the top of a picnic table....or the door to Narnia

The falls were frozen but still beautiful.
and once back at home
there was some baking.......

Some giant pretzels 

Some croissants with cheese inside

and of course always bread

My new to me beater

There was some sewing........

and some pretty pillowcases

some new summer pajamas, I still haven't mastered taking pictures of myself

and a some new cotton hand towels and wash cloths

I took a moccasin making class......like I need another hobby

There was some fun sewing....aren't they a cute couple.