lion testing, gardening and Mr Cute

the testing of the water color pencils was semi successful

the blending and graduation of color went well, and I like that look

my fear that the color would bleed into the animal appears to be justified, however -- along the front paws and the back of the lion where there is not a real strong, distinct line the color did change

so now I'm trying to figure out what I can use as a "resist" to keep that from happening on the other animals

since we returned from our daughter's right after the 4th of July we've had really warm temperatures and rain every day at some point -- usually in late afternoon or evening

it has been great for the garden!

you may remember the pictures from a couple of months ago of the wood frame we built in the area where we planted the green beans

and here it is with the green beans running up the netting on both sides

some of those plants show signs of forming blooms, so we hope to be eating green (and yellow!) beans soon

we planted a whole variety of peppers and chilis

this first one to form is a poblano and it is really pretty

one of the bell pepper plants has several little peppers about the size of a pea




here are the makings of a salad!

romaine lettuce at this end of the garden -- and some butter lettuce at the other end of the garden that we've already been eating

and the tomato plant there is loaded with little baby roma tomatoes

we have a lot of different tomato plants out there -- some for just eating, some for cooking

last summer's garden surprise was the white pumpkin that the squirrels planted just outside the garden fence

this summer's surprise is this odd companion planting in among the green beans

CARROTS!

we had carrots planted in this area a couple of summers ago, but for the most part they didn't come up and we decided we weren't going to try that again because the soil has some pretty big rocks in it still

I wasn't even sure what they were until we were weeding and pulled one up thinking it was a weed

obviously we'll be leaving the rest of them alone and getting a little bonus harvest (hopefully!)

the first of the many squash plants has begun to bloom (we planted zucchini, hubbard, butternut and pumpkin)

this is zucchini - they are always the first ones to start blooming and producing

and the blooms and leaves are just really pretty

(and yes, this is another garden picture that might serve as inspiration for a piece of fiber art!)



last night as I was heading off to my quilt guild meeting I snapped this photo (I was stopped at the light -- I wouldn't try this trick while I'm driving!)

that dark cloud is a good example of what we've been seeing

some of these clouds have been full of hail as well as rain

we're grateful that so far we've had only little tiny hail that has not damaged our garden

and I need to say thank you to my daughter for the availability of this photo for you to see -- my cell phone has a camera in it but I've never been able to figure out how to download the pictures from it to my computer, so whenever I take a photo that I want to be able to do something with, I text it to my daughter's cell phone (she has a smart phone) and she emails it back to me -- convoluted but it does work as long as I have a willing child! Thanks kid!!

I haven't posted any pictures of Mr Cute from our long weekend at the 4th of July

usually I wait until my daughter has put them out on her facebook page, but yesterday afternoon she said "go ahead and do it mom", so here you go

over that long weekend, Mr Cute had his first experience in the wading pool

that's his mommy's arm and knee there in the picture as she was sitting in the pool with him (and there wasn't a lot of water in it)

he seems to be trying to decide if he likes the sensation

before he got out he was pouring water out of that little ball toy and having a pretty good time


and here we have the DH having a conversation with Mr Cute

it's great that the DH has healed well enough that he can hold Mr Cute now














and if you look closely you can see that Mr Cute has two bottom teeth!

his hair has a definite red cast to it -- no big surprise


so there is your gratuitous cuteness for today

time for me to go get some work done!