Well, so much for posting more often. Part of this is due to illness; Ralph's asthma attack on March 25 ended up being bronchitis which he's still fighting, and I'm on day 8 of my bout with it. He was off work for most of that time; I only took two days although I probably should have taken four. At the risk of TMI, the human body should not be capable of producing that much mucous. And the cough! Sounds like feeding time at the sea lion pen around here lately. We're both feeling quite a bit better today but hey, the day is young. :-)
This has been a good spring for us flower-wise. The wisteria had at least six blooms on it (last year it had one, and the year before that [which was the first year it had ever bloomed at all] it only had one that SOMEbody knocked off the branch before it was even fully opened); our water lilies had a lovely cluster of four flowers which it's never done before (see photo); the amaryllis is opening up; and the rosemary had dozens of little purple flowers on it. The nectarine had hundreds of blossoms, but unfortunately the recent wind & rain knocked most of the burgeoning fruit off it so our anticipated bumper crop is going to be rather small instead. So much for a summer of nectarine cobbler, sigh.
I've been doing quite a bit of knitting lately. I made three little kittens (two of which are in the photo); a scarf nice enough to wear to work; and am well into a beaded bag using the green/yellow yarn I got in the Pie Swap. Oh, and I finished the green shawl, too. I'll have to get some pictures.
Yesterday was opening day for the Renaissance Faire. We'd only intended to stay for a short while--long enough to play music for the dancers--and ended up being there a full 10 hours. We had such a good time. Ralph was all over playing music for anyone and everyone (even joined a stage group playing music for their dancers) & I did a variety of things including playing music, knitting, spinning, and more music. I even managed to dance Heart's Ease. A couple girls came over while I was spinning early in the day, quite interested in the drop spindle, and I let them both try it which they got very excited about. I'll have to see if I can find a couple more spindles to bring next weekend for more hands-on demonstrating, and I want to bring my wheel too. I might even start spinning on a regular basis again once Faire is over.
One thing I really wanted to do was bring hoops & dowels to play that ring-toss game we played at the Dickens Faire, and never did find just the right materials. I really thought that would be a great thing to do as you can have customers play & get involved. So imagine my combined delight and indignation when I saw two participants playing that exact game with a young customer! I really need to get some rings & dowels for next week.
Music-wise, I think the best part of it was late in the day. Ralph & I were playing music along with a guy named R, and then E joined us with her recorder, and then J came over with her mandolin, and before I knew it there were about a dozen people all playing: violins, bodhrans, mandolins, recorders, and of course Ralph with his sackbut as the sole bass line. It was awesome. Sometimes we sounded great and sometimes we sounded awful, and at all times we were having so much fun. I played until my throat was sore.
Alas, today will not be nearly so much fun. There is much housework to be done as neither of us did much during the week; I attempted to do some laundry on Tuesday, and the act of taking one load out of the dryer & putting the next one in made me so out of breath that I had to sit & rest for about half an hour! Stupid bronchitis. Still, it will be good to start the week out with a clean house, and satisfying to have it all done.
