Monthly Archives: July 2015

What’s Growing Around Here

Since July is coming to a close and it was a perfect day for taking photos (overcast) I wanted to capture some images of what is growing around our house. I spend very little time in the garden these days, so what is growing has started up by itself with little or no help from me.

Our apple tree has quite a few apples, but sadly they seem to be dropping before they can ripen. I don’t think we will get any this year. Last year for the first time in 6 seasons, we had some for eating. I wrote about it here.

The yellow jacket wasps will be very happy. They love the fruit.

The maple tree has these beautifully colored “helicopters”.

A bit of leaf lettuce is growing in clay pots. My daughter started some seeds for a biology experiment and this was extra. We couldn’t throw it out, so we put it into a couple of pots and hope to enjoy a salad soon.

My husband and daughter went to the greenhouse and purchased some beautiful herbs. Here is a dwarf purple basil and an orange mint.

I dried some jalapeño seeds (I eat LOTS and LOTS of jalapeños) and planted them as an experiment. Do you see the baby jalapeño? I have four plants growing and they are still in shallow containers. I REALLY need to take 20 minutes out of my day and get these poor little plants into deeper pots, nothing too big though. I want to be able to bring them inside and keep them going under florescent lights when it starts to get cold.

And here are cantaloupe plants that started out in our compost pile from cantaloupe seeds that came from a grocery store melon. I dug up a few and planted them in the sun near the house. I hope they have a chance to turn into ripe fruit before it gets cold.

The violas, pinks, and lobelia reseed every year without any help from me.

My hanging baskets that my husband and daughter planted for me on Mother’s Day are doing quite well. Aren’t the flowers colorful?

So, that’s it for out and around the house at the end of July. It was nice to get out today and observe nature even if it was only for a short while before I came in and got to work on my new project. Unlike the apples on our tree, the apples in this print are looking quite delectable. Hope you all had a great weekend!

“Are You Ready?”

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Are you ready for the first day of school? It’s not so far off for some, and others have a month or more of summer vacation left. The public schools in Chicago don’t start until the second week in September and here in the suburbs the kids go back middle to the end of August. My niece who lives in a southern state has one more week off. 😦

Personally, I cannot believe it is time to start thinking about school starting up again, but it is.

My Little Darling, Gina, is beginning to get ready and would like to show you her new school-ish looking ensemble.

Gina’s lace sweater is knit out of natural colored lace weight merino wool yarn and embroidered with mirrored image rose motifs to coordinate with the dress print.

Who can resist a beret for back to school? I embroidered this one with a blue rose and added a multi-looped hand tied red grosgrain bow. Très chic!

Isn’t this the cutest blue rose print? The colors of blue, red, and green on an ivory background seemed like the perfect back to school palette.

For more information on Gina’s “Are You Ready?” ensemble, please visit my “Available for Sale” page on cindyricedesigns.com .

Talyssa is “My Golden Girl”

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After seeing Talyssa in this golden yellow ensemble I pronounced her to be my golden girl because she looks beautiful in golden yellows. Fair skinned Talyssa has a beautiful ivory skin tone that definitely prefers certain colors and I think that this is one of them.

This is Talyssa’s first ruffled skirt. I think it fits Talyssa’s personality nicely; she is such a girly girl.

This is my last color to use of my vintage pillowcase looking fabric. You can see the other sets I made with this print in the other colorways here, here, here. I still have a bit more of each, so hopefully can make (at least) one more dress in each color.