Category Archives: Everyday

Chicago Botanic Gardens, Last Day

This is the last installment of photos from our visit to the Chicago Botanic Gardens. Unfortunately my photos only take our visit up to approximately the halfway point, sorry. My camera battery was starting to lose its charge (I need a second battery) and I wasn’t sure I was getting decent shots, so I put my camera down and just experienced the gardens in real time.

After we left the English Walled Garden we passed by a hillside planted with zinnias, black eyed Susan, and those lavender fluffy annuals you see at all of the garden centers in the spring. Sorry, I don’t know what they are, never paid attention to them. Maybe you know? This hillside is covered with daffodils and tulips in the spring!

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I love zinnias and black eyed Susan and have grown them before, have you? The zinnias growing on the hillside were all the red variety. The photo above shows another variety of lavender flower growing amongst the two stars. I cannot recall the name of this one either.

black eyed susan 023 At the end of this hillside garden, my daughter spotted a squirrel in a tree. The little guy drew us both over to it. We were careful as he didn’t seem too afraid of us. When I lifted my arm he thought I had a treat and started to come over to me, but he was still cautious. I didn’t let him get too close, and luckily had nothing to feed him.

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At first, he seemed to be hiding behind a branch, but quickly came out to see if we had any treats.

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We worked our way towards the Japanese Garden which is on three tiny islands with only the first two open to the public. An arched bridge carries you over to the first and largest island. This garden is flowerless and a place I never appreciated until a few years ago. It is very orderly and is supposed to be peaceful. I’ll bet that on a weekday you can get the full effect of this garden, but on the weekends with little ones running around, nope, didn’t happen.

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One of the highlights of this garden are the two structures that are connected by a neatly raked sand garden and well placed rocks. At one end is a hut with built in table/chairs. At the other end is a little look out structure. In the spring this space is filled with cherry blossoms!

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I thought this bark was interesting in the Japanese Gardens. Sorry, I didn’t get it’s name.

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Well, that’s all from our midsummer visit to the Chicago Botanic Gardens.

Everyone have a great day! Bye for now!

“Garden Delights” & “Nature’s Surprises”

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I hope you all are having a great summer weekend. We are enjoying beautiful summer weather here in northern Illinois. The humidity is low, the sun is shining, and for July the temperatures are staying on the cooler side.

Yesterday, I got my promised Mother’s Day visit to the Chicago Botanic Gardens. We usually go either at the beginning of the growing season or towards the end in late August, so this time was a little different.

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Today I’ll show you the photos from our first stop at the gardens. Please excuse the quality of my photos; it was a very sunny day. The Butterflies and Blooms exhibit was moved this year, so we actually noticed it and decided to check it out.

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This exhibit is a large screened in enclosure with butterflies flying all around. Flowers that butterflies particularly love are planted everywhere.

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The butterflies will land on you too. I was told that they seem to love white the best. I was wearing a darker colored top, so they left me alone, but landed on my daughter’s shoulder.

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These little feeding stations are set up throughout the exhibit. I think these two are dining on banana.

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The chrysalises are purchased and hung on wooden dowels until the butterflies emerge. Here is one that is almost ready to fly free.

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This visit to the Butterflies and Blooms exhibit at the Chicago Botanic Gardens was perfectly timed (not planned though) to show you Talyssa and Gracie’s new ensembles. I don’t usually make two at the same time for Kaye’s MSDs, but the fabrics are from the same collection and begged to be made into coordinating sets, so I did just that. I hope you like them. By the way, both sets are the same size so can fit both the 17″ and 18″ MSD bodies.

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As you can see, Talyssa found her own butterflies in the garden.

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And Gracie, found a little house wren that she befriended.

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Gracie’s “Nature’s Delights” and Talyssa’s “Garden Surprises” ensembles will be available tonight (July 10, 2016) at 7:00 pm CST, cindyricedesigns.com. Check the “Shop What’s New” page at that time for more details.

Moving Slow, Moving Along

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Do you remember this photo???

I took this photo before leaving for Florida an entire month ago! Prior to leaving, I spent the week sewing dresses with the hope that I could knit the sweaters while away from my studio, which I did, but the finishing up seems to be taking forever; I am finding that it is hard to get back into the flow and feel of creating.

Today I am finally starting on the completion of the last ensemble. My hope is that when Gina’s ensemble is finished I will be able to get back in the groove.

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Here are the other four finished ensembles (in case you missed them). Alice is modeling the green floral ensemble called “Flower Picking”. Alice arrived days after I returned home. (I actually got notice from Nelly that Alice was complete somewhere on interstate 75 in Georgia.) Lucy graciously let her new sister model this ensemble. This outfit was purchased by Cara’s mom. Cara’s photo is on my Facebook page here.

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Gracie’s ensemble called “Rose Trellis” was just completed late last week.

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Here is Patsy’s “Bitsy Blossoms”. It was purchased for Ann Estelle, but Bitty Bethany snatched it and doesn’t seem to want to take it off. You can see my customer’s photo on my Facebook page here also.

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And, just completed is Millie’s “Cutie in the Garden” ensemble. Millie’s ensemble is still available on my website here.

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This is the progress on Gina’s ensemble so far. I made a quick drawing of the embroidery design; we’ll see how closely I actually stick to the preliminary design. I have the embroidery thread colors all picked out and ready to go, so this is my project for the day.

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