Fly, Flying Away

Just to let you know...

I'm flying away for a week at Nancy Crow's Barn

with Dorothy Caldwell

---Such a treat!

See you in a week!

Scratchings won't get posted this Monday I fear.

Meeting Place

We've got to stop meeting like this!

Having said that I think this is a different fox.

Oh, Those Darling Buds of May

It's all happening around here

Life is coming back 

to twigs

and branches

that looked so lifeless

just a few days ago.

A Week Scratched for Mothers

Stepping back and looking at a week scratched.

Time to get the gardening tools out

and when we're not gardening

 we're listening and watching the antics

of our happy pair of Merlin.

Couching all those strings used for tying up bundles

My favourite for this week.

An important family week this week.

Beautiful tulips arrived from second son Brett...Thank you son!

So I stitched tulips.

And then stitched an ode to Judy!

Happy Mothers Day.

A Few Birds and One Critter We Crossed Paths with Yesterday

As we sipped our morning coffee

he sat and called his mate

after each call he would puff up his chest.

She called back and swooshed through the trees.

After ages, he dropped out of sight into the stream

and it looked like he flew off with a catch

up to where the female was.

We believe we know where they have built a nest.

Trouble is all our regular bird visitors have disappeared.

The RP's and I spied Harry the Heron down on the dike....

....and a very ordinary seagull but he must have an admirer somewhere!

One Rusty Pup Oblivious to Mr. Fox standing right behind her!

Spring Clean-up

I sorted and folded all my rusted

and natural dyed cloth

Lovely gentle colours.

Then a surprise

Three leaves printed side by side in the same dye bath

yes three completely different colours.

Are you like me?

I never get to finish a spring clean-up

A colour or a stitch or a scrap

always calls to me

and off I go in search of other bits and pieces that might help give it a voice!

Scratching around in Bushes

Hanging amid forsythia blooms

and lazing around on the deck

Sun glorious sun

Blood tests

Diane and I walked through the woods and down the stream

we wrapped rocks with wool, cotton, linen and silk

and left six bundles in the stream.

We'll leave them there for about a week.

Scraps from the cutting room floor!

It's amazing what you find when you decide it's time for a spring clean

More scraps...

but what I should have stitched was the pair of merlin

that have taken over the woods

and scared away all other birds.

Merlin are very vocal when they decide to settle down.