I think the Fly is Dead

Paper beads.  That's my latest endeavour.  Roll up long skinny, tapering, pieces of paper - around a coffee sippy straw.  Glue the end down, varnish it a few times and there you have it.  A bead, or many beads.  You choose depending on your level of insanity.

Apparently I am rather insane as I ordered a box of 1000 coffee, stir-er, sippy straws last night.  If that is an indication of the winter to come, it's going to be a long, wet winter.  And there she is....  twirling paper around sippy straws...

I am really getting old.  The older I get, the younger I get.  I play like a six year old.  If only I could sleep like a child too. 

I'm still into photographing everything I don't see, in hopes of seeing it better. Doesn't help usually, but it does keep me off the streets. (for the most part).  

I found a dead fly on the screen of my backyard screened house.  He didn't fly away which was a dead give-away to his life status. I took his picture, thinking the whole time how I detest pictures of bodies in coffins.  I suppose this might have been different as he was not in a coffin. 

On to spiders.  Not a very good shot.  I was hovering around in an overgrown area of my yard... swatting mosquitoes and dancing away from ants.  It was much easier to focus on the dead fly.  

What can I say?  I promised myself I'd get back to blogging, I didn't promise myself high quality, thought provoking commentary.

Tenting

It's been a warm and sunny weekend.  The pollen is a deep as the snow was a couple months back.  When you walk you leave footprints.  Everything is glowing yellow.  There's nothing to do but embrace the pollen.  There's no rain in the forecast. 

I put up a screen tent a week or so ago.  We hauled a table and chairs into it.  We added a fan and it's a lovely place to be.  When the sun started shining in a bit too far, I hung my dupatta (shawl) up and found that it was good. 

Then as the day passed, we added more dupattas.  We created a most wonderful, colorful tent. And that is where

Marsha and I spent the past 2 afternoons... reading, painting, staring off into space, or watching the pretty dupattas flap in the breeze of the fan.

I'm creating a fancy goat.  Anna, a friend requested it after seeing one I had made for myself.  This fellow is ceramic and will be heavily embellished before he's done.  He will be going to her friend who is a local Doctor. 

I did a bit of painting on it while I was in the tent.  Mostly though I did 'not much'.  Here's the goat in progress....

And here he is inside getting his horns glued on.  I'll smooth the connection off with plaster then paint it in to hide any seams.

The Little Fish Pond Video

Here's out little garden oasis in action. The goldfish are about a year old, they survived the winter easily and still seem to be happy little campers. I made the birdbath part, that pours water back into the upper pond, out of cement. It was a fun project last spring. Enjoy!