It’s a rainy day, with high winds coming in the afternoon that will be in evidence through tomorrow morning.
You know how much I dislike high winds.
Sigh.
We went to our storage facility yesterday and retrieved the porch cushions, chairs, etc. Without the color of potted plants, I really needed to see some color elsewhere on the porch. It looks better now.
We were feeling blue most of the day yesterday. John Prine’s death hit us hard, especially Don. This morning, we played some of his songs – sung by him – and were able to smile.
By the way, I’ve lost work because of this whole thing. I was due to work with Darko on a production of Candide at the Goodspeed Opera House some time this summer. But they’ve cancelled Candide. I was really looking forward to it, not the least because I need the work. And I love to work with Darko. Ah, well.
More egg cups:
Two morning glory egg cups found at the Flea Market in Paris, two wooden egg cups, a flowery egg cup that I found in a local antique shop, a delft egg cup given to me by my Mom, a green/white egg cup – one of the first I ever purchased, and another Delft egg cup in the form of a chicken.
A very worn and old red transferware egg cup found at the flea market in Paris, my pair of Beatles egg cups found at Abbey Road Studios in London, a Hankscraft egg cup, a chicken coming out of an egg, and my most recent purchase, a Jadeite egg cup.
My four Harlequin double egg cups – made by Homer Laughlin, they are the sister pattern of Fiesta.
More tomorrow, though we’re winding down.
Don is getting more produce from our very safe produce stand this morning.
Happy Thursday.
Let me be the first to say good morning and you should have sun tomorrow. We had rain and gloom yesterday. Today it’s gloriously sunny and I was even up early enough to do the “senior hour” at the grocery. It was my first trip to the store in over two weeks. Now we’re set for the rest of the month. 99 percent of the shoppers had face masks (including me) and the store wasn’t crowded so it was easy to zip in and zip out.
I’d forgotten about the egg cups you got at Abbey Road. That’s why it’s always fun when you highlight them again.
Take care.
Kay
I’m not sure about sun – the weather forecast says Cloudy. But here’s hoping!
Thanks, Kay. Stay safe!
glad you were able to get the adirondack chairs and cushions and that listening to john prine’s music helped a bit.
sorry about that lost work. :(
hope it’s not too breezy for you. i am not a fan of much wind, either. we had beautiful weather earlier this week … nearly 80 degrees, sunny, mild. the forecast for the next week or more is for highs in the 40s, lows below freezing and some rain this weekend and i’m okay with that. as nice as 80 degrees and the sun felt, i don’t want to skip over spring right into summer heat.
thanks again for sharing your eggcups and a bit of their stories. thanks for taking the time to post lovely photos and give us all a place to connect with you and each other. means a lot.
keep staying safe and well, everyone!
kathy in iowa
Breezy isn’t the right word, unfortunately – we have a high wind warning.
Thanks so much. Stay safe, Kathy!
I know you will feel better when your weather improves. Does Don ever ever sing the song, “How Can I Keep From Singing?”, a Quaker hymn? It seems to suit the moment. I’ve been thinking how so little singing goes on now. For most people, myself included, music is more for listening than for making. Of course I am grateful for all the wonderful performances available with a click, but there is something so basic about singing, expressing, and feeling the sounds. It seems to be something that is being left to the experts.
My 2 year old grandson stops wiggling and listens and watches with fascination when I sing to him via FaceTime. I love the high school choruses that are showing up on YouTube, beautiful music and youthful faces.
No, he doesn’t sing that, but we’re both singers and we sing a lot. I sang professionally for several years when I was younger. We love to sing, but I do think we don’t do it enough! Take care, Leslie, and stay safe.
Thank you Claudia. I did not know that you were a performing singer as well as actor. 🌞🌞🌞🌻🌹🌸🌞. On another note, you have been a good influence on me and my stove. After admiring your Gold Star Stella a few weeks ago, my own stove has moved up on my To-Do list, and I have made some progress.
Oh good! Stella is the only stove I have ever enjoyed cleaning! xo
I just love the four Harlequin double egg cups. Are those from this year? I can’t remember. My brain seems to be on hiatus most of the time lately.
We have sun, but it’s pretty cold and soooo windy!! Gusts up to 40mph out there. It is nice to see the green grass again. The little things do mean so much!!
It’s much easier getting through the day if your brain is on hiatus….trust me in this! Lol! ;)
You are right!! And now it is SNOWING….. ugh. Frozen brain, too.
I got them a couple of years ago, Chris. Two were given to me by a reader and I found the other two.
Yes, we’re having the same wind – very gusty and unnerving. Stay safe!
It’s sunny here…but much colder as Chris said…guess I got used to one day of 70+ too easily. And for a few minutes we did see snow flurries…lest we forget what winter is like.
Hope your weather warms up so you can sit on your deck sooner than later. Especially, since you went to all the trouble to get the chairs and cushions. Stay safe! ;)
It’s colder here today and very windy, the wind chill is fierce. We’ll get out on the porch soon. But for now, I can see the bright cushions if I turn around in my chair, so that’s nice. Stay safe!
Enjoy the color on your porch, Claudia. I wish I had a porch! We had a tiny one at my previous house, and enjoyed coffee and Sunday newspapers there.
I’m sewing cloth masks for family members. It’s a bit boring, this piecework, and I’m often reminded of my maternal grandma who worked in a sewing factory in Chinatown. Especially since I’m using a vintage Singer from that era.
Sorry for your lost of work. I know how much the work meant in many different ways … income, professional satisfaction, working with people you love. Hope this new normal reverts to the old normal.
I don’t know if I could be without a porch again. I lived in apartments for several years with no porch or balcony, but I grew up in a house with a big porch and it’s a big part of me.
We need masks, but I have no elastic! Yes, I’ll be glad when this is over and we can get back to some semblance of normal.
Stay safe, Wendy.
I use bias tape for the ties, instead of elastic. I just finished making masks for my family today.
Don’t have that either! Ah, well. Thanks, Wendy!
The Delft and Harlequin. Wow. Gorgeous.
I’m sorry about Candide. What a lovely song and that would be a fun one to do, especially with Darko. Quick question — was the Hartford Jane Eyre the same script/version that the National Theatre did? They are streaming it today, live. It’s Sally Cookson’s adaptation. I think they will be available on youtube for one week after the live stream. (But you probably knew that!)
No. Hartford’s is an original adaptation by the director. I really liked it and thought it suited the novel. I don’t think I want to see another interpretation right now. I’d like to keep the one I worked on fresh in my mind. Stay safe, Jeanie.
It’s lucky you found a way to get fresh produce. That’s so key to a healthy diet when we’re all sitting around too much and eating much packaged/canned food. As soon as we get drier and sunnier weather, I vow to do something more about that for myself (I don’t know yet about how to get the fresh produce unless we try to get a CSA or Imperfect Foods box, as we’re trying to pull back on how much money we’re spending with these deliveries, but I can certainly find some way to get more exercise for the body which is being fed what it isn’t accustomed to eating).
(Of course everything seems to change daily and one set of info conflicts with another, but can Don use a credit card or does he have to pay in cash at the farm stand? I know if we were to journey to another town where I know of one [so as to continue to avoid the grocery store], they’re not set up for anything at their little field stand but a cash transaction. Some reports are telling us to be careful about handling germy paper money and to instead use plastic which can be wiped down along with everything else [disinfected]. Feels like minutia with having to think of every little and big thing. If being really careful though with the cash, it’s another case of benefit vs risk. [I see those lines of cars at the food banks when it’s televised on TV and I drool over those big green heads of lettuce {two to a box of groceries!} they’re handing out to people. {Of course I then feel like a total sh*t for fleetingly being envious when I know the people in those lines are suffering or they wouldn’t be there.} I did try to make a soup last night with canned green squash. It was…edible.])
Sorry also about your freelance work; I’d wondered about that. My husband had a fledgling freelance business himself (barely had gotten up the website) before any prospects (of course) flew out the window, and he’d already canceled another job in the earliest days before the mandatory orders in SoCalif about physical distancing (they’re even sending out police boats to get the surfers out of the water as of yesterday; Mayor Garcetti is NOT fooling around about the distancing in Los Angeles County, thank God) because he felt the job would bring him into contact with too many people when he needed to be safer for himself and me. We could really, really use some secondary income right now despite being retired. (Which, when I say that, makes me feel like a sh*t a second time, because what about all the people who now don’t even have primary income? In the middle of an epidemic, and then to lose your job, too?)
To other subjects …
Have forgotten to tell you how much I’m enjoying seeing your egg cups in this week leading up to Easter. Thank you for sharing them. It sure doesn’t feel like Easter holiday otherwise. But my husband and I are determined to at least have some kind of nice meal together on Sunday afternoon. I might try my unseasoned hand at baking a cake for dessert! (Oh wow am I lamenting the fact of not stocking up on flour, sugar and yeast when I had the chance. [I never have had sugar in the house for a long, long time; only found a few little packets they give out when you order coffee at a drive-thru restaurant.] If I was any kind of cook, I’d have thought of it. There are easy-enough recipes on the web for, as an example, no-knead bread. When I stock up in summer for the next round of 2020-21 virus, hoping the stores in my locale and online are back to some kind of fuller inventory, those are food/baking items I won’t this time overlook. [I think back to the little cottage I had before this current house I live in; how it had all those metal-lined BIG heavy drawers {five!} in the kitchen for when the 1920s-30s cook had her flour, sugar, cornmeal and whatever else in them; I ‘get it’ now! I’ve wanted a Hoosier cabinet for a long time, just perfect organization in my mind! But space is a defining problem in a small house. No space for a baker’s cabinet.])
Oh boy do I hate the wind like that, too, Claudia. Maybe you can watch something pleasant on television and just turn up the volume, or keep playing music, anything to drown the sound of a stirred-up world out there. For us in SoCalif, and since yesterday to right this minute, getting a good bit of steady but light-to-moderate rain (which sure, it’s April showers that bring the May flowers, but for us to get rain this late in the year is just amazing). Grateful. Not having to deal with bad drought is just one less stressful thing to have to think about, when there’s so much other stuff that IS stressful.
I call it a farm stand, but it’s a family owned business which combines produce, baked goods, some gifts and the nursery where I buy my plants. It’s a building – at least the produce, etc. is – and the nursery is outdoors and in three different greenhouses. So it’s a business that gets a lot of traffic and we can use plastic.
I’m a bit edgy from the wind and from waking up at 4:30 am. Lack of sleep and high winds = not a good day!
Stay safe, Vicki.
Oh, could you not get your mulch and stuff from their nursery/greenhouses? I wonder if they have some to sell, as it would answer your gardening deficits you’d mentioned (sounds like one-stop shopping … maybe you could pick up some muffins and bread, too .. ? .. wow I wish I had something like that near me!!!).
Yes, I can – and I usually do. But I have to call them and find out if I can order ahead and pay via the phone and then have someone load the trunk. xo
Here in Australia we are being prepared by our government to expect a long time – 6 months or more, for social distancing. This will be difficult for all of us. Some social contact will have to continue, eg medical appointments. I have also been making masks while sheltering at home. I have tried different patterns because I don’ t think one pattern will suit everyone. I am making them for older family members and friends who have other health difficulties.
Your comment to Wendy about not having elastic for the ear loops prompted this comment. While it has been suggested to use hair ties or rubber bands, as a substitute instead of elastic for the ear loops, they are not comfortable for any length of time. You don’t want to be fiddling with the mask once you have put it on.
There are other patterns for masks with ties, that can be tied at the back of the head and at the base of the head. These masks are similar in pattern for the face covering, and have ties instead of ear loops. I have been using older sheets and other fabric remnants as my material. Anything with a tight weave that is also light. A benefit of the masks with ties will be in laundering. They will stand up to regular daily washing, whereas the elastic will deteriorate after a time.
Thank you for your daily photos and commentary. I am enjoying the on-going conversations and discussion. It is helping to keep me at home.
I’ve used the hair ties, and you’re right! They hurt after a while. I have a lot of quilting cotton, with tight weaves, so I can probably use that.
Thanks, Miche. Stay safe.
Lovely comments. I think it would be nice to hear from a nurse who can give us tips on sewing masks. Thanks to Miche for mentioning the sheets, I have plenty of those.
We are having lovely weather compared to our usual rain, rain, rain. But not much we can do to go out and enjoy it.
Some of our neighbors have been really supportive and nice. Some people wave at my daughter every time they pass in front of our house. So lovely to see!
We don’t really see our neighbors except witnessing them going back and forth to their cars. But the few times I’ve been out in the car with Don, everyone we encountered has waved. A nice sense of community! I love that your neighbors are waving to your daughter. Stay safe, Jan.
What a joy you missed, not being able to work with Darko. That would have brightened things up. We had a deluge of rain yesterday and some big thunder, but only for a short while. Then the sun came out for a few glorious minutes. AND I’ve finally seen the darling little wild violets. The purple is such a surprise among the green and brown. Don’t laugh, but the best place to see them is from the bathroom window! Claudia, I haven’t listened to music for a while, but the other day I had an iTunes classic country music station that gave me such a boost! Good old fashioned Hawaiian guitar, the familiar beats and themes, everything from Your Cheatin’ Heart to Okie from Muskogee. It made me realize how much I’m depriving myself of one of the biggest pleasures of my life. Can you tell me if any of Don’s recordings are still for sale, and if so, where I can buy them? I love his voice and even tho I play piano, acoustic guitar is my favorite instrument and he plays so well. Thinking of you both every day. I may sound like a broken record (no pun intended), but I’m so grateful for Mockingbird Cottage!
I’m not sure if it’s available now – it might be. I’ll ask Don. His CD with his friend Dan is his best, I think.
Music is essential always, but especially now. Thanks for reminding me to listen as well! Stay safe, Nora.
that’s right! nora in ct … you reminded me by asking about don’s music; thank you!
claudia … i, too, would appreciate that information about getting don’s cds. thank you, too!
hope everyone is safe and well.
kathy in iowa
I’ll check into it, Kathy. xo