Mockingbird Hill Cottage

Life in our little cottage in the country

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Frost, Plants, and Brown Eyes

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I call this “Still Life of Plants, Cow, and Ukelele.”

When it warms up in the late morning, I’ll move everything back outside. So far, there are no frost advisories for tonight. In the next several days, the lows at night won’t be nearly so cold.

There are two more large plants in the den and one of the planters is sitting on the stool in front of the egg cup cubby.

There’s not that much room around here to begin with!

Don felt very achy and flue-y last night and is still feeling it a bit this morning. That’s the reaction he gets to the covid vaccination. I’m fine now, save for the usual allergy/sinus crap, but that has nothing to do with the shot. My arm is still a wee bit tender, but much better on the whole.

I spent some quality time with two of the girls yesterday when I changed a couple of their eye chips. Maeve had one set of chips that were what I would call ‘fantasy chips’ and I never showed them because I didn’t like them at all. And Sophie’s blue eye chips that I installed a month or so ago were too intense in color, so I replaced them. Sometimes, eye chips are very difficult to remove; that might be because the maker used a certain kind of glue, I’m not sure. Maeve’s fantasy chips were a pain in the tush to remove and it took me over 2 hours and several tries to get them out.

Here are my brown-eyed girls:

Maeve has the slightly lighter shade of brown eyes. Sophie’s are darker. I think they look very good in brown. I’d love to replace one more set of chips on Maeve because she has three sets of blue chips and I think a redhead needs some green eyes. But I don’t have any on hand.

These were made by AmaFlickerDolls, who lives in Ukraine.

I’m enjoying these little tweaks to the two girls that started this collection. They have neck joints now and some new eye colors. I just need to trim Maeve’s bangs a bit and they should be good to go.

Stay safe.

Happy Friday.

 

Needs Must

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This morning.

We have a frost advisory tonight, so all the porch plants will have to come inside. The pots you see in the secret garden are too heavy to carry in and out so they’ll stay. Here’s hoping they withstand the low temps – as well as my little zinnias. As so often happens around here, we get one night in October with frost and then the temps become milder for a couple of weeks. But in the meantime, all the plant life is dead.

I’m not ready for our catalpa leaves to drop, either.

But just in case, here it is this morning

We have lots of catalpas, actually. I think there are seven. But this one is right by the shed and the driveway so it’s the one we see all of the time.

I have a lot of crafty skills. But I’ve come to the conclusion that I do not have the sewing skills necessary to make little clothes for my Blythes. I tried again yesterday after working on my Elna sewing machine. I got it to work, but friends….this kind of sewing is not my strength. And though I certainly don’t expect everything to come out perfectly when I’ve just started, I know when I’m floundering. It’s too stressful for me, so I will leave that to those who are so much better at it. And there are many wonderful seamstresses out there.

As I’ve said before, sewing a straight 1/4 inch seam to make a quilt top is very different than making clothes. I remember back in junior high school Home Ec class, I was dreadful at making an A-line dress. Dreadful. Especially the darned zipper!

I’m fine with it this morning though I was a bit sad yesterday. And to forestall any questions, this was a beginner’s pattern and very easy. And I still couldn’t do it. I have the doll house project ahead of me, so there’s plenty to do that I can  do.

We get our booster shots tomorrow. And then Don gets his shot from the eye doctor on Saturday. Next week we’ll get our flu shots. Enough already!

Here’s the exciting list of things my paycheck is going to cover: heating oil, getting the septic tank emptied (which has become more expensive than it used to be,) and a new, lighter snowblower. I would have loved to put it all in savings, but needs must. I’m grateful that I can pay for these essentials.

Stay safe.

Happy Tuesday.

 

 

 

 

Seasonal Shift

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I started a new puzzle the other day but I never got to it yesterday.

It was a full day, with a first read-through of Jane Eyre in the morning and 3 hours of coaching in the afternoon. I’m tired.

I have more coaching to do later this morning.

The actors are very nice and eager to figure out the dialects.

It takes such concentrated effort to coach one-on-one. But when you’re in the same room as the coachee, it’s easier to pick up on facial expressions or frustration or whatever mood the actor is in. It’s much, much harder to do when coaching via Zoom. With Jane Eyre, I was coaching actors sitting in a board room and they were quite far away.

By the way, after I finished for the day I told Don I was absolutely sure I was speaking too loudly the whole time I was coaching. Not on purpose, of course, but I think that “They’re far away and I have to talk loudly” feeling crept into my voice. I’ll try to do better today.

On my break between the read-through and coaching sessions, I ran outside to water everything, folded clothes that had just come out of the dryer, and made a quick lunch. Don had gone out to take some pictures.

I’m coaching for two hours today, so it won’t be quite as tiring.

Then Jim again, later in the week.

The theme for this week is Zoom Dialect Coaching.

Don mentioned that it’s dark now when he gets up. And we both keep mentioning that it’s getting darker much earlier in the evening now. Sigh. Summer, you’ve been a huge challenge, but I’m not sure I’m ready for you to go. I think it’s fortunate that I’m coaching now, just as I was last year around this time when I coached during September – December. I’m so busy that I won’t have the time to be sad for very long..

And the light is different. You can tell that we’re heading into Autumn.

Stay safe.

Happy Wednesday.

 

Lambs Like to Party

Lambs Like to Party

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