Gardens

I've decided to break up the photos from the recent adventure into categories, for the most part, instead of days. The days blended together beautifully into swaths of sand and water, gardens and adventures that it's a little hard to tell which sunset or adventure happened on what day.
We will begin with the Naples Botanical Garden, which we visited on Day 1 of our journey. Though the day was oppressively hot (even for us Central Florida people), it was well worth the price of admission.









I was obsessed with all of the beautiful water lilies.








And the Children's Garden was marvelous. Here's a garden bed planted in a baby bed:



and here is a garden that I photographed with my aunt Claiborne in mind. I am nearly positive that I will go to her house one day soon and see her old purses nailed to her back fence with darling plants spilling out of them.

My Girl

This is my favorite picture of Emma from our Artists' Retreat weekend:



She is my girl - happiest when she can dream while wind blows and sand is on her toes.

Shawl

Hey Blog! I'm back.
It's been a fantastic week and it's going to take me ages to go through my photos and tell the stories.
Here's a start, though. That shawl I knit last week or something like that? My friend was kind enough to take a few photos of it while we were on the beach this weekend.











Summerflies shawl in South West Trading Company Bamboo

Going Dark

Hello Blog.
I had a post in mind for tonight, with pictures and everything, but I ran out of time. The pictures need to be edited and the post isn't written and it's getting late.
But I wanted to pop in anyway and tell you that I'm stepping out for this next week.
I'm going off the grid.

I'll be focusing a bit on finishing up the math class I'm taking and other important things as well as departing with Emma for an artists' retreat.
It's all good - nothing dramatic or scary going on. You'll just be hearing even less from me over the next week.

But when I come back, there will be loads of stories and photos and I might even call it the end of the Silent Summer. We'll see.

I'll miss you all!
Hugs and Kisses,
me

Big Girl Haircut

Emma got her hair cut today. A couple of weeks ago, she announced that she wanted a "big girl" haircut this time - shoulder-length, please.
So, we made quite a deal of it. We picked out pictures of haircuts she liked and brought them to our hair magician. He knew just what to do.








She could not stop looking at herself in the mirror! She feels beautiful and that makes me so very happy. I would not have thought it possible to make her cuter than she was, but somehow, I think it's happened.
Afterward, we picked out some lunch at the Fresh Market right next door to the salon and did a bit of shopping in some of our favorite stores in Hyde Park.

Before:

After:

A LIttle Knitting

I've been pretty obsessed with this little shawl I cast on. It's called the Summer Flies shawl. In fact, I've been so obsessed with it that I didn't even stop to add it to my projects sidebar over there. I cast it on, I think, Friday, and I'm already done with it.
Granted, I need to block it, but I may never get around to that.



Besides, it's made out of bamboo yarn. Does bamboo even block nicely? I don't know.
It has this little picot edge which took just forever. I didn't think I'd ever finish it.



Worth it? Oh yes. I'll try to get a photo of the finished product for you soon.

Summer Flies Shawl in South West Trading Company Bamboo

Hi There

I turned 34 this week.
I'd intended some sort of reflecting post with a self portrait.
The only "portrait" I managed to get was this shot of Emma, sitting in for me to adjust the focus.

I actually kind of like it - how she's so low in the frame, how she isn't posing, the bath oil all in her hair from the bath fizzies we'd made and tried earlier in the day.
It was a good birthday.
I won't lie - it's been kind of a tough week. No calamities of an obvious nature have befallen me, just a series of small things that add up and steal my focus. But my birthday more than made up for it - yummy cake and dinner out with my family and homemade frozen yogurt made by my brother and The Lovely Mindy that was to-die-for.
And birthday shopping.
Oh, birthday shopping.
I don't get to shop a lot, but that just makes it so much more fun when I get to. And there was an obvious moment of destiny between a new shirt and a pair of shoes. It was breathtaking.
I like shoes.

I've had a little bit of software trouble, thus the absence of posting. I think we are all squared away now, with a few new toys for me to sweeten the whole deal. You should be seeing a little bit more of me here soon. Yay!

Wake-up Playlist: Death Cab for Cutie, Soul Meets Body