Cloudless Sulphur

I am ready to sew up my office curtains.

Hopefully by next week I will have them hanging.
I need to stop checking for butterflies so I can get
my work done!

Fabric

I designed a new fabric

for my office curtains.

I am very pleased.

I only ordered 3 yards and I need 6
for both windows.
Thank goodness it is easy to order 3 more yards.
I love designing fabric from my photographs.

August

Sandbars are appearing in the Missouri River
and a new summer sport is emerging, sandbar mining.
All sorts of shells and fossils are turning up.
The drought does have some joyful moments.

In August I am studying Wara/Tatami,
the sabi-ness of straw.

I love the idea of creating mats from grasses.

I love honoring plant fibers.

We continue to watch the Summer Olympic Games.
I read a bit during breaks.
"In China, it was jade that was awarded to champion athletes,
while gold was relegated to runners-up (a tradition honored at the Beijing Olympics in 2008, where first-place medals were plated with gold, as the International Olympic Committee rules dictate, but their reverse was inlaid with white jade.)

I am praying for rain.
I am learning how to manage in 100 degrees and drought.
It is Lammas today.
It is first harvest.
The corn crop has been lost.

Wara the sabi-ness of straw.

Day out of time

In the Maya calendar

today is known as, "Day out of time."

I am thinking of the Mayans.
I am thinking about the ways they collected rain water
since they had no rivers or lakes.
I am thinking about how they managed in times of  drought.

I am thinking about those that came before.

I am thinking about cycles.

I am thinking about the circle of time.

I am thinking about climate change.

I am thinking about the crops that are burning up in
 the drought that is all across the midwest.
I am thinking as I do my daily watering.

We begin a new year.
We begin "Year of the Blue Resonant Storm"
 July 26, 2012 through July 25, 2013.
I hope it means the rains will return.

Buckeyes and tumbles

While watering the garden this morning 

I watched as a Buckeye came 

for breakfast.

This next generation Buckeye 

is much smaller than those that emerged

in the Spring.

There are other butterflies

out early in the day.

The Duskywings are

gorgeous on the Bright-eyed Cosmos.

We have finished our first batch
of tumbled rocks.
We will refill the tumbler with more rocks
 and begin again.
It takes lots of rocks to do a project.

We are tending the garden and reading project books.

With temperatures back into the 100's
we are keeping an eye on the birds.
We have cooling stations set up in the shade
 with lots of water and fresh oranges.