Orange You Glad

Summer's almost over.

I always get excited in the Fall. It's a holdover from school days. The excitement about a box of freshly sharpened pencils, the smell of new crayola crayons, or crisply pressed school uniforms was hard to contain. It was second only to the anticipation of what novel things we might learn in the coming term.

September, more than January, has always seemed more like the beginning of the year.

Fresh from a holiday at the ocean, I spent some time this evening combing Etsy stores to see what wonderful fall accessories were being offered in some of my favorite Autumn colors.

Here are some beauties in burnt orange:

sling tote - burnt orange by yorktownroad

Autumn Jewel-Nuno Felted Scarf or Wrap 

by amysfunkyfibers

Red Ice Earrings by DorotaJewelry

I Could Not Have Said It Any Better

Mary Mooney, in the Oregonian knitting blog wrote a wonderful post on Sunday called "True confessions, knitting edition" It's a fun read, so check it out. Here's my favorite part because I'm so not yet on the Facebook bandwagon. Here's what Mary said:

... as an adult I appear to be one of 14 people on the planet not on Facebook. (I have nothing against Facebook, honestly. It's just that I'm a truly boring person, and I don't see the point of reminding everyone of that with regular updates that I spend my time working, running and knitting. Really, the most interesting thing about is me is that I knit, and I can blab about that here. And as an extra bonus, I can blab about that here without simultaneously learning that someone who sat beside me in the fourth grade is currently watching "Mad Men"in his underwear and eating Oreos. Tell me that's not a win-win situation.)

Not having a personal page on Facebook is something about not wanting that many friends. It's something about shyness. It's also about not wanting to be part of the great time suck and a little about not wanting to read about what all those potential friends might be doing every day. I love my blog, Twitter, & Ravelry friends. It would just be too much to add one more social network and still keep my sanity.

I do have a page for the business but have been too busy to do anything with it yet. I need a Facebook fairy to show up and fix it for me.

Flower Mystery is Solved

Mr. Cha Cha and I had dinner last week with some dear friends. The wife of the couple is a plant expert and she identified the mystery flowers that were growing in our wildflower patch.

The pretty pink flowers that arrived in such profusion are called Godetia. They evidently like full sun and slightly hungry dry soil--our type of flower exactly!

The white or blue flowers with the big pods are Nigella damascena, more commonly known as Love in the Mist. Their wild-looking pods are filled with seeds that when roasted are used to spice Middle Eastern and Indian food. The pods can easily be dried.

Follow the links for pages full of lovely photos on Flickr. We still don't know what variety the monster orchids are, but if you want to drool over photographic loveliness, check out the orchids link.

     Godetia       Nigella      Orchids.

My life has been so hectic, and I've been feeling so stressed. Looking at these flowers is exactly what I needed tonight. Hope you enjoy them, too.

The More Things Change, the More Things Change

Found this YouTube video on an old post over on Peter Shallard's Website and had to post it here on the off chance that you haven't seen it because it is so amazing. If you are a business owner, stop by Peter's website. He's a shrink for entreprenuers and has some valuable but free information over there.



It's so exciting to be a cyberspace entrepreneur and be a part of all this.

Flowers on the Bias Scarf

Who said you couldn't wear flowers in the fall? This crocheted raspberry scarf has a bunch of them on both edges of both ends and on both sides. The patch of wild flowers outside my window inspired me.

Flirty Little Lynx Scarf

It's crunch time. Fall and winter swiftly approach. Customers will need hats, scarves, and neckwarmers, so my fingers have been busy.

I've been producing some lighter-weight crocheted scarves for Fall. This soft and drapey one is in the colors of a lynx.

A New Take on Thread Crochet

I've been working on a series of thread crocheted scaves. Here's one I distressed to make a raggedy texture:

There is more to come...stay tuned.


*****

2010 Giveaway Winners

I thought it was a good idea. I put all of your entries in a bowl along with a toy mouse.

When Samba got up from her nap, I showed her the mouse lurking in the bowl and had my camera ready.

Samba is such a neat and tidy little cat. She tried very hard to get the mouse out of the bowl without disturbing any of the papers. So funny! After a minute of no success, she decided it wasn't worth her effort and walked away. Luckily, Mr. Cha Cha came home shortly afterwards and drew names.

The winners are:

1. Elsie -- the scarf.
2. Jane -- the yarn.
3. Meeyeehere -- the glass.
4. Jolene -- the knitting book.

Congratulations to the winners and many thanks to everyone who participated. You are all greatly appreciated!

If you haven't read yesterday's post yet, please go there and see if you can help out with the names of those flowers. I am stumped.