Hot Hot Hot

 No seriously, it's been much too hot enough lately.

 My newest drink concotion for cooling off, a small amount of this fresh blood orange juice, maybe a 1/3 of a cup, mixed with a limonata Pellegrino and lots of ice. Very refreshing, and pretty too. When it's cocktail hour, then you can put in some vodka too.

Wow, so much cooler. Hard to tell the difference from 111F.

Summer POV

Meg vs. The Bacon! She's been trying to work on her levitation powers here. But as she was patient she got a bit because she wasn't rude and actually stealing from the table.

 Why, why, why do they BOTH want to cuddle up with me when it's more than 100F??

 They really do soak up the sun. Spike's new-found friend the lizard. Note the lizard still has his entire tail here. Spike would normally would be hunting the little guy, but maybe it was too hot.

Meg, always on alert to any deer activity. We actually both saw a fox recently during the afternoon on our hillside. At first I thought it was an enormous squirrel, but then realized it was bigger than Meg. It moved too fast to capture on camera though.

Mid-Summer Garden

 Our mimosa tree has never had so many blossoms, it's so beautiful.

Same with the pomegranate bush.

 Who knows, we might actually get an actual pomegranate off of this plant!

 I love the central part of the blossom, that texture is so beautiful.

 This would be a cool image to make into a carved stamp.

 Catching the roses at the right time of day when the sun is shining through.

 Ooh the camera can't take alllll the intense reds.

More ICAD

More ICAD (Index Card A Day) work for mid-July. It's continuing to be quite fun to work on these small pieces, they're all on 4x6" index cards. This first one is my favorite of this bunch. I wish I could have this printed on a light-weight challis and make a blouse out of it to wear all summer.

I tried to keep away from collage, I really did, but I just couldn't resist.

 This one looks better in person. It's very subtle.

Solstice Sixteen

This sixteenth Solstice Quilt block is rather simple but I think really nice because it is very graphic and quite powerful. With different prints and placement you could make some interesting secondary designs within the block.

Wandering Wednesday: SF Opera at the Ballpark

 It took a long while to get really dark at the San Francisco Opera at the Ballpark simulcast this year. It got cold pretty fast though, but our seething at the incorrigible and horrible Don Giovanni kept us warm.

 When the masqueraders appeared, we couldn't stop laughing, those headdresses were probably four feet high, and were maybe feathered? The singing and performances were divine, what a story.

 I'm so bad at scenic couple selfies, I try, but the angle is always hard to get. At least we're both smiling. And yes, Marc is wearing a SF Opera ball cap. He went to get drinks and came back with a hat, giggling about the opera having a ball cap the whole way.It is pretty funny.

 Son Alex and his Zoe, photo credit to my dad.

 My parents! They're the ones that got us going to this every year. I'm glad I was raised up listening to opera, thanks!

 I like the blurry background of this one, looking over McCovey Cove back towards the park.

The Bay Bridge lights as seen through an instagram filter.

Various ICAD

 Ten more ICAD, Index Card A Day, these are all 4x6".

 I re-purposed some note taking, figuring cards used while I was working on assembling the bullseye quilt to take to the quilter. I thought they made interesting backgrounds to begin with instead of just blank white.

 An actual sketch kind of thing. I forgot how much I love Stabilo pens.

 These sparkly pearly watercolors are fun to layer.

 Pen and watercolor pencil.

Including some bonus Lyrics to "Add It Up"

 Watercolor pencil over notes and doodles.

 These last two are my favorites of the whole bunch.

A Fiber Shot

 

I managed to make a 10x10" Fiber Shot to donate to the annual exhibit at the San Jose Museum of Quilts & Texiles.

 I titled it "44" for the forty-four buttons that ended up on it. I had to arrange them on my cutting table while I sewed them on to keep track of where they went.

 I used a lot of variety in the embroidery stitches to give the surface extra dimension.

 I'm glad I had a good stash of buttons to draw from.

Close-up of the wool fiber embellished sky.