Wordless Wednesday

The Canal Turns 100!!

Our beloved Canal is celebrating it's 100th birthday this summer with a week's worth of events. 

On Saturday, July 26th, I walked over to Mass Maritime to check out the 2 tall ships that were in port. I thought this was really cute, and a cement dog is the only kind that should ever be chained up outside!!!

An artist was painting the ship, the Charles W. Morgan, which was on loan from Mystic Seaport in Connecticut.

"They who go down to the sea in ships....."

The Coast Guard tall ship Eagle was enormous.

I had a hard time getting the whole thing in my frame.

Even back here I had a hard time!

The Morgan and T.S. Kennedy had very long lines of people waiting to tour the ships.  There was no way I was doing that!  This is the end of the line for the Morgan.  I bet I was already home, showered and had lunch by the time these people got on board!

The Kennedy line was shorter and moved faster because the ship is ginormous.

This wobbly inflatable sperm whale is called Spouter and I think was also on loan from Mystic Seaport.

On the walk back to town

Local eatery Lindsey's has had this banner plane flying around the area all summer.

There are events going on through this week and I hope to see a few more.  There was a lighted boat parade on Saturday night but it was so mobbed in town that I opted to come home before it started.  As it turns out, from the pictures I saw on Facebook, I didn't miss much.  I had it way more built up in my mind of what it would be!

Lazy Hazy Dayz

The weather this summer has been the best in the four summers I've now been here.  There are humid stretches but they are punctuated by dry days too.  Even if it's warm out, that's fine, as long as it's not wicked humid on top of it.  

We had a gorgeous, orange Supermoon on the 12th.  

Got up on the 13th to a very warm day and although I was exhausted, I had to take a walk in the morning hours before the Harry Potter movie marathon continued on TV.  I didn't want to miss the movies but also didn't want to waste nice weather by staying indoors all day.  

I love these two shop signs.

Instead of my usual trek around Main Street, I went down Academy Drive, to the Taylor's Point Marina  & Mass Maritime area.  I could watch the water reflections dance off the boat hulls for hours.  

Or as they would say it here in Massachusetts, "Hahbahmastah".  ;-)

Isn't this the cutest little railroad bridge?  It's in someone's yard.

 

Peace maaaaan.

I would love to have a lighthouse in my yard!

Love this poster....makes it look really retro.  The Barnstable County Fair has been around for 169 years! I used to go every year as a kid....and Russell worked the fair with Coke up till he left the company.  But I really have no interest in going now.  Too many people, too much traffic and way too hot.  I don't ride the rides anymore and I know I'll end up spending money on more bric-a-brac I don't need!

Organized Chaos

So this happened one day when I was trying to clean up or at least reorganize my craft table.  I found a baggie of crystals I ordered to make a project I'm dying to do, but haven't because I have nowhere to put it when it's done. I dug out some driftwood to see how they'd look as a driftwood hanging instead.  I didn't end up assembling it with the driftwood.  

So pretty!

Then I unearthed a few small things I'd been meaning to do so I glued these glass tiles onto a votive candle holder.  I keep forgetting how time consuming these projects are due to drying time and making sure the tiles don't slide out of place or fall off.

I had a bunch of small red skull cabs so I put them on 4 sides of the glass and filled in with red and purple glass blobs.  

These lightbulbs also surfaced on the table so I broke out the glass paint.  The Pinterest project originally showed nail polish on the bulbs but I didn't like the way it looked. I had to pilfer the tops of Christmas ornaments to glue on top of the lightbulb, then added the beaded hanger.  

I made this a few days before the attempt to clean the table off.  10 points to Ravenclaw!  Just a hangie thing I stuck on the wall in the bedroom.  I found the fillable bottles at the craft store and got the copper coloured ones.  Filled it with blue beads and then added the copper wings (for the Ravenclaw eagle) and then the hanger in the House colours as well.  Yes I'm obsessed with Harry Potter.  OBSESSED.  I don't even want to admit how much time I spent on the Pottermore website this month and watching the movies on ABC Family, as well as rereading the last 2 books.

My honey and I were at this great old store called Benny's, which is a real throw back to another era. It's been around forever.  He bought me this black velvet colouring poster which I can't wait to do.

The table may look as bad as it did before it was reorganized, but I truly can tell the difference.  At least now it's organized chaos.  And now I'm ready to start my new poster!

The Thursday Routine

Like most people, I suffer from bouts of OCD, and I am very OCD when it comes to Thursday, each week. That's the day my sweetie gets home and I like things to be 'just so' when he gets in.  

What I do is not something he has ever asked for, or told me was expected of me as a stay at home wife, but over time it's become a routine that I look forward to.  He works so hard, drives and sleeps odd hours. When he gets in, he's exhausted and he's either chilled to the bone in winter or dying of heat exhaustion in summer.

If the grocery shopping hasn't been done, I'll get up really early and go that morning, however I usually do it on a Tuesday or Wednesday, so as to plan the weekend menu.  I spend Thursday morning making the dinner salads, putting together fruit salad, tuna fish for sandwiches, coleslaw and pre-cooking vegetables.  Sometimes on Wednesday night I will prep the crockpot so it can start cooking when I get up at 7.  

I like for Russell to come home to a clean house, so I vacuum and dust the whole house, and clean the bathroom.  All the trash is taken out.  I do whatever laundry is left so that the hamper is empty too. Clean sheets and towels are a must for when he gets home.  In the winter, I warm the house up with all the heaters on.  Conversely in summer, the a/c and fans are cranked.  Dog toys picked up, kitchen table paperwork put away or left out neatly, if needed.

Then there are the little things that I like to do as well.  His towel is hung on the bathroom doorknob, easy to reach when he finishes his shower.  I make sure to replace the bar of soap if it's gotten real small.  His comfy clothes are taken out of the closet in the bedroom and put in the bathroom.  In the winter, I'll run them through the dryer for a few minutes to warm them up.  There is always a bottle of water and some cough drops on his nightstand.

Out in the living area, the dishes are done from all the dinner prep, dried and put away.  The fridge & freezer are stocked with his fave foods and ice tea drinks.  The kitchen usually smells really good from whatever soup, chili, crock pot meal, etc. I've got going.  I love seeing his face light up like a Christmas tree when he walks through the door and smells the food!  I will also do a few errands in the morning and get his fave scratch ticket, which waits on the table next to his chair.  I also put the remote control, or 'clickah' as he calls it, on the table because he likes to surf channels and watch his shows.

While he is in the shower, I unpack his computer and set it up so he can get right to his games.  I finish making dinner and bring his salad and drink to the TV table.  After he's showered, comfy and has eaten his salad, I bring him his dinner.  Anything he needs, I am happy to get for him.  If I go out to do errands, I'll stop and get him his fave iced coffee from Dunkin Donuts.  I spoil him rotten all weekend long and, having never experienced that in his life, he's more than happy to let me.  It brings me great joy to see him so happy, and very appreciative too, I might add.  When he leaves, I always pack a lunch for him and enclose a love note on a yellow stickie.  

I figure it's the least I can do for the love of my life. 

The Butterflies' Garden

In addition to the butterflies and caterpillars, Butterflies of Cape Cod is filled with beautiful plants and flowers

OK this freaky looking thing is a mud dauber wasp, or at least 2-3 of them stuck together.  I saw it in the parking lot  when I left and at first glance, I thought it was a dying butterfly that had escaped and had ragged wings.  I was really freaked out when I bent down to have a closer look.  I sent the picture to an entomologist/research scientist and asked what kind of mutant wasp this was.  He wrote back right away to say it was at least 2 mud dauber wasps, but he could not tell what they were doing because very little is known about them.  He said that it's possible that this was a mating thing, since they hatch in summer, or perhaps their nest had recently been hit with pesticide, causing them to lethargically stick together.  Either way I hope I never see this again.  I've dubbed it Waspzilla.