Here’s a picture of a beautiful live oak near me–on some school grounds. I walk past it on my evening walks.
The camera didn’t catch the way the grey moss glows in the evening light. But does capture the beautiful structure.
Have a good Sunday everyone.
Last Tuesday late afternoon we were about to get another thunderstorm, and I went out to move a plant on the screened back porch and saw a HUGE insect on the outside of a screen. What on earth?
All of you who follow this blog know that I had to immediately figure out that insect.
I’ve never seen a grasshopper like this HUGE creature. S/he is almost 3 inches long! With lightening from the storm already starting, I had to go outside to get pictures.
What on earth kind of grasshopper is this one?
Look at the gorgeous markings too. Huge back legs…
It’s an Eastern Lubber Grasshopper. What does “lubber” mean? Here’s a quote from the information link below:
“Lubber” is derived from an old English word “lobre” which means lazy or clumsy. This term has come to mean a big, clumsy, and stupid person, also known as a lout or lummox. In modern times, it is normally used only by seafarers, who term novices “landlubbers”.
Here’s a stock photo I found that shows the size of this huge creature in a human hand.
But don’t try to pick them up as one will spray a noxious toxic mixture at you–which is why it has few predators.
It can’t fly, so it lumbers along walking.
What kind of damage? Here’s a quote for the informational link below:
“Lubber grasshoppers are defoliators, consuming the leaf tissue of numerous plants. They climb readily, and because they are gregarious they can completely strip foliage from plants. More commonly, however, they will eat irregular holes in vegetation and then move on to another leaf or plant. Lubber grasshoppers are not as damaging as their size might suggest; they consume less food than smaller grasshoppers (Griffiths and Thompson 1952). Damage is commonly associated with areas that support weeds or semi-aquatic plants such as irrigation and drainage ditches, end edges of ponds. Grasshoppers developing initially in such areas will disperse to crops and residential areas, where they cause damage. Thus, as is the case with many grasshoppers, monitoring and treatment of areas where nymphal development occurs is recommended to prevent damage to economically important plants. Also helpful is to keep vegetation mowed, as short vegetation is less supportive of grasshoppers.”
We got 6 inches of rain Monday night and 3.5 inches in the late afternoon storm Tuesday. The grass and plants outside are now happy. But the ants aren’t, and that is another story to tell as they are coming inside my house.
PS: It’s Saturday morning now, and the grasshopper comes and goes on my back porch screen. Likely s/he came from the bio swale/stream that runs through our neighborhood or the wetlands above it. I don’t see any apparent damage to the roses though.
When I washed the finished quilt “Happy,” which had been dragged around for six years while being made, I put in 6 color catcher cloths–even though all the fabrics were washed when they came into the house.
Hmmm….
Enough said, right?
But, maybe I’ll add that I also washed another quilt, I also added color catchers to the wash.
And…hmmmm…
The reds did run a bit.
I’ll always use them for a quilt now…
And I have this tremendous sense of relief as a result, as if a boulder I’ve been carrying has been off-loaded.
“Happy” is the “36-Ring Circus” designed by Joanne Lewis. The pattern and template kit are at the Paper Pieces web site. Enough said with that information: I’m done whining.
I started this English Paper Piecing project in June of 2018. That’s SIX YEARS for heaven’s sake. There are SO MANY tiny pieces, and I spent COUNTLESS hours prepping all the templates. Plus, sewing all the curves was so, so hard. Most had to be done with a flat-back stitch, which is hard to do in an unwieldy big quilt. I used up a whole roll of artist tape along the way to get the curves to stay put properly while I sewed each block together and each row into the quilt.
The block centers are all fussy cut Cotton+Steel/Ruby Star Society. The rings are solid pastels, and the ring centers and the 4-patches between the rings are all dark solids. The outer border of dark fabrics squares this quilt off nicely.
Plus, this past year I decided to HAND QUILT it using lots of colors–dark colors in the dark fabrics and light colors in the light colors–and I’m actually not sorry about that decision as it has provided many hours in the last six or so months of contemplative stitching, though some of this work was also hard as when I made this quilt I didn’t trim back seams to a short 1/4-inch and that made the hand quilting near seam edges hard enough that I had to wander stitching lines away from them.
BUT, SHE IS DONE and has been washed and dried. Of course I washed her as her parts and her completed size have been dragged around of six years. Now she is no longer called “the quilt from hell.” Now she is called…DONE.
Here’s a close up of a border corner. The curve on the left binding is a camera distortion. The quilt is square.
The back is nicely textured, and I like the warmth of the ruby color.
Most of all, the task I set myself to make a hand-made quilt for each of my 7 grandchildren is now also complete. “Happy” is ALL made by hand except for sewing the binding on one side with my sewing machine–the other side is hand sewn. I always hand sew my bindings on the loose side.
DONE is a very nice word right now. I’m “Happy.”
I saw an insect I didn’t know the other day on the red roses.
It was about 1/2 to 3/4- inch long, the color of a green apple, and had the longest front antennas I’ve ever seen. The antennas had to be over an inch long, seemed to be iridescent, and had tiny alternating bars of darker/lighter colors.
It didn’t take long to figure out what it was: a katydid, also known as a “bush cricket” in some places. It’s kin to grasshoppers too. It’s a jumper, with big hind legs. Yes, she/he jumped immediately when it saw me looking. And it did look like “a walking green leaf”–the description I found along the identification way.
Katydids are not worrisome pests in a garden as they only eat a tiny part of upper leaves on shrubs and trees. They are prey for a lot of other insects and birds. There are many types of katydids across the world, some do eat other insects and some can be much bigger. But the one I saw is common in tropical/warm climates like the southern United States.
Here’s an image I found:
I mentioned seeing a katydid in my roses to a neighbor, and he laughed and said, “What! You’ve never seen one? We used to try to catch them.”
If I had seen one as a child at my grandparents’ house in Georgia–and there was a big garden–I have no memory of it. Hummingbirds, yes, but not katydids.
The night-time calls from Katydids are VERY loud apparently–and their calls are very distinctive. They make the call by rubbing their wings together. (There is a link below where you can hear them–and I’m now wondering if part of what we have all been calling “frogs” is at least partly Katydids.
Here’s more info:
https://biokids.umich.edu/critters/Tettigoniidae/
For sound:
AND, note there are LOTS of poems that include katydids, which you can find on poetrysoup.com
https://www.poetrysoup.com/famous/poem/a_summer_afternoon_18901#google_vignette
A languid atmosphere, a lazy breeze, With labored respiration, moves the wheat From distant reaches, till the golden seas Break in crisp whispers at my feet.
My book, neglected of an idle mind, Hides for a moment from the eyes of men; Or lightly opened by a critic wind, Affrightedly reviews itself again.
Off through the haze that dances in the shine The warm sun showers in the open glade, The forest lies, a silhouette design Dimmed through and through with shade.
A dreamy day; and tranquilly I lie At anchor from all storms of mental strain; With absent vision, gazing at the sky, "Like one that hears it rain.
" The Katydid, so boisterous last night, Clinging, inverted, in uneasy poise, Beneath a wheat-blade, has forgotten quite If "Katy DID or DIDN'T" make a noise.
The twitter, sometimes, of a wayward bird That checks the song abruptly at the sound, And mildly, chiding echoes that have stirred, Sink into silence, all the more profound.
And drowsily I hear the plaintive strain Of some poor dove .
.
.
Why, I can scarcely keep My heavy eyelids--there it is again-- "Coo-coo!"--I mustn't--"Coo-coo!"--fall asleep!
I finished the second “A Piece of My Heart” quilt top yesterday, and will measure it and organize a backing/binding today maybe.
Here are the two tops–made with the 3 1/2-inch squares of Cotton+Steel/Ruby Star Society fabrics I cut up about 5 years ago. I have lost count of all the quilts made from that fabric stash. It is probably nearing 20, if not a bit more. That might make a fun blog post one of these days.
And:
The neutral top is quilted now–with a heart pantograph that created lovely texture. This top is now trimmed and binding made. Note: Bonnie Hunter some time back said she trims with a SMALL square ruler. I’ve been trying that–using a 9.5 square–and that is really working well–much better than the big 24-inch square and a long ruler. I have much more control.
Aren’t these pretty flowers from my garden?
My two gardenia plants are NOT thriving. Their leaves turn yellow, drop off, and they grow new ones. Research says they need specific nutrients and to try a mixture that uses fish parts. I ordered some–and mixed it up and put it on them. We’ll see. The soil here (whine, whine) is mostly clay–it will take time and amendments to help it.
It has been cooler here this summer than last, but it will get hotter now likely. La Niña (cooler and dryer than her boyfriend El Niño) is shifting into place. Also the water vapor spewed into the atmosphere from a huge underwater volcano (Hunga-Tonga) a few years back is now dissipating. Water vapor is way, way more important to heat retention in the atmosphere than CO2 and is much, much more than CO2.
Anyway, I’ve really been enjoying my walks after 7 pm and can do a mile in short order. We have a frequent “sea breeze” here that is just delightful, and it appears in the evenings frequently.
The palm trees are “blooming” now. I still find their “flower” fascinating.
I have been so hungry for deviled eggs for days now. And I realized that I would be fine making some with my local eggs (Chucktown Acres) that don’t have corn or soy in their feed, with homemade mayo with a tiny bit of plain mustard that uses white vinegar for the needed acid to make it jell, some finely chopped sweet onion, and, of course, organic olive oil and salt. I wanted these eggs to be plain, so I didn’t add any herbs to my mayo this time.
It didn’t take but a minute–as cooking the eggs is quick and making mayo is even quicker and easier, and now I have some to drizzle over salads and other things in my bowls, like the chicken and potatoes below. I can’t use cayenne pepper to decorate, but my deviled eggs are DELICIOUS. They really hit that hunger spot I had.
Here’s my dinner salad last night. I had made a big bowl of salad with the last of the roasted chicken, so I just took half of it for my supper and added the eggs.
I washed my improv quilt. It has a coral backing that ran when I washed it, so I was nervous about washing this quilt as there are so many light colors on the front. But so many of these fun blocks used glue, so I needed to wash it out. I put 6 color catchers in the wash and crossed my fingers (and toes) as I so love this quilt. She came out beautifully from the dryer, and now is all crinkly and cute.
Right now she is living on a chair in my tv/reading/hand-sewing little room. With different folds, different parts of the quilt show on the chair. Right now it’s the red “wheels” block. (Tara Faughnan is going to do this “block” class again starting in September. If you are interested, go to her web site and sign up for her newsletter.)
So, improv blocks joins “Happy,” where I am working on the final hand quilting of the border. See the big pillow–I found it at Costco the other day so I don’t have to use one of the couch pillows I made to get a hand project up and out of my lap, which is too low for easy hand work. I’ve not had any issues with my neck or shoulders once I adopted this pillow practice a few years back, and as you know, I do a lot of hand work. (The loose orange threads you see are from the longarm basting I did to hold the layers together.)
In line, waiting for its turn, is this recent project which is set up to be a wall hanging and is yet unnamed. You can see the orange machine basting threads, which I will remove as I work.
“Pieces of My Heart” (the neutral) is on the longarm. The colored version with the light heart is growing on the design wall, and I’ve been making parts for the “Prickly Pear” quilt designed by Annabelle Wrigley and using her solid fabrics.
This double heart pantograph is new for me, and I’ll use it on both of these “heart” quilts. I am using a soft grey here as it was better for the backing than a neutral thread. There are enough darker “neutral” blocks here to make the light grey work well.
Enjoy your Sunday!
It’s the biggest darn flying wasp-like critter I’ve ever seen. Some are close to almost 2 inches long. And they have set up shop in my red roses.
It took me some time the other morning to get some pictures–without risking being stung–and some time researching with pictures to figure this one out as there are other similar insects out there. One is now moving into South Carolina, and it is a problem.
It’s a Cicada Killer Wasp. And they are not true wasps or hornets as they don’t bite or sting.
Yes, the females are up to 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 inches long. The males are smaller, but are very active as they are “guarding” the underground nest the female digs for her eggs. Males aggressively patrolling a nest location can be scary if you don’t know anything about these highly colored insects and encounter one. All one sees is the size and the waspy colors.
This picture is of the smaller male on guard. He’s very active so it took me some time to get a resting picture.
Here you can see the distinctive yellow dot on the front of the face–and the dull red markings around the head and on the legs. There are three yellow bands on the lower body, on the upper part. The rest is black. The wings are stationary and lie flat when at rest.
The HUGE females are much harder to capture with my camera. She has what looks like a stinger protruding from her rear, but it is used to sting her only prey, a cicada that she ceaselessly hunts down as she uses it for food for her eggs. If one tries to capture her and brushes the stinger, it can leave a very mild sting, but that’s all. Research says that the sting is less than that of a mosquito bite. Mostly these insects eat sap and nectar.
Here’s a quote from the informative link below:
“Female adults often dig their tunnels in a backyard sandbox, a sand trap on the golf course or in a nice sandy picnic area outdoors. Lawns, gardens, flower beds and athletic fields are other preferred nesting sites. They excavate noticeable amounts of soil around their tunnel entrances and create unsightly mounds. Large soil particles are removed with mouth parts and then shoveled through their legs in a dog-like manner.”
I now remember that I saw these piles of dirt obviously excavated from my rose garden beds last year. At the time I was puzzled by what dug out the dirt. A frog maybe, I thought? I just put the dirt back with my trowel and called it a day.
But…
Here’s one of the dirt piles I found this morning–and look how well the Asian Jasmine (which is not a jasmine) ground cover is spreading now. That is a LOT of dirt for an insect to remove with her mouth and shovel backward with her legs.
The adults only fly around for about 2 months, and now that I know what they are, I’ve enjoyed watching their antics in my roses. I’m not worried about having them around. At the very least, their tunnels and underground nests will aerate my very very poor soil.
Please don’t kill these harmless creatures. Instead, enjoy the show and the other benefits they provide. You can’t miss them. They are HUGE.
Last night was the monthly Charleston Modern Quilt Guild meeting. It was a lively event that produced a room full of visiting, laughter, and frequent clapping celebrating various projects being shown.
Jean Craig, president of the Charleston Modern Quilt Guild, and her husband recently hiked a mountain trail whose length is 76 miles.
Here’s a quote from Wikipedia: “The Foothills Trail is a 76-mile (122 km) National Recreation Trail in South and North Carolina, United States, for recreational hiking and backpacking. It extends from Table Rock State Park to Oconee State Park. It passes through the Andrew Pickens Ranger District of the Sumter National Forest, Ellicott Rock Wilderness, Whitewater Falls, and Lake Jocassee.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foothills_Trail
Jean is a quilter, so guess what she came home and made:
That’s Jean on the left, and Rick Sanchez of Rickrack Room (also an amazing quilter who has a longarm business) is helping Jean show her quilt. Near the bottom, Jean depicts the “foothill” mountains they walked.
Here’s the back:
I think she said that the quilt is a gift for her husband, who said this event was a “level 2” event. Jean explained that a level 1 event is clearly fun things like parties. A level 2 event is something that you know while doing it that you’ll like it all a lot more when you are done. I love that!
I spent part of yesterday afternoon ironing the backing pieces for the neutral “Pieces of My Heart” quilt top AND matching up the print. I’ve had this cute fabric in my stash for a long time (thank you Betsy Maislen for showing me this fabric).
I bet you have to look hard to see where I matched the print:
And today is another day to fill with fun Level 1 events! One of such events will be putting this backing and its top and batting on the longarm.
**Here’s a link to the method I use to match backing prints:
Hello readers,
Where does the time fly to? It’s almost July.
We got rain last night–and a lot of thunder and lightening, so I have not had to use my new little water sprinklers yet. The rain gauge had 1 inch of water in it this morning. Yeah!
I’ve been sewing steadily in the afternoons, and I make myself quit at 7 pm to walk. Yesterday was very humid, but a nice breeze developed in the early evening so the walking wasn’t too bad. It was hot yesterday, but it is summer. We got spoiled with our coolish weather these past weeks.
Here’s the design wall right now:
Yes, using the colored 3 1/2-inch squares of Cotton+Steel (original designers)/Ruby Star Society and making the star from neutrals is working out nicely. The neutral version with the red heart is ready for the longarm, with batting cut and backing panels cut, but the panels need to be lined up and joined–not to mention ironed.
Annabelle Wrigley’s “Prickly Pear” block from season 4 of The Color Collective, made with her fabrics, is a challenging block. Those two blocks (16 inches each finished) will repeat to make 4 across and 4 rows or 64 inches square. There are so many creative ways to organize how to lay out these blocks, but I’m going just plain.
The bright blue triangles on the background are creatively organized as well, which is bending my mind as when the spatial genes were passed out, I didn’t get any. Right now the most frustrating part is how to press each block. I ordered more fabric yesterday as I was lacking enough fabric for the curved triangle pieces and the field fabric to make the whole quilt. And I added a bit more of the blue just in case.
I had a visitor on the porch the other day: an Anole lizard, which is very common here. I’ve always loved this little lizard.
This creature can be tamed if captured apparently. I tried once as a young mother with children, but that anole didn’t like being captured. This lizard is also an insect eating machine, so I’ll happily leave him/her in the wild. This one can also change its colors from shades of brown to green. How fun is that? It isn’t camouflage though, just a mood thing.
Here’s a really fun link to more info about this cute lizard, with good pics that illustrate much about it. The pic of how a male blows out the bright orange pouch under its throat is especially interesting. I have seen one do that.
I passed this tree on a recent walk and did not recognize what it was. It was tall, with beautiful foliage. The closest I could come with on my phone app was that it was a water hickory, which is in the walnut family of trees. The other guess was a pecan, but I know those trees and this wasn’t one I’m pretty sure. Also it was in the wetland on the side of my path.
https://plants.ces.ncsu.edu/plants/carya-aquatica/
We were treated to a rainbow a few days back, but didn’t really get any rain from all the swirling clouds. Just a sprinkle for a bit.
The ditch is the intermittent stream that runs from the nearby wetland; it runs through our property. The mail kiosk is on the left of this picture.
OK folks, it’s time to get about the day. I dug out the big Lantana on the side of the house that wanted to be a tree yesterday and am replanting with two cone flowers (echinacea) and a yellow daisy (rudbeckia) I lucked into at Home Depot yesterday. (I did check with a local nursery before buying at Home Depot.) The roots from the Lantana had already reached a long way in all directions!!
Louisa Enright's Blog 