Newport, Rhode Island
Nice places to visit but I wouldn’t want to live there.
I could however settle nicely into any of these houses on
Martha’s Vineyard…
In fact I did live in one of them :)
To read about the special school house above please CLICK HERE
(Which house do you think I lived in ?)
Comments Off on Summer Cottages …
Tagged architecture, houses, Martha's Vineyard, Newport, Photographs, Rhode Island
Illumination Night is Wed, Aug 19, 2015
It has always been my favorite event of the summer… going to Illumination Night is a thrill for me no matter what my age is.
I think I was 2 and 1/2 the first time I went to Illumination Night. I’m embarrassed to say that even with my annoyingly good memory, I don’t remember it. My first memory of Illumination Night involves wearing a particularly pretty dress so I’m thinking I was around three or four, which would have been around 1946.
My dad, mom, god-mother and I would have an early supper and then walk to the Campground. My dad and I would stroll around looking at all the beautifully decorated gingerbread houses while my mother and god-mother would chat with friends and relatives.
At 8 o’clock the Vineyard Haven Band would begin playing and the always fun community sing would start. Patriotic songs like, America The Beautiful, Yankee Doodle, Battle Hymn of the Republic are always stirring and emotional. It took me a couple of years to learn the words to all the songs and I still get messed up on a couple of the rounds like John Brown’s Baby. The band playing the Star Spangled Banner and the rousing Stars and Stripes Forever are always a crowd pleaser.
But as much fun as that was it was only a precursor to the main event. The Tabernacle and Campground go dark… the crowd cheers. The lighting of the first lantern and then all the gingerbread houses are simultaneously aglow with Japanese lanterns.
Everyone oohs and ahhs and stream out of the Tabernacle to walk through the magical fairyland the Campground has become.
My dad would carry me on his shoulders so I could see everything… I felt like I could touch the stars.
After seeing all there was to see we’d head out onto Circuit Ave to either the Frosty Cottage for ice cream or Darling’s for popcorn, a tasty ending to a perfectly enchanting night.
No matter your age, Illumination Night is fun for everyone, I myself morph into an 8 year old.
Illumination Night as described in the Vineyard Gazette:
If you’re on the Vineyard this Wed, Aug 19, 2015 you should go and experience Illumination Night. 
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Tagged architecture, Campground, Events, Illumination Night, Martha's Vineyard, Memories, Oak Bluffs, Photographs, Tabernacle
Sussex County, New Jersey
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Tagged architecture, barns, buildings, colors, farms, flowers, New Jersey, Photographs
I’ve been seeing a meme on both Facebook and Pinerest lately about how August is summer’s Sunday, and I quite like it. It’s appropriate this year, given the changes I’m already seeing.
Though, to be fair, it isn’t always like this. This summer (and last, too) was pretty mild. In Augusts past we’ve had brutal days and nights where it’s still 90 degrees at 10:00 at night. Now may days are bracketed by farm chores completed in downright comfortable temperatures. Three years ago I had to be out by 8 am to beat the awful oppressiveness of it. Evenings I would just sweat through it.
But these last few……..
It’s been perfect. My friend Lisa and I agree that we can put up with frigid “polar vortex” type winters if it means we can have these summers.
The stream is totally overgrown, but it’s a lot of wildflowers and color. It’s so difficult to properly photograph.
See that wild morning glory in there? It’s that time!
Alabama, in our pasture wasteland. The grass (not that we had much to begin with) is all gone for the year.
Happy Sabine.
Roquefort is so “majephtic”.
Sweet Keswick
Yeardley
Basil, who has never lost his cuddliness.
Chicken watering hole.
Our curriculum for the school year is submitted, plans for share dyeing are in the works, Emily the shearer has been contacted about shearing the Angora goats. Our first tentative steps toward fall have been taken.
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Tagged Farm, Homeschooling, Pets, Uncategorized
I’ve been seeing a meme on both Facebook and Pinerest lately about how August is summer’s Sunday, and I quite like it. It’s appropriate this year, given the changes I’m already seeing.
Though, to be fair, it isn’t always like this. This summer (and last, too) was pretty mild. In Augusts past we’ve had brutal days and nights where it’s still 90 degrees at 10:00 at night. Now may days are bracketed by farm chores completed in downright comfortable temperatures. Three years ago I had to be out by 8 am to beat the awful oppressiveness of it. Evenings I would just sweat through it.
But these last few……..
It’s been perfect. My friend Lisa and I agree that we can put up with frigid “polar vortex” type winters if it means we can have these summers.
The stream is totally overgrown, but it’s a lot of wildflowers and color. It’s so difficult to properly photograph.
See that wild morning glory in there? It’s that time!
Alabama, in our pasture wasteland. The grass (not that we had much to begin with) is all gone for the year.
Happy Sabine.
Roquefort is so “majephtic”.
Sweet Keswick
Yeardley
Basil, who has never lost his cuddliness.
Chicken watering hole.
Our curriculum for the school year is submitted, plans for share dyeing are in the works, Emily the shearer has been contacted about shearing the Angora goats. Our first tentative steps toward fall have been taken.
The prompt is: This week, share an image of something creepy. Unsettling. Eerie. Grab a shot of something you find disturbing. Try a black-and-white shot of something you’d normally photograph, to give it a moody cast. This week give us some heebie-jeebies !
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
My choice is the abandoned Gingerbread Castle and adjoining Wheatsworh Mill in Hamburg, New Jersey.
Fairy tale characters used to abound here… now, sitting alone on his wall only Humpty Dumpty remains.
The Gingerbread Castle is slowly fading away…
Wheatsworth Mill
https://dailypost.wordpress.com/dp_photo_challenge/creepy/
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Tagged architecture, buildings, eerie, mill, New Jersey, photo challenges, Photographs, post a week, postaday/postaweek, postaweek, weekly prompt
First, the facts:
Title: Knitting Fabric Rugs: 28 Colorful Designs for Crafters of Every Level
Author: Karen Tiede
Published by: Storey, 2015
Pages: 176
Type: How-To
Chapters:
Knitted Rugs: The Backstory
Materials: The Heart of a Fabric Rug
Color! Rules of Thumb
Process: Rug-Making Nuts and Bolts
Earn Your Stripes
Tantalizing Tessellations
Log Cabin Designs and Beyond
Spirited Spirals
Inspiration: Going Free-Form
The In-Depth Look:
Sometimes a knitter gets bored knitting the same old things. Scarves. Shawls. Sweaters. Socks. (Other things that start with S.)
Sometimes, you can even get bored with traditional yarn, and yearn for something else.
Or maybe you’ve got a stash of fabrics you don’t know what to do with.
Or you just want something completely new to try. (New to you, at least.)
Well, maybe knitting rugs out of strips of scrap fabric is just what you’re looking for.
The author begins by explaining how to choose and prepare your fabric–old clothing, mostly, either from your closet or from thrift stores. Then she talks about construction methods–how to make a ball of “yarn” from your fabric strips, how to start and join new strips to your work, and so on.
Then she gets into patterns–basic ones with stripes, Log Cabin style designs, shapes based on quilt patterns, even free-form designs–whatever you might need to turn your strips of fabric into a rug you’ll be proud to use, whether that means hanging it on the wall or using it by your fireside or next to your bathtub.
I admit that this technique isn’t for me–all those ends! Even with the joins tied together as you go, I’m too much of a perfectionist to love this look for my house, BUT, that said, I love the creativity and the practicality. Not to mention the frugality of turning old clothes into something new and usable again.
You can check out this book at your local book store or get it directly from Amazon.com.
Want to see bigger pictures? Click here.
This review copy was kindly donated by . Thank you!
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Tagged How-to, karen tiede
The Flying Horses, the oldest carousel in the United States, are housed in this building at the intersection of Circuit and Lake Aves in Oak Bluffs. They came to the Island in 1884 from Coney Island. 
The Flying Horses are not a carousel, or a merry-go-round, they don’t go up and down just round and round. They are flying horses, like Pegasus, and fly to wherever you can imagine . They don’t actually have wings, but as you make the first circuit you feel like you’re about to fly out the open windows.
I flew on these beautiful horses every day when I was a little girl. The ticket taker was a young man who would never take my tickets ! We tried everything to get him to take them… we brought him candy and cookies and tried slipping the tickets in with them… nothing work. At the end of the summer I said I wanted to buy him a gift, so off my mom and I went to purchase what I thought was a novel idea .. a tie. I was 5 years old, what did I know about buying gifts for men… he, by the way was about 13 but in my eyes he was a grown up. We put the tie in the box with all of summer’s uncollected tickets. As he came around to NOT collect my ticket I handed him the box. He smiled. Ah ha, success… or so I thought. As we were leaving the Flying Horses he came over and thanked us for the tie and as we turned to leave he handed us the tickets. I won’t say who he is, just that he turned out to be an official in Oak Bluffs in later years… and someone I’ve never forgotten.
Comments Off on The Flying Horses Of The Vineyard …
Tagged animals, carousels, Flying Horses, Martha's Vineyard, Memories, Oak Bluffs, Photographs
What’s the most intriguing book you ever read? Something that made you think, explore new ideas, or just be really impressed and awed and amazed at the sheer wonder of the creativity of the thing?
Don’t forget to leave a link to your actual response (so people don’t have to go searching for it) in the comments—or if you prefer, leave your answers in the comments themselves!
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Tagged Wordpress
The Elms
