Today Winston and I went to Summers Past Farms for Pumpkin Patch Day. The pumpkin field is small, but there were still lots of pumpkins to choose from. I picked this pretty Cinderella pumpkin right off the vine.

 
I have been using my iPhone camera more than my Nikon lately, and I've got a couple favorite camera apps that really make a difference. For taking pictures I like Darkroom Premium. It waits until you're holding your phone steady to snap the shutter, so pictures come out nice and crisp. The photo above has no other effects, it's straight out of the camera. All the editing programs are fun too. Tiltshift Generator is a current favorite. Look, mini pumpkins!

And the Best Camera app is pretty great too. It has all sorts of fun filters you can apply and stack and re-order for different effects. It would be nice if they added the ability to adjust the intensity of the features, but maybe they'll add that eventually. After the pumpkin patch we went to a beekeeper meetup in Balboa Park, and I took a picture of this tree:

I used the Jewel, Candy, Vignette, and Frame filters. Not bad for a 3 megapixel camera and a $2.99 app, right? There are lots of good, free apps too. I wrote about a few just the other day, if you're interested. 

Now that I see my pictures big on my computer screen, I feel like I had a pretty productive and successful photography day, if I do say so myself.

I like giraffes, don't you? Maybe it's because they are tall that I find them so appealing. I do not, however, have quite as long a neck.

This is from my trip to the Boise Zoo last month. It's a nice little zoo, and I had fun getting photography tips from my brother as we walked around. It was like we had our own little photo safari.

I've been working on my jelly roll quilt. 126 triangles down, 78 more to go. I've started putting pieces up on my design wall and I think I'm going to love this quilt. I really like creating my own originals, sorting through fabric and finding just the right combination, but sometimes it's so nice to just let someone else do all the thinking work, and just enjoy the patchwork zone that I get into, cutting, sewing and pressing.

Winston is laying on his back, paws in the air, and just started wagging his tail for no apparent reason. He's such a happy dog, I can't help but smile when I'm around him. Yesterday morning I was loading the car with bags for Good Will. I left it open while I went back in the house to get ready for work. When I cam back out to leave, a good 20 minutes later, there he was, sitting in the driver's seat, ready to go! I was tempted to take him with me to work, but it wouldn't have been much fun for him to lay under my desk all day.

I am experimenting with the power of video. Here's one for all the Winston fans.

What I really want to do now is learn to edit and add music and other fun effects.

Thanks for commiserating with my blahs, I’m feeling a little better. It helps that it was sunny this weekend, although not very warm. I did go swimming a couple times this week, and walked on my lunch hour a couple times too. I’m sure that helped. I snapped out of my funk enough to sew my skirt this weekend, although I think I look decidedly fluffy in it, which is fine, it’s that much more motivation to keep up with the swimming this week.

I also framed some art, as you can see, and picked still more daffodils. I think we have a week or two left. One of my favorites is blooming right now, a small cream one with an apricot center. You might be sick of seeing daffodils, but I may have to get some close-up pictures of those anyway.

Lest you think it’s all as peaceful and pretty as the photo above around here, I though I’d share a behind-the-scenes reality shot as well:

Half the pictures I took look like this one. There’s no such thing as personal space around here. As I type there is a cat licking my arm. I do not know why.

Sally didn’t visit me in the studio this weekend, but I have to share a story, which is just about the saddest ever. When I painted my studio I removed a big, cheap, ugly mirror, and just had it leaning against the wall outside while I decided what to do with it. I tried putting it in my car to take to Goodwill, but it didn’t fit, so I thought I’d just take it out and leave it on the curb. Meanwhile, I moved it to the front of the yard, by the trash cans, next to the gate. When I went outside later that day, there was Sally, sitting down next to the mirror, talking to her reflection. Poor, lonely Sally! She had to find herself a buddy in a mirror! I don’t know quite what to do for her. Shortly after all this, the wind picked up and blew the mirror over and broke it, so now she really doesn’t have a friend. Luckily, the glass was glued to a backing, so it held together, but it was still badly cracked, and I put it out with the trash the next day. Mr. HeyLucy said he saw a big grey goose hanging around early one morning this week, so maybe she has a suitor. I think I will look for a plastic mirror for her, in case things don’t work out with the grey gentleman.

I think I have the blahs tonight, so this might be a really boring blog post, but apparently I'm not letting that stop me from jabbering away anyhow. I took some pictures of things I've been making, but they are all so boring and uninspiring. Here are the pickles I made, I'm not sure how we'll be able to wait another seven weeks (at the very least) for them to cure.

I have a stack of fabric for some fun Spring projects, and I'm too blah to work on any of it.

Left to right: a light, Spring-y top, grey linen for a skirt with rickrack around the bottom, and some birds for a quilt for a baby girl on the way. I have no idea what sort of quilt yet, once these blahs go away, I'm sure I'll think of something.

Maybe Winston can perk me up, what do you think?