Fun things emailed to me

Ready for another riddle? This one was sent to me by the bf:

This thing all things devours:
Birds, beasts, trees, flowers;
Gnaws iron, bites steel;
Grinds hard stones to meal;
Slays king, ruins town,
And beats high mountain down.

The following is not a riddle (or is it?) but rather an email I received yesterday:

Subject: buffet table skirting clips

Hi Becky:

How are you doing Becky? How is "the big day planning" going?  Have you and Larry settled on the food items yet?  We went visit your mom last Saturday and peeked at the linens, runners and table skirts she picked up.  I looked at the buffet table skirts and not sure how to set it up.  Come to find out we will need some Velcros table skirting clips.  I found them on Amazon, wanted to order but not sure the thickness of the table.  If you have that information with you, send it to me so I can order them.    Let me know if there are things else I can do to help.  We will take your mom to LA Flower District.  I need to get some more flowers to practice.  I will also get the floral foams to use with the arrangements. They'll make the flowers stay in place (I hope!) and hold the water in during transportation.  I plan to stop at the Chinese kitchen supply place in Monterrey Park to buy some tongs for the buffet.  If there are anything you need there, email me before Saturday, OK?   Say hi to Pat for me. 

Aunt Winnie.

It was such a fun read that I had to forward to a couple of friends whose names are mentioned in the letter, and now I'm sharing with you. Poor Aunt Winnie. I hope she realizes that her email got delivered to the wrong niece.

Project Facelift

Everyday I spend 10 minutes staring at the contents of my closet and wishing I had a new wardrobe. Then I pull out an unexciting to top to pair with an even more unexciting bottom and start my day. I really need to go on a good round of shopping (I'm guessing a week's worth will do).

On Sunday afternoon I spent 20 minutes rumaging through my closet looking for inspiration for a new look. Alas, I came up empty handed and cluttered room-ed. I ended up with a drab pairing of a black top with black jeans and realized I had finally had enough. After mass, I headed straight to my room and pulled out a few tops I had not touched in months. I selected a torquoise/teal blue shirt I hadn't worn since 2009 (yes, this should have been donated a long time ago but I have a hard time with letting things go) and decided to see what changes I can come up with to revamp the style.



Before

With TT's help and after 3 hours of tedious trimming, styling, pinning, and hand sewing, I came up with this:


After

detail of "flowers"

The shirt is still one size too big but I won't be shoving it farther into the closet now that it has a new, more agreeable face. For Christmas I'd like a sewing machine that will thread itself please.

L is for Love

On this past lazy Labor Day, after I had slept as much as my eyes desired, I decided to venture into our yard again (after a very long hiatus). My wanderings first took me to the mini orchard on the side of the house where there are now approximately 20 fruit trees. The lone avocado that was once the center of my orchard-world attention is now no more. It disappeared some time two months ago, about the same time I stopped fawning over the garden. In addition to the loss of avocado, there has been a gain of trees that bring the promise of good fruit one day. I'll report more on them next year.

After treading through the battle field of an orchard (gophers, snakes, and squirrels vs dad and trees), I ventured over to the vegetable patch (or what's left of it). Most of the plants are still alive but they're no longer lush and fruitful. Here's a look at what it used to be...
From 7/9:

Super hot chilies

cherry tomatoes

Thai Hot Chilies (not so hot)

I forgot we used to have cilantro

carrots

Opo squash vine

the actual fruit/vegetable

our harvest: green beans, heirloom tomatoes, opo squash

From 7/26, we have:

salix tortuosa, flourishing in plain tap water



Roma tomatoes (they're about half the size of store-bought ones but in my mind they taste better becuase they're my babies)

my onions!

g'bye beans



death of a garden

And finally, from 9/5:

planted down 3 branches of salix tortuosa!

I pulled a carrot out to see what it looks like. This is what it looks like...

The lucky carrot next to TT's finger. It's bent because apparently there's cardboard underneath the dirt to keep the animals from digging up. Mom didn't know this when she put the seeds down.

L-O-V-E