Ring, Gardening, Squirrels

I was given this great piece of glass a few years ago by one of the instructors in the hot glass shop at Red Deer College in Alberta. The class were making some kind of complex hot roll-ups with the ends pinched off, and this was one of the ends, slumped in the kiln. I've always thought it was just the coolest piece of glass. In the last few years any smallish object that I see goes through the mental "How can I make this into a piece of jewelry??" filter, so I drilled a hole in this, and made the ring base with PMC3 (you can see the base a few posts below when it came out of the kiln). The rivet was fired into the thick PMC disc so it's extra secure. I like it! It has a wonderful contrast of texture and the darker stripes of the glass are transparent. It's fun to look at and to wear!

It has begun to feel like a proper spring finally, and we "gardened" all day yesterday. I put that in quotation marks because most of of our gardening is in big flowerpots on our deck. The yard is huge and mostly meadow, and full of bunnies and butterflies and the thought of cutting it back to make flowerbeds is overwhelming. Pots on the deck is just right.

We planted Chalon Watercolor pansies, sweet peas, heliotrope, mignonette, stocks, nicotiana and nemesia for fragrance, cosmos, petunias, nasturtiums and marigolds for color, and thyme, oregano, basil, mint, dill, Italian parsley and catnip for flavour! (Kitty says Mmmm, catnip!!) Our chives and rosemary overwintered (the rosemary indoors). This weekend I'll plant the morning glories, Shirley poppies and four-o-clock seeds.

It looks so pretty out there now, with the dragonfly twinkle lights on. Unfortunately I can only get one string to work, I spent far too long switching out bulbs on the others before giving up in exasperation. Not a job for the end of a hot grubby day.

So had a couple of visitors yesterday morning and I was so happy that they dropped in again in the afternoon and I got to see them. Obviously siblings, they were very playful and cuddly together. In fact the black one crawled on top of the grey one to take a little nappie in the hot sun. Their back legs are really long so they have the funniest walk and they are still just a bit uncoordinated in an endearing baby way. They were insanely cute, and completely unafraid of us. I know that unafraid baby squirrel=lunch for a predator, so hopefully they get some street smarts soon. But in the meantime, holy cuteness, Batman! "I am no bigger than a bluebell!!"
Come here so I can put you in my pocket and feed you tiny peanuts and keep you!!