My other visitor

My grandson has been with me for over a week now and he is enjoying himself. Last week it was very hot, to warm to do much so I got the pool out.

Great fun playing with water, specially when it is hot!

Sunday we went to Madurodam. The day turned out to be dry and sunny after all. Forecast had been to have some rain.
Lots to see, an impression:

 

 

 

and do, like

 getting a boat through a lock

 pumping water through a pipe

how many cheeses do you weigh: 1, 2, 3 or 4 cheeses?

A new garden visitor

Last week my neighbour friend spotted a Greater Spotted Woodpecker in her garden.
Today, I saw him in my garden and managed to take some photos. Unlike the other birds, he is very shy and flies away when he sees some movement.
This all is about 2 meters away from my window and I can see all this sitting at my dining table.

I do not live in the woods but in a build up area (with a green garden), so, I really am enjoying all these visitors that have found my garden. The little birds are not bothered by my cats either. Being almost 15, they do not hunt anymore (have never done much like that anyway) and the birds have learned this by now.

He was just back, and being a real woodpecker, he has managed to get nearer the food ;-)

Nice gift

Today my grandson has come to stay with me for a bit in his holiday. He had made me a gift, a painting on canvas.

I will find a nice place for it to hang so that I can admire and enjoy it every day.

I've had a lovely few days with my friends from England. We went to Amsterdam for one day and visited Van Gogh Museum. We also did a day on the train last Saturday. We went to Groningen and visited the museum there. One of the exhibitions there at the moment is Painting Canada.

When my friend spotted this she was ecstatic as she had wanted to see it in London but was unable to do so. Well worth seeing. I bought the catalogue to be able to enjoy the paintings longer.

We than went on to Leeuwarden where we had half an hour and next to Stavoren.

Here you can read up on a legend about Stavoren. We were just to late to see a group re-enacting the story.

This weekend were fishery days and there was lots to see. We had about an hour there and just saw the last of it.

Next we took the ferry to Enkhuizen and had our dinner on the boat.

On the way we saw boats like above.

From Enkhuizen we took the train to Amsterdam and beyond to home again. In all we were away for 12 hours. Very enjoyable day with good weather.

The weather has changed to summer at long last, so lots of outdoor activity for this week. It is going to stay this way until Friday.

More garden

Raining again! But just had the Jay's together and they are a pair.

Now that I've seen them together I can see the difference between them.

The little birds are busy too.

I should be preparing for my visitors but my book is almost finished, so will read instead, with a good cup of coffee and watching the birds a bit too

Returning hedgehog

I've seen the hedgehog here most evenings this week.
Tonight I was able to get a good close-up when it was not yet to dark.

I'm enjoying a few days with my granddaughter. The weather is not kind though, where is summer? A good time for doing some baking together. She'll have something to take home with her tomorrow :-)
Also a good time with this kind of weather to do boardgames together, she loves doing this. Snakes and Ladders and the Game of the Goose amongst them.

No news on weaving so far.
My friend Toon however is busy making a frame for using my ondulé reed. I think it is going to work really well. I've ordered the standing beater from Louet to use with it. Never looked into how this worked for the Magic Dobby but it is like you see on the bigger Louet looms. When it's all finished I'll post some photos.

I have some friends coming over from England, so the next week will be busy and still not much weaving going on. But I may have some time thinking over what the next warp will be.

Enjoying very much reading The Paris Wife by Paula McLain at the moment.

Returning garden visitor

Today the Jay was back. Also thirsty.

I spotted 2 for the first time this morning but only briefly, so unable to get them in a photo together.
Now it's raining, again. My violets have suffered from the weather so far. Hopefully they will survive this weather. The big pot I've had since last October and it flowered right through the freezing weather.

Another garden visitor

Just spotted this hedgehog tonight

I had seen it once before, just before I left for England. It walks about between the different gardens here as my friend a few doors down has also seen it in her garden. It's been a few years that I spotted one in our garden.
Now I understand why one of the cats wants to stay out late at the moment :-)

Back from England

I had a great 8 days away in England.
The reason for going was the Complex Weaver's Study Day with Jennifer Moore on June 29th. This was organized by Wendy Morris from Handweavers Studio.

It was great to meet up with old friends and meet new.
Though I know quite a bit about double weaving by now, it was so good to have a day with a weaver who has double weave as her speciality and I did learn new things. Whenever you have a chance to take a course with Jennifer, I highly recommend going, if you are interested in double weaving.

I also went to the V&A to see the Ballgowns. Very enjoyable to see. This exhibition is on until January 6th.
Another day was spent at New Designers. So inspirational to see this, but I was saddened that there was so little weaving compared to surface design.
I also went to see these but found it very disturbing to see. Is this what society has come to now? But glad that I was able to see these tapestries for myself.
Another visit I made was to Buckingham Palace where there was a special display of some of the Queens Diamonds. Never been and very interesting to see all.

On the way out we walked through the gardens.

A lovely experience in all.
The Olympic buzz was there to see and feel in London. But I'm glad not to be there when the crowds come in for the Olympics.
I love the general buzz of London. My first visit was in 1967 and I lived there for a few years from 1969. It feels like home going back there.

Back home now. The cats were happy to have me home again. The garden has grown quite fast so lots to do there. I have not seen the Jay yet (the nuts were finishes when I came home) but the Blue and Great Tits are busy feeding (I put out more nuts).
My grandson is at his first pony camp this week with 18 girls and 1 other boy. Looking forward to seeing how he comes out of this :-). He will also celebrate his 7th birthday at the camp.

Just watched the Men's finals at Wimbledon. Quite nail-biting at times. It would have been so nice to have an English champion again after 76 years, but not to be this time. There will be another year.

Summer is still to come. Yesterday was a lovely day and it looked like dinner could be in the garden, but just as dinner was served the rain started. Today was a very wet day. But we keep positive and hopefully summer will come before autumn arrives.

Hope to be inspired enough to do some weaving soon.