I’ve come to the end of another busy day with not enough time to write a proper post (whatever that is). So I’ll reach into the File of Languishing Photos again and see what comes forth.
Fluffy puffy stuffy clouds. Cotton balls in a sea of blue. Cheerful denizens of the sky, unlike their nefarious cousins, the storm clouds.
The mustard and ketchup flower. The blushing sunshine flower. The tulip with outstretched arms and a welcoming nature.
And to finish off this random bit of writing, a haiku.
Puffy stuffy clouds, Blushing tulips glow below; Will they ever meet?
Tiptoeing through the tulips with feet that delete.
I’m still doing rough drafts of the poinciana tree and feel like I’m getting to know it better. Here’s the first and second rough drafts side by side, followed by the original photo. I drew the second one from a photograph of a different perspective, so the trunk is different.
My sense is that when I begin to do the watercolor painting, it will be loose, rather than super detailed. We shall see.
Looking through old files today, I ran across a series that I started through the gospel of Mark in 2015, another one of my grand ideas that sort of petered out. Is it too late to say that I only intended to go from Mark 9 through Mark 12?
Thou hast seen all that I have for today. A blessing on all your heads.
Can this blog be saved from deletion in the morning?
(To start at the beginning: Adventures in Italy Part 1) (crappy photo alert: still can’t find those original digital photos from our trip!)
Genoa, Italy – August 2016
It was by now getting to be close to 6:00, so we had to decide whether or not to pursue the 3rd attraction that we had a ticket for, which was a tour of some towers over by the Christopher Columbus house. Well, why not – in for a penny, in for a pound. By the time we got there (another 20 minute walk), it was almost 6:15 and we couldn’t find any open door around the whole area of the towers. Is it possible they only opened at 6:00 and if you weren’t there, closed up again? We could think of no explanation that made sense, but didn’t care enough about it to ask any of the nearby people about it. C’est la vie.
Time to start thinking about supper. Giovanni had recommended a couple places, one of which was very near where we were, so we walked down the narrow street to get to the entrance: Rosmarino Trattoria. We went in and found out that they didn’t open again for dinner (cena) until 7:30, which is typical in Italy, probably in much of Europe actually. Should we find a nice place to sit and wait or go back to the B&B (another 20 minute walk) to freshen up? In spite of the fact that we were both fairly tired, the allure of having a quick refreshing shower won us over and we hoofed it back to Il Borga Di Genova, home sweet home. This way, Kris posited, we could also put on some “glad rags” before going back to the restaurant. Gotta love a guy that uses the phrase “glad rags.”
Feeling amazingly refreshed and dressed in our aforementioned glad rags, we got back to Rosmarino Trattoria at exactly 7:30 and were the first customers there, so we got our pick of the tables. This time, the woman who seated us gave us an iPad with the menu in English (oh happy day!) to look over. Much of the food here in this port city is seafood based and although I’m not a big fan of seafood, I wanted to be open to trying something new. “I wonder what dolphin tastes like?” I mused out loud. Kris thought it was probably a lot like mahi mahi and that made me wary of it being served raw or sushimi style. The menu also had beef tartare, another type of raw meat that I wasn’t terribly eager to try. One of the selections, even in “English” was mysterious, something like vitetto tonnoto with crispy something. I asked the waiter what it was, and although he spoke English, his accent was such that I still couldn’t understand. “I’ll have that,” I said, throwing caution to the wind. Kris ordered the pork belly with figs and we both ordered another pasta pesto again for our first course. The pesto pasta was different than the one we’d had the night before, but still so very tasty. The main meals arrived, beautifully presented.
I tucked into mine and discovered that it was a cold tuna salad, stuffed with spinach leaves and topped with some sort of thin crispy bread. This was a surprise, but not an unpleasant one. Kris said his pork belly and figs was excellent. The reddish stuff on his plate appeared to be some sort of sautéed sweet onions – yummy (he gave me a taste). We both chose tiramisu for dessert. The restaurant had filled up rapidly after we got there and every seat was taken; the staff was quite busy running around filling wine bottles, bringing food in, etc. We thought they’d be eager to empty our table but after we finished eating, the check did not appear. We speculated that at Italian restaurants, you come at 7:30 and stay for a couple hours, after which the restaurant closes. After waiting 15 or so minutes, Kris finally asked for the check so we could get our weary bodies back home (remember, we still had a 20 minute walk ahead of us). It was around 9:00 by the time we left.
Piazza de Ferrari at night
It looks like we walked around 12 miles and really got to know the town well in the process, so it’s all good. We may take a train today to a nearby coastal town – not sure yet. My legs are still aching from yesterday so I don’t want to do as much walking! I’m feeling my age…
We have one tulip that comes up around our back fountain every year, for the almost twenty years that we’ve lived here. We’ve tried all sort of plants around that fountain over the years, mostly annuals that come and go. But that tulip, which we did not plant, is about as dependable as they come.
It is a herald of spring. It is a lone sentry calling out “who goes there?” to creatures great and small. It is a fashion model providing color culture after the long winter. It is a banner, proudly resisting the wind.
The voice of the LORD makes the tulip to bloom. And in the His temple, everything says, “Glory!”
My mother loved paper dolls. She had many fond memories of making her own paper dolls as a child and encouraged us girls to do the same in our house growing up. There was sort of an elemental pleasure in playing with either our own homemade versions or the store bought ones, even though it was kind of irritating that it was so hard to keep their clothes on with those little tabs.
When Mom died, we discovered that she had a whole box of paper dolls, apparently finding them irresistible all through her life. Some are in boxes, already cut out and ready to play with; others are still new and uncut. But does anyone play with these anymore? It seems like a hopelessly old fashioned “toy” in these days of computer games and smart toys.
I decided to bring a set with us the last time we visited our children and grandchildren to see how it would go with our little granddaughter. She was surprisingly interested and engaged for a time. We set everything out and figured out which clothes should go with which doll and then tried to put the clothes on them. As I remembered, the clothing only barely stayed on and that only if you put it on the dolls and left them alone. Gee, there must be a way to fix that problem.
It was a journey into the past. I think I’ll do it again sometime with her just to keep the tradition alive.
I had a suggestion to embellish a mushroom with a gnome sitting in its shade.
That’s a really tiny gnome or a really huge mushroom – take your pick.
I wanted to paint some fish for a card, but didn’t really like either of my efforts that much, so I ended up doing a drawing and coloring with pencils (as above). I might share the final result at some point, but here are the ones I rejected.
The Rejects – I might still do something with these
A friend asked me if I’d do a painting of the beautiful poinciana tree that grows in her neighborhood. I’m used to painting in small dimensions, so this would be quite a challenge! I decided to start with a sketch from the original photo.
As you can see, the perspective is a little off – I need to make the trunk and branches skinnier with a canopy that size. And the canopy needs to be a little wider. Back to the literal drawing board! I’ll do a bunch of sketches before attempting to paint this.
Last and least, I’m still plugging away at the book of drawing lessons that I received for Christmas (50 Ways to Draw Your Beautiful Ordinary Life).
The wicker chair looks really odd to me, but that’s pretty close to the original in the book. I’m still determined to do all the lessons and hoping I’ll get better along the way.
I wish I could see all the things that you are working on: gardening, sewing, knitting, decorating, furniture making or refurbishing, baking… Everyone has a workshop of sorts!
Time to go nap under a mushroom and dream about deleting this in the morning.
Genoa, Italy – August 2016 (a note about the bad quality of the photos with these Italy posts thus far: I have been unable to find the digital originals from this trip, so I’m taking photos of the photo book I had made. Ugh! The hunt for the photos in the labyrinth of old hard drives continues.)
We walked on, admiring the beauty of the architecture and reminded of how young the United States is by looking at an ancient city.
At some point we had wanted to go up to a higher part of the city to a scenic overlook, so we found a shady spot to get a fix on where we were and where we needed to go next. We depended on the combined use of the map on my phone (with that handy pulsating blue dot that tells you where you are) and the map we had gotten from Giovanni. We discovered that we had wandered much farther west than we needed to and had to backtrack in order to find the place where we could catch a funicular up the hill. The street signs in Italy are not placed right in the intersections as they are in the U.S., so it requires a little bit of hunting each time you come to an intersection to find the building on which the small sign is placed.
As you walk down each street, you pass many little side streets that are exceedingly narrow and dark; I found them somewhat intimidating looking, but still rather quaint. Every block or so, we’d stop in a shady spot, get out the phone and the map, and check to see if we were still headed in the right direction. It looks so simple on a map, but the reality is less clear, especially since there are so many piazzas with roundabouts and multiple streets funneling in and out of them.
We finally came to a very busy street where the funicular station was supposed to be, but couldn’t see anything that looked like the right thing. Hmmm…. We crossed the street, hoping for the best. I was feeling very determined not to walk up that steep hill! I saw a little shop on the corner and went in, hoping to get help. “Scusi, non parlo Italiano,” I started off, thinking it best to get the facts out on the table right away. “Dov’e funicular?” The young woman behind the counter responded with friendly enthusiasm, apologizing for her poor English, which was of course many times better than our Italian. “It is by toonel,” she started out. Kris understood that this meant “tunnel,” which helped (I was still trying to work that one out – toonel?). “You go left, is two shops from toonel.” Perfetto! We said our “grazie’s” and walked over there, a very small and understated entrance – no wonder we hadn’t seen it. We were confronted by a machine to buy the tickets and this is definitely Kris’s domain, so I stood back while he figured it out: three euros for a round trip that gave you 100 minutes up at the top. We had to wait a few minutes for the funicular to start its trip up the hill and there was another one at the top waiting to come down. They started up simultaneously and although it appeared that there was only one track, it split in the middle, allowing the funicular cars to pass each other. Here’s a photo of how it looks:
I grew up singing the song, “Funiculi, Funicula,” so I couldn’t help but think of that as we rode the Funicular. “Some think the world is made for fun and frolic..and so do I, and so do I…”
At the bottom looking upAt the top looking down
Once at the top, we were feeling the need for a little cold liquid refreshment (did I mention how hot it was?) and stopped in at an outdoor ristorante for a birra and an aqua naturale. Ahh… Now, to find the panoramic vista! Well, that turned out to be easier said than done. I think we both figured that once we got up there, we’d see a sign and a bunch of tourists with cameras. The view was obscured by buildings and trees where we were so we walked for a bit in one direction but the elusive panoramic vista did not appear before us and it seemed we were getting father away from the action, so we turned around and pursued the other direction. It always seemed just beyond where we were. I was beginning to lose heart, but Kris spurred us on with the thought that we should persevere and it would be worth it. We walked on and eventually did find a place that gave a beautiful view of the area further up the hill and a better partial view of the rest of the city below. Good enough for me!
We turned around and headed back, still well within our 100 minute limit, and boarded the funicular to go back down the hill. Here we are, waiting to go down again:
‘Tis the season for thinning our apple trees. I head out with my handy little scissors in the morning and for every bunch of apples (usually 3-5), I cut off all but one. They’re still fairly small at this point. Lots of times it’s an easy decision when one brute bully beast of an apple is surrounded by puny little fruits that are barely making an effort. Sometimes, though, there’ll be 2-3 good-sized apples in a bunch and it seems like cold-blooded fruitricide to send some of these hurtling to their doom. I keep reminding myself that it’s good for the tree, good for the fruit, good for the harvest and therefore, good for us. Every apple I remove gives the tree more energy to pour into the ones that are left. It’s a useful image to contemplate when I think about what the Lord has to do in my life to make me more fruitful and to give me a better harvest. I don’t want to get in the way of what the Master Orchard Keeper is doing, even if it means removing what I think is good fruit.
I can only do so much at a time before my arm starts complaining, the old tendinitis giving warning: stop now or you’ll be sorry.
To read about a dark time in the life of our apple trees: Woe Has Come
I might have to thin this post out in the morning.
This is a glorious time of year. There’s fresh green color everywhere that makes you glad to be alive; things are growing, budding, fruiting, and teeming with life. Glory to God in the highest!
Roses at the grocery store caught my eyeThe Michael planter (named after my uncle) with moss rose hair this yearThe Betty planter (named after my aunt) whose moss roses are in bloomThe Mary planter (named after my mom) with buds ready to bloom
Whatever else is going on in your world, spring always tells the story of life after death, of green and fresh resurrection, of budding hope and of a Savior who died so that you can be fruitful and teeming with life. Glory to God in the highest!
We drove to Sanders, Arizona, staying at a little mobile home unit behind somebody’s house out in the boonies. It wasn’t a very long drive, so we stopped at Monument Valley to do the driving trail tour.
Many western movies directed by John Ford have been filmed in Monument Valley, by the way, including, “The Searchers,” “Cheyenne Autumn,” and “Stage Coach.” John Wayne referred to Monument Valley as “God’s Treasure,” which from my point of view is mete, right and salutary.
Evidently part of Forrest Gump had been filmed there, too, since we saw a signs for Forrest Gump Hill shortly before arriving at MV itself. I’ve only seen Forrest Gump once and it was about a thousand years ago, so I don’t remember much from it. Next time we watch it, I’ll be on the lookout for Forrest Gump Hill.
Forrest Gump Hill is on the right
Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park is owned by the Navajo Nation, so it isn’t considered a National Park.
You could get guided tours, but we figured we’d get as much as we wanted out of it by doing the self-guided driving tour on something they were calling a road. This kind of driving is apparently called “off-roading.” Oh my goodness – I’ve never been on such a bumpy road. If my head hadn’t been attached, it would have fallen off. I could hardly wait to get off that road, but it was one of Kris’s favorite experiences, so “vive la difference.”
We stopped at all the turnouts, as well as taking the side spurs to places of interest. The East and West Mittens, as well as the Three Sisters, were probably the most iconic sights.
A mitten – let’s call it West Mitten since I don’t remember which was which.And this is East Mitten – looks like a teapot to meThe Three Sisters! (I’m confident about this one)
One of the places we stopped along the driving trail was called “John Ford’s Point.” A very sad looking horse stood out in the sun waiting for people to hire it for a short ride. I exchanged a sympathetic look with the beastie before we moved on.
John Ford’s Point with a rando posing on itThe price options are hilarious (to me)An iconic western scene – the bird wheeling in the sky
We bumped and jolted our way along the rest of the trail, stopping at the Rain God Mesa and Spearhead Mesa and a couple other places to do the Tourists Taking Photos routine.
I think this is Rain God Mesa – don’t quote meSpearhead Mesa?
It took us about 2 hours to do the 15-mile trail, partly because of all the stops and partly because we had to drive very slowly over the sandy, rocky and rut-filled road.
Thanks for joining us on our Southwest Tour – more to come!
It’s a mush with a room; It’s a pale little ghoul; It’s a fungus amongus; It’s a toad with a stool. Some of them fill you; Some of them kill you; What odd little critters To put in your fritters.
Paintings copied (more or less) from things I found on Pinterest. The whimsical poetry is my own, for better or for worse.
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