Spin Cycle – Page 80 – Lemon Drop Pie

My patio was lost under willow leaves and sticks, pots and potting soil, and a big green bushy bush. I have a vision of me, sitting outside on my patio with my cup of coffee and reading the paper, just like I’m on vacation only I’m not; I’m at home. With my patio under this mess, however, this vision would never actually become a reality.

(Picture extremely messy patio here…I always forget to take “before” photos!)

I started off by clearing the table of all the gardening implements I dragged out in the spring, and hosing the layer of soil off. I washed it with some natural soap, and hosed it again. Clean and sparkly! I opened the umbrella and swept out some old wasps’ nests that were only half-way built. Those dang wasps keep coming back when the umbrella is closed, so yesterday I sprayed the umbrella with a little wasp killer. I hope that keeps them away!

On another day (this was not a one day project) I put on my leather work gloves and got out the edger. I cut and tore off sod from around the edges of the concrete. Argh! (That’s supposed to be a manly Tool Time grunt but it reads more like a pirate growl.)

Edging the patio — A neat edge…I am woman, hear me roar!

The next day, I swept off all the old leaves and dirt from under the table. There actually was a patio under all that debris!

The chairs that belong with the table are grouped under the willow tree from our 4th of July party. We never actually sit at the table very much. My next project is to tackle that huge green bush on the right and trim it down. I’m waiting to borrow my brother-in-law’s electric trimmer–I do not want to tackle it with our hand trimmer. I’m lazy that way. On the left of the patio is our vegetable container garden. I’m hoping we get to the tomatoes before the chipmunks do!

My lost patio, found again!

I have yet to sit outside with my cup of coffee, however. Too hot. In fact, it has been so hot (over 100 degrees) that we used our patio table for another project. We melted crayons.

Melted crayons — Melting crayons in a muffin tin

Yes, it is THAT hot. (Thanks to OneMommy for the idea!) I may have ruined my muffin tin for making muffins, however. But don’t our new crayons look pretty? (Those are the bottoms of the crayons…the tops look rather melty and dull. The heart shaped crayon in one Emmy made at preschool.)

Circle crayons — Lily and Emmy’s new crayons!

Written as part of Gretchen’s Spin Cycle prompt, “Lost and Found”.

What summer project have you been working on?

You don’t even know what it’s like to live with an competitive pianist. Oh, the hours and hours of practice! Scales running up and down the piano keys over and over, and just when you think she’s done playing scales, she starts another variation. Listening to someone practice the piano is not relaxing; it is listening to the same few measures of music being repeated over and over again until it is absolutely perfect. And what’s worse, she actually LIKED to practice! I mean, who likes to practice the piano? It was all I could do to sit at that piano for half an hour, and she tried to get in THREE HOURS of practice a day!

I supposed that’s why my sister is a music professor and composer and I am not. While I like to pretend that her constant practicing drove me crazy, in reality I was very proud of her piano playing. (My other little sister was also quite an accomplished piano player. They both played the piano far better than I ever did, probably due to that practice thing they both liked to do.) I was more interested in reading books than practicing the piano, and so I would hole up in my bedroom and read while my sister practiced. Perhaps that’s the reason I can shut out the world when my nose is in a book; I trained myself to ignore the piano.

On our vacation, Ed and I were walking through the hotel lobby and a young tattooed man sat at the baby grand, playing quite well. “Clair de lune,” I knowingly told Ed. He told me it didn’t sound like Clair de lune to him, at least not the part he with which he was familiar.

Soon enough, however, he said, “You’re right.” Of course I was right. I only heard it being practiced a gazillion times, along with Chopin, Beethoven and Bach, to name just a few composers.

Now my sister is a composer of her own. She lives in California, though, miles away from Illinois. I’ve never been able to hear one of her pieces being performed live. This piece is one of my favorites. It’s based on a quilt square called “Flock of Geese”, which happens to be one of my favorite patterns. Meredith wrote three pieces based on quilt squares in honor of my mom, who was an avid quilter. She was able to play a simple version on her laptop for Mom when she was in hospice. Click the link below to listen:

Flock of Geese

I used to have a Flock of Geese pillow my mom made for me a long time ago. The block was blue and white and I have no idea where it is now; I wish I still had it. What I do have, however, is the memory of Mom’s face as she listened to this beautiful piece of music. I could tell that she could envision those geese, flying away into the distance.

Written as part of Gretchen’s Spin Cycle prompt, “Music”. Also read about my other little sister here: Art Matters.