Farmers Market in the Rain

It is raining pretty steadily now. We are experiencing the outer edges of Tropical Storm Nicole, which is moving up the Atlantic coast right now.

A couple hours ago, when it was just barely drizzling, we decided not to let a few drops of rain stop us from going to the farmers market down town.



There were actually quite a few people enjoying the market despite the rain.

We had empanadas for dinner, from one of the booths, and ate them while listening to live music and watching small children play in front of the stage. Then for desert we had the most wonderful mocha cupcakes ( there were about 6 flavors to choose from, but we chose mocha, because we had discovered earlier, that today was National Coffee Day).



Our new rosemary plant:

A Knight to Remember

Middle school and High School students at the school where I work, were met by this guy as they entered the school this morning.



I wonder if it made them think twice about being late to class.

Skip Counting Review

The lesson that Blaze is working on this week in his Math*U*See book, is skip counting by 5's. In the previous book, counting by fives was taught with a clock face, which I think was a great practical application and visual aid.

The following musical skip counting songs were the ones that Blaze enjoyed most as we listened to them together last night, because he needed a little extra practice to remember the number 30.

This Week in Sports With Blaze

Last week for kickball in the park, there were more college-age volunteers than there were children for them to assist. This week there were many children, but hardly any volunteers.





There were plenty of volunteers at soccer on Friday, though.



Blaze had 4 helpers all to himself for awhile, which he loved.





Does Duck, Duck, Goose count as a sport?



Sunday swimming:

Tailgators

The University of Florida football team will be playing the University of Kentucky at 7p.m. EDT, but the tailgate parties have been going on for hours. We took a stroll around campus this afternoon to check out all the action.

Large inflatable gators are everywhere.







Curious about all the noise, the real gators always show up to check out the tailgaters.



A few pranksters come out, too.



Mostly, though, it's just lots of people with a lot of school spirit, having a good time.

















Just as we were all getting hot and dehydrated from our walk, we reacher the O'Connell Center, where there were booths handing out free drink samples, free wash clothes next to a tub of ice water to dip them in, and free cheese samples.



The cheese gator:

The Airship Ornament

Last year, for Blaze's birthday in December, I posted a picture of the airship ornament I made out of wool felt, wool stuffing, and embroidery floss. I promised that I would soon post a pattern for it, but things got hectic and we were out of town for much of December, so the pattern was never posted.




So, here it is, many months later...

I just finished making another little airship ornament, because I joined a Secret Santa ornament swap. It reminded me that I had not yet posted this pattern, so, without further ado, here are the instructions for making a little felt airship ornament:

Print this image out as a full sheet of paper:




Embroider the lines on the blimp, by backstitching a contrasting color of embroidery floss.




Sew on the side fins, to give the airship a more three dimensional look.




Put the two pieces of the blimp together, with the neat side of the stitching facing outward. Blanket stitch most of the way around, leaving a small space for stuffing.



Stuff.

Sew the opening closed.

Sew the two halves of the ship together using blanket stitch and matching thread. Continue stitching until all the raw edges are finished.





Attach the ship to the blimp with embroidery floss "ropes" ( you may notice from the pictures that I did not do this the same way on the blue ornament, as I did on the brown one. There is no right or wrong way to do this.).




Attach a "jump ring" through the fabric at the top of the blimp and feed a ribbon through the ring to form a loop for hanging the ornament.




The ship is big enough to hold a small piece of candy.

The Beauty of the Swamp in Early Autumn

Nothing is Safe From My Cans of Metallic Spray Paint

I have no idea what I'm going to do with them at this point. I just know that Blaze was no longer playing with them, and they look cool in the more realistic metal colors.

Happy Autumn!

Fall officially begins at 11:09 PM EDT tonight.

The weather here is still very warm and not the least bit Fall-like. Blaze and I did some of our homeschooling outside yesterday, in between his speech therapy and physical therapy. There is a lovely, quiet spot with a picnic table, where a creek full of tiny fish and small water snakes, runs next to the building.





Later, we went for a walk in the woods, to find Fall leaves to place as a bouquet on our nature table. Since there has been no cold weather to trigger the change in leaf color, this led to a nice discussion about other reasons this happens, such as shorter days and less water.