Progress on Many Fronts

Poor Smitty. Not only does he have to endure yet another streetwalker cat in his territory, but his wings are clipped and he can't even go outside to escape the insult. He whines and cries and howls hour after hour to go outside. The catio can't get built soon enough. It hasn't progressed any further since the last time I showed it, but this weekend should see mega-progress...at least, I sincerely hope so. When Construction Man also has a full-time job as Engineer Man, it makes it hard to get things finished. That, coupled with weekends away and rainy weather, and it's pretty slow-going. 

For now, I take Smitty outside with me whenever I'm puttering around in the yard. Yesterday we went outside to dump the compost, feed the birds, and then generally just take a walk around. 

The compost pile is growing its own vegetables right now. I'm not sure what this is, but it's a vine, and that makes me think its a pumpkin or a squash of some kind. It has no flowers, and so it's hard to say for sure. A pumpkin would be nice since it would be of the pumpkin pie variety from our CSA last year.

The herbs are blooming right now. This first one was pretty much a waste of time for planting. It's cilantro, which grew up tall and bloomed about ten minutes after I planted it. I won't bother with that next year.

This is some thyme.

The next one is sage, which is pretty when it blooms. It's planted next to the lavender, and you can see that on the left side of the image along with a stem from one of the sunflowers.

The sunflowers are heading up. It's always exciting waiting for them to bloom.

There are several blossoms on the zucchini, and at least one zucchini. I planted these for the flowers, rather than the zucchini. The bloom well into the fall, and so they're good for the pollinators. Nevertheless, enough zucchini for relish would be nice this year.

The daylilies are opening.

Round 2 of the lettuce is doing well. I don't know why all the seeds don't germinate, but it doesn't matter. We always have more lettuce than we can eat.

The tomatoes are doing really well. They are setting fruit, and blooming in profusion.

Remember when I repotted them just a couple of weeks ago?

You can see how much they've grown already in the image below.

Cats who go out with their moms following a rain shower get toe jam. Ew.

When they go back inside, they need a nap.

While he napped beside me, I finished stitching in the ditch around all the blocks for the Live, Love, Teach quilt.

Here's how it looks from the back.

Today I'll get a start stitching the sashings. I'm just going to do straight line stitching 1/4-inch from the blocks on either side of the sashing. It probably won't get finished today, but for sure I'm expecting to sew the binding on this weekend. It'll be good to have this one finished.

While I was waiting for the glass guy to replace my windshield yesterday, I finished the embroidery for the first block for the Bee-utiful Quilt-A-Long. Blocks 2 and 3 are due out today. You can find the quilt-a-long in the Moda Bakeshop right here. When I went looking for that link, I noticed that Block 2 is posted now.

Smitty and Sadie are doing marvelously well. Sadie is still getting comfortable in her new surroundings and seems to need some quiet time several times a day. Hours pass and I don't see her. When I go looking for her, I usually find her in the little bed I made up for her or else lounging all stretched out on the ping pong table in my sewing room. I thought she might be attracted to the catnip that is sprinkled around there, and so I poured a little into a bowl. She was not at all interested in that.

She continues to pull herself across the floor in an effort to be adorable...which isn't difficult. Some of you with sharp eyes might notice that she was spayed so recently that her belly furs haven't grown back yet.

♪♫ I wanna be loved by you, just you, and nobody else but you. I wanna be loved by you alone. Boop, boop, bee, doo. ♫♪

This morning, she and Smitty bumped noses several times, and I believe they were even playing together for a while. Smitty loves to run and chase, and I think she's a little unsure whether he's playing or being aggressive. Perhaps he isn't sure either.

So there you have it...the state of the union at the Three Cats Ranch. Today is a grocery shopping day, and then I'll get back to my quilting.