Sadly not many diamonds reached the beach this week. This and my piano on the south side of the house are too hot to sit for long. Succession is coming along. The first page is starting to sound like it has promise.
The scrunchie is done. Yay! Time to start a new one. It’s an easy crochet pattern I found on Etsy.
Empty needles called for more socks so toes are nearly finished.
Huggable Arch is coming along.
Ready to do heel increases.
I had to get peg drops for my violin 🎻. I’m learning basics like tuning and putting rosin on the bow. Finally making notes sound halfway like notes. So much so that I’ve managed the first line of Twinkle, Twinkle.
I’ve nearly memorized Imagine on the uke.
With smoke the recorders aren’t getting attention because deep breaths and scratchy throat make this a bad choice for now.
With smoke and heat the only exercise I get is on the stationary bike.
It is getting cooler. And September seems closer. Let’s pray we all make it. Fires on our coast, floods to the east. I hope we all make it to Fall.
Wow. With summer heat and humidity, not to mention ADHD with non compliant stresses, progress is slow. But my super power is running.
Even the smallest amount of progress will get the job done eventually. It is in the giving up that nothing happens. Except drama. Reliving trauma never brings positive results. Acknowledging the downside, not jumping in and feeling sorry for myself, helps me survive and thrive.
In this case:
Talking too much, distracting thoughts, feelings, actions, and resulting health issues. They all are there. It was worse when I was working in jobs that weren’t healthy for me.
I wish when I’m interrupting I could say I’m sorry. But I believe that sorry implies a will to change. Sadly, in my 74 years that change is detrimental to my health. Every time.
I was Hermione raising my hand with the answer. But being fair, I let others answer first. By the time the teacher called on me my mind had already gone a thousand places and I couldn’t even remember the question. Then someone else would get it right and it was exactly the answer I knew I knew. And I knew what I had to say was unimportant. That my gold star was unimportant.
Yet learning was the reward. Still is. And friends. And family. But ADHD threatens all of it. Unless I do little bits. Many, many little bits.
I’ll never be a concert pianist or win great awards from my efforts of anything. But I have to be happy with my little wins. And keep trying to be a human who does her best to be kind.
Anyway. My little win is my new slipper socks.
I move the stitches as I work the last ribbing row onto separate 9 inch circular needles. That makes the cast-off work so much easier.
Shorty slipper socks with arch hugging ribbing.
Yep. For me.
And because I love how that arch feels I’m trying it on the watermelon shorty socks.
Two rows into the ribbing.
The heat makes yarn too hot. My brain needs something to stimulate it. But often, I find I get sloppy and make a ton of mistakes.
My Duolingo is still going but Chinese is as hard as Hebrew and Navajo. I tend to lose a lot of hearts. But I find a successful language like Italian to play with until I build the hearts up.
My music is even harder to get to because of heat and disruptions. But. I will keep trying to get all my passions back into my daily schedule. I miss having a good routine that pushes me to try.
Across from my piano that didn’t get touched is my sunset beach. But that’s the south side of the house and it gets hot in there. Bring back nice temps!
Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “pore/poor/pour.’” Use any of them or use them all. Bonus points if you fit ’em all into your post. Have fun
It’s raining, it’s pouring…
The humidity affecting every pore.
Poor kitties and puppies experiencing loud scary thunder and lightning.
And yet the downpour drenches us in cats and dogs.
With the backlight on you can see how far I’ve been able to dot into the suds.
Without the backlight you can see how the colors paint the picture.
Yay! I caught back up to the beginning of the tinking. The rest is progress, I hope.
My daughter shared a recorder YouTube with me. It is fun and may explain my adult experience. I didn’t have a recorder in grade school. I only met the instrument when I was blessed to be part of a Renaissance/Christmas group. We played and sang at mall openings, rest homes/nursing homes, churches and caroling. We even recorded an album in an actual studio in L.A. But at that time I was better at singing; just a baby in recorders.
This YouTube reminds me of my trying out the recorder in the last couple years. I can play all the black belt songs. Yay, me! But I’d love a great teacher for moving forward. Mostly I’ve taught myself through books and a few YouTube tutorials.
Anyway, enjoy.
Oh, my Succession song is finally sounding like there’s promise. Dexter Theme still sucks.
My poor violin needs tightening in the pegs. I’m learning how to do that. No songs yet. Just learning how to hold, tune, put rosin on the bow. And possibly on the wayward peg, apparently.
Meanwhile, I’m loving the Olympics, wishing for a pool like crazy! Oh, well, pretending bike racing instead.
I’m so far from finishing anything. And I am proud to say I’m starting something new.
Next to my Enya Ukulele is what looks big enough to be a guitar. But Enya is small.
Isn’t she pretty?
Way back in my 40s I was gifted a violin that a friend found on a wall. It was a planter. She took it to a violin maker and he was able to make it perfect for a first violin.
My daughter and son wanted to join and soon we had a 1/2 for my daughter and a 3/4 violin for my son.
At the time I was teaching keyboard at a couple elementary schools. I was introduced to the violin teacher in the same schools. She kindly allowed my trio to come to her classes to learn.
I got to learn Twinkle, Twinkle before the program ended. My son didn’t seem to like violin at all (though he grew up to be in a band as a guitarist, so maybe he did like strings?). My daughter was probably too young. She would lay the violin on the floor and saw with the bow. Sadly, hers was the best of the three instruments.
Somehow the violins left our lives. I’ve been wanting to try again but never could find one at a price I could afford.
Then I saw this during Amazon’s last sale. Even $46 seemed too much but my husband said I should go ahead.
The set up per the free YouTube tutorials went okay. Then, tuning. I was sad I couldn’t tune a couple strings. More tutorials. I finally found one about loose pegs. The fix was easy.
The book that came with my Mendini by Cecilio violin instructed new students to spend time holding the fiddle, tuning, and rosening the bow every day. So I know this will be a slower learning experience than the Ukulele. But I am excited to learn my first song!
Well, that is, after I learn the holding, tuning and putting rosen on the bow properly. So I’ll just enjoy how pretty it is and the four notes I can play from the properly tuned new baby.
Meanwhile, I’m trying to memorize Imagine, Amazing Grace, Auld Lang Syne, and Edelweiss on my Enya. It might take a while.
One ponytail holder finished. The next one nearly finished. Crocheted.
Finally on the heel of these slipper socks.
See the wrap-around yarn? All tinked and ready to try again.
A few more rows until the heel.
Piano scheduling had difficulties this week but I started attacking Succession and Dexter measure by measure.
Working on my series: Haven.
Doodler (zendoodle.com)
Music major: voice and piano
Mom of four great adults
Reiki II practitioner
I have been on disability/retired for 10 years now from depression, anxiety and fibromyalgia.
Books, games, music, and life — filtered through the mind of a writer, drummer, and philosopher who thinks too deeply about all of it. If it moves something in your chest, I'm interested.
Darswords 
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