Not sure exactly what this was.. maybe an old grain storage structure.

This was the day Della and I did our tour of the daylily farm. We found a very scenic old house by the road. Since it had a "for sale" sign, we figured we could stop and take pictures.

The Fair is Done and So Am I

It was a good fair until we packed up and headed home. One prize winning goat took it into her head to jump OVER the tailgate of the truck and I thought she'd broken her leg (this is Thelma, who has already survived one broken leg). But today she is walking. Husband Larry, in the other truck, had the wooden milking stand fly out of the truck bed as he got onto Hwy 29. Amazingly, IT survived. God was watching over us all, but by the time we had put animals and other stuff away I was past stressed.
Today we cleaned up equipment and trucks and I cleaned the worst parts of the house and made us the first homemade dinner in days. Nice.

The Fauquier Fair

Three days into the fair, one to go. The girls have won their usual assortment of ribbons, the heat and humidity have been the same as usual too. I have had fun running around with Dell's camera (only for a brief time!). It's so fast that you really feel like a photographer. I'll be interested to see if she likes any of the photos. I spent all day Thursday and Friday at the fairgrounds, leaving at 7 am and returning home at 10 pm ish, and today I just couldn't do a whole day. So Larry spent his day there and I came home at 2. I spent a couple hours helping shuck corn for the blue ribbon dinner, so I ended up with all th bits and pieces of corn that no one wanted. Esther and I blanched and froze up a lot of packages for the next low country boil.
(I don't have pictures up yet, since they are on Dells camera, but I really liked the Low Country Boil that Laura introduced us to. It's a Georgia/South Carolina tradition, kind of a shrimp boil with extras. Very easy, good for big groups, and a lot more affordable than serving straight crab or shrimp at today's prices.)
Besides doing the corn, I baked muffins, did a load of wash, ran the dishwasher, did all the animal chores, took a bath, and caught up on emails. Nice to catch up before the last day of the fair.

Death in the Garage

So, I go out to feed and water my 22 chicks in the garage, and look what I found.

 

That lump in the middle of the snake is former chick #22. I put him in an aquarium

to show the little boy coming over later!

The nuggets are light amethyst, (such a light purple that at first I thought they were pink), $5 for the whole strand. The mottled purple beads are charoite. I seem to remember that charoite was originally found in Russia near the Charo river. Really good charoite is deep purple, but this was inexpensive. I liked the way it worked with the amethyst. I used czech glass beads as spacers on the necklace and earrings, but ran out for the bracelet and had to use some round amethyst. It still works as a set, but that disqualifies it as a fair entry, because they are into "make it match" not "artistic license". I found that out last year-I was giving Hannah a necklace and earrings and thought it would be neat to give her a prize winning set. Well, I got 4th place because I was dinged for several things I did on purpose!
The Bead Warehouse in Silver Spring (run by the the personable Marvin) is the source for a lot of my beads. Accent Beads in Rockville is also good for bargains on strands.

Amethyst Necklace

I have forgotten to ask Dell to photograph the last couple creations..and now they are given away. But this time I remembered before sending this one off as a gift. I found that with such large stones, I had to use .018 wire, and that gave me trouble when I tried to double it back through the small stones. So in the end, I had a gap. Normally I'd cover that with a crimp cover but I'm out and the weekend is ahead, and we have a "low country boil" planned with the family. So, in the spirit of Amish tradition, I offer this imperfect creation.

Touring Around

Today Della and I went to a daylily farm. She took scads of pictures, which she's going to post I'm sure, and I bought 2 plants. I have never seriously thought about daylilys, but after walking up and down among hundreds of plants of many types, I am thinking about a perennial bed with lilys as the focals.
On the way home we didn't take I-95. Instead we went up Hwy. 1 and happened across Stonewall Jackson's Shrine. It's a nice little place with the actual bed that he died in, very well kept up.
We ended up by stopping at a Goodwill in Massaponax and then getting a coke and ice cream at the Sonic acrss the street. I was a little worried about the traffic on the way back, since the 4th of July weekend traffic has already started building, but we had a quick drive home. Just in time for chores and dinner!