I'm on Summer Break until August 7 - I'll be checking emails infrequently, and both the blog and the shop are on pause until the end of the break. (You can order things, of course, but they will be sent out only after the break.)

There will be online workshops again after the break, too - an English and a German sewing workshop, and a German spinning workshop are already bookable in the shop.

Have a lovely, happy summer, and see you after the break!

I woke up this morning to the sweet, sweet sound of raindrops falling. 

It's been very dry here for a good while - summers are hot these days without the relatively frequent thunderstorms that used to come every few days when it was hot and sunny. This morning there was just a little gentle rain, which did not last for long and did not yield much moisture (it was about one litre per square metre), but now we finally have some more, with a good dose of thunder thrown in, and that is very, very good. I hope the thyme in our lawn will get blooming afterwards, and it's also going to make the plants that are still not crispy very happy.

Another happy thing? The Grünes Heupferd in our wintergarden has grown up and is now an adult. At least she has wings now, in the proper size, not just the little stumps.

So. Rain, a grown-up green lady, summer break coming up, and the first tomatoes are also starting to turn red. Plus it looks like my lemon grass did actually survive the Great Grub Attack - something laid eggs in that specific flower pot, and the grubs that hatched from them were too many for the roots of the plant. I found the grubs by chance when looking into the pot and pondering re-potting. Which I then did, of course, and two of the stalks still had some hint of green. One of them is growing again now, jury's still out for the second one, but at least the one is saved and can eventually grow into a proper large plant again.

(The grubs were transferred to the compost heap, where they can eat to their hearts' delight. Without killing my plants!)

Part of this day was spent on doing things for the European Textile Forum. We do have a date (November 7-13), we have a topic (spinning and making thread in the wider sense), we have a location (we'll return to Mayen), but there's a few things that have to be organised in a different way this time around. Biggest of them all is our catering - the company that used to provide us with food (including very creative uses of canned pineapple in a lot of dishes where I would not have expected it) seems to have gone under during the pandemic. Which means... getting a new caterer.

That's not quite as easy as it sounds, as options in a small place are limited, and we have specific requirements that have to be communicated properly. That is under way.

Another bit that has to be set up again is the registration form - the software that I used previously is not compatible with the current version of Joomla that the Forum website runs, so I've had to find a new one and am now getting acquainted with it. And building the form - so registration can finally happen. 

There'll be a bit of a price increase for this year's conference, as everything has gotten more expensive. I'm a little sad about this, but, well, it can't really be helped.

So... it does look like I've figured out and tested that form thingie, and the updated cost estimate, and now all that remains is finishing the info bits and the CfP, and then the thing can actually go online. Hooray!

Soon it will be time for my summer break. Very, very soon - actually it will start at the end of this week already, and I'm looking forward to that very, very much.

As usual, my break will be a mix of time for relaxing, going on holidays, and taking care of things that get left behind during normal work times. There's some website work to be done, for instance. (Yes, again. It's a neverending source of work.) Some garden work. Some projects that are lined up but have not happened yet, and hopefully there will be time for them, too. Putting the shop and blog on hold for a few weeks takes out quite a bit of time-eating elements, and allows me to take a bit of a breather... and also to do some more stock-taking and, if necessary, re-stocking.

So since there will be blog silence for a bit from the end of this week: If you have anything you'd like me to blog about tomorrow or Friday - let me know! 

It's Monday, and in spite of having had a normal amount of sleep, I'm tired. Go figure. This is slightly annoying, as - of course and as always - there's plenty of work to do. The cat snoozing in the room does not help either, spreading her snooziness molecules.

Probably the heat here is also to blame, at least partly: It's been very hot the past days, and today is no exception. There was something trying to look like a little hint of rain this morning, but it was not even enough to really register, either in our rain meter or on the ground. Which means the important plants still get their daily watering through the can today. 

We have two rainwater collectors, one of them a very large one, so there's water for the thirsty ones. Which are, mostly, tomato plants placed in pots, and a few more placed in the soil in beds. The latter, however, are not as easy or quickly to water. I also have the tendency to think that since they have roots, and practically unlimited freedom, they should be able to stretch their roots until they get to moist soil and take their water from there. In contrast, the plants in the pots don't have that possibility, so they have to get their portion of liquid daily.

So since it's been hot and dry with enough watering activities for most of the plants this year (at least up until now), there are quite a few promising-looking green tomatoes being made already. Now I hope that they will ripen soon-ish and be delicious. It would be really nice to have enough for making some sauce, or diced tomatoes, and can that for use in the winter, but I'm not sure if that will work out...

Just like last year, there's a great green bush cricket living in our wintergarden. 

It's a little larger now than it was on this photo taken some days ago - and on the photo, you can see the cast-off skin from its previous larval stage. Not fully grown yet, the green thing.

This species mostly eats other insects, but the specimen here is definitely not opposed to snacking on some green stuff as well - the leaf it is sitting on belongs to an avocado plant, and several of these leaves have a hole, or a piece eaten out of the edge. (And yes, I'm sure that this green lady is to blame for the holes, I've seen her take a few astonishingly big bites out of one leaf edge yesterday morning.)

Last year's guest had an even more exquisite taste - it bit off the tender young stem of a passionfruit seedling, and killed some other seedlings as well. Munching some avocado leaf is, in comparison, very much holding back on the havoc possible. Much appreciated!