Over the weekend I visited the Oakville Grocery for a pause of knitting and a cup of artisan dark roast coffee, and was lucky to get my favorite bench in the shade outside.
Here nearly finished with the last of the Lincoln Street sleeveless tops I have been knitting for weeks, and having had to knit Miss Fifteen’s over a second time. It is perfect timing for Miss Fifteen was in a big summer musical production of Mary Poppins, rehearsing six weeks out of her summer vacation, and the show was this last weekend. The performance was great, but now that its over, this means finally we can have our long-awaited Summer photo shoot, so next post you will see them on the actual Lincoln Street modelling the design I released earlier this month.
But after this photo shoot, the days are few before Miss Eighteen leaves for college, and things will just be changing like crazy. We might get our foundation to the house started this Autumn as well, but still all of that is up in the air. I will be distracting myself while ascending again into another pattern writing frenzy, one which I have been anxious to get to for several months. It will involve a lot of knitting while walking through the late summer, up early chasing the morning dew as it evaporates into the droning heat of August. And so I guess these few blissful morning pauses of coffee at the Oakville Grocery must be savored as they come. I hope you all are finding your moments of bliss too!
Jenjoyce Design 
You deserve BLISS, as do we all! Thinking of you.
Thank you~~ xx
it looks a wonderfully peaceful way to start the morning and contemplate the future. I can’t wait to see the photo shoot!
College does change things, I miss having my nieces come to me for their summer vacations, but they have friends and lives now, it was to be expected. I hope they get to a place where they can come visit occasionally, but it is so far that weekends don’t work, and they don’t have the kinds of jobs where vacations are generous. Life marches on.
Oh, how sad is that , when the nieces grow up and start their adult lives, but we must learn to love them as good friends now. I will be sending her off with some extra St Andrews Socks that I knit to help her feet stay warm, for she is going to a foggy & cold climate near the Pacific Coast. Lucky her!!!!
I know she will appreciate that! And any hats and scarves and shawls you send her over the years!
I am resigned to losing the fun little girls, and looking forward to getting to know all these women they have become!
The way you pick up on coordinating colors always blows my mind. The way you saw the matching colors of brick red and grass green in your bag and the background. Looking forward to the photos. Wish we could see Miss Fifteen in the play! I bet she was wonderful! xo
Usually its luck, lol. Accidental talent? Is there such a thing? The musical was lovely, but I don’t love being in tight crowds anymore, it was a labor of love, and N. was awesome! Today is our photo shoot in Calistoga, I am so excited! xx
Thank you so much Jennifer.
I have been thinking of you and Emma a lot since your last post about walking. My husband and I walked together most days through the Australian bush that surrounds our wee cabin in the Ghost-town.
He died in that cabin, with the double doors wide open, facing the trees that swayed and rustled in the autumn air. I held him in my arms and talked to him about how he and I (and Reg-Dog) would find each other there. Would always be there.
And then he died.
And 3 weeks later, Reg-Dog died too.
I walked, hour after hour after hour, looking for them…
For over 2 years I stayed in that cabin, in the ghost-town and walked the bush.
In the end, I had to leave. In the end, the landscape frightened me, not for any other reason than that, Michael’s and Reg-Dog’s presence was everywhere. Not in the singular but in thousands of memories and echoes, in a multitude of nuanced memory that paralysed and eviscerated me.
That image you posted of your “view” walloped me. I realise the degree to which my own “view”, overlain with countless memories, the focus of so many thoughts and dreams, was there, inside me… Unforgettable.
And Emma too
I admire that you are able to embrace the journey of laying new memory over that which is already home to countless others.
I wish you every joy and success.
To bliss…
Karin
Karin, your story touches my heart deeply. I love that you want to have a conversational tone here on the posts, keep them coming!
I have full empathy for your life & loss, and feel that is a beautiful thread we weave together. Thank you, xx
Thank you. I nearly deleted the post a number of times as I felt my sadness might highjack and undercut the sentiment of your post.
But I know that my comment is a work in progress, cast on from your previous post. It is an attempt to articulate an understanding of the courage required to face what has been lost. And to know when, in my case, to walk away.
Thank you…
XX
I’m glad you had some peaceful, quiet time. Wow one off to college already? And the musical sounds fun and wonderful.
Steph, yes, the kids do grow up quite fast, don’t they? I am gearing up for change, big change, and ‘solo-ing’ down (sort of like downsizing socially I guess) ready to take on a new chapter, although I am not sure what it will be. I know for sure, I want to get in shape, and do a lot of walking, for being displaces from wildfire,and Tiny House living, has made me so sedentary! I hope you’re enjoying your summer vacation with kids home! xx