Lacy petals

 Hello all!

Monday August 17th and just about 2 weeks left until we go back to school on 1st September.  Enough about that!

I am happy today because I have finished and have submitted the final paper for the Textiles Material Science course I have been doing with the University of Borås in Sweden. It feels great to have pressed the 'Submit' button at last and to have one less thing on my list of Things to Do This Summer. 

I still have some written work to do on the Foundation Certificate of Achievement in Spinning, so you know, there is never a dull moment. 

The weather is overcast, still, warm and humid today. Grey skies, a soft drizzle and humidity of 70%! I have to say I got a bit of a shock there when I saw Relative Humidity of 70%. I rarely look at the humidity levels, but even I think that 70% is high, no?

We had some fine sunny days last week and I discovered that a small leaf-cutter bee has been utilising the petals of some flowers I have on the side deck. The petals had begun to look 'lacy' I thought, but I just presumed they were dying back or something. Then when I was sitting outside last week, I noticed a small bee carrying pieces of petal to a gap in the wood of our house wall. Then I watched her emerge and to my surprise she flew down to a bright yellow flower (Black-Eyed Susan) and cut an oval shaped piece from it, then flew back to the gap and in with her. 

As you can see from the photos, which were taken a few hours apart, she took pieces from the yellow flower first, then later on took pieces from the orange flower. 

Quite amazing to witness. I read later that she is a solitary bee, a leaf-cutter bee, and she uses the pieces of petal/leaf to make individual nests where she lays one egg. 

I hope to get a photo or video of here, but perhaps she is finished laying her eggs, or maybe the grey weather doesn't suit her. I live in hope!

August 5th 2020. D-Day minus 26.

Well people, it seems like a long time since I first started writing about lockdown and covid. I remember the freshness of those days on April when we were all walking along the country roads and getting out fix of fresh air and exercise 2km from home. 

All is well here thankfully. I am still trying to get my fix of fresh air and exercise along the road. I do notice though that there are far fewer people walking and cycling then there was back in April. I also notice the loud and quite constant hum of the traffic from the main road when I walk. And when I drive to town, the roads are almost as busy as they used to be. 

The seasons are beginning to turn a little again now. It is August, and still summer (even though in Ireland August is technically the first month of autumn). Still, one can see that the evenings are a little darker, a little earlier. It doesn't help that we have had so much rain for the past week on and off. Last Wednesday in Kenmare, Co Kerry, the town square was flooded and some shops lost lots of stock and shop fittings. Some days you would think the calendar had just gone straight to October. 

On the bright side, we are going to have some warm days in the coming week, I hope they might even be dry and not humid and rainy. Definition of winter in Ireland: cold and wet. 

Definition of summer in Ireland: mild and wet. 

Nevertheless, one has to get out and enjoy the days the best we can. 

All too soon it will be time to go back to school. That is what I mean by 'D-Day minus 26' in the blog title today. 26 days until I have to go back to school on 1st of September. My son might go back the previous week. My daughters will go back on 28th September. 

I am going to enjoy the days I have now without alarm clocks and deadlines. 

I hope all reading this are well.