Flowers and crocheting and yarn

My father's birthday is tomorrow. I went up to the farm today to see my parents and have an early-birthday/belated-father's-day celebration. We went out for BBQ at a place where the owners know my parents by name. (They holler out from the front counter when your order is ready--and they didn't have to ask what name to holler.)

I took lots of pictures of my mother's flowers on the back deck.



(The flowers are purple--not blue. The camera isn't good with purple. And the unusual flower in the lower picture is an African daisy. Or--so says my father. But when I Google "African Daisy" I don't get anything that looks like this.)

While I was there, we had some bird visitors:



(There are more Cardinal photos--plus a Wren and a Chickadee--and lots more flower photos on Flickr.)

The family is planning a 4th of July get-together at my parents', and I actually managed to get off work on that day. (The manager often gives me Friday off--and the 4th falls on Friday.) I'm planning to take Sam and Jacey with me that day.


I finished a doily for a birthday swap with other helpers on the Ravelry site. The woman I'm swapping with likes purple, so I made a purple doily and got her purple yarn:



The camera got the purple totally wrong, so I've faked it in Corel Paintshop to approximate the actual thread color, which is pretty accurately indicated by that color chip. I swear, I'm going to take this camera and a skein of purple yarn to Best Buy (where I bought the camera) and tell them I want the camera to get that color right. The camera is so far off--in every light, with every background color and every camera setting--and it's ridiculous. (Really, those blue flowers up there should be about the color of the color chip. And the correct color doesn't even show in the window before you snap the photo; it's obvious it's going to be wrong.)