Saturday kicked off the first day of yardwaste recycling in North Bend for the season. It is free for residents and despite having a large yard for piling up my storm damage, I really do take advantage of it. If nothing else, it tends to be easier to load up my truck than drag everything into the woods.
Yardwaste day always makes me thinking of going to the dump as a kid. Except it smells better and there are not spiders on the garbage cans. My friend's son really gets a kick out of going to the dump too and she finds it so odd, but I totally get it. For some reason it is one of my enjoyable childhood memories too.
The sun came out Friday rendering me "functional" and greatly improving my relationship with Nim. I was able to take advantage of the weather to load my truck for the first run Saturday morning.
The Trillium are coming in. I always get a few in the same section of the yard. Trillium are apparently on the toxic list for dogs. Fortunately my dogs really only want to stomp on them.
Costco has been selling three pack of dog toys lately. I can't really trust Nim with fluff-filled toys anymore, but if I am watching him I let him have them.
Nim was perfectly content to run the yard all day. He also doesn't try to sneak out the gate while I am loading the truck.
Saturday morning it was time to head out to the recycling facility.
Rusty doesn't get a lot of opportunity, but he really has become quite the truck dog. My jeep was in the shop again recently and Rusty really thought he was top dog tootling around town with me out of his crate.
He has come far for a dog that was super anxious in the car when I first got him.
He is always a great companion for this errand. While being an easy dog to love, Rusty is often a hard dog to like, so I really value the things we do together that really bring out the best in his personality. Rusty likes routine and simplicity. He likes things to happen in his preferred order and at his comfort level.
At the North Bend facility, the people watching for Rusty is fantastic.
When we got back from our first load (I did three on Saturday), I let him explore the yard while I started gathering piles again. For him, the movement of the piles is like a brand new yard for exploring.
On Wednesday I decided to check out my sister's evening glass blowing glass at Redmond School of Glass. In the above photo she is just at the start of her project. A small amount of glass is put on the end of a stick that is hallow so it can be blown into.
These benches are set up so that you can roll the bar back and forth while you shape the glass. A person can crouch at the end of the pole to blow into it as needed to expand the project.
During the process the project is expanded by either blowing in the pipe and by adding small amounts of molten glass.
Now the shaping is occurring using damp newspaper. During this process you are always continuing to roll the project to keep it symmetrical and keep gravity from pulling it lopsided.
Continuing to roll, and the project is expanding from blowing on the end of the pipe.
The scoring is in prep to transfer this project to another pipe.
Flattening the base of the project before transfer.
Still being flattened with a wood paddle.
The pipe being held to the base of the project also has molten glass. The project will be broken off at the score mark on the original pipe and then balanced on this new pipe.
Now that it is attached to the new pipe they will break it at the scoring line.
In the above photo the project is now on the new pipe which leaves the hole that was on the previous pipe for blowing air into now accessible to widen the project open.
Final shaping and smoothing with wet newspaper.
After a little more final smoothing the project is then taken off the pipe so it can sit until it is ready to go home.
