What a beautiful day

This first photo is just goes to show that Mother Nature will win. If you look closely you can see that all this new growth is on a tall stump that the loggers left behind in the spring. I love it, it gives me hope every time I look at it. I know it is silly but it gives me hope for the whole world.




Yesterday was wonderful. I finished my last test for the semester in the morning (I get a little more than a month off school now) then my sweet Hubby took me out for lunch at a new British Restaurant in town. It was great. The decoration is
just right. It really felt like a British Pub. We will go back. I, of
course took several photos. Guess I will have to do a scrapbook
page on that too.

When we went for our walk, the sky was overcast and there was a lovely breeze. The temp was perfect and the bugs mostly left us alone.

This beautiful creature came to visit the other day. I took the first photo through the screen door, just in case. Then with the aid of my Hubby (he held the door quietly) I managed to sneak out on to the porch and get more photos with the built in
telephoto. This little camera of mine is amazing. These photos
were taken from quite a ways away. I see deer often on the way
to and from work.

I love them. I also acknowledge the fact that they need to be hunted. They are very prolific here and the climate is good to them. If the hunters don't take some for food, there will not be enough natural forage for them. My heart hurts to think of shooting them harm, but starving slowly to death isn't nice
either. Thank goodness I don't have to be the one with the gun.
I prefer to do my shooting with the camera, what do you think?

My Hubby is preparing to repaint the railings. This little guy came by to visit. I got the first photo, then I startled him. I waited a minute and when he peaked over the side, he was so cute I couldn't resist.

Breakfast is almost ready, the berries were lovely and my sweet Husband seems to think I am not spoiled enough already. So this is what I am looking forward to.

The last photo, is called Spontaneous relaxation. Spontaneous is this sweet kitty's name and she is better at relaxing than anyone else I have ever met. Have a great week.

Sound Track

This lovely old Elm tree stands just outside my back door. It wears a necklace of poison ivy. Since there are no small children here and the rest of us have enough sense not to touch it, we leave her decoration to Mother Nature. I am not sure what niche in the ecology is filled by Poison Ivy, but it is beautiful. Just looking at this picture makes me think of the old lullaby, "Rock a bye baby".

I enjoy a wide variety of music and my life certainly has it's own soundtrack. If I don't wake up in the morning with a song in my head, I usually have one before I finish breakfast. Don't get me wrong, I don't spend my days spontaneously bursting in to song like an old Doris Day movie. (Although I do enjoy watching old musicals, Doris Day, Bing Crosby, Ginger Rogers & Fred Estair, Oklahoma) I rarely sing out loud. I just hear the music.

My Husband will sing out whenever he gets the
mood. He has a great sense of humor so he often

"warps" the songs just a little. The song "Let it snow", became "Let's go home", on a lovely winter day when he was working and wanted to go play.

When I listen to a lot of music, my overall mood improves. We are listening to a collection of Sea Shanties right now, (I think that is what they are called?) When we were putting primer up on the wall for "the project" we listened to a double CD of music from the old "Dr. Dimento" Show and Duran Duran's greatest hits. I currently have Loreena McKennet's "An Ancient Muse" in my pickup's CD player. I have music by Blackmore's Night, Dead

Can Dance, Steelye Span and The Beatles in the

pickup waiting to play. My Ipod is full of pod casts

from "Thistle Pod","Marc Gunn's Celtic Podcast" and other Folk music.

Are you starting to see a theme here? I will sing out in crowds. (but only when they are also singing) I like the sound of my voice blending with others. I am also quite capable of dancing to the music, anytime, anywhere, even if no one else can hear it.

What is on your soundtrack?

One day early

I am posting one day early as I am scheduled to work tomorrow. I don't usually work weekends but I don't mind. It is Saturday and we were surrounded by fog this morning. very atmospheric. The temperature was lovely too. I didn't even look at the thermometer. I took today's first photo from the steps to my back door. The building is an old summer kitchen.

We went for a short walk before breakfast. We had some mail that needed to go in the box. I took my camera and on the way back I got the pictures of the mushrooms and the choke cherries. I have no idea what kind of mushrooms those are but they are quite pretty with the dew drops.
The choke cherries are another matter entirely. I
remember picking and eating them up in what I
believe was Ogden Canyon as a child. I am originally
from Ogden Utah. We went choke cherry picking with some of my parent's friends and I remember Frankie telling me I was going to have a belly ache if I didn't start putting more in the bucket and less in me. I must have been about 5 at the time. I remember it was a pretty day and that I liked the fruit, but I don't remember if I ever got that belly ache.

I was thrilled when we discovered we had wild choke cherries here. That is until I discovered that they like to grow high up in the tree
and we can't reach them.....
Oh well, the birds are happy and when they are happy, they sing. We get a chorus almost all day long.

The screens on my front windows, well most of my windows, are old. I like the view from them
and how the screen shows as part of the pattern. It all adds up as part of why I love to live here. The other day this moth stopped by to visit and I of course, had my camera in reach. I initially wanted to
see how good of a close up I could get of the moth through the screen. When I looked through the lens, I saw this and decided it was what I wanted.
This old place charms me in a new way nearly every day. (Kind of like my husband. He has been charming me for more than half my life.)

The strawberry pancakes are another example of how much my husband spoils me. This was breakfast a few Sunday's ago. They taste even better than they look. I am quite lucky.
He is my love and my best friend. We have done a lot together and are planning on doing a lot more.
We both want to travel as much as possible before we get much older and we enjoy our home together. He is my biggest fan and always cheers me on. With that note, I think I will go see what he is up to. See you next week.

Another Sunday morning in our woods

It's a lovely day here in the woods. My husband and I took our first Cuppa out on the porch. It rained earlier this morning and everything sparkles. Can't take photos as my camera is charging. Sometimes it is nice just to enjoy without trying to capture it on film. (OK, so it is digital and it doesn't use film, how would you say it? Capture it on memory card just doesn't sound quite the same.) Anyway, we listened to the frogs, the birds and our wild bees. It is so peaceful.
The first picture today is of the stream on the far end of our road. It is the destination when we walk in that direction. There are tiny fish in it almost year round. There is enough water in it right now to sound lovely but we could sure use more rain. The walk is just over a mile in each direction and the view changes just a little each day.
Nature is always busy out here, one of the reasons I love it. This next flower is growing down by our mailbox. There are several of them and they are on stems that are about 2 to 3 feet tall. As usual, I have no idea what they are. I just like them. They will probably be gone in a few days and something else will come up.
I think the red bird is a small cardinal. We see them often, the males have crests and are shaped just like cardinals, but they are about the size of a parakeet. They are very fast and a bit camera shy. I have been trying to get a photo of one for quite a while. I took this one the other day on our walk. I took 3 or 4, but this is the only one he show up in. Persistence!
I also attempted to take a picture of our bees going into the base of the column. No luck, my husband tried, better, but not quite what I wanted. The bees, like the
little birds, are just too fast. I will keep trying because they are such a part of summer here.
Our home grown tomatoes are starting to ripen. They have the best flavor. We have two different types, one bush of cherry tomatoes and one of Tommytoes. The Tommytoes are, I believe, an old fashioned variety. They are larger than the others and full of flavor. The only other food plant we are growing right now is my rosemary. We don't use a lot of rosemary but the plant is lovely and they get quite large here. Lander University has several on campus that are waist height and 3-4 feet around.
Our sweet kitty just jumped up on my lap and started to purr. Guess I will have to type with one hand for a minute. She is very affectionate and silly. She was laying in the bathroom sink waiting for me to get up this
morning so she could have a "sink drink". She will drink from her bowl, but she loves to drink water from the tap.
She jumped down, it is a little warm. Now she is laying on her back with her paws in the air. SILLY!