Some recreational photos from the past week or so.
A bit under the weather, again today, and sleepy. The blue wild flax petals fall around Noon or before. Just one new one when I went out, half an hour ago. Going to reheat last night’s supper for lunch, I think, and then take a nap or read a book.
The week has been too warm and too humid, with attending off-and-on rain showers. I’ve turned the desktop computer on (but not the printer) and will not unplug everything again until/unless there is a thunderstorm in the immediate area.
In the meanwhile, the puppies and I have gotten outside occasionally for short time periods to walk around and remember that we are mobile creatures, all of us. I am happy for the Tough camera that I bought (Olympus), which is droppable and waterproof. Yes, the wet is that wet.
The Scampers and I leave tracks from the back step into the living room until the sun’s been out long enough to dry the grass in the back yard.
Things are … scattered at this point, disorganized and relatively low key, but comfortable.
Here are some of the photographs from the last time that the Scampers and I went outside. Not that long ago.
endless, is time, as
grains of sand upon the beach
footsteps side by side
Copyright © 2016-06-09, by E. W. Bennefeld.
The insects were busy long before some of the flowers in the wildflower garden were open for business.
In order to put off Sunday evening’s dishwashing, I have taken a lot of photographs, this morning.
The reports of the Nile Virus on the news broadcasts sounded daunting. Since I can’t use insect repellents or insecticides, I may be spending more time indoors than I had planned on, timing my gardening around pest-free conditions. I expect that may involve being out on a breezy, dry day in long skirts/long-sleeve shirt and work gloves. I still have to improve the soil along the front and sides of the house, where nothing grows, now, but for the tulips in the spring. I’ve the “aged” used coffee grounds and the peat moss. I have only to dig out half a foot of soil all the way around (in sections), mix the barren dirt with the additives, and smooth it out, again. Then I can water the soil and tamp down the seeds. I’ve only the annual flax seeds, and only two ounces of those, and so I may have to order more for summer and autumn blooming.
The new garden is in shade more than I’d planned on, by the backyard fence. It catches tree and house shadows before 9:00 a.m. and late in the afternoon until dark. So, I must pick wildflower mixtures next year that fit better with that.
The Scampers mostly do not come immediately in answer their names, but when they hear the call “Scampers!” there’s a rush and the sound of galloping feet. They know, when they hear that call, that something important is about to happen. (Treats, a ride in the car, a meal, or to stay home and take care of the house, which involves a special treat beforehand and a reward when we return home.)
The Scampers turned one, last December, and they’re growing, energetic, and happy. Mostly. The beginning of summer’s heat is dragging them down, already. 80°F isn’t hot, but the 45% humidity doesn’t help things.
One of the Scampers’ favorite things is to chase the neighborhood bunnies. It’s fortunate that there are so many ways out of the back yard, since the Scampers are learning to hunt as a team. If they’re anything like our previous dogs, though, they wouldn’t know what to do with a rabbit if they caught one.
Mostly, the Scampers are really good friends. They brighten our lives.
This post was written in response to the Daily Post prompt of 2 July 2017: Scamper. Without the Scampers knowing about it.
We’ve enjoyed a lot of rain showers, recently, which helped with keeping the flowerbeds watered, and also the grass seed that Al has added to the tracks made by the trucks and related equipment during the renovations the summer before last and the preparations for the wood-working shop that’s currently underway.
The rabbits are spending a lot of time in my wildflower garden before we get up, mornings. The Scampers enjoy the frantic races, first thing. Gives them an appetite for breakfast. I’ve increased the amount of food I give them, because they were losing weight.
This morning we got up early, so that I could have lab work done prior to my appointment this coming Wednesday. Just got a notice that the rest of the test results are waiting for me online. Suppose I should check those out. The new A1C and other misc. stuff are at The Art of Disorder.
Best wishes for the coming week!
Woke up around nine o’clock, this morning, and have been behind in things since then. I see that the next pot of coffee’s finished brewing. About time for another break, I think!
I hope that this is a hopeful day, wherever you are.
There was far too much wind, today, for Al to continue the shingling, and so he put together the framing for the interior wall of the workshop. I helped raise it, and we figured out where we want the wall positioned (how large each room should be) and where the door should be situated. He’s off, now, looking at door frames.
This has been, I now realize, a tough week for me. Internal adjustments, the most profound of which is becoming aware that I really do not have to take my mobile phone with me as I move around the house and yard. There will be no more telephone calls from hospice, hospital, care or independent living centers concerning decisions to be made about my parents. My siblings all have spouses and in-laws to respond. Their children are grown and are themselves having children. Even when/if something happens to my husband, I have a whole raft of in-laws and siblings, nieces and nephews to call upon. Who have demonstrated their willingness and ability to handle things.
Does that leave me alone, here, to grieve about one more thing? Or do I accept being cherished by those who know and love me? There is not another, comparable burden to pick up.
What brought this on? I woke up, this morning, with no thoughts about what must be done, but instead set about a normal routine that included putting on coffee to brew, feeding and guiding the puppies, deciding not to eat breakfast, washing last night’s dishes, and wandering out into the back yard to catch up on what Al was doing. I had not put my phone by my bed, last night, and this morning I plugged it in to recharge and left it in my sitting room. Didn’t think about it. Sometime during the week I set my phone to “Do Not Disturb”, and it’s still there. And I can leave it like that.
I took the camera outside with me and took some photographs. The blue flowers in the upper right corner. I am wondering what they are. At first I thought perhaps a variety of oxalis, but the leaves don’t look right.
We’ve another bird nest above the motion detector light. Sparrows have moved in again, after the first nest disintegrated in the winds, wet and late snow of this dampish spring. I hope that this nest holds together.
In lieu of wildflowers, which are only now beginning to grow in the new wildflower garden, I’ve taken photos of the chives by the back step. I enjoy having them just outside the back door, handy for cutting. I like them in soups, salads and scrambled eggs. I do still need to find good recipes for low-calorie/low carbohydrate/gluten-free soup. I will make it through the summer, but nothing’s better than a tasty clear soup in the wintertime.
I have, while pulling what dandelion plants I can reach out of the wildflower garden, noticed three new plants that appear to be flax. I am looking forward to wild flax in order to take photographs, again, and I’ve been worried that they won’t “take” in the new spot. I am not sure what the sun exposure will be, since we didn’t pick the plot (50 sq. ft.) until late in the summer or early autumn. Too, the willow tree across the back fence has dropped some larger branches, and we had to remove one of the four stands of cotoneaster bushes, those closest to the back fence on the southwest end of the yard.
There was precipitation, this morning, but the afternoon winds have dried the grass enough for Al to mow the yard. He’s finished the front and sides, and is now working on the back. Before that, he cleared out the project-in-process enough that he can build the interior wall when it’s too wet for shingling. Looks like tomorrow will include shingling.
In the meanwhile, I also took pictures of the peony leaves. The new plants, erupting from the middle of the plot we staked out (to protect them, early and now emerging, from the lawnmower), had raindrops on their leaves. I love the colors of them when they are youngish.
I am going through stacks of books and papers that have accumulated beside my chair since my father died. Time to start putting things back into order, again. Since inheriting, after giving away my set to a nephew and his family, the family’s Great Books of the Western World, along with copies of all of the Great Ideas Today yearbooks (with duplicates for the years when both I and my parents were buying them), I am once again short of shelf space. I do not know what I would have done if I hadn’t given away/thrown out over five hundred hardcover/paperback books with last year’s Spring Clean-up Week discards.
Nonetheless, I will keep at this thing. Neither of us wants to go into older age with closets or cardboard boxes to go through when it actually will be too much work, rather than now, when it just feels like it is. I have new artwork to put on the walls, however, when I get to the framer’s. I look forward to that.
