Day 342 - Noisemakers

*sigh* Well, my nice cozy sleep was most unceremoniously interrupted this AM by these guys and their obnoxiously loud JACKHAMMER!! Ugh! I know I should be (and really, I am) grateful that we have people like this who are willing to brave frigid early Sunday mornings to repair broken water mains, and I'm beyond grateful that it didn't affect OUR water, but still... a terribly rude awakening from a perfectly sound slumber!!

Day 339 - From pumpkins to pinecones...

... and gourds to greenery, we're well into decorating for the season. For this joint project, I conceived and supervised while Lew implemented. ;)

Day 337 - Piece work

Pieces of a decoration my ever-so talented hubby is putting together for outside.

Day 333 - Outdoor decor

Time to replace our fall Indian corn, gourds and pumpkins with some winter greenery, pinecones, and... I dunno, maybe berries. This bag of pinecones will get us started.

Day 329 - Still going strong

Amazingly, my birthday bonsai is still blooming in November! Must be doing something right. :)

Day 281 - Basket o' gourds

More orange color spills out from a fall basket decoration on the porch bench.

Day 277 - Matching set

Oh joy! We were so pleased with the bench we got last year, that we decided to get some matching pieces -- a small table and another, slightly shorter (3 ft instead of 4 ft) bench. They came yesterday so Lew spent this afternoon sanding the rough spots and putting them together. Tomorrow he'll put the water seal on and they'll be good to go.

Day 273 - Wind blown

So I walk into the dining room this morning and this leaf sticking to the outside of the window caught my eye. Cool beans, I thought -- there's my "leaves" picture of the day. On closer examination, I could see that it was actually stuck in a spider web (which explained all that gross, uhmmm... bug stuff... on my nice clean window. Ewww!)

Day 272 - Can you stand another deer pic??

Y'all are going to get sick to death of deer photos, but they finally figured out the obvious so I had to record it. I took them from our bedroom window, so they're not that great, but they're the only ones I took today.

Anyway, while the fence between our yard and the field, rusty, rickety and falling apart as it is, still provides a bit of barrier, my next door neighbor took down some of the fence in his yard so he could tackle the weeds more easily. So, there's a large gap in the fence that's been there for a couple of years. Today these younguns finally figured out they could get to that nice green grass on the other side by just bounding into his backyard... which they could have done ages ago!

If you look closely, you can see red things lying on the ground. My neighbor has an apple tree, but apparently they could care less about the juicy, tender apples and preferred munching on the surrounding vegetation instead.

See Lew's Other Pics for a few more shots.

Day 261 - Body Armored

So I'm sitting at the computer, minding my own business, when all of a sudden I hear this "thunk" against the patio door. Thinking it might have been one of my hummers, I went over to take a look-see and saw this laaarge... as in big!... grasshopper. Seriously, the thing was at least 2 inches long, if not more.

Relatively speaking, probably not really all that big, I guess. I'm just used to the little inch-long jumpers hopping out of my way when I walk across the lawn. This dude could've made me seek cover!

Day 259 - Decisions, decisions

So I was messing around with a couple of shells for this week's big theme (the larger shell is about 6" across -- big!) and took them outside for better light. Then, I couldn't decide which photo I wanted to use ...

the one on the the bench showing the insides...

or the one on the deck showing the outsides...

or maybe the one with the leaves and acorns showing... well, I didn't know what it showed, I just stuck the leaves and acorns in there because they were there. Then I thought, whoa! A perfect metaphor for seasonal transition... from summer seashells to autumn leaves and acorns.

I get all artsy fartsy sometimes! ;)

Day 247 - Bonsai bloom

Keeping a close eye on it for the past two weeks, I was rewarded today when the one bud that's been showing color finally bloomed. It's not the perkiest flower, it actually looks a little peaked, but I'm just pleased I haven't killed the thing!

Day 242 - "One bad apple...

...don't spoil the whole bunch, girl"*

*Lyrics from the 1971 hit tune by the Osmonds.

Day 234 - Birthday Bonsai

My son and daughter-in-law sent me the cutest little bonsai azalea for my birthday. It has lots of teensy little buds so it'll be interesting to see what it does since blooming season has passed. It's an outdoor type that's supposed to be able live in the same conditions as a normal azalea, but I don't know. At the moment it's sitting on the patio where I can keep a sharp eye on it.

I've never taken care of a bonsai, so I sure hope I don't murder its delicate little self!!

Day 195 - Stormy weather

On an otherwise pleasant and sunny day, the skies suddenly turned dark and ominous and that humongous black cloud mass proceeded to empty itself of its load of water. We lost power instantaneously but rain in July is always welcome - it's good for the grass. ;)

Day 192 - Baby bug

Out in the back yard to take a picture for another project, I came across this little critter crawling up the door frame as I was about to come in. It's a baby, only about 3/4" long, and only hung around long enough for me to get one macro close-up before it disappeared while I was trying to focus for a closer shot. I musta skeered it. :)

Day 182 - Free as a bird

There really is a bird in this photo!

Nothing says freedom like a grandly soaring hawk. I was only able to get one shot of this one looking for something to eat in the wheat field before it disappeared. It's not the best shot, and I actually thought I'd missed it, but when I looked at it on the computer, there it was. It's a little hard to see against the green in the first photo, but I cropped it a good bit to give a better view in the second.

Day 172 - Wildlife visitor

(taken with Lew's Nikon D40X SLR)

Looky who came to visit us today! I almost fell out of my chair! Having lived here for over thirty years, I've seen my share of deer... out in the farmer's field. Once recently, in the darkest of night, a slew of them came up to the fence, but this is the first time I've ever seen one this close in daylight. I was astounded! Isn't she a beaut?

Actually, she was a little thin - we could see her ribs - which probably explains why she came so close to civilization. Had it not been for what's left of the fence, she probably would have been in the yard, munching on my azaleas!

(taken with my Nikon Coolpix 4800 point & shoot.)

She moseyed along the fence in one direction, then turned around and walked back, stopping to feed along the way. Here, I caught her in mid-munch. I have another shot of her with leaves in her mouth, but I'll be posting it on my regular blog for Camera Critters on Sunday. Both of these were taken from inside the house. (I just love my camera!)

Day 168 - Cool change

This week's hot theme would have worked perfectly last week when we were frying, but as you can see, hot just wasn't happening here today. I'm not sure our temps even went much over 80. Not that I'm complaining, mind you... I just wish I could bottle some of our cool and send it on out to my AZ pals for some relief from their 108 degrees! *gasp!*

Day 160 - Blue skies, smiling at me...

Ugh! It was blistering hot again today - 97 degrees in June! - so needless to say, I didn't stray far from the AC. I poked my nose out the patio door long enough to take a picture.

Usually when we have this kind of brutal heat, there's not a cloud to be seen and the skies are a hazy white-hot. When I looked up today, I saw these uncharacteristic puffy white clouds and a bright blue sky... and I enjoyed them.