Catching up since June
I've been busy. But, at last here is a little catch-up bunch of pictures to
say something about out recent activities.
Happenings around the yard
After returning from the "big road trip", I was greeted by an overgrown yard.
Somewhat bigger than typical (maybe not that much) was this
elderberry bush that was about three feet tall when we left. It's about
12 feet tall now. Then there is this flower that may have been planted,
but may be a weed from the bird seed, and we don't really know
what it is. Speaking of not knowing what it is, here's
another one. It is apparently an unusual hibiscus - it has deeply
variegated leaves with five lobes (not, it's not that!).
There is a variety of other life around the place, too. Here is a
bat that took up residence in our deck umbrella. We have some large
jack rabbits around (this is one in two different poses). We have a new
squirrel-proof birdfeeder (really!), and this
grosbeak hangs around it regularly. Then there was this
red widow spider that I captured in the small shed. Amelia thinks it is
fortunate that it was me instead of her that discovered this
small snake in the kitchen downstairs. Finally, we have some regulars that
come through the yard
eating almost everything in sight, but fortunately they haven't figured
out how to get over out eight foot fence around part of the yard.
Finally, I made a sign with our
street number on it for the driveway. I expect this will head off most of
the traffic on up the hill looking for us (but surely not all).
July Visitors
We had a number of visitors during July, mostly in connection with the
Beardsley wedding. Evan, Laura, Ian, and Fiona were the first to arrive.
Fiona is a big
fan of swinging, so she enjoyed going high in the big swing (but with
the "inside out tire seat" that is quite safe). Ian also
took a turn in it, while Fiona did some smaller swings in the other
bay. Here's a shot of a
couple of swingers. Dennis and Rita came up a few days later.
One day we went to Emigrant Lake and took our
pleasures with the water slide. Here come
Laura and Fiona. A bit later,
Evan and Ian have come down and are getting out of the pool. One of many
times down
Fiona hits the water. I finally got into the act, too, and here are
Fiona, Ian, and me in the pool after a slide. Back home, Fiona rode the
all-terrain tricyle on some fairly forgiving terrain. That's Dennis in the
background.
We all journeyed to Eugene for the wedding of
Mark and Darla. After a successful conclusion, here they come
down the aisle. The next morning some of the party met at a restaurant
for brunch. So big a party we had two tables - here's
table one, and
table two, or maybe I got that reversed. The empty chair is mine - yes, I
was there. The week after the wedding, Don and Becky came down for a few days,
but I seem to have laid up my camera for that period.
Wildflowers!
After all the excitement, Amelia and I decided to take a wildflower drive up
Mount Ashland and return on the backroads to Wagner Creek. On the way, we
had this nice view of
Mount Shasta. A little later on we looked south and saw this view of
Pilot's Knob. I took a couple of interesting shots of
dead trees, with
flowers in the foreground. The real prize, though, was the amazing
variety and beauty of the
wild flowers that were growing in great profusion (if this comes out really
small in your browser, you need to set it to not resize pictures to fit the
screen, or I guess I'll take pity on you, and you can click these shots in
turn:
one,
two,
three,
four,
five,
six,
seven,
eight,
nine,
ten). Finally, as we were coming down into Wagner Creek, I shot this
wonderful cloud picture.
Trips
Our friends, the Kings, returned home from their around-the-world trip (with
six month stopover in New Zealand) and stayed with us a couple of days while
they contemplated their final leg up the mountain and bought a
new car. Ten days or so later we went up to check on them and help them
celebrate their anniversary (45, they claim). If was a sad time for Amelia
when the
bottle went dry.
On the weekend of the 16th, we went down to Benicia to help Evan and Laura
do a small amount of kitchen remodeling and cabinet painting. I worked
(some) and Amelia helped out by keeping Ian and Fiona busy at a motel and
thereabouts. Dennis and Rita also put in a lot of time.
The kids had a great time doing
cannon balls, (almost missed
this one),
underwater summersaults, horsing around with
spaghetti, and generally having a
good time. An in-progress shot at the house
shows that the off-white cabinets really
lighten things up compared to the old brown color. The kitchen formerly
had cabinets and an exhaust fan above the range, center-right side of picture,
and removing all that (with downdraft exhaust to come) greatly opens up the
space between the kitchen and the rec room.
In and Around the Shop
I finally am getting to work on (and in) my woodshop-to-be. One of the first
things I did was to (finally) make a sign with our
street number for the driveway. Pretty good if I do say so myself. The
next project was getting some
railings beside the so-called steps down to the woodshop (over the big
shed, where the swings are). These will keep most folks from inadvertantly
falling hundreds of feet (OK, millimeters) to their instantaneous death.
Finally, I am enclosing about 200 square feet (about 1/4) of it for a little
hidey-hole for myself and things I like that aren't permitted in the house
(and so on). I'm in the process and these aren't really good pictures,
but here is in the "north end" with the
boookcases and a few studs, and another from the other direction later on
showing
more studs and the door. In the end it is planned that another 1/4 will
be storage (you can see storage items in both pictures), with the remainder
being used as a wood shop.
Guess that's all for now. I have some pictures pre-May that I want to get up
(just a few), so maybe I'll work on that next.