~ a view of the porch this morning...

...late summer loveliness.  This is where we sit before the craziness of the day begins.



Ozzy's favorite place to sit before the craziness of the day begins. :-)

The flowers in the hanging pots have been changed from petunias to chrysanthemums, and, the blue morning glories on the porch are blooming...sigh...summer is coming to an end.

~ the fore of us...

...playing miniature golf in Flemington :-)

~ happy sunday...

Just popping in to say hello :-)  We are up to our ears in half finished projects -- and I'm not finding the "beauty shot" in any of them.  Maybe I will find it during the week.

I can't write a post without sharing a photo, so here is a pretty, late August afternoon view of that Shady Corner Spot post that I shared way back in April.



Hope you're having a lovely day :-)

~ the plastic fish saga continues...

After working up a sweat in the yard, I thought about jumping in the pool.  Since the weather has been a bit cool, I walked over to check the water thermometer and saw Ozzy's plastic fish tangled in the cord.



Then this guy popped out...




                             !!!  DON'T TELL OZZY  !!!

{The first photo is Nicholas taking a photo of the spider with his ipad -- he really needs to clean that screen!)

~ yes, it's a plastic fish...

This plastic fish floats around in our swimming pool every summer.  This year, Ozzy has decided that this fish belongs to him.  He bends over the side of the pool and retrieves it every time we take him outside.  We are trying to teach him to voluntarily put it back in the pool before he goes back in the house, but, so far we have been unsuccessful.

sigh... ;-)

~ morning stretch...

focus...
breathe...


focus...
breath...



now, let's take a look at your technique...



Update:  If you are viewing this on your ipad, the video may not appear.  To correct this problem, you can view the video with this link: Sofia's technique


Ta da! :-)

~ sunflower update...

I was waiting for the sunflowers to fully open before giving this update.  However, as Nicholas and I were floating around in the pool I thought that it might be a good time to snap a photo -- just in case -- because of the possibility for thunderstorms this afternoon.




As I expected, the sunflower on the left is the tallest...once again.  The sunflowers this year are not so spectacular.  Most of our plants this summer seem to be that way -- except for those strange marigolds in the large pot.  Have you ever seen long stemmed marigolds?  These are Rick's "experiment".  Do you think he's invented something new?  hee...hee... ;-)

~ vintage photo Saturday...

Photo of my father, wearing his summertime loafers.  He only wore them after he had finished working for the day and bathed -- and then he put on some Old Spice cologne...  My grandmother is sitting on his knee -- and even though she looks a bit serious in this photo, she probably giggled after it was taken. :-)




You can click on the photo to take you over to my flickr stream where you can learn a little bit more about it.

This hot and humid close enough to summertime weather puts me in a vintagey mood.  You know, the kind of mood where you want to sit outside on the porch, drink a cool glass of lemonade, and have a light hearted chat with someone...

I'm off to do just that :-)