The Difference A Day Makes

The total rainfall for our county was officially twelve inches in the last twenty four hours.

You read that correct, twelve inches !!

Passing the local community park this morning, it looked more like a lake, than a park, not a patch of grass or walking trail in sight.

Isn't it peculiar, that just a few hours earlier the creeks resembled raging rivers, and now as daylight turns to dusk, they've once again regained composure and receded within their banks.

We're All Downstream

We've had rain....
The kind of non-stop gully-washing rain, that drenched the parched grass and flowers, and gave a respite to the Summer heat.

Non-stop rain.
In some nearby areas, up to ten inches has fallen since midnight last night.

So much rain.
They've canceled the County Fair events this evening....can you imagine ?

I puddle up the neighborhood
I make the postman mad
I wake the worm and spank the frog
Sleeping on his lily pad
And when the tulips in their beds
Nod happily, it's true,
I shake the petals of their hands
And say, How do you dew?

Here's My Handle, Here's My Spout

I'm not alone, when I say "I love teapots".
I've never met a teapot, I didn't like.
All shapes and sizes, earthenware, and fine bone china.

Some of my favorite teapots are considered collectors' teapots, "themed" from English landmarks, and famous characters. They are James Sadler teapots, and can be quite whimsical in nature.

James Sadler was founded in 1882, and is one of the leading manufacturers of teapots in the UK. It began with James Sadler, who built a factory in Burslem at the heart of the ceramic industry in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England. He went on to make a name for himself by making fine earthenware teapots.

I'm always on the look-out for a new teapot to add to the collection.

Guess Who's Been To Dinner ?

Around the garden, flowers are looking bedraggled, the excessive heat being the culprit.
Several of the old trees are already showing signs of an early Autumn, their leaves yellow and fading.

I've noticed a few of the bushes, their leaves becoming sparser and sparser, and then it became obvious why; not so much the heat, but our resident deer, chomping away merrily.......

Water Cooler Conversation

click to enlarge

"Poor indeed is the garden in which birds find no homes."

~ Abram L. Urban

The Little Home

The Little Home

The little house is not too small

To shelter friends who come to call.

Though low the roof and small its space

It holds the Lord's abounding grace,

And every simple room may be

Endowed with happy memory.

The little house, severely plain,

A wealth of beauty may contain.

Within it those who dwell may find

High faith which makes for peace of mind,

And that sweet understanding which

Can make the poorest cottage rich.

The little house can hold all things

From which the soul's contentment springs.

'Tis not too small for love to grow,

For all the joys that mortals know,

For mirth and song and that delight

Which make the humblest dwelling bright.

~Edgar A Guest

Cottage Dreams

I can see from the window a little brown house,
And the garden goes up to the top of the hill.
And the sun comes each day,
And slips down away
At the end of the garden an’ sleeps there . . . until
The daylight comes climbing up over the hill.

I do wish I lived in the little brown house,
Then at night I’d go up to the garden, an’ creep
Up . . . up . . . then I’d stop,
An’ lean over the top,
At the end of the garden, an’ so I could peep
And see what the sun looks like when it’s asleep.

Beauty In Flight

" We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever. "

~Carl Sagan

Shades of Blue

Searching For Shade

"Heat, ma'am! it was so dreadful here,
that I found there was nothing left for it but to take off my flesh and sit in my bones."

~ Sydney Smith, Lady Holland's Memoir

Cooling off with a walk through the woods.

Shady canopies.

"Whilst August yet wears her golden crown,

Ripening fields lush- bright with promise;

Summer waxes long, then wanes, quietly passing

Her fading green glory on to riotous Autumn."

~ Michelle L. Thieme, August's Crown

Gentle and airy Queen Anne's Lace.

Wild Blackberry Vines.

State wildflower, the Passion Flower.

Sunny squash blossom.