little place of mine

2011-04-09T12:40:00.000-07:00

It's been a year since I played around with this blog, and I was struck by how much my great granddaughter has grown....some of her baby pix run down the right hand side of the blog....I'll have to add some current ones.

Here's What I Read

Watermark by Vanitha Sankaran A novel of the middle ages....interesting in the way people lived...touches of the Inquisition. The father in the story is a papermaker in the days when paper was considered, maybe not an evil exactly, but certainly un-necessary.

The Worst Hard Times by Timothy Egan...non-fiction...about the dust storms of the '30s. Unlike Steinbeck's book centered in Oklahoma, this is more to the heart of where these storms did their worst...the Texas area. The devestation was so horrific it's hard to believe I hadn't heard about it before. I started skimming toward the end...enuf is enuf...but the beginning was fascinating.

The duo...The Glass Castle and Half Broke Horses, both by Jeannette Walls Bios of her family....and what a family! Guarnteed to keep you reading.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot non-fiction...gives you something to think about....the ethics of what's yours and what's not. Almost positive you'll learn something you didn't know.

The Kings of the Earth by Jon Clinch story of up state New York....poor, bleak hardluck farm with three bachelor brothers....good reading

Little Bee by Chris Cleeve story of a young Nigerian girl in danger of her life, escaping to London. Again, I learned things and that always makes it a good story for me.

2011-04-09T12:12:00.000-07:00

It's perfect spring weather...blue sky, puffy white clouds...cool breeze...sprinkles...no sprinkles...and lots of yellow flowers.

I started this blog two years ago...then took a year off last year....When I tuned in just now...(barely remembering its name) I discovered a written but unpublished post...the one just before this....can't imagine why I didn't publish it. I finished it up just now, adding a picture of the gray squirrel.

I can't stand killing spiders. I just hate breaking their delicate legs, but we both can't live in this house, and we pay the bills.

Some one sent me a list of cute things making the rounds on the internet. One of my favorites is

Dear Noah, We could have sworn you said the ark wasn't leaving until 6. Sincerely, Unicorns

Now doesn't that just break your heart?

2010-05-27T14:39:00.000-07:00

Kingdom: Animalia

Class: Mammalia

Order: Rodentia

Family: Sciuridae ....is that not the perfect name for a little squirrel?...scurri-day...well, close enough

walk out back of the dog kennels, down the wooded incline to the path....

make your way through the umkempt, overgrown woods to the tree where the turkeys roost....

turn left, make your way over and around the downed pine...through the marshy spot and on to the big sugar pines.

Look waaaaay up at the top of the one closest to the path and you'll see a large, loosely knit ball of sticks and brush ....looks about three foot across.

It's a gray squirrel nest....many years old. This one has a domed roof and is used to raise babies....although I've seen simpler stick platforms...probably not to raise babies in

When our rain pours down and the chill winds blow I like to think of the little scurri-days all curled up together in their roofted home lined with soft mosses and hair and lichen.

their nests are called dreys....I have no idea why...I'll have to look that up.

We have a scurry of these Western gray tree squirrels... I love to watch them. I've read they are the largest of the tree squrrels, and I think the prettiest....

Their tails are as long or longer than their bodies and banded white, black and gray. The tails on the largest and most furry are beautiful....the mamas use the hair to line their nests.

These squirrels are being displaced in California...our border state some other type of squirrel.....In Washington state grey squirrels are considered "threatened" and in Oregon, "sensitive".....I guess these are warnings on the continuum that leads to endangered.

We have dozens of them in our yard, scurrying around, busily getting food and burying it....chasing each other through the spring sun and the bright yellow forsythia.

2010-05-21T17:07:00.000-07:00

spring rainbow in southern oregon

taken by a friend and neighbor, a neighbor if you are a flying crow

FIRST 2010 PICTURES OF MY SPRING GARDEN

TA DAAA!

My new Allium

I want to try drying them for bouquets

yellow rose buds and pinks

new poppy buds with raindrops still on them

Bekka checking out the rhodie newcomer

hostas and pinecones

Sally

come on....let's go in...it's sprinkling again

I woke up with a headache that waxed and waned all day....along with the rain showers...I kept thinking if they would get in sync I would be able to dash out and check out the garden....but nope...ain't happening.
I'm spending too much money on my garden. This isn't something you're going to see on a garden tour....you're not even going to see it if you drive by because I live deep in the woods....You're not even going to see it if you are the occasional visitor unless you go to the back of the house and peer to your extreme right out of a window....so what on earth am I doing!
Not only that but I'm not a garden designer...so someday someone is going to buy this house and look at the garden area and say OMG and yank the whole thing out. But...for right now, it's mine and I love it like my new BFF.
It's the only exercise I keep at for more than two days. I do wish I had started gardening younger when my back was young and strong....I never know if I'm digging my last shovelful or not.
Right now I'm digging up a small plot to plant giant sunflowers and birdhouse gourds....I haven't even shook the seeds out yet but I'm anxious to post pix of the coming wonders.

**************************************************************
I had my 76th birthday this week. The marching song, 76 trombones leads the big parade has been flowing through my head all week....and that's how I feel...like 76 trombones leading a big parade....I feel as good on this birthday as I did bad on my 40th....

(what a waste of time to feel bad on your 40th....haha)

but as the old saying goes youth is wasted on the young
Speaking of sayings...this from my granddaughter.

"If a cop in Arizona says papers and I say scissors, do I win?"

2010-04-24T23:48:00.000-07:00

Just a Flutter By
colored pencil on hot press

blow down
The tree is more than twice as long what is shown....a long, tall pine
destroyed by the pine beetle infest killing our beautiful trees.
the two dead trees behind it were taken out as well
Our big Cband dish is showing...I loved to watch it slowly turn, scanning the infinite starry skies, looking for......

my soaps...haha
(It searched for aliens, too, in its spare time)

wild and windy today....Very often our weather is like coast weather....many clouds caught in the hills surrounding the town....sun and wind....we're really not far from the coast, if we were allowed to drive straight through the wilderness area instead of looping down through California.
I've been digging in my garden......and every spadeful turns over earthworms and snails. This wasn't always so.......When we first came here the soil had no humus and was hard as a rock....nothing would grow but trees...not even rhododendrons which thrive in the wild here in the NW. But, after years of spading in whatever mulch I used, the earthworms and snails moved in.
They say snails are a good sign and means the soil has plenty of calcium...it helps build their shells.
Yes, I like healthy snails to come out every morning and chomp on my plants. I can't put out snail bait because of the dogs.
But lately the dogs haven't been allowed in the garden because the blown down tree smashed so much of the fence.
We had the tree hauled away, along with 14 other dead pines, but the fence isn't dog proof yet.

2010-04-19T12:28:00.000-07:00

pencil sketch

Bekka

checking to see if the grass is ready to be mowed

if you like casual, we're ok

if you like spiffy, let me know when it's done...I'm busy drawing cats and googling on the side.

Why am I drawing cats? I'm just scratching an itch. I've given up thinking I'm going to do anything with my drawing...now I just indulge.

why am I googling? Well, just go look yourself up on Spokeo.com and be surprised at the most tell all "find a person" site yet...yikes....and yes, our house does have central heating no matter what you read.

Your wants subside as you grow older. I was surprised the other day when I made a list of new goals....The only thing I could think of was.

1. Don't fall again.

No more 1. Write a book. 2. illustrate a book. 3. Get skinny. 4. Be a brain surgeon.........Nope, no more of that pie in the sky fluff...just, dearlorddon't let me fall down again ever. I'm living the simple life now....

just trying to keep my toes turned up.

*****************

Who knew that pretty-in-the-fall burning red bush was going to take off growing like crazy in its fourth year, and shadow the yellow rose on one side and the blue veronica on the other.

Bekka knew....she told me not to move the veronica there....

"Don't move it! she yapped. "In exactly four years time that bush is going to take off like a running turkey."

Bekka is the real gardener...she can hear plants.....She cried....long low wimpers when they cut down our tree, and she laid for hours by the iris I stepped on.

But you know how it is when someone talks ALL the time....all the time yapping at me. Shut Up! I told her....go count your freckles and leave me the heck alone,

and I went right ahead and moved the veronica.

Now I have to move it again....oh, you should see the smirk on that retired, know-it-all-dusty old pointer....aaaggghhh

2010-03-21T14:26:00.000-07:00

decorating the woods

pencil on hot press watercolor paper

Spring is Bustin' Out All Over!

Garden time! and my writing juices are flowing right along with the waking buds. I bit the bullet and went on a wading foray into my little fishpond. I hate to ever do it because of damage I may cause but it has to be done at least once...maybe twice a year. I built up the rock sides that the nightly raccoon knocks down in his fishing ventures. I fished out a bucket of pine needles, oak leaves and algae. I trimmed the dead spikes of reeds and yanked out hands full of pond greenery to open up more spaces for the fish.

Lots of fish wintered over well...orange...black....and orange and black....love em!

I have a little less than a million snails and their eggs, and yards of frog eggs.

Then I went to the teeny pond and started fishing out the oak leaves when I noticed they were covered with snail eggs....oh drat....I destroyed them in the larger pond...all those poor little babies I threw away.....one can only hope the mamas laid eggs on the rocks, too.
I've been weeding and raking in the beds and was sure I was keeping up with things when all of a sudden, two days of sunshine caused an explosion of greenery.

Spring is like my granddaughter...far ahead of me....has more energy than I do..... younger than I am..... waaay cool....and pretty,too

2010-02-04T21:45:00.000-08:00

This is an amazing picture

(not taken by me)

A butterfly, early in the morning,

covered with dew.

Browsing through the library today, I bought a book of animal photography for $2 just to have this picture.

2010-01-30T14:43:00.000-08:00

Poppy Dreaming

water color for a note card

shadows are from scanner but I'm pretending I was clever enough to paint in shadows from surrounding flowers

I have two computers and they both crashed within days of each other...this cannot be!

My laptop's virus protection, (free Avast) downloaded it's latest definitions, rebooted and my laptop expired on the spot....the tech said the OS was destroyed...$120 to fix.

The PC was too slow...almost five minutes to boot up...tech said the hard drive was dying...(seven years old)...

Soooooo....money being paid out for opinions and tech help...and the decision must be made what to do.

You know where all the answers are, my friends...in cherry vanilla ice cream...bet you didn't know that...or maybe you did...

On another subject....continuing from the last post as a movie critic, I went to see Sherlock Holmes and left in the middle. As far as I could tell it was one long, loud bashing fight with a little dialog sprinkled in between bouts....and an implausible plot. On the other hand, my daughter and granddaughter liked it...... go figure. (It's been tested and proven that whatever movie my daughter likes, I don't go see...haha...the movie gene was lost in the crossing)

2010-01-27T03:55:00.000-08:00

can't sleep so will blog about Avatar, a science fiction movie set in 2154, which I saw earlier this evening.
I want all of my movies in 3D from now on, thank you. I'm being cheated for accepting less.
An avatar is a personification of an idea...and the people in Avatar, humanoids called the Na'vi, are the embodiment of our higher selves.....and they clash...go to war... with the worst of us...the military who go into foreign countries in real life and bomb the ecology and humanity to smithereens.
I want to be a Na'vi and ride a pteranadon, which they clumsily rename a Banshee.....a giant flying reptile from the dinosaur age. The setting is on Alpha Centauri's moon, Pandora, where the humans want to mine for unobtanium, a precious mineral.
The actors wore skull caps with little cameras in front taking pictures of their facial expressions, which were then digitally transferred to the digitally created characters.
In Avatar, a human's intelligence could be transferred to one of the Na'vi...so a few main characters bounced back and forth between being a human or being a Na'vi. Sigourney Weaver from Aliens played a main role.
I won't tell any more of the plot in case you are going to see the picture....the plot is secondary in a way...the magnificence of the movie is the special effects. Forget the 3D glasses of the 50's.....the audience actually gasped when it began and some things were right in front of your eyes....I thought I might reach out and grasp the little floating jellyfish.
I'm waiting for the industry to make a second screen to fit over the main movie screen so we don't have to wear glasses....and I'm waiting for all movies and tv to be in 3D.....and I'm waiting for humans to evolve into the Na'vi.

If you can dream it, it can be...(or did I just make that up?)

2009-12-19T21:14:00.000-08:00

hanging around, getting into mischief

The correct term for a flock is a "rafter" of turkeys

but a gobble of turkeys sound better
I step outside and at the first noise of the door, the wild turkey flock burst into gobbles. It is so instant that it seems automatic. The sound is one sound...every gobble at the same time. I stay quiet for a second and then gobble back. Again the loud gobble from the flock…it interests me how quick the response is so I keep playing the game until I tire of it….easily amused am I.
The only thing I can relate this response to is when you see a flock of birds wheeling in the sky…the turns they make are so together you wonder who the leaders are…the turkey gobble from the whole flock is that quick…..ok….enough I guess…it’s just fascinating how it works.
We are routinely having flocks of 40 to 50 birds gather by the garage door calling for Jack to come out and feed them. He’s really feeding the other birds but the turkeys get their fill too. Sometimes another flock waits on the slope above the driveway, as you see in the picture. There is a hierarchy…a pecking order and woe to the bird who steps out of line, or the flock who wants their share and dares to come too close.
We have far too many turkeys here. They were introduced to this area and have become a nuisance. I think the only enemies they have are the rare wandering dog and the raccoons and they can only hurt the eggs or very young poults.

The flock tear up the ground with their big strong feet…they pick at all the plants even though they don’t want to eat them. They pick my iris blossoms to death before they ever open, and scratch out any sedum I plant.
When we first moved here I liked to see them come around the house because I’d never seen wild turkeys before. I was surprised to see how well they fly, even the babies. At fourteen days the chicks have strong wing and tail feathers and fly up onto the fence around our back yard.

We have two hunting dogs inside the fence and each has caught a wild turkey a couple of times. There is a suspicious amount of large feathers laying out there right now.
Except for their ugly heads, they are beautiful birds…their feathers gleam in bronzes,blues,greens and rust.......shimmering colors like oil on water.

Benjamin Franklin wanted the wild turkey to be the nation’s bird instead of the eagle. In a letter to his daughter he trashed the eagle as a bird of low character while of the turkey he said, “a true original Native of America... He is besides, though a little vain & silly, a Bird of Courage, and would not hesitate to attack a Grenadier of the British Guards who should presume to invade his Farm Yard with a red Coat on."
I can’t imagine a turkey attacking. It’s taken years for me to get within ten feet of them without them running off.
Actually, the gobbler in all his courting glory would make a great patriotic picture because his head is bright red white and blue.

Old Glory

2009-11-25T14:24:00.000-08:00

Oregon Junco
watercolor on 140lb hotpress watercolor paper

Redwing Blackbird

watercolor on 140lb hotpress watercolor paper

I found a nest like this once, and wondered in awe how the little mother recognized the reeds that were close enough to use...and how she kept the first grasses in place as she started to weave...and do the fathers know how to weave?

The day before Thanksgiving 2009...and this year it means nothing to me. Relatives aren't around...I'm just over an illness....things are peaceful and that's the way it will be tomorrow...peaceful and turkeyless...by choice. I've had many a year of full sized dinners stuffed with relatives...and mostly my giving. The younger generation works full time and can't cook anyway...haha. I'm afraid if they gave a dinner it would be tv dinners.
My turkeys always had the stuffing inside...which doesn't seem to be the popular thing these days....might get sick or something. Also, turkeys are cooked breast down these days...and have been for a few years but not when I started. Then I heard two more new things, (to me)
The first was a cooking show discussion on the best roasting pan to have...They had four...a $200 one...a$100 one...an $80 one and a cheap one for $50...ahh me. I won't bore you with the discussion and which one won or why....In the beginning I used to use a blue and white speckled roaster that was closer to fifty cents than fifty dollars and the turkey was great. Later, I used just the broiler pan and the little V shaped holder that turkeys rest in. Worked great.
The second new thing discussed the fact that the white meat and the dark meat needed different cooking times...the white meat a lower temp...so the plan was to line a huge bowl with bags of ice and put the turkey in upside down so the breast meat was resting on the ice. Then they put a bag of ice into the turkey cavity and another into the neck cavity. They left the turkey cooling until the white meat was 36 degrees...Then into the oven...and the two types of meat were supposed to come out perfectly. Well.....a lotta trouble unless all this works makes you supremely happy.

Hope your Thanksgiving is/or was just the way you want it...ours will be.

2009-10-27T20:53:00.000-07:00

first pencil I could grab...paper out of printer... bird sketches.....
One of an Oregon junco...a little black headed, pink sided, seedeater that lives year round in large parts of Oregon...usually stays in flocks...happy little birdies...at least they make people happy to see them flitting around. I want to do a water color of the bottom sketch tomorrow for a card. I remember my first biology class in college...I was excited to be able to learn the names of all the little birds in my yard....then I discovered the teacher called them all dickey birds. I was flabbergasted...some education...haha.

This is all the art I did today...has not been a blue ribbon day. First, I didn't sleep a wink last night, so I couldn't make it to the computer club meeting this morning.....I guess the social committee went all out and it was decorated in Halloween splendor.....with lots of candy and goodies...dang. The 50/50 was the largest in months...almost 75 dollars which I'm sure I'd have won if I'd been there...haha.
Then Jack comes home from shopping at Costco and he had a $450 dollar ticket because his handicap parking ticket expired 4 days ago....yikes...He can appeal, but not in town. It was another county so he has to go there and only on certain days. In finding that out, he discovered his driving licence had expired too...we didn't get the heads up they usually mail out. Anyway, this time he has to have proof he's not a terrorist or alien so he digs out his birth certificate...which of course they won't accept. It's signed by everybody but the angels and has a huge gold seal of approval....but that's not good enough for them. Nor the fact that he's held a valid licence in this state for over fifty years.
So he contacts...or tries to contact the city and building where they are keeping something better for him....but got lost in the telephone maze when he had to start typing his name...backwards...Hentges, G, John using the key pad. He did learn it would cost $20 to get this copy even though I think no person will be involved....he didn't have anyone on the phone...just numbers. I think they'll accept all the info...then call up the copy from the basement...send it out via email, all electronically......and collect twenty bucks...I don't know....I'm going to do it for him tomorrow on the internet.
So, then I went down to the DMV to find out what I would need although I don't need to renew for five years. They didn't like my birth certificate either....that precious little piece of yellow paper with the seal and the signatures of my oh so young mother and father...the paper I've been guarding for over half a century...nope...ain't worth nuthin' lady. BUT...I have a passport so naah naah naah.
There's more but I'm tired of talking about it....I want to go back to the fifties thank you.....or back to bed might do, too.

2009-10-24T19:50:00.000-07:00

colored pencil on 140lb hotpress watercolor paper .

..couldn't get it all on scanner.
Billie Jean
Billie Jean is up for adoption but you have to go to Arkansas to get her.

3 overripe bananas means banana nut bread.
what's not good for you? eggs...bananas...milk...nuts...

I cut a slice into quarters because no one has ever been able to find any calories in such a tiny piece, so it's safe to eat.

come on over

2009-10-14T18:38:00.000-07:00

graphite on watercolor hotpress

Perfect day today. Did exactly what I wanted to while it drizzled outside. Messed around...watched my soaps...drew this horse....made a carrot and raisen salad, pea soup, and cornbread for dinner.

They tell you to learn when to quit on a drawing, but on a pencil drawing I don't want to quit. How simple my life would be if I'd rid myself of all my colored pencils and watercolors and simply worked with a pencil...it's my favorite.

I get so irritated with Blogger. So many times I can't access my blog to work on it. They throw me on a page to begin a new blog and they won't take my password. Don't ever ask them what your password is unless you're a whole lot smarter than the average bear. Finally after about the 15th time, using the same password, they let me in. Fie on them! A hex on them! May bleach splash on all their clothes tomorrow.

2009-10-14T10:53:00.000-07:00

colored pencil on lordyknowwhat

done many a year ago and never dated

This was done for a children's book I had in mind. Several...many postings ago I talked about some Canadian Geese I was privileged to help raise and I thought it would make a great story....I had tons of pix of the geese...and the story had a great beginning, middle, and end.

I did three illustrations and couldn't do any more.

I've always wanted to illustrate children's books and it was painful to finally realize I just didn't have the stick-to-it-iveness to do a big project. Well...sticking to it wasn't the problem...it was just total lack of interest...it just disappeared.

The babies' nest was ruined and the survivors hatched under a blackberry bush in the rain...after the eggs had rolled down a bank. This picture was to illustrate a bedraggled baby. I look at it now and want to get going on it again.

It's been at least ten years, and if I had finished only one picture a year I'd be almost done.

Like Gilda Radner said, "I base most of my fashion taste on what doesn't itch."..........hmm, naah, that doesn't fit.

How about when she said, "I'd much rather be a woman than a man. Woman get to wear cute clothes and be first rescued off a sinking ship."....nope...still not right.

How about, "Dreams are like paper, they tear so easily".

2009-10-13T22:13:00.000-07:00

graphite and colored pencil on Bristol
Charme
This is a Haflinger mare who lives with Gail at
http://gailatthefarm.blogspot.com/
Since she is a much loved pet who receives a lot of attention, and a horse I've never seen, I hope this drawing isn't too far off.

There are many horse stories from around the world telling when and where a certain group of people first saw these animals, and one of my favorites is about Egypt and the Hyksos.
Hyksos is just a name given these Asiatic people who seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. They swarmed over the hills and descended down on the quiet peaceful people living along the Nile. And the startling thing was they drove horses pulling chariots.
The Egyptians had never seen a chariot, a horse, nor the composite bow used to kill them. While ducking the arrows from this modern war bow, the survivors fell in love with the horses..... who wouldn't? .....(well, my husband wouldn't) and they eventually learned to handle both horse and chariot better than the Hyksos.
So, although the Hyksos stayed to rule the land for awhile, I think the Egyptians came out ahead.
I wish someone would write an historical novel about this period of time. The wonder and amazement of seeing their first horse ever...plus chariots, probably fastened the Egyptians to the sand, their mouths open in awe and wonder, making the invasion a slam dunk.
I'm guessing now....(I know more about the Hyksos than the historians do...haha.)

2009-10-09T14:45:00.000-07:00

colored pencil on hot press watercolor paper
Wanda
This drawing is really twice as big...includes another window and much more of the couch, but I couldn't stand to put down one more pencil stroke I was so sick of it. I should know by now I cannot do big pieces...I don't have the patience...already I'm thinking about the next drawing and my fingers are itching to get at it....and my mind has left this one. After a couple of things are done...like the face and the folds...and they turn out ok, then the rest is just work. You don't think Michelangelo painted the whole Sistine Chapel do you? ha! He finished up those pesky cherub eyes and the peons filled in the rest....(hang around for more history facts)

When I was fifteen I had a cat named Cinderella. A few days before Cindy was to have her first litter of kittens she began looking for a place to have them. I thought it was curious and interesting how she went about it.
She searched every nook and cranny for the best nesting place. If I opened a dresser drawer and turned my back she'd be up in it, rooting around. "Oh, no you don't", I'd tell her, putting her back down on the floor. But if my bedroom was where she wanted to be, so be it, and I put a box, with a bit of a blanket, near the dresser.
But off she bounced to investigate the yard... flowery corners or dark caves under bushes.....and I followed with the nursery box. There didn't seem to be any pattern to the places she scoped out. And I patiently...well, scratch that...not so patiently followed with my box.
One day I came home from school...no Cindy...and I knew she had finally had her babies....I looked everywhere.....ev ver ree where.
It was my mother who finally found her. Cindy had those babies in an open keg of nails out in the garage....right on the nails!
Mommy and babies were just fine. We transferred them to the back porch, but she moved them again back to the garage... not the keg.
Eventually I won, and she stayed on the back porch.
She definitely was not the sharpest nail in the keg.

2009-10-04T13:47:00.000-07:00

a gray day...rain is pattering in the bird bath, but my new yellow chrysanthemums are shining out like sun in the garden. A little red headed woodpecker is hanging upside down on the suet feeder filling his little gullet with fat for the cold weather. I'm home alone. I feel like making oatmeal cookies.
Nuts, raisens, cinnamon, cloves, eggs, brown sugar, rolled oats...what's not good for you?
Fun to make...too bad I have to throw them all out.
(You certainly weren't planning on eating them, were you Pat?)
Shall I eat
or shall I not
I knew the rules
But I forgot

2009-09-30T14:15:00.000-07:00

Joanie
colored pencil on Bristol Board

It's been a week since I've posted...I can't believe I can't chatter more than that.

Jack and I were at Costco many years ago and we wandered over to Pier One. I fell in love with this red plush throw and a matching pillow..doesn't exactly fit anywhere in my life, but it was perfect to put Joanie on for a drawing. (It doesn't really have tassels.)

Our fall is really here now and it's great! A little rain, a lot of sun...cooler weather...pumpkins, gourds, yellow leaves, dried corn stalks and WalMart full of Halloween. No store does holidays like WalMart. They are training people to not even bother to look elsewhere...they have it covered. Aisles full of little kids trying on costumes...shelves full of wonderful ghoulish things. I reached out to touch one item and a hand slapped mine...haha...I really jumped. I can't remember the item, it was last year, but I think it was some kind of candy dish guarded by a witch's hand.

2009-09-24T12:15:00.000-07:00

pencil on hot press watercolor

I don't think I've posted this picture before. I try not to post pictures of my great granddaughter, otherwise that's all this would be...her picture album.
Anyway, this is the first time she was placed on a saddle and I love her cowgirl grip...haha. Two crossed fingers. Obviously this child inherited no cowgirl genes....(or else she's destined to be a talented trick rider) Well, her mother warned me she would be raised as a city child.

I just got in from wading in my little fishpond, scooping out the pine needles, which are still falling so hard they were hitting me on the back as I worked....but, I couldn't wait any longer...pond was getting choked. These are the three prong, long Jeffrey pine needles which invariably get hooked on things...all the greenery in the pond....so it was a hand picking operation.

Jeffrey pine needles

I got my soil analysis back. Soil is too acid for most flowers...low in potassium...and lacking compost and fertilizer. But it's not that simple...flowers which shouldn't be blooming are, and visa versa...Good grief. I'm not going to start pouring good money into this plot of soil. This was supposed to be a fun little hobby. So, I'm going to plant only what grows well. If I really want a certain plant that doesn't like it here, I will plant it in a container with potting soil.

I would love to be spading in chicken or cow manure for compost but my dogs would dig every single plant up, sure there was a dead animal down there somewhere.

Decisions, decisions. Today is the first day I've said to myself, ok, I'll get a new knee. I had a left knee put in several years ago, but now I need a new right knee. I'm tired of walking in pain. I hate the idea of the risk of an operation and infection, death and worse, and also the painful therapy...but, I'll bite the bullet and do it. Just not yet...haha. The idea has to soak into every gene in my body.

2009-09-21T21:07:00.000-07:00

colored pencil on something or other
done two years ago when Bingo was a pup and didn't have the feathers he has today...He was in the middle of obedience training, thus the command to "Stay" as he tries to step out of the picture.

Bingo today

up on my soap box, or blog box, with a little ranting. A friend of mine was walking her little chihuahua, Bingo, down the sidewalk. They passed a young girl sitting in her yard with her arms around her pet pit bull. She released an arm to wave and the dog dashed to the sidewalk and grabbed Bingo. Much screaming from everyone...Bingo was rescued and seemed ok....but the next day was shivering and giving little yelps when touched, so off to the vet where they discovered two puncture wounds and much bruising.

Next day my friend walked down the opposite side of the street. The mother came out and crossed to talk to her, giving her the standard pit bull owner rhetoric..."She's never done that before...She's so sweet...I'm amazed she would do that...I just don't know what happened.....blah blah blah.
It's so irresponsible to have a pit bull, not leased or fenced, in a residential neighborhood with people..and kids..walking by....(aside from the fact it's against the law.)
I read just the other day, some dog lover saying, "There's no such think as a bad dog, just a bad owner." That is so not true.
Hunting dogs hunt without being trained...retrievers retrieve, shepherds herd, and fighting dogs attack other dogs, period. They are bred that way and can't be trusted.
Ok, got that off my chest.

2009-09-19T14:54:00.000-07:00

watercolor on 140 lb Arches

scribble picture..pen and charcoal on Bristol
looks much better enlarged, (click on it) while I, on the other hand would look much better made smaller....how nice if a double click would take care of that, too.

Got in a housekeeping mood today and did things you do only if it's spring, or you're pregnant....neither possible.

Am forced to read a Danielle Steele book today, and we are not amused.

Drug out my guitar today, dusted it off and am staring at it....do I really want to go through the pain of developing callouses on my tender fingers again? Maybe. It pleases me much to sit and strum and sing ballads to myself...If I lived in New Orleans, I'd sit on a corner and do that...so many people do, no one would notice another little old lady, and someone might actually toss a quarter into my shoe. What fun. All you need to know is G, C, D, E and A....and have a lot of nerve...haha. You should hear me belt out Love, Oh Love Oh Careless Love.....or not.

Better I should paint gerainiums on the guitar and forget about it.
Better still if I just go to bed and quit nattering on...ciao

2009-09-16T12:36:00.000-07:00

colored pencil on Bristol board

Lazing around in a recliner for a month, staring at the ceiling does not inspire blog writing..but I'm now getting interested in things again...feel chatty today.

I bought a new, violet, velvety neck pillow...one of those U shaped supports for your neck. It made me think of the little, seemingly inconsequential things that are super important to you.

I wish I had one of those things on my plane trip from hell. Three seats in a row at the windows, and I was in the middle. Huge plane...long, long flight....after hours and hours and hours the toilets were full...How could that be...aren't some things illegal? I thought they dumped that stuff over Iowa or some place....(to fertilize the corn...haha) I payed plenty for that trip...big modern jet...boy, was I naive. I got so bored and soooo tired. Couldn't walk to get my legs circulating...aisles were too narrow and too busy. Could Not sleep...shoulders pressing me on both sides...my poor head lolling back and forth. I really needed a velvet violet neck pillow then, or even a black scratchy one. And of course they lost my luggage. I'm not sure I've ever been on a flight that didn't...but then I don't fly often. I did learn to tuck a nightgown and tooth brush in my purse.

Second thing I never want to do without is my hot water tap. The first one I ever saw was my mom's. She went on and on about it....yeah, yeah, mom..(sweet old ladies love their instant tea) Well, I take that all back...I hope I never have to do without my instant hot water tap...a required tool of modern life.

I was going to say the third little thing I never wanted to do without was electric windows in a car, but I have been lately and life goes on...haha. Jack has the van but I chose a little white pickup...plain jane...no additives...and right now it has muddy raccoon prints going doing the windshield and I've been reluctant to wash them off....reminds me of living out remote instead of boring here. Of course boring is in the mind isn't it?...I should never say that again.I should go out and make myself like this boring old place...haha.

2009-08-31T13:34:00.000-07:00

Sweet Basil
colored pencil on Bristol board

Basil is all grown up now..he's my granddaughter's cat.

I started a watercolor demonstration here...autumn leaves scattered on the ground......it was fun...started out with the sketches, cut up all the leaf pix and taped them in various positions ...arrangingarranging...then the time consuming task of taking the pix...lighting wasn't good...and on and on...finally I ruined the actual watercolor.....well, I whiled away an afternoon...haha
My art room is downstairs...and when Jack asks me where I'm going I usually say, "downstairs to ruin a picture"

What I should have done is posted the whole thing and then showed a different picture at the end...that's how it goes a lot of the time anyway...but I wasn't amused at the time, and didn't come up with an amusing ending.

I tried to do it too fast...I was just reading PERPETUAL CHOCOHOLIC 's blog, where she is giving a lesson in colored pencils...drawing an apple...and she said it was too daunting to put the whole lesson on at once....should have read her blog first.

Now I'm going to do it backwards....have the final picture in my hand before I show how it came to be. That's what they tell you about writing too....have your ending before you begin...good advice for me...I can think up all the characters...all the situations...but never come to a conclusion....maddening.
Speaking of writing reminds me of when I was still in my twenties...I had a few articles published in magazines....one was of a neophyte trying to ride her too-much-horse-for-her article..(true story) .....Another was an article on breast feeding. It was back when the saying "Happiness is...." was popular and my article was called Happiness is a Fifth of Carnation...published in a Carnation milk publication....a house organ.
It was written in an article writing class I was taking at Clark College in Vancouver, WA. I had no idea what I was going to write. Your grade was based on you writing an article, and sending it in....if it was published, well you aced the course.
Week after week I listened to the teacher and couldn't come up with an idea...but a gal in the front row was bugging me to death. She went on and on about her article which would be on the benefits of breast feeding...how wonderful it was....how you couldn't consider anything else. Week after week she obnoxiously yammered about the poor children who were denied this treat...making it sound like they would wind up in reform school with rickets.
Well...my children weren't breast fed. It wasn't even talked about....I came out of the anesthetic already bound tightly, and I unquestioningly swallowed my meds which were drying up pills...(I was so innocent it's unbelievable)
But I figured my kids were as healthy as hers and finally I had had it with her....I was going to write an article on Not breast feeding.
I was really jazzed about it...and started researching....ha! Nothing out there to support my theory...well, almost nothing....so I shamelessly began dirty tricks. If a doctor had a quote saying, "Breast feeding is best for babies, but in the event that isn't possible, formulas are great."....I would dissect his quote and come up with, ".....formulas are great."
Oh my....I filled a whole article with this kind of writing...I had a lot of funny things in it, too....and it just flowed off my fingertips onto the typewriter keys. Sent it in....had it published...Carnation was only too glad. Not a lie in it...but oh, the fudging.
Miss Obnoxious in the writing class never wrote a single word.....she just talked the talk.......as a matter of fact I was the only one published.
What's the moral?...hmmm...
no morals in this story...haha....
or don't tick off Pat...
or better yet, don't believe anything you read.

2009-08-30T21:46:00.000-07:00

Holland Isla

I think my pilot light is out...my leg is healing from my fall but I don't want to do anything....and I don't want to do anything about not wanting to do anything...

2009-08-24T21:02:00.000-07:00

34.

pencil on Bristol Board
baby Blue Jay used to have a mother but after drawing her three times I told her to take a hike and I'd watch him myself.

Today's weather was just lovely...and my leg hurt a teeny bit less so I guess things are ok.

2009-08-21T20:21:00.000-07:00

33.
below is the art challenge from http://rosy-artblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/its-art-challenge-time.html
She offered three pix to use for artwork, and I chose her cute mom Juanita.
Sorry, Juanita, that I couldn't quite nail it, but it was fun trying.

2009-08-20T16:49:00.000-07:00

Bummer week...recuperating from my fall...on pain pills that just take the edge off...lotsa napping..using cane...not wanting to do anything.
Better today but not walking around.
Perusing through the photo album, came across a favorite pix of mine taken in about 1932 of my mother in law, Ethel. I always liked her hairdo and the dress...so I sketched it....Then I came upon a picture of me taken sixty some years later with the same hairstyle.
Well, I guess there's only so many ways a gal can wear her hair.
Hurts to sit here so gotta go....but hurts to sit there, too.

2009-08-14T21:20:00.000-07:00

31,
Had an adventure today. I was in the dog kennels washing out their water pails when I tripped on the hose and fell down.
Shock...pain...Sally took off, but Bekka stayed and barked and growled...she was locked behind a gate so she had freedom to the yard but not to me.
I lay there tensing this muscle and that...trying to determine the damage....nothing broken.
I just leaned against the fence, still gasping...hose running all over the place, when it dawned on me I couldn't get up.
First time in my life that I fell and was helpless.
First shock...pity...desperation, and finally anger.
Jack wasn't home.
Usually I get on my knees and get up, but my knees were scraped, bleeding, and bruised and one was already double size. And, there was no grass...only concrete and gravel.
A bleeding gash on my arm...from the fence, I guess, though I don't know how.
Everything hurt...ankles, wrists, shoulders, side. What in the devil was I going to do...
I decided to get to the front porch steps. I knew I could turn backwards and hoist myself up on the first step with my arms, grab the rail and stand up....but the steps were across the yard....gravel driveway all the way.
Ok...just do it!
I fanny bumped my self along...the heels of my hands bleeding from the rocks...my clothes slowly shredding.
shut up and just do it!
bump...slide...bump...slide...
Four feet from the step, and Jack pulled into the driveway.
There I sat in the middle of the driveway smiling at him...(to show absolutely nothing was wrong, just bumping along for the fun of it....dang...I had wanted to be on my feet and cleaned up when he got home.
Funny how much worse you feel with sympathy....
We got into the house, pulled off my wet, dirty, torn clothes...grabbed a clean mumu and the disinfectant and a towel...and collapsed into a chair.
He brought me a full glass of wine.
That was four hours ago and oh my...my nose is the only place not aching...but I am so happy nothing was broken.

2009-08-14T13:34:00.000-07:00

30.

colored pencil on off white bristol,
too large for scanner
When Beans, (pinto) and her twin foals came racing into the ranch with the rest of the band my jaw literally dropped. I hadn't seen her up close for about a year...watched from the hill with the glasses, checking up on the herd, but hadn't noticed from that distance she was expecting.
She came tearing down off the hill, head high, proud as a peacock, and who could blame her. Two spotted babies marked every bit as pretty as she was raced along side her....god I hope they hadn't inherited any of their witchy mother's tendencies. She was the most godawful horse I ever owned, bar none.
Would not be tamed, period. Kicked down every fence I put her behind...she wound up living in the bull pen....she couldn't faze the logs that fence was made of. I should have gotten rid of her a long time ago, but she was so pretty I just liked looking at her.
I hurried down to the pens to get a closer look at the newest addition to the horse band. (excerpt from Pony Crossing..which will never be finished, I'm afraid.....ahh me...so much to do, and soaps to watch, too)

2009-08-10T21:56:00.000-07:00

cradle boards are art work to me, and to many Native Americans. I started a color book of the different styles...but the book was longer than my span of attention so it languishes, crying to be finished.

This drawing isn't typical of the color book drawings...they are straight line drawings with designs to color.

I contacted Martha Berry, a Cherokee bead work artist for information and she told me that the Cherokees didn't use cradle boards...interesting. I haven't looked into how they contained their babies but will.

I like the idea of making everyday utensils artwork. Harpoons and kayak paddles decorated with charms for good hunting...cradleboards with beadwork beckoning the good spirits. Everyday clothing made of bright colors and designs....not cool, I guess.

2009-08-09T14:26:00.000-07:00

28.

slowly floating up out of a black place, I see gray......no sunlight, but somewhere light is finding its way in....I come up from two days with the blanket over my head, and wander out into the yard looking for a reason to hang around. A little gray lizard stopped to talk to me...he asked to be painted sky blue...he never wanted to be gray in the first place...

Tell me about it, I say.

Great, a gray lizard is my muse......figures.

Not Iris, the rainbow queen, nor a bubbly water nymph, just a little gray guy.

but, I like him....he looks me in the eye and sympathizes...the least I can do is immortalize him.

Listing my blessings does not help. This is not feeling sorry for my self...this is an imbalance inherited from my family. I am middle of the road...neither the worst off of them, nor the best.

Trying to figure out why I'm hiding under his desk, the doctor asks, Does your husband abuse you? (He's constantly fiddling with his new computer.)

NO...and DO NOT ASK ME THAT AGAIN. I've told you before we're fine....but he follows the program on his computer, asking the same old questions....I flip through my magazine in the dark shadows. He never looks at me.

(Have you lost any weight?

Yes, I now weigh a hundred and three.

Good, he says, still not looking at well nourished me, and dutifully types it in.)

(in my dreams)

It is what it is

2009-08-03T21:10:00.000-07:00

27.

colored pencil on bristol board
My favorite plant...hen and chickens

tiled in Photoshop

My garden is not doing well...it's actually only in existence because as soon as I finished making my teeny fishpond, I was still raring to go...so started a garden growing around the pond.
This is the second full year and the poor soil is doing its work. Then our week of triple digit temps curled the leaves of my poor hosta, and melted my ice plant.
About the only things doing really well are the daisies and the dragonflies.

I'll have to admit the garden looks a little lush in this picture but walk around the paths and you'll see the ailing little patients.
the little wire fence around the pond is crooked because of Bekka's constant lizard hunt....without the fence, I'd have a pond full of rocks.

Eventually, only the things that do well will remain...the survival of the fittest is my motto....I'd like to find a little garden plaque saying just that and stick it out there to give them fair warning...no wimps in my garden!
(hard woman)

2009-07-31T11:42:00.000-07:00

26.
The Wild Geese Story
I walked past this planter this morning and the whole geese story popped into my head.
I bought this to remember them by about ten years ago.

We were living in a remote part of Oregon...big ranch country. We had a few acres carved out of all their acres.
Our nearest neighbors were Denny and Laura....Denny worked for one of the ranches.
One day while cutting a field he had to destroy a Canadian goose nest.
Only four eggs remained intact, and Denny brought them home to Laura.
After that I was over there every day so curious and delighted to be able to watch wild geese grow.

Hatching

Swimming in an old tub out in the shed.
They are two weeks old in this picture.

At four weeks they follow Laura because she was imprinted on them

Four weeks...pestering Midge who tolerated them

Four weeks...outside pool

A handful at four weeks

Six weeks...gangly...fluffy, but with emerging wing and tail feathers.
They were named now...and could be told apart by little differences.
Spring, April, May and Sunny

Eight weeks and stretching those wing

Eight weeks...all four can't fit in one pool anymore.

At maturity they were beautiful birds

Preening

Laura and I were dreading the day our children would fly away. All four were loving individuals with different personalities.

We could tell they were getting ready...they used to race across the yard,
flapping their wings...

and one day they just lifted out of the yard into the air.

It was as thrilling as when one of your children takes their first step.

From then on they flew every day, but kept in circles over their yard.

One day a hired hand drove in to the yard. In the back of his pickup was a cowdog who jumped out and somehow got in to the back yard. He lit into the startled geese and began snapping at them. Three rose into the air but poor Spring was trapped against the fence.

By this time Laura ran screaming into the back yard chasing the dog away but Spring had a broken wing.

Thoroughly traumatized, she refused to move, eat or drink for a long time....

The other three left for a year.

The season went by and then Laura and I began searching the skies for our three to return. So many things could have happened to them. They were so tame maybe they landed somewhere and someone shot them.

But...they came back! We were so thrilled. But it was just a brief visit. We'd see them circling the small valley but finally they left.

Then Laura and Denny bought a small ranch of their own, and we moved too. Laura wrote and said she never saw her babies again.

Spring lived out her days with the barnyard geese.

I painted this little oil painting for Laura before we moved.

Spring, April, May and Sunny

2009-07-30T10:14:00.001-07:00

25.
Hidden in this camouflage is a teeny frog that could easily sit on my little fingernail were I clever enough to charm him.

The only reason he caught my eye was he jumped when I dribbled the hose near him.

Today was the garlic harvest. When the leaves have dried out part way up the stalk, it's time to go.

So I dug up my one giant garlic plant.

It smelled sooooo good.

I hung it in the baby pine while I worked in the garden and thought about what to do with it....

I've enjoyed the plant in my garden and hate to end it. Maybe it can just hang in the tree until....??

2009-07-28T11:25:00.000-07:00

24.

got up when I wanted to
slipped into my cool one piece thingy with no belts, buttons, etc. Combed my hair with my fingers making me serviceable enuf to answer the door.
checked my email to see who wrote me in the middle of the night.
Xanga, Staples, Cabelas, Huffington Post
fixed coffee and a half an avacado
settled down to wake up
meandered through The Commoner by John Burnham Schwartz which I had finished but didn't want to leave. A loosley disguised story about Michiko, the pretty, tennis playing girl who married the crown prince of Japan in 1959...the last free choice she had. Life behind the palace walls was no fairy tale....(Schwartz also wrote Reservation Road, made into a movie)
watched a minute of The View...until they all began to talk at once about the octo mon....I turned it off.
it's not eleven yet and it's 90 outside
wandered into the bedroom and made the bed....it looks cooler when made
went outside to give my friends a drink, turn on some sprinklers, let a hose dribble into the fishpond to give them a tickle.
tried to think of something for dinner but couldn't hold on to the vaporous thought and it drifed away
checked my email again got mail from a (computer) club member giving me a little job to do
headed downstairs to work on a watercolor of roses and watch my soaps
it's started off to be a lovely day.

2009-07-26T08:17:00.000-07:00

23.
Ari's gone!
Gone!
get a grip
Nary a sign of her, nor her gossamer nest of golden babies. I can not believe it...I'm bummed.
Don't you just hate it when your pet spider disappears?
and don't be getting me a new one, I'm not ready.
...remember me tho short I lived....
I will, Ari.

annnnnnnd, I haven't written about him, but my pollywog is gone too!
I knew him when he was no bigger than a tadpole....haha...no, I meant no bigger than a mosquito wiggler. An undiscerning eye wouldn't have noticed him among the hoy poloi but I caught that little swagger right away. He grew and grew and was the size of a fat little pea, and coal black.
I think Bekka drank him.
What losses I've had, and all within 24 hours.
...my baby fish, Ari, and my little blackeyed pea.

Too sad to trod the garden path
To pass my friend's sweet places
The pond....the leaf where Ari lived
I miss their happy faces.
(I made that up...yep!)

2009-07-24T20:42:00.000-07:00

22.
One of my baby fish died....I don't know why...The ceremony had evidently already started when I arrived....he was lying in state in the center of the fishpond surrounded by pink waterlilies...I scooped him up with the fishnet and gave him a proper Viking send off...a mighty right hand swing over the fence into the wild woods....ahh he was a beautiful sight...sailing through the setting sun into his Valhalla. Rest in peace my little buckeroo

Ari's nest it is a-changin'...her babies are growing. If you click on this picture to enlarge it you can see the shadowy bumps of the spiderlings.
(spellcheck says spiderlings isn't a word...well, it should be.)

The following picture is of a
Ctenucha multifaria, pronounced "middle size, day flying, hawk moth not found in the east."
Now you know as much as I do about him, and more than most people. He doesn't venture much farther east than my back yard....monarchs migrate three thousand miles, but nucha can't catch a bus to Nebraska.
Here he's sharing the lavender with a honeybee.
The garden is droning on in the hot summer sun...nothing new going on...I cut back all the Becky shastas but their filly headed cousins, the Crazy Daisies persevere....I'll take back everything I said about them....and the black eyed susans are just unbelievable...strong, bright and forever.

It's so sad to go through the plant sections of grocery stores...seeing the leggy, thirsty plants...half forgotten now that the rush of spring planting is over...How come we never see pictures of sad plants in the paper like we do the pets at the human society? They need adopting, too. Do you know plants cry?

Well, maybe that was a dew drop come to think of it. But, don't be rash in your sneering. Our minds are so little we can't even understand time, so how do we know plants don't have some sort of chemical communication system unknown to us. They are alive and that's a good enough start for me.

2009-07-13T10:33:00.000-07:00

21.
one hour plus one pail of weeds...today two pails...minimum time to be spent in garden daily.
I should spend that much time working on the house...
heck, I should spend that much time working in the kitchen.

But five years of owning and cooking in a bowling alley snack bar,
and five years of owning and cooking in a cowboy cafe in eastern oregon
should earn anyone time off in the kitchen forever....
but I digress.
I went over to the

(I know, it needs repainting)

anyway, Ari has her nest on one of the leaves and I wanted to see if her babies had hatched yet.

Yesterday I noticed her sister moved into the neighborhood, just two leaves down, and was beginning to raise a family, too.... but, sad to say, sis's babies are gone today. Clean gone...no trace of nest, but sis is still hanging around so I don't think this was a good thing. Home invasion..

anyway, Ari was off the nest, taking a break about three inches away, reclining in the shadow of the stem. As soon as she saw me loom up, she scurried right up and wrapped her arms around the nest.

precious, huh? As if she had a snowball's chance if I were a preditor.

I thought this might make a perfect mother's day card because just look at the shape of that leaf...wow...hearts and love all in one shot.

No?

2009-07-11T11:09:00.000-07:00

20.
I have nothing to say today.
Rat: so shut up
Pat: people with blogs don't have to shut up... besides, I can always make things up.
My garden had a vote just before I went out this morning....They voted me the best thing that ever happened to them....and gave me a big bouquet of flowers.
Rat: I'm outta here!

Rat is my alter ego. I developed a split personality when I was teaching...I had to come up with something that would explain certain cranky days.

Mrs. Hentges: "Class, I'm sorry about this morning....that was my twin sister Rat that was here teaching."
Class: "We know, Mrs. Hentges."
Mrs. Hentges: She hid my shoes and I couldn't get to school."
Class: "Yes, Mrs. Hentges."

this is Rat in her "Don't Bug Me" hat. When she had that hat on, you could not come up to the desk and bug her.

I do have a little garden thingy. When I was out weeding I found a little garden spider guarding her nest of eggs...all bound up in spider silk.
When I first saw her she had just one delicate little leg on the nest...she must have sensed me because she moved further on to cover them.

This morning I checked on little Ari (Arachne) and she was totally covering the nest, but she looked a little deflated. I was worried she was dead so I tickled her with a blade of grass, and she giggled.....
so..not to worry.

Speaking of bugs in the garden...I also saw a dead bee right smack in the center of a daisy...yes sirree...laying on his side on the yellow velvety, polleny center...What a way to go!

2009-07-08T20:07:00.000-07:00

19.
A mixed set of pix

How many times can you drop a camera before it quits working?
I'm counting.
My next camera is going to have a bulletproof case and a
zoooooooom lens.

Today the most happiest of surprises in my fishpond.
The pond brutalized by the raccoon....but I'll take back some of what I said about him.
He didn't eat all my fish.
Just traumatized them into hiding for a few days.

I went to The Frog Prince and bought five feeder fish for a dollar.
Brought them home and put three in the big pond and two in the nursery pond.
This afternoon I went out to see how everyone was getting along and
wowiezowie! I had twenty or more babies sky hooting all over the place ...
and my three old gold fish placidly grazing.
Those three goldfish are almost neon they are so deeply orange...
a combination of the sun and the wild goodies they eat....just like the egg yolk color from free range chickens...vivid.
But...back to the babies...from whence they came? I haven't a clue....well, yeah, a clue, but it's still a bit of a mystery.
Gold fish lay eggs
and then they eat them.
I never dreamed of having babies, but somehow a handful survived.
Gold fish eat babies.
....lordy, someone must have layed a thousand eggs and just got tired of eating fish for dinner every night.

It only takes two to under seven days for an egg to hatch...and some of these babies are soooo tiny you can barely see them...but some are older, and some are even older.
Fish For Sale
All of the babies are dark. Just like some foals are born dark and don't get their mama's color until they age, goldfish don't become their true color until they age a bit either.

Once upon a time I dug a hole and stuck a hose in it...
and now I have a whole, healthy ecosystem.
Fish darting around eating, snails sliding over aglea covered rocks, water lilies blooming, beautiful red dragon flies flitting over the surface....I feel like Mother Earth.

Today's lily...so lovely

The old birdhouse, refurbished, and relocated.
But the squirrels empty it speedily...and the dropped seeds are sprouting weeds....so I have to rethink this.
Maybe I'll just stick a candle in it, and it can be a garden light...or not.
Notice the tall elephant garlic growing next to it?....taller than I am at five,five.

Here is a closeup of the garlic bloom.

Several years ago I planted two or three buds

and nothing happened. I forgot them and started building my garden around them. They must have like the company because zoom! This one shot out of the ground and grew really fast.

I've never raised garlic and am looking forward to digging it up.

A rare flower cultivated by only our family. Not available
Family: Hentgesrosamultiflower
Genus: Rudolphispanic

Species: Femalewonder

Common Name: Holland Isla (Hollydolly)

2009-07-06T12:28:00.000-07:00

18.

Foxy Days
A friend of mine sent these great red fox pictures. Her husband saw the animal very early in the morning going past their place...he grabbed a camera and we are the happy beneficiaries.

They live near us, as the crow flies, and I know we have the same foxes living in the woods near us...but they are shy and it's rare to get such great shots. She/he has something in its mouth...probably breakfast...or maybe taking it home to the kits. Foxes eat any and everything.

Still on the subject of foxes, here is my greatgranddaughter Holland.
This was her first trip to the Portland Zoo.
kissykissyfoxiebaby

2009-07-05T16:00:00.000-07:00

17.

Enlarge picture by clicking on it, then imagine this creature as big as a hawk.
They were, hundreds of millions of years ago...fossils have been found in Kansas...these are predatory carnivores
but romantic myths abound of their supernatural powers and unusual talents.

Remember, in your childhood, when your mother told you if you didn't shut up these "darning needles" would sew your mouth shut. No? Whoops...only my mother did? hmmmmm.....My father also told me I only had so many words allotted to me and if I didn't shut up they'd be gone before I got out of kindergarten.....that's probably why I'm typing all the time now.

I saw both of these creatures in the same spot by the fishpond, within hours of each other.....I read they were territorial...maybe Black ScaryFace chased the other one away...who knows...

These large red eyes have thousands and thousands of lenses and can see 360 degrees. When I moved near him, he raised his eyes up, making it look like he was seeing me....eerie

2009-07-04T18:50:00.000-07:00

17.

she loves me she loves me not she loves me she loves me not
this year next year sometime never
Happy Daisies

My daisies in one hundred degree weather.
They curl their little petals down tightly making them look just like fried eggs...
which is what they probably feel like.

Little Button

2009-07-04T10:57:00.000-07:00

15.

The Fourth of July
that means Sally and Bekka get to sleep over

the best looking thing in the garden this morning was the weed pail....a bouquet of leftovers...unwanted sweetpea, old roses, sheared veronica, leggy yellow angelina blossoms , broken daisies......
what a sad phrase...broken daisies.

..... at the teaparty
we keep birdseed on the fence posts

taken through a window...outlined in light

patient Bekka waiting

2009-07-03T19:17:00.000-07:00

14.

Dragonfly
Click on this picture and enlarge it to really appreciate the beauty of the wings.

After my disastrous morning in the garden, this guy made me forget it all. I usually have bright neon blue damselflies flitting around the lilypads, but when this orangy red dragonfly landed on a lily bud not six inches from me I was agog....yep...that awkward, strange word agog says it all.

In the above picture he is hanging on a spent lily blossom of his very same color. I have no idea what he was thinking or doing...(yes, I can usually tell what a dragonfly is thinking...haha)

Although they are carniverous and care naught for flowers, he'd fly off and return again and again to the same lily, almost in the same spot.

Something was drawing him back....my presence?... my natural mind connections with dragonflies...hmmmm....probably not.

I like the above picture...the lighting...his angle...

Some people can get dragonflies to land on their fingers...

probably the same kind of people who can get hummers to land on their hands...but not the same kind of people who are holding cameras, snapping like crazy, wondering if Nat'l Geo is buying dragonfly pix these days.

2009-07-03T11:04:00.000-07:00

13.

Raccoon Ravage

I woke up with a headache.
An ongoing fight between my pillow and my neck.
No matter...I had an easy day...could do whatever and indulge.
I wandered out into the garden to say good morning....Yikes! Mayhem and Murder! Well, maybe not murder yet, because I hadn't gotten my hands on the raccoon.
Don't ask me how I know it was a raccoon...I have a headache...I just know.

Tipped pavers...planter dumped in the drink.
This was the only picture I took.
There were rocks tumbled into the pond...FISH GONE!
Can't take a picture of fish gone.
Plastic ducky upside down, floating on his head...plants trampled and broken, decorative bird houses, that were sitting by plants, tipped over.
Oh, you should have seen the bird feeder...top yanked off and the plastic tube pulled half way up out of the top....Actually that made me smile to picture the raccoon up on top of the feeder, yanking up the dang top and throwing it on the ground...working at the plastic tube to pull it out.

The raccoon alone wouldn't have caused as much havoc, it was Bekka chasing the raccoon.
How do I know it was Bekka and not Sally...I know BadBaby.

Soooooo, I hiked up my garden pants and waded into the pond and began repairing the damage....and that's where I've been in case you missed me.

Shoot...I don't know what to do....I guess I'll start by locking the dogs out of the garden at night. They have kennels, so that I can do....wurrawurra said Winnie the Pooh.

"Remember the night is for hunting...
Remember the day is for sleep....."
Law of the Jungle by Kipling

I guess I can't really be mad at anybody, right?
Raccoons hunt.
Dogs chase.
It Is What It Is

as long as I'm ticked, I'll continue ragging on BadBaby.
Here is a picture of her laying on a newly planted Veronica.
I usually immediately place a rock or pot or something by new plants so that Bek won't lay on them, but this time I turned my back and forgot.
All that's left is the plant marker...looking like a tiny tombstone.

2009-07-02T21:35:00.000-07:00

12.

Hot today....101.
I always try to sneak up on the fish pond to see who I can surprise.

aha gottcha

I run the hose at a slow drizzle in the deep end of the pond to aerate the water. The delighted fish come out of hiding and scurry around chasing all the newly disturbed goodies to eat.
One day I brought a few new fish home and introduced them to their new home. My biggest fish immediately swam up and swallowed down a newcomer.
Thanks for bringing home takeout.

The following is a favorite picture of mine. It was sent by a good friend who loves cameras and flowers.
These are pansy seeds in the pod.
I've never seen this before. Aren't they lovely?

The second picture shows them a little further away.

and the last picture shows them true to size. You can barely see them. They are on the far left side of the picture...showing against the rim of the pot. Being that size is why we miss seeing them, but I'll sure be looking at my next pot of aging pansies.
Notice Mr. Duck with his sunglasses?

2009-07-01T22:03:00.000-07:00

11.

Rudbeckia

Gloriosa Daisy

Blackeyed Susan

Family: Asteraceae...(ass-ter-AY-see-ee)

doesn't that word just roll off your tongue...love it

ass ter AY see ee ass ter AY see ee ass ter AY see ee

poisonous

A big bold in your face flower. So satisfying to grow.

Grows in tall, intensely yellow flower clumps that attract butterflies.
I will always have these beauties in my garden.
butterfly on blossom

These flowers grow wild in almost every state. I saw my first blackeyed susans in Michigan when I was five. My mother stopped the car so I could pick some, but they were too tough to pick.
When my mother told me its name I liked it because I have a cousin Suzanne. I asked my mother if there was a flower named after me, Patsy. I was very disappointed...irked..that there wasn't. Just who was in charge of naming flowers anyway.
My cousin Susie has dark brown eyes like this gorgeous plant.

2009-07-01T17:12:00.000-07:00

10.

Couldn't bear to part with
my old bowling ball

Thyme

thymus vulgaris

(vulgaris meaning common and unrefined...the bad connotation is only related to describing people)

There are over a hundred varieties of thyme, most of them difficult to tell apart.
Thyme oil was burned in the temples of Greece.
It symbolized bravery
Medieval maidens embroidered bees on their hankies and wrapped them around a sprig of thyme to give to their favorite knight to wear during tournaments.
Now we do mundane things with it like sprinkling it on our food.

This is a picture of creeping red thyme, which can also be lavender color. Creeping thyme is one of the more popular landscaping plants. It is low growing, far spreading, stepable, and so satisfying when it blooms.

This is all I have this year, but next year I hope to have yards of it. It belongs to the mint family and should be deer proof, so I'll try it outside the fence.

It was thyme that the lovely Persephone was picking when she was so cruelly abducted.

Wandering the mountainside fields of Nysa that sloped down to the sky blue Aegean Sea, she was half mesmerized by the soft buzzing of the bees and the intensely scented thyme.
I picture her as a young Lindsay Lohan...I saw a picture of her once, young, innocent and photoshopped....She looked like a dream...ethereal.

Hades...King of the Underworld saw her and instantly became besotted....and like a sweet talking Ted Bundy, he coaxed her within grabbing distance, and fled down to the dark innards of the earth.

Persephone's mother was furious! A woman of great political power she immediately shut down summer. People could starve as far as she was concerned. Let them eat cake!

Have you ever lost someone who made it feel like the sunshine had gone? Well that's how Demeter, P's mom, felt. Her sunshine was gone, and so she would make everyone's sunshine gone.

Zeus became alarmed. King of the gods, he could not allow people to die of starvation, and so he made a deal with his Ted Bundy brother, Hades.

To make a long story short, Persephone was allowed to return to the upper earth for three or four months a year, (except in California where she can stay all the time) and Demeter allowed the sun to shine for that short time. Gloom, darkness, fallow fields and below zero temps returned when P had to go back to Hades.

One more little "means nothing" fact. When P was gathering her thyme, she was not alone. Her girlfriend...forgot her name... was with her...but she was a nymph and of no help at all.

Did you know nymphs lived an average of nine thousand, six hundred and twenty years? That's a recorded fact...no kidding.

Faithful Bek hanging around while Sally is off doing whatever.

2009-07-01T15:26:00.000-07:00

9.
Garden Boy is looking a little ratty...needs new stuffing...but he'll just have to get in line...I'm not twins, you know...sometimes I'm not even one.

... a nest of chickens in his hair....

The next picture is an old moccasin of Jack's that used to be overflowing with Hen&Chicks, but the turkeys made short work of that. They are as destructive as a herd of cows...they don't eat my plants, but pick them to pieces for the fun of it. I made the mistake of not keeping the moccasin inside the fence where the garden is.
The snake is a pet I brought from eastern Oregon. I seem to have no snakes here at all....at least at our place. I'd like a nice little garden snake sunning itself on a rock by the fish pond....at first I though Sally and Bekka were keeping the snakes away and then it dawned on me I never see them anywhere on our place, and I'm always out in the woods, poking around, turning over rocks, just generally butting in.

I like snakes....I like all reptiles...
Once we lived where we had lots of garden snakes so I caught one and brought him in to live in an aquarium....without an adequate lid. So I improvised a lid and left for awhile to make a good lid. When I came back the snake was gone...and we hadn't even gotten to know each other. I looked evvvvvvvvvverywhere. No snake. Turned the house upside down and shook it. No snake. I knew Jack was not going to be happy about this so I added it to my list of NeverNeverTell things, and life went on as usual. One day I decided to put some goldfish in the empty aquarium and I found an open box of food left over from my last goldfish. I put my finger in the box to lift the tucked down lid...and felt the coiled up snake!!! That box went flying off my hand like a home run in Yankee Stadium. I like snakes but I don't want them sneaking up on me. He had been coiled up in the box...I can't imagine how he fit....for at least two months......Or maybe he just spent the days there, and prowled around at night. I let him go....figured he'd earned it.

2009-06-30T14:18:00.000-07:00

Sharing the garden

Sally and Bekka have a large place to patrol...and the layout is such they get to run through my garden...

sweatshirt bumpersticker...It is What it Is

I am extremely fortunate neither are diggers..most of the time.

Sally is a white English Pointer

Bekka is a liver ticked German Shorthair

They used to be bird hunting dogs, back in the day.

They are nine now and have other jobs.

Sally has bee patrol. She HATES them. She has a thin coat and has been nipped by many a bee. In the summer she hangs around the lavender and Veronica bushes, so intent that she ignores calls to dinner.

Bekka...BadBabyBekka...My beloved Bekka

has lizard patrol.

Unfortunately the lizards dive for the rocks around the pond and other places, and Bekka starts digging...she doesn't dig much...just paws, but she has knocked so many of the rocks back in the pond I have to keep it surrounded by a little fence.

The dogs love everything I do in the garden...sniff at all the new plants... ...sometimes move the new plants a few feet...inspect the contents of the wheelbarrow coming and going...and mostly are pretty good dogs.

Sally on bee patrol

Bekka taking a drink from the fish pond nursery. This is where I keep the overflow of pond plants. They are too expensive for me to toss.

Another picture of Bekka just because I love her. I wrote about her about nine or ten years ago and it was published in the Courier...one of those Reader Writes columns...I'm sure you remember it...haha. She is impulsive and in your face if she wants something, ...will not be ignored....eats everything in one gulp. She's like a pony in the house, wants back out as soon as she get in... whereas Sally is neat and quiet as a cat in the house. Jack says I love Bekka because she is just like me...hmmmm. I am not like a pony in the house.

2009-06-30T13:45:00.000-07:00

crazy lady?

The oddest thing is happening. I planted a row of Stella d'Oro daylilies.

(I digress) genus: Hemerocallis

now don't go thinking the latin is boring..

hemera is "day" and kallos is "beauty"

The golden beauty of the day

Anyway, a couple of years later they needed dividing so I dug them up and managed to get 14 new plants. I planted them in my new garden along the edges of the paths. Now they are blooming for the first time and they

and not golden beauties of the day!

They are deep, vivid, orangy red and on very long stems.

How could this be! You probably think I bought new lilies and simply forgot...but fourteen? I never buy fourteen of anything except maybe grapes. It just isn't how I shop. I am totally flumoxed, and must stop writing and get a grip.

My original Stella d'Oro border

The new, but gorgeous mystery lily

2009-06-30T06:14:00.000-07:00

6.
Rosettes and babies

There was an old woman who lived in a shoe
Had so many chickies she spread them all over her garden

Don't throw away broken pots. Partially bury them and plant a display around them.

Girls gone wild.
They don't usually go to seed in such a dramatic way.
Click on picture to enlarge

Hen and Chickens..

other names Live Forever-Houseleek-Old man and woman

Family: Crassulaceae..(crass-you-LAY-see-ah)

Genus: Sempervivum..(sem-per-VEE-vum)

Species: Tectorum...(tek-TOR-um)

evergreen perennials

When you see sempervivum tacked on a plant it is Latin for always living and means the plant is evergreen, perennial and hardy.

tectorum means roof

The story goes that hen and chicks were planted on roofs to

prevent lightning?

prevent thatched roofs from catching fire?

Probably the later, if any of it is true, because with moisture filled leaves they would be fireproof.

Hen and Chicks were my first plant to grow as a child. Gramma Lamb had them growing along side her little house in North Bonneville, Washington before the Bonneville Dam put the town underwater and they had to build a new one.
She was not my grandmother...everyone in the tiny town called her that, and I knew nothing of her family. Oddly, manymany years and miles later I found myself related to her by marriage...but she was long gone by then.

Hen and Chicks grow as a succulent rosette...the hen...surrounded by her little pea size chicks. Cut or break the chicks off and poke them dirt and they grow. Every few years a rosette will bloom...I've not seen a definite time line but once they bloom, they die. You can let the bloom go to seed and collect the seeds if you have nothing better to do....no blogs to maintain...no books to read...no cats to draw...

We have lived in many houses and one had whole beds of Hen and Chicks thickly matted. I loved them and when we moved I took a goodly strip of them and planted them alongside the new house. One day while I was gone we had a man with a bulldozer come to do some repair work and he ran his dingdong machine back and forth over my plants. Hen and Chicks are tough but even they have limits.

2009-06-29T21:28:00.000-07:00

Angelina Stonecrop

After the pond was finished I had tons of time so I decided to start adding a garden around the edges. We live in a clearing in the woods. The soil is acid and very poor. I am a new gardener and an old lady and I knew right off I could not handle a compost pile...I had neither the strength nor the patience to treat it properly.

I add JoGro, a locally made compost, and potting soil and fertilizer and figure by the time I'm a hundred and ten the ground will be great.

I want easy care plants.

One of the first plants I added was for the rocks in front of the pond. There were several tiers of rocks and I wanted a teeny rock garden.

Angelina Stonecrop

stonecrop/sedum/succulant

stone crop, also called the hen and chickens family

sedums are part of this family

succulants are plants that originated in arid climates. They are juicy, fleshy plants that store water in their leaves, compact growing to save moisture.

Angelina is a butter yellow, easy growing, spreading sedum

perennial.

good drainage, partial to full sun

They are tolerant of poor soil, drought, new gardeners and careless ones.

cascades easily

2009-06-29T20:49:00.000-07:00

yes, that's my shadow

Every day I went out and lined more rocks around the edges.

They slid down

I'd build them up

slid down

build up

slid down

I'd look out the window at this seemingly unsolvable mess and say to my self, "two rocks...I'll just place two solid rocks...If I do two solid rocks a day, some day it will be finished."

I quit taking pictures

When the rock sides were as stable as they ever would be I added some embellishments.

I planted three sprawling juniper bushes whose duty it was to spread over nearby imperfections.

I added some flat cement tiles where pots could sit.

I added some water plants...left them in their pots so they wouldn't spread and root in the pond itself.

And finally I added five small goldfish.

2009-06-29T18:07:00.000-07:00

aagghhhh....cookie time again

I had to decide how to cover the ugly edges...thought of manymany things and tried a few. Finally I settled on river rocks. From the river. Is that legal? After many sneaky trips I saw some people brazenly loading their pickup in front of godandall. I stopped and talked to them and they said, "oh yeah, nothing wrong with taking some rocks".

hmmmmm

where do you draw the line?

when the river changes course?

I struggled with my conscience and my dark side won.

What is written in this blog

stays in this blog.

I forgot to say that I designed this pond to have one end deep enough to winter the fish in our relatively mild Southern Oregon winters .. and I wanted a shallow end for frog and dragonfly eggs. I'd never do that again.

fish eat frog and dragonfly eggs

You can tell this was well thought out.

sweatshirt bumper sticker......I learn as I go

2009-06-29T17:55:00.000-07:00

well, it needs a little tweaking...

I had no idea I was going to be faced with gathered, pleated edges...

wurra wurra said Winnie The Pooh...

what to do what to do.

What was I thinking? That it would magically mold itself perfectly to the rough dug walls?

Well, the first thing to do is have a cookie and think.

2009-06-29T16:54:00.000-07:00

1.

It all started when I wanted a fishpond in the back yard, so I dug a hole.

This was going to be my own project. It would have nothing I couldn't do myself. So there goes any fancy wiring or water setups....hose only.

We are on a well

No city water for my fish

Next I had to look for lining. I had to Google to even get started...had no idea what was available or recommended. Then trips around our little town to see who sold what at what price. I am not crazy about shopping or making decisions so this took me days and days.

Finally I found a tough, reliable lining sold by the yard at Chet's in Grants Pass...right under my nose. It was wide enough...(and that was just a lucky happening since I had already dug the hole....I must be a natural at this) and more importantly it was of the right weight and flexible enough for me to handle all by myself.

Bought it...trundled it home...rolled it out over the hole and tamped it in.

I bought some pond gravel, washed it, and layered it across the bottom.

AND filled it with the hose!

EXCITEMENT!

MY FISHPOND!