summer time

World's worst blogger.

I suck. Luckily no one reads this blog but my mother and sisters, unless I've lost them too. But hey, here are some pretty pictures I just downloaded!

One thing you may not know about me (or you do, if you know me at all) is that keeping plants alive? Not my specialty. The joke in our house is that the only reason my child is alive is because she can tell me when she's hungry. How she survived the early years before language, I do not know.

Anyway, last year I started a rock garden in the back yard, because rock garden plants are very low maintenance, which is definitely the main criteria if you want to survive under my care. My thing with plants (and children) is that I forget to water them for months at a time, and then I drown them with several gallons of water at once, figuring I'm making up for my incompetence. My friend Christina literally weeps for the plants in my care: "They're talking to you! They are begging for water! Can't you hear them??"

Luckily, I love succulents. And the beauty of succulents is that they hardly ever need water! Woohoo!!

Last night while lovingly WATERING my rock garden and gloating over my success, I noticed this plant that I don't recall putting in the ground. Is it a weed? Meh. It's green and it's alive. Good enough for me.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAA
This was just some little succulent, minding its own business, and then one day it sprouted this weird, leggy growth, about a foot tall, with these sweet teeny flowers on the ends. I like it.


AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Hen and chicks: gotta love 'em. Totally my kind of plants: you plant one, water it once every six months or so, and it is so grateful that it rewards you by propagating all over the place. If only children were this easy. Oh. Wait...

AAAAAAAAAAAAA

My favorites: Moss Roses. They add so much lovely color.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Snap dragons remind me of when I was little. In fact, sometimes when no one is looking, I can't resist the urge to snap one off and make it talk: "Aaarrggh!! Ahoy matey! That sun sure feels great today, doesn't it?!" Why do snap dragons talk like pirates? Or is that just me? Has anyone else noticed that the neighbors won't make eye-contact anymore?

***********

Last Friday was meeting some friends/co-workers for lunch in the little town of Tekoa. To get there, I drove through the Palouse on roads I'd never driven. I really, really love the Palouse. The scenery is just gorgeous and the little farming communities are so charming. People sitting on their porches, old guys driving their tractors down the road, kids riding horses in the fields....There's something really appealing about that simple way of life, isn't there?

I was afraid of being late for our lunch date, so I didn't take as many pictures as I wanted. But I couldn't resist capturing this beautiful little scene, near the tiny town of Waverly.

***********

I've also been doing some sewing. This is a custom-order Hooter Hider (also known as a nursing cover), made for someone who knows she is having a boy.

And i couldn't resist whipping up a matching onsie.

And last but certainly not least: Beatrice, aka: Bea, BB and, most often, Beast. She loves nothing more than laying on the back deck, watching the world go by.

She's got a terribly rough life. I think she's plotting her escape.

Hope you're enjoying your summer. I can not believe how quickly it's gone by; school starts three weeks from today. Which reminds me, does anyone know how often I have to water a 4th grader?