Wishful Wednesday

I ‘wish’ it was wicked…but not too much luck with that today.  At least not yet.

Instead another long, looooong day in the car had me thinking of so many things I wish I could change around here. Wish David was still here…the kids miss him so much.  Wish I could buy him one more banana split at Dairy Grove…and watch the kids giggling over their own ice cream, and how much Dat loved his 😀

Wish I could find a job.  Now that at least can be more than a ‘wish’.  I can change that.  I will change that.

Wish I could find a better ‘home’ for the kids, and me.  Found a wonderful little run-down ‘shack’ of a home driving around last week, the paint long gone, but the porch strong and sturdy, the tin roof needing a good cleaning and mercy! does the whole place need landscaping…a girl can dream.  It would be such a joy to take an old abandoned house like that and bring it back to life.  Make it a ‘home’ once more.  No fancy renovations; just restore it and love it. Put an old wringer washer like Grandma had on the back porch, and a tire swing in the tree out front.

Get a wood burning stove (or gas if the city is picky) like the one we love at writer’s camp.

   My cast iron would be right at home.  

Add a porch swing and a joggling board…

I’d be happy to spend the rest of my life fixing the old place up and making it a little ‘more loved’ every year.

If wishes were horses….

Someday, I’ll gallop away.

 

Fantasy Friday

Possibly not the kind of fantasy others expect me to indulge in…those usually involve warriors, weapons, water, and your occasional monster or two. Sometimes a bit of romance/sex just to keep things interesting 😉

No, decidedly NOT suitable for YA. Which works for me.

But today, and tonight…actually for the majority of this entire week…my fantasies have been more decidedly domestic, a lot less fun, but terribly relevant just now.  I am missing our old house, the neighborhood, my gardens and the landscaping I loved.  I have discovered I cannot function when my nights never embrace the darkness; there is always some hideous street light or spot light denying the night and obstructing my view of the moon and stars.  I miss nightly strolls in the dark, just gathering my thoughts, organizing this wild clutter of rampant imagination, and centering my soul.

Where, then, can we go, me and my small troop of offspring?  The countryside may be well suited to this introverted earth mother, but my boys are more like David was…happier with sidewalks or biking/hiking trails, and civilization (at least parks) within reach.

Finding a compromise should be interesting.  I’ll keep you posted.

Meanwhile, other more entertaining versions of fantasy (yes, the ‘other’ kind) are running rampant through my pages with the current focus remaining on dragons and eco-themed ships on both air and water.

 

Think they are any match for a flight of dragons?

This is way more fun than trying to imagine what kind of place we should call home next.

Yay! Fantasy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Loving Eucalyptus

In the front corner of the new yard there is a huge and very old eucalyptus tree. No, not the kind with smiling koalas slowly munching leaves from drowsy perches, but the wonderful, small leaved variety that grows so exuberantly here in the Low Country.

The bark is shaggy, peeling, rough and gorgeous. It makes a statement all on its own.

Couple it with the narrow, fragrant green foliage and it presents a graceful tree for the lawn or border. Ya gotta know though, that gorgeous bark means it is basically self mulching….and there is a lot of bark. Another bonus? That spicy eucalyptus aroma… adored by most people, and repellent to most insect pests.  Thank you, eucalyptus oil.

The big one out front is home to myriad and varied birds, as well as providing strong branches for a handmade birdhouse and bird feeders, and a small platform that serves as a makeshift treehouse for the kids. It weathered the hurricanes this year without issue and has quickly become a family favorite.

Today a friend gifted me with a start from her own big eucalyptus. A few years and it will become a new bird sanctuary in this overly busy bit of urban landscaping, a welcome, gentle respite for our birds and tree frogs, a cool place of dappled shade welcoming all.

Glad you are here, little tree, grow strong. Welcome home.

July slides by

,,, and I shall miss it!  So quickly come…and gone.

We found this gorgeous creature in our backyard.  She has an amazingly perfect web and sat and posed for her photograph.

Golden orb weaver…right next to the screen porch.  So beautiful.

More planting of flowers today.  Pentas, Mexican sage (which is a kind of salvia), found the most gorgeous phlox in a pale pale pinky lavender with white, and added more portulaca.  The raised vegetable planter is now a butterfly garden and they were already visiting it before I could even get the final plants in the soil.

Whacking….weeds and words

It was a good day at work.  Whacked weeds, edged flowerbeds.  Lots of outdoor work to burn off energy and frustration.  Potted a couple of baby crepe myrtles I hope will do well and grow into nice new trees.  Purple.  I think purple crepe myrtles are sooo pretty.

Then at home I whacked more azaleas…so many more to trim.  And now I am whacking words in my edits.

It has been a good day.

Weaving a Web of Wonder

As I wandered around the front yard this evening, pulling weeds, deadheading flowers, and checking on the bird bath I nearly walked right into a gorgeous web stretched from the live oak to the azalea bush hedge.  It was head high for me…so a good 5 1/2 feet from the ground and extending upward several feet higher.  A beautiful spider dangled beneath it, lowering herself to give me a close once over.  Her body looked like it had been sprayed with mercury, the long slender legs striped with vibrant yellow.  I apologized for disturbing her work, ducked under the web and continued over to the hostas.

Returning to the house, I made certain I was well clear of her intricate and beautifully woven web…until I felt the whisper brush of silk against my skin and realized in watching her, I had touched another web.  Another beautiful black and yellow orb weaver (Argiope aurantia) also wove its    delicate web from the opposite side of the oak to the azaleas surrounding the next tree.  I only brushed a couple of filaments and the spider swiftly scurried down to repair the damage.

I watched as these gorgeous females tirelessly created their artistry in silk.  Here they will lay their eggs and, in just a few short weeks, they will be gone… their life’s work completed.  But for this moment, the beauty of their creation becomes eternal.  And I am humbled to have been present to see its creation.

Another Beginning

A new month….April is past and May is upon us! Wow! how did that happen so quickly?  The year is flying past.

Edits on my ms are progressing well, albeit more slowly than I had hoped.  In just two weeks it is off to the beta readers …at least the part that is completed.  A little scary, but hopefully it hangs together well enough to get some encouraging input as well as corrections for me to work on.

The vegetable garden is planted and has expanded into pots. Potato bags have been ordered and as soon as they arrive the root crops will be completed.

Meanwhile, it is a gorgeous beginning to May in the Lowcountry.  Mid 80s, sunshine, occasional rain (no need to water said garden!) and both gardenias and jasmine in bloom so everything smells amazing.  The magnolia is showing its first color and will be filled with sweet white flowers in a week or so.

I do so love the pristine beauty of our white spring flowers… gardenia

Jasmine

and Magnolia

what now?

It is Monday…again.  Not sure how that happens so often 😉  The weekend was lovely, if hectic.  The car is still  in the shop (seems Hyundai is rather sloppy about getting and shipping parts)  So we are managing all of our trips in the Miata… which just has to make ya smile.

No garden supplies or soil till we get my car back, but we did stop and nab some tiny tomato plants… heirloom, of course… and decided to try out hand at white eggplant.  Found lovely Japanese heirloom variety with smaller egg shaped fruit… very excited to see how long before they up and kicking out pretty white eggplants for the table.

Got morning glory seeds to start… we really wanted some interesting striped ones I’d seen, but this is a pretty heirloom mix of colors and will look nice trellised up the porch pole.

Looks like lots of gardening to be done this week.  Won’t that be fun!!!

Spring is such a treasure.

Frantic Friday

Things have gotten even crazier as our week of house-sitting winds to an end.  They will be home today!  Reesie and I had to RACE through our morning to try to make everything as perfect for their return as we could. It is an act of love, and we enjoyed every minute of it.

Electrician was to arrive at 7am…so we were up early.  My car is in the shop needing brake repairs (head cylinder?  All I know is…expensive!  ouch!) and we still needed more topsoil to complete the flower bed we have been working on all week. So we had to go to Lowe’s and buy it just a bag at a time, load it into her teeeny Miata and bring it home.  Took three trips, but the bed was completed.  It is a long curve that begins at the patio, goes straight, forming a path between the rose bed along the back of the house, and this new perennial bed and then curving to invite the visitor to stroll into the yard itself where other plantings and settings await.

I lined the bed along the walkway with daylilies…. yellow, black, red, oranges, bicolors… so many different and beautiful plants.  In the center is a tall tower covered in clematis in burgundy and pale lavender.  The edge closest to the patio is lined with identical pale gold daylilies, then a stone paved pathway to the nook under the birch tree, and the bed resumes with a grouping of various perennials in lots of colors including carnations, dianthus, balloon flowers, and blanket flowers.  When we are finished planting it, this will be a gorgeous display of color.

We also tended Merrill’s vegetable garden, potted his white onion sets (they couldn’t wait any longer to go into the ground), and treated the roses.  A bright candy striped rose opened today…a fitting finale to our week.

At home, there is plenty of work to be done.  Some very long, busy days ahead of us getting the house cleaned and fixed up and our gardens in.  First up… a lawn mower!!!  And removing a lot of ‘stuff’ from the screen porch.

And to finish off this gorgeous, busy, frenetic and fun Friday… our weekly Fantasy photo…

April!

And so March left us and April swept into the Lowcountry.  Since my work this week has been entirely outdoors, it is a lovely thing indeed.  Sunshine, blue skies, and lovely temperatures in the 80s.  Perfect for working in the yard and garden.  For hauling mulch, potting flowers, stripping away the last vestiges of winter and embracing all that is new.

My wisteria is now in full bloom.  Beautiful purple flowers festoon the fences. Hang in pendulous bunches throughout the heavy green of the magnolia tree and add splashes of lilac along the roadsides and woodlands.

  Such a happy addition to spring.

Writing continues. The new chapter seems to be meshing well with the previous version and adds the hint of conflict and a bit more mystery to what has gone before in ages past and what may yet come to pass in this story.  Love it when a story comes together ❤

Daughter and I collected the last items we needed for our new ‘rabbit run’ tonight.  Hopefully this weekend we will be able to get it laid out and by next week the bunny will have a lovely new run so she can get outside and enjoy spring as much as the rest of us.

Hope your April is also off to a bright and brilliant beginning.