Friday

Sometimes it feels to me like everyone wants to write about the small things out there. It's what matters! Those big time spectacles we see played out on the news or in the papers? Don't sweat them: it's the little things that make us happy.

I'm almost in total agreement. You need only leaf through a few pages of Ocean to realize that no big event has made its way here in many a blue moon. I talk small, look for small, delight in small.

But just to be clear: sometimes the big can be mighty exciting!

(This is not an introduction to any big announcement. I just want to go on record for wanting to strike a balance.)

True, the big news from our corner of the planet has to be the weather and it's not a happy story: we just get rain again and again, hard falling rain, loud, forceful rain. Thunderous rain. Everything feels squishy, slippery and wet. And the bugs are just in heaven!

Well, never mind. Very early this morning, I do a fifteen minute lily clearing - enough to keep the visuals in check (just please don't look past the first line of flowers!), and enough to get annoyed at the mosquitoes, and at myself for not spraying, covering or taking any other precautionary measures.

Just one photo from my morning in the garden (I'm in a hurry to do my weekly grocery shopping):






Breakfast, lovely as always.






With a view toward the (more or less) cleaned up lilies.





And now comes the noon hour. Snowdrop's mom has taken some hours off to share in her little girl's after school routines. We're especially eager to all take part in the pool experience. And of course, what do we get? A prediction of rain. Storms too.

Oh, bother with it all! Let's at least try to get a little of our adventuring under the belt. Pick up a happy little girl, walk to coffee shop! (Where we admire the paintings of birds...)





And though the clouds are looking mighty dark and dare I say it -- mighty fierce, we make it to the pool... So far so good... Mommy and daughter are out in the (pretty empty today! no surprise there!) pool...






Snowdrop is extremely happy to show mommy her games...






She relishes the attention too. I'm much more to the side of her play when she and I come alone.






But I'm so very happy that we have had this time outside, that the rains held off... Until they didn't anymore and we make a dash back to school where I left the car. And just as we come to the farmhouse, the storms roll in again.

Never mind. Ed is back from his meetings -- wet from the motorcycle ride, but still happy to play ball...





And the little girl of course returns to her babies, because, well, a mother's work is never done...






I am grateful, really I am. Yes, there are heavy storms predicted for this night, but we had our few minutes of outdoor play. We all needed that.

(On the porch, during the afternoon rains, looking out at the gardens...)






Snowdrop wakes, she plays.
My hair is in my way!
You want a ponytail? 
Yes! (Gaga smiles.)

 This is gaga and me on a motorcycle...






Ed picks up the camera.






You'd never know that storms were raging outside...





Until it's time to head out.

Torrential rains.

Still, we are lucky. Our basement is sporting only one small leak. Our roof is solid. And we have screens on windows that keep bugs out! How good is that!

Small stuff, right?