Tuesday

And the trees keep falling and the mosquitoes keep biting and the storms threaten and the summer is turning out to be quite the interesting (for lack of a more appropriate term) season!

Yet, like the unattractive wallpaper that you swore you couldn't abide for a single day -- it just had to go, the minute you moved into your house -- after a while, you get used to the new status quo and though I can't say I don't notice this summer's perturbations, I accept them and adjust the day's plans accordingly.

Morning walk through the gardens -- with a bug swatting paddle.






(Day lilies and the tall lilium -- all grand.)






(Lilies in the roadside flower bed as well...)






Breakfast, taking it all in from a safe and comfortable place...







Yes, of course -- I wish I could get closer to my gardens. There's a lot of tweaking that you can do all summer long: deadhead spent flowers, support tall stems, pick out a few weeds. And the berries -- I really must pluck them this week! But I love whatever I can get. Like with your children who grow up and move on, you learn to take what life offers. In the case of my gardens -- I get visual bounty, from the porch, or during my quick morning walks. I am satisfied.


I pick up Snowdrop at the usual noonish hour, but maybe she is tired, or maybe because it is a sticky day, she isn't that keen on getting out of her stroller at the playground.

I look out at the lesser lake -- such still waters! There is no wind at all. Warm muggy air that refuses to move on.






The girl is hungry, that's for sure. She devours the croissant and asks for a coffee shop treat. Okay, let's pause there for a few minutes. (She is perhaps the only one in the place not glued to a computer screen.)






We leave a few scattered crumbs on the floor and I find the broom to sweep them up. Snowdrop takes over. She's not bad at the task!






Revived, she asks if we can go to the pool. Of course!

Waiting by the gate for the doors to open at 1, I encounter a woman, a grandma actually, who has been here at this same hour every time we've been here. She looks at Snowdrop and smiles -- I see a different sweater today! She knows Snowdrop's devotion to her cardigans. That's okay, my little girl insists on a princess dress every waking hour of the day. Even at the swimming pool.

(Here's a moment without a sweater -- when we're getting ready to change into a swimsuit.)






One of the first in the water -- loving it so very much!











Look, gaga! Another schoolbus! Yes, it will be another crowded day at the pool. I'm not surprised. It really is muggy out there.






We don't stay long. Maybe an hour -- it's all you need to refresh yourself on a day like this. Besides, raffi, the baby of choice is waiting at the farmhouse. (Feeding her cakes is serious business!)






In the late afternoon, just before the rains come down again, Ed comes in from surveying the farmette lands -- the beetles in the orchard, the cheepers in the coop, the mosquitoes out by the blueberry bushes...
I've got good news and bad news -- he tells me. The bad news is that the tree we worked on yesterday -- it toppled completely, right onto your rear flower bed. I can't leave it like that. I'm going to have to go and clear it out.

Where in that is the good news, I wonder?

For me, of course, the good news is that I can still sit out on our porch, listen to the drizzle on the glass roof and look out on this...