Bird brain

"Grammy, you changed your table." This from a 7-year-old grandson. Well, yes, I did. I moved the stack of library books from the dining room table to another stack in the living room, put the Halloween candy bowl in the basement storage room, sorted and recycled the mail, put a bag of purged clothing into the car, hung all the coats that were draped on the chair backs. No wonder he noticed the table was different. He said, "It looks like fall."

Such a sweet boy. Because that's what I was going for. Never mind that the hutch behind is still full of summer seashells. The table is fall.

But what fascinated the 7-year-old and his brothers, 9 and 11, were the pheasant feathers. What kind of bird is that from? What does it look like? (We're suburb dwellers - no pheasants around here.) I tried to explain...well, it's kind of like a turkey but not, has beautiful long tail feathers, lives in fields...but - their attention had waned.
Relating this to friends later, one of them said, "Why didn't you show them the taxidermy pheasant you have in your hallway?" Okay, duh.

Yes, there is a stuffed pheasant in the hallway. I look at it every day of my life. It's so familiar that it doesn't even register anymore. Obviously.

Maybe I'll remember the next time they're over. Bird brain, indeed.

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The Wind Blew

Last week looking out my living room window.

This week.

But I did wash the windows.

 

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Pink and Blue

That's all I have to say.

Except for a little coral.

And pink and purple.

Fall is on its way so I have to enjoy this while it lasts!

 

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Peachy Day

I hardly ever bake, much less when it's 95 degrees outside and not much cooler inside. Colorado summer days can be quite hot but we're a mile closer to the sun, right? Those hot days lead to a great peach crop harvested on the Western Slope of Colorado and eagerly awaited by all of us on the other side of the Continental Divide. I was so hyped up by all the TV ads showing luscious ripe fruit that I made a peach pie. But since I hadn't planned ahead and let the peaches ripen for a few days I had to wrestle those babies to get them sliced and pitted. There are no severed fingertips in the photo below.

I prebaked the pie crust but it shrunk a little. These things happen.

So I decorated the top real cute with these fancy cutters I got at Williams-Sonoma.

I made my own pie garden with a bird on a branch and a bumblebee hovering above the peaches.

And who better to eat this garden-y peach pie than The Dubious Gardener and The Reluctant Gardener?

It was a pretty good pie and probably the last thing I'll bake 'till Thanksgiving. But who wants to think about that? For now I'll enjoy the summer heat and the last peach which is now ripe.

Peachy!

 

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I never saw this before! ....

...and I can't actually show you but I can tell! See this birdbath fountain below? Yes, I know it's a crummy photo but iPhones aren't great at at zooming in. Notice where the chickadee is - that's the bubbler that brings the water up through the fountain. A lot of birds prefer to drink right from the bubbler but they bathe in one of the bowls below it.

Today I was sitting on the back porch frittering the afternoon away when I glanced up and happened to notice what I thought was a really large bumblebee in the bubbler. At second glance I was astonished to see it was a female Broad-tailed hummingbird. Taking a bath. In the bubbler. Whooee! How clever of her - just her size, too. I was too awestruck to remember to grab my iPhone, and when I did I was seconds too late. Bath over. Here she is a few minutes later getting all sticky again at the Black and blue salvia. Another bad I-photo.

I get hummers daily at this time of year and I'd never seen one even get close to a water source, much less take a bubbler bath. I guess they get plenty of liquid to drink from the flower nectar but their little bodies must get sticky from it too. I wonder if they would like the mister? I think I'll set it up and find out.

 

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Orange pop

The other evening I accompanied The Reluctant Gardener, The Dubious Gardener, and The Expert Gardener to a local garden center which was having a flower show, a car show, and a free barbecue. Free entertainment, and I don't need much of an excuse to go to the nursery. We ate barbecue immediately - didn't want to miss out on that. While Reluctant and Dubious toured the car show in the parking lot (and got seconds on the food) Expert and I took a look at the flower show. To our surprise it turned out to be a judging of trial plants that weren't available yet. The staff gave everyone three flags and we were instructed to place them in each of our three favorites. Okay, now that was fun! We saw plants in colors that variety hadn't come in before, like this orange calibrachoe. After the judging we could buy them so I did.

They said the ones with the most flags will be the varieties they buy a lot of next spring. Pretty clever of them. But not everyone likes orange flowers. Apparently I do because I bought this orange petunia too.

This reminds me there's an orange Popsicle in the freezer waiting for me.

 

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She sorts seashells

Seashells. I love them. Since I was a little kid living in Florida I've been fascinated by them. Found on the beach or bought in a shell shop - I wasn't picky. None of those shells survived the "way too many" moves but I've managed to look for seashells anytime I'm near a beach. Or a garage sale. People sell their souvenir shells - really. That's okay because I'm likely to buy them. Yesterday it occurred to me that I should sort the shells and put them in a container I found at a flea market. First I had to rinse them all off and pick out the leaves and stuff that had fallen into their bowls. They've been outside for awhile. Then I spread them out on a mesh top table to dry.

I'd like to just leave them here - they look cool. But that won't do.

I seem to be especially fond of the spiral ones.

I remember finding one of these pincushion shells on Sanibel Island at about age 8. I was thrilled. But I stepped on it later that day. Lots of tears. My mother asked me why I put it on the floor. As a grandmother of five I now know the answer is "I don't know!" delivered in a mournful wail.

Some of the shells are so dinky I had to set them on top of the sand dollars so they wouldn't fall through the mesh.

Here's the thing I bought at a flea market. Not sure what this was ever used for. Maybe a display for a bakery countertop? Not sure why I bought it either. Or what I was going to do with it. It took me two weeks to think up the seashell thing.

The finished shell holder.

This is my seashore beachy theme hutch for the summer. Kind of overdone but I never know when to stop. And it's a great improvement over the Christmas Village that was there until mid-July. Seashells are better.

 

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Grand all around

We were on a road trip last week - the Dubious Gardener, me, and two of The Adorable Grandchildren. Our cabin near Bassetts in northern California was surrounded by these grand trees - white fir. I was in awe. Children in the hammock below were dwarfed by these giants!

 

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The White Buffalo cometh

I'm pretty sure the Native Americans who hold the White Buffalo sacred never envisioned it with golf carts zipping around in the background. But that's what I saw as I went to take this picture. Yes, all that greenery behind the buffalo statue (and what a statue!) in this high-altitude garden is a golf course. The background is the Williams Fork Range with the scourge of the mountain pine beetle very visible. They chew through and decimate lodge pole pines in an unrelenting onslaught.

This weekend we toured gardens at a much higher altitude of about 8,500 to 9,000 ft. in Summit County, Colorado. Rocks all over. It IS the Rocky Mountains but I think these below might have been brought in on a flatbed truck. Unfortunately we were destined to have a close-up view of a flatbed truck but more on that later.

Below, a stepping stone path through a wildflower-meadow look.

Just plain pretty. Love the Blue Spruce in the background.

I thought this was some new variety of Columbine since we see so many in the mountains. The Expert Gardener told me it was Trollius also known as Globe Flower. I think she looked at a plant marker.

This garden below was all about a fairy garden for the owner's grandchildren. Nice little stone bridge...

...and stone house with sedums growing on the roof. Clever!

Charming trellis...

...and lit-up seating area for fairies. The whole fairy garden was huge, tucked under spruce and pine trees behind a raised stone retaining wall. So well done, but so tidy I wondered if her grandchildren ever played in it. The one I made for my grandchildren looks like a tornado swept through it. Sheep upturned, houses on their sides, fairies askew like they've been on a binge. But this was one to aspire to.

Since we got lost finding the next garden we decided we might as well eat lunch. The Mountain Lyon Cafe hit the spot. I love this kind of place with a ton of choices on the menu, everyone is friendly, and there were lots of cars in the parking lot. That's the same as a good review for me.

Excellent - a buffalo head on the wall!

But that wasn't as surprising as what we saw on the way to the next garden - a buck on the roof of the Alpine Garden Center munching on poppies and pansies. Nice!

I really liked this fairly long waterfall but I liked the Sweet William even more.

Not a bad idea for an old whiskey barrel. But I think gravity will win out soon.

Nicely done walkway to a front door with volunteer violas coming up through spaces in the pavers.

Crack plant.

Dubious Gardener and Reluctant Gardener taking a break from all that up-and-downhill walking.

A lot of people used orange traffic cones to cordon off their driveways from garden tour vehicles. Not these homeowners.

They had some very effective simple plantings showcased against stone.

 

Is this stunning or what? Look at that bright burst of color against the white stones.

This was not a stunning moment. This is not us, but it's what happened to us. It's never a good idea to throw a rod on Interstate 70 on your way home. Sure glad I've been paying for that AAA membership (with 100 mile towing) for all these years. We could have used some of that White Buffalo karma though.

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