Sort of. I mean, really, I didn’t go anywhere. I just took a break.
I didn’t get a whole lot done either.
Work has been crazy busy. Plus, we decided to hang out at the WV place all last week. So, no progress on projects at the MD house.
It was a great week in WV, though. We didn’t really want to come back. But now that we’re here, it’s good to be home.
I don’t have a whole lot to say, really.
But I took quite a few pictures last week.And if I don’t share them here, they’ll just be stuck in my computer, unseen, forever.
So here goes…
If you’re not really interested in looking at pics, you might want to stop reading now. Because there’s lots of ’em.
Now, to really appreciate these pics, you should click on each for a larger view so you can see the detail. They’re cool, if I do say so myself.
Critters
Snake! Not a great picture, but one I had to share. It was about 6 feet / 2 meters long.Ladybug (in bright morning sun).Another ladybug. (Diffuse, soft morning light.)Small butterfly on thistle.Butterfly or moth? You tell me. I have no clue.Slightly larger butterfly.
Spider.
On a Dewy Mountain Morning
Drippy leaf. Another drippy leaf.Wet grass.Wet pine.Big drip.
These berries are some of the few bits of color currently in the forest other than green.Drippy berries.Not sure if this is a diseased version of the same tree that has the red berries, but I love the color of these particular berries.
The plants weren’t the only things covered by dew…
After two weeks, I decided I’d had enough of the West Virginia place.
Um, maybe that’s not entirely true. I love life in the country. I’m just trying to convince myself that I’d had enough, hoping it would make being back in this crazy, crowded, metropolitan Hell more tolerable. Really I had to come home to do chores and stuff.
Anyway, why I came home isn’t important. The ride home is what I’m talking about here. We hadn’t, as we’d hoped, had many opportunities to ride our motorcycles in West Virginia. Not only was it horribly hot, I was way too busy with work stuff to get away. So I decided I’d ride my bike home. If I can’t do any riding in Maryland during the week, at least I’ll have the rides to and from under my belt.
Although cloudy and rainy most of the morning here in Maryland, sunny, blue skies were supposed to prevail by afternoon. All was pretty much fine weather-wise. I did get rained on a little bit. But what was not fine was this weird thing that happened while I was on I-70. Before I describe said weird thing, you need to look at a picture of my helmet.
Red arrow = air intake; blue arrow = air vent.
I wear a full-face helmet. With the visor/face-shield down, there’s not a lot of circulation and sometimes, just like a car window, the visor can fog up. That’s why many helmets are designed with some sort of ventilation. The red arrow shows the vent on my helmet. That air is directed upward so that it blows out of those holes indicated by the blue arrow onto the inside of the face-shield, reducing the chances of fogging. My face-shield is up in this picture. When it’s down, those vents are on the inside with my head, about three inches from my nose.
While cruising along on I-70, to my complete surprise, a large bumblebee hit my leg and then flew up and hit my helmet. It was stuck right in front of my face. From what I could see, it was stuck, holding on for dear life right near that vent. I couldn’t look too closely because I had to watch the road. I turned my head to the left and to the right several times thinking the bee would just blow away.
It didn’t.
Even though the bee was only three inches from my nose, it didn’t seem to be moving, so I wasn’t too freaked out. Yes, I was a little weirded out. But not enough to risk my life stopping on the shoulder of an interstate highway. Besides, I knew I was almost at my destination. And how much harm could a bee do while clinging to the outside of my helmet?
Once I did stop, I was quite surprised to realize the bee was on the inside. It had ridden there, mere inches from my nose for about fifteen minutes!
The Bee
What are the chances of a bee hitting my leg, bouncing off and getting sucked into that tiny little air vent? Fortunately for me, either the collision, being sucked into the vent, or a grisly combination of both killed the bee. Can you imagine having a bee fly into and around inside your helmet? There’s not that much extra space in there, trust me. (In case you are wondering about the big, black thing inside my helmet, that’s my backrest. I usually stick my helmet there when I get off of the bike.)
Other than that, the ride was pretty much uneventful. And you know what? It’s actually kind of nice to be home.
So, do you want to know what the world looked like after a 3-hour torrential rain? Not, like, the whole world. Just the smaller area around our WV place.
The storm was a real gully-washer.
They call storms like that “gully washers” for a reason. I’ve seen this phenomenon a couple of times, but it never ceases to intrigue me. “Amaze” is a bit strong for this situation, I think.
There were a lot of leaves in that gully on the left-hand side of the road. They’d collected there over a number of months. They were moldering and compacted. If I’d tried raking the leaves out of there, it would’ve taken some effort. Trust me, there’s a pretty long gully beside our driveway.
The leaves that didn't get pushed out of the gully were transported to the end of the road.
That was all done by rainwater.
A closer look.
The girls were not fazed at all by the storm’s aftermath. Actually, I think they kind of liked it. The younger two, anyway.
Belle
Belle loves running through wet grass. Actually, she loves running through grass, period. So wet grass is just a bonus. She loves it even more if there’s a bit of water laying around that she can splash through. I wasn’t able to capture any shots of her doing that, so you’ll just have to trust me.
K
K, on the other hand, isn’t crazy about getting wet. She’ll do it, mind you. She just doesn’t enjoy it like Belle does.
Meg
I honestly don’t think Meg cares one way or the other about being wet. For her, it’s just a state of being. Although several times during the storm she’d stick her head out of the doggie door, stop, and back-up into the house. It was raining HARD, though, so I don’t blame her a bit.
Meg didn’t walk to the end of the road with us on Sunday morning. Sometimes one or more of the dogs will veer off on a little side trip of their own. But she was waiting in the driveway when we got back.
So, other than lots of leaves being pushed out of the gully, the world just looked wet. It felt REALLY humid, too. In case you were wondering.
In my next post I’ll reveal something really weird that happened to me during my ride home.
This has definitely been the longest week EVER. Which is weird, because it was only a four-day work week. It was one of those weeks, though, where I had a pretty complicated work project due on Friday. On Tuesday morning, before I logged in and checked e-mail, I had a pretty good idea of what I’d do each day to get that project finished. Wrong. Something else crept up. Something else almost always creeps up. I should know better. Anyway…
There wasn’t a whole lot of spare time. And I couldn’t enjoy the spare time I did have because all week it was unGODly HOT. One of the reasons we decided to work remotely again this week was so we could get some motorcycle riding in. That and we just love working here. Even if we do have to share an office (GASP!). More on that later.
I decided to do something different this evening (I started this post last night). A blog post (this one) that’s more images than words. So I need to stop typing now and post some images.
Here goes…
One CRAZY Caterpillar
Our house is in the woods. The woods are full of critters. Some smaller than others. Some more alive than others, too.
Only two of the many trophies the girls discovered this week.
The girls are forever digging stuff up in the woods. They LOVE being able to run loose and explore. Thursday, while I was on the telephone, Belle and K came walking up out of the hollow. One was carrying a deer skull, the other a neck bone. Hubby was here so he retrieved the bones and disposed of them immediately. Unlike me. I like to leave stuff lay around for a while in high places and take lots of pictures…
Belle and her mystery critter.
With those bones in mind, perhaps you can imagine my horror when I saw Belle running around with THIS in her mouth. Maybe you can’t. I assure you, I was appalled. Because I knew I would have to be the one to get that thing, whatever gross, stinky, dead thing it was, away from her. This is what she usually carries…
Belle's favorite raccoon.
Belle LOVES that raccoon. She carries it around often. I could plainly see the mystery critter was not the coon. The horror soon turned to relief, however, when I discovered the mystery critter to be an old dog toy (bunny) that someone had lost in the woods at some point. We haven’t seen that thing for ages. It’s ears were both missing, which I found sort of amusing.
The office hubby and I share.
This is one of the reasons we enjoy being here during the week. Our outside office. We have to share, but that’s okay.
I really enjoy our outdoor work space.
If it weren’t so darn hot, it would have been perfect. Only the mornings were tolerable. Last week, I had to wear a jacket to work in this space in the morning!
The fans helped, but just a little bit.
We could never do this at the MD place. We live too close to the airport.
Hubby hard at work.
The dogs like the outdoor office, too. Until it gets really hot.
Break area.
The hammock is a nice touch, don’t you think?
Returning from one of our little strolls.
We did have a bit of drama yesterday. That project I’d been working on all week? The one that was due at the end of the day? At just before 5:00, I was getting REALLY close to being finished when it started storming. And the power started flickering on and off. My computer has a battery. But no power means no Internet. No Internet would have meant I was screwed. Big time. I’d have no way to deliver the completed files on time. My blood pressure was through the roof, let me tell you. I did manage to finish and get the files uploaded, thank goodness. And then I gulped a beer straight down to calm my nerves.
It rained HARD and for a long time.
We needed the rain. But still. It rained liked this for a few hours. There was one quick gap in the storm (thank you, Weather Channel radar) so I was able to take the girls for a quick afternoon walk.
The break didn't last long.Wet dogs."I don't like thunder, Mama."
Finally, I decided my time would be better spent making dinner than trying to stay dry on the front porch and watch the rain.
The girls waiting for their dinner. This was between storms.I had an audience.
Usually I’d shoo the dogs away, but by then it was thundering pretty loudly, so I let them hang out in the kitchen.
Hoping for droppage.
This tiny little kitchen isn’t big enough for me and three dogs. Luckily, everything I needed was at hand, so I didn’t need to move around much.
It stopped raining hard around 8:00 PM, I think. It didn’t stop completely until after we were in bed.
I think I’ll go see what the world looks like after three hours of crazy, hard rain.
Amy and the kids spent the weekend with us at the WV place. Klondike, their very large, white German Shepherd came along, too.
This post is probably WAY too long for most readers, but I have lots of pics to share. If nothing else, just scroll through and look at the images. Be sure to click on each if you’d like to see a better (larger) picture.
The Grandkids: Joey (almost 3), Brianna (9) and Gaige (6).
The only big plan for the weekend was for all of us to do a bike ride on the C & O Canal. So one of the first things Hubby had to do on Saturday was install the bike seat on Amy’s bike. He put one on his bike, too, so they could trade off if necessary.
Pop's Workshop
Brianna and Gaige can ride their own bikes. But Joey is too little to be able to keep up with all of us, hence the bike seat.
The Seat Works!
Saturday was pretty hot, and we needed to do some shopping, so we decided to wait until Sunday for the bike ride.
K and Joey (he's got the devil in his eyes here for sure)
We all sort of just goofed around on Saturday morning. The kids spent most of that time outside playing. The dogs did, too. Our girls were a bad influence on Klondike.
Notice the dirty feet?
Amy and I walked Joey down the driveway. I asked him to pose on the little bridge Hubby made for me years ago for my pond. Since I no longer have a pond, I was quite happy to put the bride to use at the WV place.
Joey saying, "Cheese!"
Joey thinks the new gate is lots of fun. It was Amy’s idea to have him climb behind the sign. Check out the dirt on his legs!
Joey has always been a climber.
Brianna and Gaige were off “having an adventure.” They were exploring the woods around the house. When I told them not to touch any dead stuff they might find laying around, I think they thought I was kidding. Thank goodness they listened because they found the source of all the bones the girls have been finding over the last few months.
Amy and Joey
Joey, being a boy, loves seeing Pop and G’s motorcycles. Pop started his up, sat Joey on the seat and let him rev the engines. That’s no “cheese” grin in the picture below. That’s a “look-I’m-riding-Pop’s-motorcycle” smile.
Joey Revving Pop's Motorcycle
Gaige and Brianna were having a blast exploring our woods. I don’t know how many times they went down the very steep hill behind our house, which they then had to climb back up. Far too many times to count, that’s for sure.
That’s one of the reasons I have far more shots of Joey. Brianna and Gaige just didn’t sit still long enough. And remember that bike ride we were planning? It didn’t happen. Not for Joey and I anyway. He woke up with a fever that had him feeling really crappy. Once he had medication in him, he felt much better, but as soon as the medication started to wear off he’d feel bad again. So he and I stayed at the cabin while Hubby and Amy took the older kids for a ride. Hubby took my point-and-shoot camera along, too, and did manage to capture a few good shots for me.
Amy, Gaige and Brianna all ready to ride.
After the ride Brianna and I had back in April, the kids were REALLY looking forward to this trip. Amy was, too. They aren’t able to get out riding much at home.
Gaige and Brianna taking a short break.Gaige riding his bike, happy as a clam.
Meanwhile, back at the cabin… with a fresh dose of medication in his system, Joey was ready to roll.
Biker JoeyKlondike following Joey.
After riding for a little while, we took a cookie break then Joey got to play in some water. That’s an activity Amy thought he’d enjoy. She was so right, as usual. He sat there for about an hour and a half, happy as could be, making soup. What kind of soup? When I asked him, he thought about it a bit, shrugged his shoulders and said, “Regular soup.”
A Great Day to Make "Soup" (aka water play!)
Soup making was quite a hit with Joey.Joey was only slightly frustrated with these pushy taste testers.
Soup making is messy business. I had to hang Joey’s shorts outside to dry while he napped.
Joey's shorts needed time to dry.
Speaking of naptime, look what showed up outside our kitchen window while Joey was sleeping and everyone else was still away.
Pileated Woodpecker
The Pileated Woodpecker, which is about as big as a Crow, is the largest woodpecker in almost all of North America.
Pileated Woodpecker
Pileated Woodpeckers are extremely skittish/bashful, so this is the first time I have ever gotten a decent shot of one after five years of our living in the woods.
After the bike ride, Gaige and Brianna were more than happy to take over the water play. Joey was back in the house. His fever kicked back in while he was napping, but Amy returned literally just as he was waking up and gave him some more medicine.
Kids are never too old to play with buckets full of water.
After they tired of that activity, they tossed the football around for a while.
Future quarterback.
I’m not saying this because Gaige is my grandson. I’m saying this because it’s a fact. Gaige, at age 6, throws the football amazingly well. See his fingers perfectly aligned on the stitches? You should see the spiral this kid lays on the ball. And he throws it in a very purposeful, practiced arc right to his target. I was quite impressed. Really. I have never seen a six-year-old throw a football with such precision.
I could barely throw a Nerf football at his age. Granted, the ball he was using isn’t full size, but it is definitely larger and harder to manage than a Nerf ball would have been.
I have no idea how well he catches because Brianna can’t throw a football very well at all and I was too busy cooking dinner at the time to play with him.
K and Belle sharing a bed.
By the end of the day, even the dogs were exhausted.
Meg resting after a LONG day.
Sunday was a long day, but we still managed to squeeze in a campfire. I don’t have any pictures of that, you’ll just have to trust me. As warm as it was, I didn’t really want a campfire, but the kids would have been so disappointed had we not had one. During Brianna’s last visit, there was a statewide burn ban on, so we couldn’t have a fire.
Time to hit the road.
By Monday afternoon, it was time for Amy and the kids to pack up and head back to civilization. It really was a great weekend. But it went by FAR too fast. Hubby and I are already looking forward to their next visit.
I actually have quite a few more pictures of Brianna that I took while she didn’t know I was watching. While Gaige and Joey were playing, she was dancing. It was hysterical. I’ll try to get those pics into a slideshow and posted tomorrow for your viewing pleasure. 🙂
Coming up with topics for this Blog isn’t always easy. It’s something I struggle with often. There are often snippets of stuff to Blog about, but that would be like showing you a pile of fabric scraps instead of a finished quilt. Sometimes scarps can be cool though. So today I’m going the scrap route.
Hubby and I have been working on a few very different projects of late. Some of those projects are bigger than others. Beautifying our long-neglected MD yard is one of them. I’ll give you the whole scoop on that later. For now, though, I’m giving you some pictures.
Rain Isn’t Always Bad
There’s just something about droplets of water on plants the intrigues me. It makes for some interesting images, that’s for sure.
NOTE: you’ll really appreciate the images if you click on each for a larger view.
Droplets on Leaf
Look at the colors. I tweaked the photo a bit to make the colors stand out more. And I really like the result. I never realized that the stems of the honeysuckle were sort of purple. That bush has the coolest colors. Purple stems, green leaves, and coral-and-pink flowers. Like these…
Honeysuckle Flower
I still don’t know the exact type of honeysuckle, or whether it blooms all Summer or just during the Spring. I just love the colors on this plant.
Honeysuckle Flower
The blooms in the pictures shared above are slightly past their prime. Here’s one that’s just emerging…
Newly-emerging Honeysuckle Bloom
I’ve bought quite a few flowers over the past couple of weeks. I’ve planted some of them. Hubby has planted some, too. But there are more to go. Here are some marigolds that still wait to be planted.
Wet Marigolds
Dry Plants Are Interesting, Too
Plants don’t have to be wet to be interesting. Last April, I planted a little shade garden. In it are a Mountain Laurel bush, several ferns, and a hosta or two. All of the plants have actually done very well. And now the Mountain Laurel is starting to bloom.
Mountain Laurel
The blooms are quite interesting, wouldn’t you say?
Mountain Laurel
But the ferns? The ferns are VERY interesting. I’ll have to get a shot of the whole garden. These close-ups are awesome, if I do say so myself. But I’d like to show off the whole garden.
Fern
The ferns stayed green all during the Winter. The multiple feet of snow we had smushed them a bit, but they survived. And now they are huge.
I’ll try to get a picture of the whole garden to share with you soon.
