Lost and Found

Many thanks to my niece Lib for posting this family photo on Facebook, taken a gazillion years ago:

She is the darling little one in front. From left to right, Carol, Lisa, Gail, Maureen, Tom & Anita Price. We have all had good fun seeing this blast from the past. I remarked how high my Mom's hair is, and how long all of our hair is--my goodness! My father must have been in his late 50's in this photo, which would have made our Mom in her late 40's? Apparently this was taken at our once yearly visit to Harris Corporation where our Father worked. What's so weird to me is there are no other people around us...perhaps we scared them off? If Maureen doesn't remember it, the story of the photo is lost, never to be found again...

Speaking of losing stuff, don't you hate it when you KNOW something is around the house, however, try as you might, you cannot find it? I know I do. I searched everywhere in my bedroom for my bike shorts yesterday to no avail. Same thing this morning....and then, just like that, when you're not looking, it is as plain as day. This afternoon I was doing a little ironing and lo and behold, my shorts and tank top were on the shelf above my hanging dresses. No doubt, I pulled them off in a hurry one day to slip on a dress. Having found them makes me happy.

Yesterday, I sent Sue a message: "are you still my riding buddy?" Shortly thereafter she answered she'd be ready in about 15 minutes. As I rode up in her driveway she said she had something to show me in the backyard. Oh my goodness--a baby blue jay startled her when she emptied her pool skimmer. Can you imagine opening the cover and finding a live baby bird???? Me neither. Sue is a collector of both things and plants, some of which I'll show you shortly. One of those things are antique bird cages which she put to use for drying out the bird.

I'm not much of a blue jay fan, mostly because they are kind of a bully bird, but this little one sure was cute! The door is open because we were trying to coax it out after our ride. Eventually Sue turned it practically on it's side to make it easier for the baby, who finally hopped out and into the bushes.

This added some excitement to both of our mornings. I asked Sue if she wanted to ride over to the "peacock neighborhood to see if there were any babies?" Sure thing. Riding with someone else is the ticket as the miles pile up pretty easily, especially if you are chatters like we are!

No babies, in fact, they were laying new sidewalk, scaring most of the peacocks into the trees. I counted at least 15 in one huge tree.

Moseying home, we went into another neighborhood and by golly, Sue spotted these two bunnies!

Although the bunnies are not particularly cute, I figured you might want to see them, just the same. Taking leave of Sue, I rode home to work in the yard, trimming and trimming. I'm happy my caladium bulbs are coming up around the oak tree.

Oops, I forgot one other thing from Sue's back garden. Ever the thrifter, she planted an agapanthus from her neighbor's yard, and look what happened.

The white ones are not nearly so common as the lavender type which are blooming like mad this time of year. Neither of us know what the little pink guy is behind it--a volunteer apparently. Speaking of volunteers, have you heard that term in connection with a garden? It means previous flowers pop up in unexpected places. The term fits our side garden perfectly; not necessarily a good thing if you are a purist which I am not. Merely grateful anything with color blooms. :)

Working out back, I noticed the air plant, a birthday gift from Maureen, is blooming!

The natural world is a curious and exciting place isn't it? Oddly enough, my largest orchid, which only dropped the last flowers a few weeks ago, has new buds already. Go figure?

Through my years of obsessive photo taking I've discovered the best yards along my daily routes, places worthy of pulling the car over for. One such house is just across the street from Lake Como Elementary where Bruce claims we first met in the 6th grade during summer activities. I'll take his word for it, as you and I know, there's no hope for my memory--it is one of those things that is hopelessly lost and there's scant evidence to think it can be found! Anyway, today I took this one which if it were for sale I'd call, "The One That Got Away."

The Monarch was behind the sunflower when I began the shot, hoping it would come around front, but it had other plans!

As you know my photography editing skills are limited, including, until just recently, the ability to re-size images, a requirement for applying to art shows. Let me tell you, I am so darn excited I finally learned how to do it. For years, I've had to rely on Mr. Roger to do this for me before I could enter them into what's called, Zapplication, the site most all art shows use to process their applications. I would pick three images, he would re-size them, sending them back to me. Of late, he's been uber-busy, making this process much more complicated. Not to mention I was getting nervous I would miss my deadlines. As they say, necessity is the "mother of invention", or in my case, a Google search to learn how to use my Mac for this task. Woo hoo! Let's just hope I chose three good ones to send in with my application to Winter Park Autumn Art Festival! I will be sorely disappointed, as you can imagine, if I don't get in. What will be, will be is a pretty good motto for this kind of thing. Sounds good anyway!