A Whole Lot of Knobs

Before we get into the knob story, I have something to confess. I am dumb with a capital D. What did I do now? Well, Sunday afternoon, while at the pool, our friend Carolyn Reinike offered to pull David behind their ski boat on his paddleboard. I decided I might like to do the same. First, however, was David's turn, and he made it look very easy.

Next up was Mom who has not stood up on a paddleboard for two years, so why she thought she could do so is a mystery. Wishful thinking perhaps. Anyway, I gave it a go, but try as I might, I could not bring myself to stand up.

Carolyn was gentle with me, going fairly slow which gave me the idea that I could manage to move outside the wake for fun. Then this happened.

Actually, this is after I managed to pull myself back on the board after crashing off. One more go of it,

and I'd had all the fun any 65 year old needs to have on a lazy Sunday afternoon in July. So riding wasn't the dumb part. The dumb part was not standing up because the rubber gripping on the board killed my knee which was nearly healed from a tumble I took more than a MONTH ago. I'd skinned so much skin off that it was taking forever to build back up ,and now I've gone and got a big blister on it. Although it doesn't hurt, who knows how long it will take to get back to where it was before I acted as if I were 20 years younger!

Well friends, we are nearly back to our regularly scheduled programming, namely birds and nature. In fact, shortly we will resume just that, but first let us put some meaning to today's title, shall we? I came home from Home Depot with 24 knobs the other day. Bruce was not sold on them, so we went to Lowes to see what they had in stock. Finding one there he particularly liked, the good news is that it was $1.75 cheaper and when you are buying so many I need not tell you that it is a nice bonus. Buying just one, we did a comparison on the same drawer. I had to admit that his choice was just fine,  so today I bought 23 more knobs and began putting them on.

His choice is more in keeping with the furniture. Finishing the dresser, I moved on to the nightstand and it was then that I counted the remaining knobs in the bag and what I needed to replace. Not one and the same.

I hated to go back out in the heat, but when you are four short, you are four short. Back to Lowes, and now we are get to go. I am happy to report that the room is nearly what we want it to be. A few more touches, and that will be that.

Leaving me more time to observe nature, although this type is not my favorite.

In as many days, I've found this toad in one of my porch plants, and Bruce killed a Cuban Tree frog that was hanging around inside the pot by the front DOOR! If that nasty frog had jumped out on me I would have freaked!  (As a reminder, CTFs are invasive and killing them is recommended by the University of Florida. )

You have to take the good with the bad, and this morning was full of goodness. Stepping out back to see what was happening, I almost fell over with happiness because this was right in front of me!!!!

Thankfully my camera was nearby and I was able to grab it quick, although that turned out to be unnecessary because those two hung out for at least twenty minutes. As is so often the case, lighting conditions were abysmal, so I tried a few things, including this shot taken inside while I was standing on the tub frame.

And just what do I mean about the lighting? Well, it was about an hour after sunrise and the strong backlighting makes it challenging, to say the least. Nonetheless, I was fortunate to get a close up.

If I had to guess, I would say they are young, but that is merely a guess. Oh how I hope they come back!! The only reason they flew off this morning is because the yard guys arrived to do some trimming, catching me in my nightgown with a camera up to my face!! That bathroom shot? Took it when I went indoors to make myself more presentable. :)

How many different birds do you count below?

It is a wonder to me that our four ducklings continue to thrive.

Here's a tip for you----if you want to see a rainbow, go outdoors and look East when the sun returns following a thunderstorm. Usually works. Two in one week!

The above did not last very long though because it began raining again, even while I was taking this.

Mr. Peck took yesterday off from his non-paying job and we did errands after a nature walk twice around Lake Davis. He found these Wood Ducks chilling on a Cypress branch during our first lap.

"Wonder what we will see the second time around", I said. Or should that be asked? Anyway, before long I saw some water commotion and hurried over to the lake edge.

Thinking it was a fight at first, I soon realized it was Muscovey ducks mating. You have seen a bunch of that in this blog, haven't you? You see what I see.

From afar it looked like two ducks, however, on closer inspection we only saw one, thinking our eyes had deceived us because for at least 30 seconds, if not more, the male had the female underwater. Eventually she surfaced and skedaddled.

He, on the other hand, came in hot pursuit!

Eventually they settled down and that was that. Earlier in the Spring I thought our duckling days would be numbered, but by golly, they just keep coming.

 When I sat down to write, the sky was inky blue with huge thunder and lightening crashing all around. Nary a drop of rain has fallen and the sun is, once again, blazing. The weather is nearly as unpredictable as what nature will I come across tomorrow. Isn't it fun?

your friend,


Gail

The Finish Line is in Sight!

The dishes piled up, but at least we ate, albeit very much out of our regular time slots.

We most definitely like to keep a bit of a schedule, and oftentimes it amazes me how people eat at all times of the day. I suppose we're old-fashioned? We also go to bed about the same time every night, unless, of course, we get sucked into a show on Netflix, like Ozark, which is very hard to quit watching. I was saying to Bruce that those types of shows are like reading a good book that you just can't put down. Do you agree?

Back to the magic of caulk, here's a better shot of how it works wonders as Bruce is making his way around the room.

And so it began, the rolling of the walls that about did me in. This is a large room, I think something like 14x17 feet, and as I neared the finish line on the second coat, my arms were feeling it. Honestly, I wanted to quit, but how were we to finish with that sort of attitude? Bruce was the one getting off and on a ladder to paint the new crown molding. Now that's an art!

Actually, I took the photo below on the first pass. Thank God for Pam who loaned me her extension pole which allowed me not to use a ladder to reach the 10 foot ceilings. That, my friends, is a life saver. although it is also the reason I tired because, well, let's face it, I'm a wuss these days. My arms ain't what they used to be, for sure.

I heard from Jane who said she was a wee bit sad that we'd abandoned the first color scheme, inspired by her painting, however, there is plenty of her influence to be seen as you will soon see. But before we get to the draperies, once the painting was complete, we got the furniture all back in place and it was time to add the personal touches, as in stuff for the shelves. Bruce was like, "I can't wait to see how you fill it." No pressure honey!

Rummaging around, I found some stuff hidden away in cupboards, including the tv cabinet which had some of my favorite books behind stacks of CDs. Because it had been two years since I'd seen them it is understandable that I'd forgotten all about them. Now, however, they will again see the light of day!

Also, I found some neat hooks at Marshalls that I had Bruce put up on the left wall for hanging our stuff, be it, clothes or in this case, bags. Although we had some art there it was not ideal as that is a very narrow wall. Okie, dokie, here we are about an hour later.

We just love shelving, the more the better! One thing you might note is that one bedside table is larger than the other. Because we bought this bedroom furniture for our 25th wedding anniversary, I have no recollection as to why we bought one nightstand, and as I discovered from reading the back when it was moved, one chest. BTW--our 46th wedding anniversary is about a month from today. My title today is about nearing the finish line because I've got one other thing up my sleeve. This morning I purchased 24 new knobs to update the furniture, and once I get Bruce's go-ahead, well, I will go ahead. :)

You would think I had no time for nature, and truthfully I've not had much, but one otter came to say hi this week,

and yesterday morning, after Bruce left to work at the church, I got back to taking a walk for more reasons than one. I wanted to begin breaking in my new Sketchers that I purchased to take on our upcoming trip.

As has been mentioned before, when we fly anywhere we take one suitcase and one purse/travel bag. Married to a weekly business traveler, this is how he did it, so who am I to argue?  Our friend Susan was extolling the virtues of packing cubes, suggesting that I watch some Youtube videos on them. Now that we get it on our television, I began looking for ideas. Eventually I settled on tried and true, Rick Steves. In turn, he passed the torch to Sara ,and when she came on, I could hardly believe my eyes. Why so? Well, she was wearing a dress made from the same material as one that I made!! You just know I had to take a picture, don't you?

Eventually she got around to mentioning that she'd made the dress because the material is so lightweight!! See that bag on the table in front of her? That is what she takes for a two week trip to Europe where she is a guide for Rick Steves!! While my suitcase is not that tiny, packing for two weeks means having a plan. In my case, everything I will be taking is some form of blue (!) and one pair of shoes. Thus, the new Sketchers. Like my black pair, they are immediately comfortable. and for someone who oftentimes has sore feet, it is just what I need.

Once out of the car I thought to myself, it is unlikely that I will see anything new, but then again, you never know. Not long after, this guy came swooping down out of the trees, inches from my head!!

While not nearly as exciting, the light was right on this squirrel.

Now it was time to get down to business, making a pair of draperies. And for the record, I learned that draperies are lined, while curtains are not. Thank goodness for lots of open space on the living room where I rolled out the fabric, cutting two panels 79"x54", and about the same for the black out lining. We've been home for 11 months now and every single night it has been far too light in our bedroom. In another blunder, when I had the shades made, Dave kept asking me if the shades were dark enough, and I said, of course they are. I'm a light lover, hating dark interiors. Duh, should have listened to him!! Once upon a time I could get up and down off the floor with ease, however, age has a way of changing things, and although I still can do it, ease does not come to mind. Anyway, following an online tutorial, I worked away, changing but one thing and that is how you attach the back tabs.

Instead of attaching the bottoms first I chose the other way around and am happy with that decision. And why did I not just buy some curtains you might be wondering? Several reasons, chief among them is that the window size is unusual. And while I love the look of floor length draperies, my table dictated that I go to the window sill. Shoved up against the wall, function precluded form in this case.

We slept well last night!! You might note, just beyond the corner of my computer is the offending light bollard that has been giving me fits! I wish I could show you a better shot of them, but it's well nigh impossible shooting a photo into light from the window. They are pretty, take my word for it.

Bruce just called and he's on his way home after spending another long day at the church. He's been remodeling our pastor's office which now has the finish line in sight as well. Last evening, just after he left to attend the community board meeting, I was chatting with Nancy when all of a sudden, the big sliding glass doors shook and there was a loud, and I mean loud, BOOM. Scared the dickens out of me! Turns out it was the Space X rocket booster returning to Earth, 50 miles away. Really something. As was the rainbow that happened soon thereafter, although I only got the tail end of it. Plus, while I was looking at the rainbow, I heard an owl hoot down the way although I never could find it.

Finally, on Sunday following church, we met up with Jeff and Lori at Dubsdread. Remember them?

Should you be one who prays for strangers, please add them to your list. Jeff is getting no better without going into any details.

Now, only one more room to go, however, when we tackle the master bathroom is ytbd. I wonder if I can find funky blue floor tile????

your friend,

Gail

Blues

Thank you to all who commented on the paint scheme. Throw all that out the window friends because, well, things have changed. Not drastically, but thanks to these two young ladies at Sherwin Williams, we've got a new paint scheme. I went in and said, HELP! With my fabric swatch in hand, I explained that I'd chosen Waterloo for an accent wall, but nothing I tried with it worked. The young lady, pictured on the left, knew me as soon as I said I was a blogger and asked if I could I take her photo. I've done it before, or so it seems.

The young woman on the right is in training and seemed to learn from our conversation. After several ideas, we settled on SW Tidewater for the walls. Still I wasn't completely sold, so we chose a different deep blue, well, because we could. Actually, since I had painted the whole thing with a tiny brush, it was going to need to be repainted anyway, so maybe my original choice of Waterloo was the problem. I did love that color but it was definitely very dark. Three gallons later, I was out the door with both SW Tidewater and Inky Blue.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, or make that the condo, Mr. Peck was a busy beaver. Before I left for the store, we moved lots of things out of the room to give both us, and Edmond, room to move around. Edmund? Yes, the carpenter Bruce hired to do the crown molding because his saw was a tiny bit too small to handle the wood. He worked for Bruce many times on Darden projects, as well as making a new fence for us when we lost ours in Hurricane Charley.

What was Mr. Peck doing, you ask? Moving the air conditioning vent lower so it would fit below the crown molding. It is one of those home improvement projects that is laborious and no one notices, but it was important to him. Following that project, he moved on to putting up the shelf holdersfor two floating shelves he purchased at IKEA to put above our bed. We have such high ceilings there is a lot of wall to work with.

Note where my sewing table is. Oops, it shows in the next one!

See those drills? They are sitting on our dresser mirror which is on the table which is on the bed! Got that?

Now the brackets are installed and the ceiling of the soffit is back to white. Whew! Bruce, on the floor, is cutting in the new blue color because in this family he is the king of painting. I'm pretty good, but not nearly as good as he is.

The thing about the new paint is that it is a little fresher looking if that makes any sense. In spite of having a very large double window, a lot of our room is shadowy, so as it turns out, now that I've got two coats of Inky Blue on, it just feels lighter.

Last night we slept in the guest room on the double bed. Although we have a Queen bed, we would do just fine in a double because neither of us is overly big. The thing about that room is that the ceiling fan is over the bed which was excellent, unlike in our room where the fan is at the foot of our bed. It's hot, there's no getting around it, so the more cool air the better! Jackie sent me a text the other day saying it was the year anniversary of the tea party they gave me in Vancouver before we left. (link to that wonderful event) It is hard to imagine that we were still there last year at this time. Furthermore, two days later she sent me another text saying she walked to the library and it was so hot there now. I had to laugh because hot there is about 15 degrees cooler than here. Now she understands why we do very little walking here in Orlando. I carried a backpack there every day, but you won't catch me with one here, that's for sure!

Edmund, along with his helper, arrived at 9:15 this morning and immediately got to work. I went out to do some errands and when I got back they were done, leaving the caulking to Bruce who I found on the ladder doing just that.

I'm not sure if this photo does what I was hoping but, it is better than nothing. Caulk is magic is my book. Working his way around the room, he is filling all of the cracks which cover any imperfections at the the ceiling line. He is going to sleep very well tonight because, as I type ,he is cutting in the walls, both at the baseboard, and the crown molding. Last night we quit around 8:45 which was way too late for me! Once he finishes the cutting in, I'll begin rolling the walls.

Another thing Bruce did yesterday was put up the curtain rod. All of this should make more sense once they are made. As of this writing, they are not. Let us hope it does anyway.

I had lots of nature shots to show you, but I think I've convinced Bruce that he doesn't have to finish tonight so I'm heading into the kitchen to fashion some dinner using the roast chicken I made last night. However, I did want to tell you that I checked on our Lake Cherokee swans that I could not find the other day. All accounted for.

Finally, has anyone watched Ozark on Netflix? Oh my gosh!!!!

your friend,

Gail

You Just Never Know

Here's a newsflash---I put on makeup this afternoon! And just how long have you been without, you ask? The short answer is, far too long. The truth is, between the heat and just plain laziness, I've been looking not great lately. I wanted to look better for my darling husband when he returns from his church work. Let's see if he notices!

And while church is taking up a lot of his time, he still managed to finish this for our living room and I could not be happier with the color. Or having the television hanging on the wall.  I can't wait to show Roger, over at Ace, a photograph. Don't know what I'm talking about? Here's a link to my last post in case you missed it.

Speaking of which, have I told you that I'm an administrator for the Lake Pineloch Village Community facebook page? From that involvement I have learned a lot about engagements, page views, reactions, and what have you, all related to whatever I post. For my personal page, I am not privy to all of that information, but I can tell that a lot of regular readers are not seeing my posts. How else to explain no reactions to some of the most interesting photos I've ever taken? The point is, there is a lot going on behind the scenes of facebook, that's for darn sure.

A lot goes on behind the scenes of Days for Girls, thanks to our fearless leader Sharlene, who works tirelessly throughout the year. Monday we packed kits for an upcoming shipment to Malawi. I began the day, along with other volunteers, counting bars of soap. Lots of soap. 700 went back into inventory with the rest packed tightly in boxes for the trip to Africa. Next we filled the shields with liners,

which made their way into Ziploc bags, heading down our assembly line. The bags have five more liners, two pairs of panties, a washcloth, instructions, and an additional Ziploc that the girls use as a washing receptacle. The final step is closing it all up and stuffing into small drawstring bags.

Before long our boxes of menstrual kits will be loaded on a container ship, headed to West Africa where Helen will distribute them. Should this charity interest you, here's a link to their webpage.

Because we finished an hour early (!), I went to see Maureen. It was Bingo day and that is always fun. Although Maureen had three cards, she was not one of the winners. When someone does win, they all sing, B I N G O....

It was the first time I'd seen that young man who is helping the woman in purple hear the calls. He's been volunteering for four years which I find remarkable. Unfortunately I cut Maureen out of the photo! She is adjusting as well as she can to her new life in a wheelchair.

Holy cow...we have a small tomato!

We've no clue if it will ripen in this blasted heat though. Speaking of which, well, it is hot. With rain sometimes. Which is why I try to walk as early as possible. Do you see what I see in the big tree?

Stay tuned...

My Green Heron seems to be hanging around and since he got no love in my last post, here he is again. Of course it could be a girl, couldn't it?

Remember we talked about bird identification and how there is so much to learn? To the casual observer, these two look very similar,

however, the foreground bird is a Little Blue Heron while the other is a TriColored Heron. Now you know.

Well, the nearly grown up Cygnets are changing colors, little by little. This took me so by surprise that it is not very crisp but it does the trick of showing how they are changing.

Speaking of which, another tricky part of identification is the molting stage. This Wood Duck couple looks way more similar at this time of the year. The male is on the left although it is hard to tell given that he does not have his brilliant colors.

Those eyes give it away!

When I've not been out looking at birds, I have been thinking about, or working on the bedroom. I got all of the dark blue done, however, we aren't certain about that soffit.

As you can see, I put some green paint on one wall trying to pick the color for the rest of the room. It is Georgian Green by Benjamin Moore. I painted more of it,

however, Bruce remains unconvinced, voting for the color I auditioned on the other wall. Wyeth Blue by BM.

Input from you would be most welcome!! Next week the crown molding will go in, and then we will actually do the final painting. Hoping to have a decision by then!

One of the projects Bruce has been working on at church is the rehabilitation of the large front porch columns that are in serious need. Peeling paint and deteriorating sentinels is not a good look. He's interviewed several contractors, or at least as many as do that kind of work and put a budget together. In other words, project managing for no pay, and he couldn't be any happier.

While he keeps on working, I keep looking at birds. This morning I saw one of my favorites, the Limpkin picking up a snail.

Apparently, one of many, many eaten in this same spot.

For the most part I've been confining my walks to Lake Davis, mainly because of the shade, but this morning I walked around Lake Cherokee as well. And you know what? Not a swan to be found. Where could they be? Part of the lake is inaccessible as far as sight lines, but once around the houses, I peered through my zoom lens, seeing a little white, but alas, it does not look like a swan to me!

Green, green, and more green! But no swans. Where could they be? I'll keep you posted.

While leaving I decided to go a different direction and am I glad I did. You just never know what you will see, and in this instance, pulling the car over to the curb, I hopped out because, by golly, there was a pelican on Lake Davis. (not there during my initial walk around the lake)

Now that I've had time to do research, I've discovered it is a juvenile who, apparently does not know that she should be closer to the ocean. Watching from the shore, I knew when some ducks came into the picture,

that the Pelican would do something. It sure did!

Took off, flying towards downtown.

As an aside, so wondering what the SunTrust tower will become when the sale of the bank goes through. Anyway, I kept my eye on the bird and sure enough, it came back for a fish, plunging headfirst from the sky. As they do.

By now I knew I had to get going, having errands to run. As I walked back to my car, who should I see but Harris sitting on his big front porch. We chatted, and it was he who said, "you just never know" what you will see on a lake. Isn't that the truth?

your friend,

Gail