Christmas in August

On Wednesday this week, the mailman brought a package for Rowan from New York. Usually, Chris tells us to expect one, but it had slipped her mind this time, so this was a nice little surprise. Rowan was excited; somehow he knows when the packages are for him.

He was trying to "cheese" for the camera, even though it looks like he's grimacing.

He liked Mickey on the bag, and seemed to be content with just that, but of course, there was something even better inside. It was a little red car with a Stitch figurine in it that made Ro giggle when he saw it.

He's posing for the camera to show me what he got, though you can't really see either the toy or his face. Chris told us later that Britt had told her about it and it was Paul who picked it out and sent it. Thanks, Paul!

I just found my camera that's been missing for a couple months. Since it was missing, I had not taken pictures of my garden like I had intended to. So I am posting some now. A little explanation before we move on: there are no wide shots of the beds in front of the house because I have not kept up very well on the weeding. In my defense, we have been very busy and there have been a tummy bug and cold circulating through our house. You may also notice the pictures are a little hazy, in fact, it's almost like there was a fingerprint on the lens. Well, there was, and I didn't notice it on the camera's display when I took the pictures and discovered it only just now. Please for give the lack of clarity in the following images.

I planted petunias, begonias, and mums in the front yard and this container did especially well. The temperature on the northside of the porch has been just right and it's right by a sprinkler, so it makes for happy flowers.

In addition to the flowers, I devoted a container to a zucchini and crookneck plants. The zucchini was a little feeble to begin with, then the squash had a wicked infestation of earwigs (I hate earwigs, ugh, those and thistles). We haven't had any zucchini yet (it looks like the blossoms are falling of before the fruit can come on for some reason). We did get one adorable knobbly crookneck and have another growing now.

Last of all, there's the Little Rosebush that Could. There was a dead stump of a bush along the fence, and earlier in the season, it didn't seem to be doing anything. I started thinking it was gone for good and maybe it should be removed. It seems no sooner than I thought that than a few little stems shot up and put out little pink blooms. I deadheaded them when they started to look spent and now we have a couple more buds.

*Apologies that some of the pictures are sideways. I thought I had fixed them, but apparently not. I will try to fix them a little bit later.