10 Rather Unrelated Things


#1 
Homemade vanilla-coconut ice cream with homemade chocolate sauce.  Heaven in a bowl.
#2 & 3
A yard full of snapdragons that literally made me stop in my tracks when I first saw it.   I then had to take Matt there so he could see the loveliness as well.  I adore snap dragons.  Matt taught me how to snap their little mouths at the start of our relationship so they are special to me in that regard.  They make me think of Matt.
 
#4
A cocoon that I found in the garden.  Several of them actually.  While I was holding it the tapered, ringed end of it started to wiggle and, I confess, freaked me out so that I tossed it back into the dirt with a gasp.  I didn't know that cocoons could move like that.  I thought they were just hard, protective shells.  I wonder what it is in there.
#5
A pretty flower that Matt accidentally cut from the plant that grows on the fence while we were trimming the tall grass there. A pretty accident if you ask me.
#6
Matt playing Yahtzee with over-sized wooden yard dice which he recently got from his mom.  I think they were made by his uncle.  Matt is so delightfully silly. We still need to figure out what yard game they really belong to.
#7
A note from Matt that I found on the whiteboard yesterday.  Its been pretty hot and we've sure been enjoying having a nice, cool basement to escape to. 
#8
My $6 clothes line.  One of the few major (at least to me) shortcomings of our new house versus our rental house is that we lost the clothesline.  The new house didn't have one.  So we'd been reading up on the different styles and comparing reviews and prices.  And we'd been putting off making a decision since we had the free-standing indoor racks to use in the meantime.  Then, I found a clothesline just laying with someone's trash.  All it was missing was the actual strings.  So, we took it home and after purchasing some $6 clothes line cord restrung it.   It is currently mounted in a per-existing hole in the grass making it just over waist height.  As it happens this makes it really easy to pin to.  And I like that it spins so that I just set the basket down on the grass and make the clothesline come to me!
#9 My peonies are blooming despite the fact they got knocked to the grass by the May snow.  At least, I think they are peonies. 
#10  I like to follow Michael Pollan's advice:  Eat all the junk food you want, just make it yourself.  You indulge in the treats much less frequently if you remove the convenience factor with the result that they really become treats instead of staples.  Junk food is all the more delicious when it really is a treat...like a taste bud party explosion.  So, when I was craving greasy, delicious fries we just fried up some at home instead of running to Hardees or some other such establishment.  Cheaper, too.

Comments

  1. The purple flower is a Clematis and the pink looks more like a wild rose to me. LOVE the message from Matt! SO SWEET!

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    1. Thanks for your help with the flowers. I am terrible at it! And google is only so helpful when you are at the "Its pink and ruffly" kind of identifying stage! They are right mixed in with some peonies, but they looked different (yellow in the middle) so I didn't know. I need some sort of guide book like I have for birds!

      And I Matt is awfully sweet. I am lucky to have found him!

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  2. This was such a nice post. Matt sounds like a really nice guy. I like a guy who can find joy in mundane things--big dice, board games, the basement...you know. I ask again, does he have an really old brother, uncle, cousin father? LOL

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    1. If he did I'd surely send him your way! : ) But alas, all those boys got snapped right up!

      He sure does know how to savor the simple pleasures and delights.

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  3. Interesting chrysalis -- maybe keep it in a terrarium until the butterfly hatches out?

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    1. I thought of that! Wouldn't that be fun and interesting! We did so one year when I was working for USDA. Currently I put it in a quart jar mostly filled with dirt and reburied it in the garden so that I can find it again. I just need to whip up a terrarium now! If I am successful I'll be sure to let you know!

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  4. Hi, just popped to say hello from the UK - looking forward to catching up on your blog.
    The 'rose' is what we call here a 'dog rose' it's planted along roadsides here and allowed to grow into a thick hedge, and is beautifully sweet smelling.

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    1. Greetings! Thanks so much for the flower info! I am just so new to flowers I am at a loss! They do smell quite lovely! Pop by any ol' time!

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  5. Hi there BLD in MT, those are some interesting photos and I really love that snapdragon garden. My son was asking just recently why some houses (that he's seen in US movies) have basements. I wasn't too sure, but maybe you just answered this by saying about them being cool. Houses in NZ tend to be built either on wooden piles set in concrete, (or driven into the ground) or on a solid concrete base.

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    1. I think basements are awesome because they tend to be isulatative no matter the season. They are delightfully cool in the hot summer and cozy warm (especially with the woodstove) in the winter. Its also easy to make a food storage room that is cool and dark. It is so interesting the differences in houses! All the houses I've ever lived in had a basement. Just about all American houses do I guess. I never really thought to consider that might not be the case everywhere! How interesting!

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  6. Such a lovely post :0) A whole yard of snapdragons too! Beautiful! x

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  7. That is a tomato hornworm pupa. I find them every so often - the first time I found one and it started flipping around wiggling in my hand I about freaked out! lol The moth form is really pretty though (at least, I think it's pretty!)

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