nearly wordless wednesday

milkweed

 daylily

milky bellflower

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friday

Piper and I managed to get out in the woods today for the first time in ages.

"Who's a happy girl, then?"

"Piper is!"

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saturday snapshot

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wordless wednesday

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sunday morning haiku

Like leaping a stream

with one landing point, mid-way.

The bed, my belly. Oof.

Good morning, Moxie!

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nearly wordless wednesday

After four (or was it forty?) more days of this:

the sun came out at noon today!

Despite the mud, all the goats were basking on the Upper West Side.

They looked so happy, soaking up the sunshine.

I could almost hear a collective sigh of relief.

My afternoon was spent on errands,

all centered geographically around the distant feed store.

Because guess who will be returning tomorrow?

My Occasional Helper!

Another sigh of relief, this time just from me :)

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saturday snaps

Look - it's sunshine!

The air is not grey!

Colors are rich and deep again!

The rain actually stopped Thursday, but the ground was saturated - every footstep left a deep print in mud. Although I'd optimistically planned to plant something - anything! finally! - that day, it was still far too wet.

Even when all the vegetation is dripping wet, Moxie and Della choose to come outside with me. Actually, they aren't really coming "with" me; they would be happy to be running in and out at will, all day long. But I am very concerned about hawks, so if the cats are outside, Piper or I must be out there too. And since Piper takes one good look around and then heads for her secret spot under the porch, her role as hawk-deterrent is negligible. So that just leaves me.

Here they are, my little jungle cats:

Fortunately, yesterday was again not-raining, and the soil had begun to dry a bit. I was finally able to plant two rows of pole beans. Hallelujah!

It looks like one row in this picture, but there is a little aisle between the two sections. The end of the second row is where you see the yellow bucket, which is full of rocks.

All that lush greenery between the garden rows looks pretty good to the goats, who poke their noses through the fence when I'm working. Every time I straighten up, I pull handfuls of greens to share out.

The goats tend to keep moving, though. Rain or shine, the mosquitoes are absolutely horrendous. Despite frequent applications of non-toxic repellent sprays, the goats are covered in itchy bites and so am I. LeShodu, who hates both the bugs and the sprays, spends more time in the barns and less time out browsing than some of the other goats. So today when I came up from the garden, I brought LeShodu a whole hatful of fresh alfalfa, picked seconds before, just for her.

It's the little things, isn't it, Shodu?

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Dear readers, I hope you are all having a lovely weekend, and if you are hiding from mosquitoes or anything else, I hope someone will bring you a hatful of fresh alfalfa.
Or, you know, something equivalent.

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june

I'm actively adding something positive to June, by participating in #growjune on twitter. It's a monthly art challenge; people try to post a new piece each day, with either a certain theme (like #growjune) or in a particular medium (like #paintSeptember). Running a hashtag search instantly displays everything that has been posted each day. The results are varied and interesting!

It's just a fun way for people at any level to share work and encourage each other. If you feel like jumping in, let me know!

I may not manage to post something every day in #growjune - but I will try. It's very satisfying to look back and see seven or twelve or twenty-five pieces in a month.

Would you like to see my first effort for #growjune 2017? It's this ink and watercolor sketch of a section of Solomon's Plume. And that's my actual thumb at the bottom, not a super-realistic painting of my thumb ;)

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