Saturday, June 30, 2012

Coordinating

Doesn't her tongue go well with the roses?

Friday, June 29, 2012

Color Week

Someone and her red collar made the cut at Jan's Color Week "Red Day" over at the Poppytalk blog.  Check it out here.  

If you're on Pinterest, check out the whole week of color here.

And, you can see the whole pool at Flickr.

I love Poppytalk, Pinterest and Flickr.  Eye candy if ever there was!

Thursday, June 28, 2012

17 Pounds

I just donated a 17 Pound bag of dog food to a shelter! Just by writing this post! Check out the good work the people behind Pedigree are doing by clicking here:



Many thanks to Laurie Eno over at the Daily Corgi for telling me about this opportunity.

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

One Word Wednesday

Impasse 


Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Grooming

Poor Harry. He is always just a little unkempt.

Our first cat, Buster, was a lovely, dignified grey and white "Tuxedo" cat who spent hours every day grooming his wonderful coat.  There was never a hair out of place and his white "shirt" was as white as can be.

Harry is nothing like Buster in that regard.  Harry is a slob.  Oscar Madison to Buster's Felix Unger.  

I've seen Harry grooming himself maybe 20 times in all his 10 years. It's such a rare occurrence that when I saw him doing it yesterday evening, I ran for my camera and managed to catch this shot:

If you know cats, you'll recognize that as a typical grooming pose. 

As I said, Harry doesn't groom himself very often, and something tells me that after yesterday he won't be doing it again anytime soon:
 
Poor Harry!  Takes so much abuse from the dog-girls.  At least now he has an excuse for being a slob!

Monday, June 25, 2012

Don't tell Pumpkin!

Sunday, June 24, 2012

Vocabulary

 “Many of us have to spell words such as "out," "cookie," and "bath" when conversing with other people, lest we unnecessarily excite our pets. And even then they often understand. I've actually had clients who resorted to using a second language around their dogs, but after a while their perceptive pooches caught on. Who says dogs don't understand us?”  Warren Eckstein

In addition to words like "sit," "stay," and "off," my dog-girls appear to know "let's go," "upstairs," "downstairs," "treat," "go to your room," "popcorn," "dinner," "daddy's home," "where's Harry?" and "that's it for now." I'm sure I'll remember several more words and phrases as soon as I hit the "publish" button.

Smart b-i-s-c-o-t-t-i these dog-girls of mine are!

Friday, June 22, 2012

{this moment}

{this moment}  
A Friday ritual. 
A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week.
A simple, ordinary, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. Inspired by Soulemama.



Wednesday, June 20, 2012

One Word Wednesday

Stay


Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Keep on Truckin'

When I saw this photo of Darby,

the words "keep on truckin'" popped into my head.

How many of you are old enough to remember the "keep on truckin'" craze?

The saying meant something along the lines of "stay with it; you're doing a good job."

Although the saying has it's roots in the 1920-1930 jazz scene, it really took off in the late 1960's when Robert Crumb created a one page comic with the title "Keep on Truckin.'"  I'd ignore copyright laws and copy the image here, but if Wikipedia is to believed, poor Mr. Crumb and his copyright have been violated enough, so I'll just send you to look here.

In addition to all those t-shirts, mugs and posters bearing the image and the saying,  there was a TV show by the name.  The show aired in 1975 and had an astonishingly short run -- 4 episodes -- if this write-up is to be believed.  Sounds like the best thing about the show is that Rod Serling was supposed to introduce each show, but died two weeks before the debut.  It sounds like he was lucky.

Born in 1943, it looks like Robert Crumb is, ahem, keepin' on truckin'.  

Shortly after I took the photo, Darby stopped truckin' and took a nap in the shade. 

Monday, June 18, 2012

How fast they grow!

May 18, 2012

June 16, 2012

May 6, 2009
May 3, 2012
July 25, 2010
May 3, 2012

Saturday, June 16, 2012

Farmers' Markets

I went to the Little Italy Farmer's Market this morning with my friend Betsy.

She bought these lovelies: 
Photo by Betsy
I bought these:
 

Then, I came home and the girls and I went out to this Farmer's Market:


where I got this: 


OK.  I didn't really grow these.  But our friend Dan, did.  He has harvested nearly 200 pounds of the sweetest onions I've ever tasted.


I love Farmers' Markets!

Friday, June 15, 2012

Friday Fun with Bonnie & Bailey


I just couldn't resist posting this.... Bailey and Bonnie made me.  If you haven't heard the song before and therefore don't recognize it, you can watch the original video below by pop artist Carley Rae Jepson.  


[this moment]

{this moment}  
A Friday ritual. 
A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week.
A simple, ordinary, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. Inspired by Soulemama.


Thursday, June 14, 2012

Flag Day!

I love our flag.  It's a shame Flag Day isn't celebrated more.  But, we're celebrating here with a quick trip through our photo archives in search of flags!









Happy Flag Day!  Long may she wave!


P.S.  If you're so inclined, you can read more about Flag Day here.  

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

One Word Wednesday

Sprawl


Monday, June 11, 2012

A new gate

The gate on the vegetable garden side of the house was on its last legs. 15 years in the weather and termites had done it in.

So Glenn made a new one!

I designed it.  And he fabricated it in his makeshift welding shop on the other side of the house!

We found the large sawblade and the wheels in Pennsylvania and Virginia on our last trip to visit Erika.  We packed the wheels in our roll-aboard suitcase and checked the sawblade!  (Even with the $25 baggage charge the sawblade was much less expensive than we can find them here.)

We don't know how long we will live here (with Erika and any future grandchildren living on the east coast) but we wanted a gate we didn't want to have to worry about -- no painting or staining and no food for hungry termites! We don't even have to worry about rust -- it's already rusted!  The only problem now, is that I won't want to leave it when we move!


The bell (up there on the left) clangs when the gate is opened. And the little fan blade in the lower left, spins when the wind blows.

And even though we never leave the always-hungry Corgi-girls alone in the vegetable garden yard, we were sure to leave no spaces big enough for a Corgi-girl to get her head caught.

A gate like this wouldn't suit everyone, but it sure suits us!

Sunday, June 10, 2012

The antler

Yesterday, I gave each of the girls an antler to chew on. 

We have not had good experiences with marrow bones lately.  Pumpkin believes ALL marrow bones belong to her and while Darby eventually ends up relinquishing hers, she puts up a good fight!  ( The fights sound and look perfectly horrible, but don't result in any injuries.  Still, they aren't something I want to continue.)

They both love bones and bones are so good for their teeth.  It finally occurred to me to try giving the bones to them in the contained atmosphere of the house where I could supervise and better control the situation.  But, ugh! Marrow bones are so messy!  But, duh!  Antlers are nice and clean! (So are these bones that Erika's dogs love. And, don't fight over.  But then, Bonnie and Bailey never fight over anything!)

Darby took her antler, ran to the dog bed under the computer desk and began gnawing away.

Pumpkin, it seems,  didn't know what to do! 

It was the strangest thing!  She walked around and around the downstairs, ran upstairs to the landing (one of her favorite spots) then back downstairs.


Then back up to the landing where she dropped the antler,

flopped down near it and stared at it! 
    
With bubbles of drool collecting on her chin. 

She never did chew on the antler and after a while I retrieved both antlers and set them aside for another time.

Silly girl! 

Saturday, June 9, 2012

Did we see Venus?

Daisy and Company over at Downunder Daisy asked in the comments yesterday if we saw Venus.  Darby and Pumpkin didn't, but some of us from my office did!  (And we got to get out on the roof to do so!)