morning of the solar eclipse

Perhaps because I was self-employed most of my life, Monday mornings don't hold the usual dread that they do for many people who differentiate them from weekends. I tended to look at my down time in terms of seasons and winter became a haven for me from the rigours of business. But today, this Monday of all Mondays, is supersaturated with relevance, for today,

Western Europe, Northeast Asia, Northwest Africa, North America, much of South America, the Pacific, the Atlantic and the Arctic 

will have a solar eclipse!

If that don't beat the Monday blues! We live such little lives on our beloved little planet and cosmic phenomena really serve to remind us the relative importance of everything. There won't be another solar eclipse in my part of the world, eastern North America, til 2025.

After another rainy Saturday and a hot and humid Sunday,

it promises to be bright though hot again today.

Muji would rather be outside with me

Babu would rather share the window with Muji

The hayfield looking ESE already promises heat as the dew lifts this morning.

So far so good with the grapes ripening

The beans grow in rows like a curtain

A brown butterfly suns itself on a fallen maple leaf

What a clever landing pad.

Raspberry for breakfast

Our new mint patch

a new stalk of gladiola

a nest of hens and chicks

a tall weed with its pretty little blossoms

We're inveterate, or should I say, "veteran" sales hunters,

but this ten cent cabbage takes the cake,  my best deal in years.

Muji hops down from the window and is at the door to greet me before I've got it shut.

Babu isn't far behind.

The middle section of my sketchbook has two signatures of cheap kraft paper which I'm enjoying for its mid tone, allowing me to use a light cream colour to effect. Outlined in a brush-tipped India ink Pitt pen and coloured with coloured pencils, I'm still working with multiple images for more interest. The heavier, gold-dotted kraft cardstock that I collaged on was harder to tear and therefore left some really nice edges.

 

Smitten with that gold-dotted kraft card, I found a place to lay it down in this coloured pencil extravaganza. It's been so much fun not to work to anyone's expectations but my own and see where my intuition will take me. I haven't been able to work like this since the '80's.

Giving myself permission has been a long time coming.

"Let freedom reign. The sun never set on so glorious a human achievement."

                                                                                    Nelson Mandela

peace on earth

morning garden

These are the dog days of summer, named for Sirius, the dog star, its brightest in the night sky this time of year, that seems to be timed with summer's greatest heat and its ensuing lethargy.

I open the windows for Muji, this morning's shot of him, and Babu, until it's just too hot.

I rarely venture out mid-day, unless it's to hang laundry or fill the birdbath. Mornings and evenings are my time to escape.

This morning, however, was a touch cooler and I ventured out.

the Purple and Mauve Petunias with the deep blue Lobelia in one pot

and the pretty pink Dahlias in another

pink and white geraniums and mauve petunias 

morning dew on a flowering onion 

too pretty for one shot

zucchini blossom

more zucchini- each blossom represents a zucchini squash to come.

upper left: garlic... below: lettuce... middle: swiss chard... upper right: peas

blueberries

peaches

This year we've put bird netting around our little tree

to keep the blue jays from pecking the living daylights out of our little peaches

Bird Netting will hardly discourage the deer from taking our Harelson apples,

but one can always hope.

The hydrangea are hanging as if it has rained, but now it is their own weight that keeps them bowed.

Wally's new rose bush is blooming again

Tiger Lilies are finally blooming

a white hollyhock in the lily garden

looking back towards Forget-Me-Not Cabin

in back of the cabin looking Southeast there is the spicy scent of Sweetgrass, but it must be the Goldenrod which is so prolific this year.

the hayfield looking East Southeast

Everyone, including me, seems to be sneezing. It's not just the goldenrod. There are all kinds of pollens in the air.

and now looking east

At my feet, the vetch is weaving through the honeysuckle,

its little pods beginning to dry out.

The Fibonacci Swirl in action on this drying weed flower and more subtly in the flower itself.

The Echinacea around the Composter are thriving,

the Lavender below. 

Little yellow pollen stamen are skirting the seed head of the Echinacea

This makes the Bumblebee happy

as he gathers pollen on his back legs

The Sweet Pea wants some of the action and is tangling itself up on this Echinacea seed head which is actually shifting to seed as its pointy orange bits burgeon out.

The long spires of the Liatris Spicata, commonly known as Spike Gayfeather, 

reminding me very much of the beautiful menace that can fill up waterways in Muskoka, and Nova Scotia too, Purple Loosestrife- but not nearly as invasive.

It  is blooming from the top down and is actually the colour of the buds below the top blooms. 

That's my camera for ya.

The pictures keep coming. I've come to accept that it doesn't matter where I start; a picture is going to come out of it. I scribbled the wolf one day. You must understand that animals come easy to me which is why I concentrate so much on faces these days. It's an indication of how tired or distracted I am if I revert to animals. I did this over a week ago. The cutout is from a new pack of them that Tim Holtz is putting out. I came upon a damaged pack yesterday and got it at a substantially reduced price so you can be sure you will be seeing more of them. It's fun to have something quick to resort to though it actually took me quite a while to place her in this eerie position. 

pencils crayons, Ranger white "opaque" pen, Sharpie gold paint pen and the Tim Holtz paper cutout

Don't Stop Believing In Yourself

all pencil crayon but for some India ink Pitt pen and 7 Gypsies rub on letters "don't stop"

I went to bed that night after writing "believing" not wanting to end it there.

I came up with "in yourself" after realizing how far I've come in so many ways.

I wish the same for you.

There is a world of possibilities to choose from.

It takes a long time, sometimes, to discern which is the road to take.

The Road Not Taken 

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

by Robert Frost

garden of earthly delights

The end of another week, the last Friday of July, how quickly it all goes.
Today, like yesterday, is cool and overcast. We're expecting more rain. The ash tree that has been shedding all week will appreciate that more than any of the other plants that seem to be doing so well...

like the black hollyhocks amid the clematis

Of course the hollyhocks are not really black but a deep maroon

On the other side of the composter are various plants like Echinacea and lavender

The Echinacea always seem to have benign bumblebees in them

that don't seem to mind me getting up so close to them

while they busy themselves with the task at hand

There are also sweetpeas growing up the composter walls.

Wally's garden is coming along very well, especially the peas that are too heavy to climb very far up the green trellises Wally erected for them. Peas for lunch, peas for snacks, peas for supper.

The beans are just coming in on the lefthand trellis and to their right the zucchinis, then the beets, then carrots and in the back and throughout Dill and Cilantro.

There were so many bumblebees in the cilantro. You rarely see so many together.

The bumblebee got away in this shot, but I decided to take advantage of this exposure of Cilantro blossoms.

On the pea trellis this hornet appeared to be having a nap and let me get quite close to it.

On the far side of our yard I can peer into the neighbours' poppy garden

There is a mass of berries on the mystery tree that grows from their yard into ours.

I must do some homework on this.

The black currants ripen a few at a time, and don't grow like grapes the way I once imagined.

The hayfield has been filling in nicely since it was mowed on the first of the month,

and the goldenrod, harbingers of autumn, are coming into bloom. 

Looking over to my right, Wally has cut a swath out between the massive rose bush and the equally massive back of our hedge.

The little maple tree is not so little anymore. I swear it's grown 2 feet this summer.

Wally mows around it now that I've trimmed the honeysuckle to the left, barely unrecognizable with the grass and lupins growing around and through it.

This is the first time I've noticed that Honeysuckle have a fruit all their own

And who ever looks at the grainy seed head of grass?

I'm so happy with this camera for close-ups.

Another thing I'd never noticed is how the Lupin seed pods spiral open to drop their seed.

This is a vague memory for me- that cow vetch has a seed pod.

I don't think I've noticed this since I was a child.

This camera life, this blogging, has taught me so much.

Heading back up to the house (there is a definite slope to this part of the yard) I head toward the Hydrangea, still bowed from last night's rain

Wally wanted me to look for the bird's nest he saw there.

It has been abandoned, and now it is squished from the weight of the branches.

What I love about it is the animal hair lining the nest. I find this very touching somehow.

So beautiful.

In the middle garden, the succulents we call Hens and Chicks is blooming.

And the Hostas too

I hadn't realized until a few years ago that they are lilies.

Back in the house, someone needs attention

Three Sprites

pencil crayon and India Ink Pitt pen 

And today, because I've been so happily busy making pictures, a "two-for-one". 

I rarely have so much work back-logged. This little Dancer, also done in coloured pencils with Pitt pen has a little white Sharpie paint pen too, but what's really unusual is that the body and the hair are done in Winsor & Newton pigment markers which I believe are alcohol based and absorb a little too readily into this sketchbook paper. I believe marker paper is less absorbent allowing for more blendability. Because I've been storing the marker upright instead of horizontally, I sometimes get less saturation which helped keep the skin tones more subtle.

With that, I will carry on here. Always something calling me to get done. Who would we be without some external thing calling us, defining us, ethereal beings that we are?

"We are not human beings having a spiritual experience.

We are spiritual beings having a human experience." 

                                                                                                    Pierre Teilhard de Chardin