My "Starter Kit"

I'll admit it's a small one, but my "Crazy Cat Lady Starter Kit" arrived yesterday. I jest; I highly doubt that I'll end up with a dozen cats in my house.

This little stray mama and her two six-day-old kittens came to stay with me -- our first round of foster kitties!

They eat. They sleep. They scramble back to Mama whenever I hold them.

This 5 3/4 ounces of fur and wobbly legs has captured my heart!

They're so tiny! Their little "mews" are high pitched and sweet. It's going to be a fun month or two having them here. The mama will go back to the animal shelter when the kittens are weaned, and I will continue to foster the kittens until they are large enough to be spayed and adopted.

Piles On My Desk

Sometimes, to get the tidy result, a mess must first be made.

Do you know what I mean? Empty the garage so you can sweep it out and organize; pile everything from the fridge all over the counters so you can scrub and clean and put back the good stuff.

I do it weekly at my bookkeeping job at church. Once I have pulled out all of my mail and inbox work and start establishing piles, it looks like I have absolutely no organization:

But truly, there is a method to my madness. I just keep whittling away at the piles until everything is printed, signed, mailed, communicated, reconciled, and filed. And when my desk looks like this:

I go home! 

Picture Wall

I recently gave a make-over to a wall in our living room.

Lots of pictures, so I decided to do a collage

It's a mix of older and newer family pics, travel memories, and inspirational reminders

Squirrel In the Window Well

This little guy

was stuck down in here

because that piece of wood was covering the lip of the window well and he couldn't climb past it.

So I lured him out with a tomato and he is happily running back and forth along our fence again.

Trail Ridge Road in the Fall

This prime fall weekend for viewing colors, we were apparently not alone in choosing to head into the mountains...

These two in yellow matched the scenery all day long

Every time we encountered a new peek of brighter color, we pit stopped to grab a closer look. And as we climbed to higher elevations, it got better and better.

We found a great place to have lunch, wishing our own Cy was along with us

My favorite shot of the day

These memories will be held dear

Okay, so how is it that I have lived here over 25 years, but I have never before driven over Trail Ridge Road? I'm pretty sure I would have remembered these steep drop offs. Yikes! 

Way steeper than it looks here

Just to compare, this is a similar view of the road we traveled, but in winter.
No wonder they close it down for several months each year.

But really beautiful views

There we are

My girl and I, enjoying a river

And my love and I, near the end of a very full day

Reminiscing: Independence Eve

We traveled to my home town for July 4th this year. I just came across some photos from a fun family day shared with my nieces, nephews, sister, brother-in-law, parents, husband, and daughter. It's so great when we converge together from the three states where we live.

A gorgeous, mild day to visit a beautiful park and walking path.
Kind of fun to be with this posse. (and you know, I looked up "posse" - it's
"a group of people who have a common characteristic or purpose.")

feeling rhythmic

feeling relaxed

he thinks he's hiding

almost 24  years with this guy

what's a summer night without a convertible ride?

waiting for fireworks. And wishing we had brought chairs!

Evening finale

Garden Makeover

Perennials are the best.

I have six flower beds with 900 square feet of planting space in our yard, and each one has primarily perennials. I cultivate and rearrange and thin and sell and pull out and cut for arrangements and give away and thoroughly enjoy them.

We have a long, narrow bed right by our front porch. When we moved in, there were already a few rose bushes and some tall phlox, and I added a few things through the years.

While it's really established and pretty, I also felt that it was getting quite overgrown. The ground cover was kind of a pain, and the lavender patch on the right end was overtaking things.

So I enlisted the help of the men in my family, and they were so kind to dig up everything. Yes, everything.

Quite a collection that was redistributed to a few other spots in my yard and shared with a friend

A Blank Slate

A drain spout goes right through this bed, so it's been nice to have a strong root system in recent years. (I didn't think of this fact when I decided to do this revamping project.)

I'm concentrating on adding back some of my favorite perennials that grow in a more controlled, circular pattern. Yarrow, heuchera, Japanese iris, veronica, and mums are a few that I am working on moving into this new spot.

I transplanted a lot of the lavender to an often-unseen area where weeds constantly threaten to take over. I am hoping that the lavender wins next year!

The guys dug up those threatening weeds here, too,
so I could move some of my plants to this area.

The past few days, I have worked on rearranging and sharing some of my favorites from the back yard into this flower bed. It's so empty! But once I add some mulch to tuck it all in for the winter, it will be fun to see what comes back bigger and stronger and prettier next year!