Southern MN Storms

I hit the basement with Kel and Julia (and the cats and the dogs) three times while I was there! Mother Nature must have had gas. During the last storm Lenny and I watched this cloud dangle and go back up

And finally form this funnel

And then a few minutes later we spotted this dangling particable in another area of the sky. The Nicollet firemen say there were no tornadoes spotted. Perhaps this isn't a full blown tornado but they certainly look like funnel clouds to me.
Here they are the clouds in the sky above our campsite. We had wind, tons and tons of rain and some hail. Big enough hail to put a few dents in both of our vehicles. Haven't noticed any dents yet in the camper but we haven't checked the roof either. The ground was so saturated that we didn't even attempt to get our camper out to bring it home.
The storms did make for some interesting looking skies.
Finally a rainbow. I think this was Saturday night. The weather cleared just in time for the Friendship Days parade on Sunday.
My Uncle Ed and Aunt Sandy live on the parade route and invited us to watch it from their porch. Of course we went a bit early to play a few games of shoot.
It was a gorgeous day but the clouds just did not want to go away.
I have not been to Friendly Days for years but this yea we had two very good reasons for going. The first being -
Julia and her friend Macie 'walked' in the parade along with their 'school's' float.


Here she is throwing candy to her daddy. Julia just was not quite sure what to make of the crowds.


And the second reason-
And right behind my grand baby was my Uncle Dood and two of his 'brood' Lisa and Kathy. Dood was the Grand Marshall this year. I asked someone what the qualifications were for this honor and was told that you really do have to be an old fart and to have lived in Nicollet your entire life. Yup Dood fits the bill :) He is a good choice for many other reasons as well but I like those two the best.



Julia and Macie were going to try some rides. Here they are waiting to get on one.
Checking things out
Around they go
Enjoying it so far. I wonder though who is having more fun, the little girls or Macie's mom Sara?

Right after this picture was taken Julia decided it just was not so fun and began to cry and get out. Pretty heartbreaking when she is crying, extending her arms and saying 'Daddy' 'Momma' and 'Gamma'....begging someone to please rescue her! The poor girl so wanted to go on a ride but once they started to move she just couldn't do it. Ah well maybe next year, or maybe not.

We headed back home soon after and it really was good to be home back in my garden. That will be the next post.

Who Knew!

That I would enjoy a pedicure so much. Len, Kel and Julia gave me a gift certificate for an Aveda pedicure which I used last week. It was heaven and for the first time in a long time I have clean soft feet with painted toenails. Ahhhhh. I also found a gal to give me the best haircut ever, recommended the best hair product ever and cnvinced me to purchase a flat iron. What's next make-up. Nah I don't think so:)

And who knew....hulu.com, how have I missed it all this time? I am sitting at the hospital waiting for my dad's surgery to be done and through the wonders of Skype I was talking to my friend Mary. She tells me about hulu and by golly guess what...I can watch the missed episodes of the View! I love the view....Hulu, good stuff.

Who knew that I would miss shopping with my friend Chrissy so much since I have moved! David on the other hand is damned glad that we have moved...it's a money saver :)

Who knew that when I moved north life would become complicated down here. It's tough to have family this far away that is getting 'on in years' and needing more assistance....who knew (thank goodness for Nicollet County SS and ISJ SS)

Who knew that Dad's surgery would run two hours late and last 4 - 5 hours...not I. The surgeons are running late and they did tell me that there really is no reason for me to stick around. So hey, back to Peeko and the camper I go. Who knew....

To Hit The Basement Or Not

I am currently in our camper at the Leonard campground enjoying spending an hour here and there with Julia and other friends. It has been a windy stormy couple of days and my heart goes out to those that lost their homes in the various tornadoes throughout the state.

On that particularly stormy day Kel kept me updated on the watches and warnings and at one point she texted me to say, 'Julia and I are in the basement, come join us'.

I seriously am not the first one to the basement, I like to see what is coming at me...I know I know...stupid stupid stupid. BUT I grabbed my camera and took some shots of the awesome sky.

The clouds rolled in looking pretty funky. It was at this point that I decided hitting the basement might not be a bad idea.

After we came out of hiding the skies made for some good shots

And the sun rays came through
We had lots of wind, a boatload of rain and some small hail but no damage here. David reported that he was without electricity from around 5pm until 5am the next morning (he was in bed that night at 7....bored). Across the road a tree had blown down knocking lines with it and causing a bit of a smoldering fire at the base of the tree. David called the power company who said they would call the fire department, but oh no my husband puts the fire out himself by soaking grass in a water puddle and putting it on the smoldering tree. What a guy huh!

We are now left with heat and high humidity, yuck.

A very happy Father's Day to all of the Dad's out there. Most especially to five of the dad's in my life. Lenny, Ry and Melvin, David and of course my pop. Have a wonderful day.

Run Wild Run Free

Well maybe not at all wild but certainly free. Yoni belongs to my friend Mary...or does Mary belong to Yoni hummmmm. Anyway while Mary was on an extended vacation we had the opportunity to return many favors and do doggie daycare for Mary (and Yoni).
Here she is on her way 'up north' for HER vacation.

Once Yoni arrived to her vacation destination she was able to run free the entire time. Living in town, Yoni is always tethered for her own safety. Yoni has also been known to 'bolt' out the door if not on a tie out spending some time running the streets of StPeter. Not so here. Yoni not only sticks around but accompanied me to the mailbox and 'stayed' when instructed to do so as I crossed the street to get the mail :)

She is a purebred Siberian Husky


And is absolutely gorgeous

Even in black and white

The husky in Tackla is pretty obvious when she is next to Yoni. All three dogs get along very well.


Yoni's vacation ends today. She was fun to have and has been invited back anytime.

It Was Just One Little Ad

In our local little paper
That led to this little roadside sign

And caused my Honda to become full of plants...... Who knew one little ad could be so dangerous :)


I spent this past weekend at the Leonard hotel and along with spending time with Julia I was able to spend a day with my friend and gardening mentor Mary....talk about dangerous...
There is a great place in Faribault MN that specializes in Clematis.
Oh and there are lots of other gorgeous flowers and plants as well. For instance this sea of red geraniums was only one color in the greenhouse.
Lots to choose from, but no worries, Donahue's provides very large shopping carts for your pleasure.
Yes Bugsy, there it goes, your inheritance. But as I have said, your inheritance will be beautiful to look at.

On the way home from Danahue's Mary wanted to introduce me to her newest addiction.....Iris's. This is Earthworks which is a little 'farm' right off of highway 22 by Kasota. Earthworks was started a few years back by Diane Shelly. She grows everything that she sells and her 'farm' is a pleasure to stroll even if you don't purchase a thing.
The process of buying an iris here really is quite efficient. You walk around the many rows of colorful varieties of plants, find one (or two or ten) that you like, take a corresponding tag, write it on your order sheet and off to the checkout. Because Iris's are bulbs they are dug after the bloom time. You in affect order your bulbs after first being able to see the flower up close and personal. If there are no red tags by the flower you are out of luck and the bulbs have sold out. I refuse to admit how many I may have ordered and will not tell you how many more than that Mary ordered. Suffice it to say that they will be beautiful in our respective gardens:)
Leaving you today with Earthworks blogspot
www.earthworksgardens.blogspot.com

Ahhhhhhh

It was an enjoyable and memorable few days. As we remembered the men and women who have lost their lives to allow us to enjoy the freedoms that we do, we were also able to spend time with Ryan, Len, Kel and Julia.

Once again Ry made the trip to MN and took the time to spend 5 wonderful days in northern MN with his Pop and I. It's always great to see Ry and is especially fun to see the camaraderie that his dad and he share..... you throw Lenny into the mix and oh does the 'shit' fly. Fun fun.

David and Ry spent three days on local lakes fishing, two with just the two of them and one with Lenny. Day one saw both Ry and David with their limits of sunnies. Day two was a bit slower but still enough fish and day three was a nice time on the water with the two boys and a pop with enough fish for a meal as a bonus.

Proof that yes he did in fact catch fish

Lots of them and they were a very nice size. This is the day one catch


He even learned to clean them. There were a few bones left behind but we persevered:)
While Ry was here we picked up our new 'rig'. On our way to the cities a stop at the Pequot Lakes coffee shop was in order
Here she is the new rig. This was Len, Kel and Julia's 'suite' when they were up. They report (since they were the very first to sleep in it) that it is a very nice suite.

This night hawk built a nest, for the second year in a row, in the parking lot of the RV dealership (RV world). They put cones around the nest so that no one disturbs her.

After spending almost a week not feeling well at all it was so nice to spend time with a happy Julia. She is so grandma's girl and goodness knows I do not have a problem with that!

Here she is in the Barbie car that David found in the ditch last year. Her legs are not long enough to push the gas pedal so daddy is helping her along.
And the water fountain was a hit with her as well. She splashed and threw rocks in it for about an hour.

Daddy introduced her to grandma and grandpa's very own 'lake'. She threw rocks and Peeko tried to 'get em' as Julia says.
This was the best, her and I sharing time down by the lake or in Julia's words the pool.
It was just the best few days and as I floated in my floatie in the 'pool' while Julia was napping I once again thought about how lucky David and I are.

On that note, as I was posting this, I found out that yet another person that we know is about to embark on the big C journey. Bob Geldner has been diagnosed with lung cancer and he certainly could use your thoughts and prayers. He does not yet know where his journey will take him in regards to treatment but as he said to me this morning, "This is a journey I just as soon would not go on". Please send good thoughts his way....damn damn damn cancer damn you to hell.

It's Been A Strange Week

Last Tuesday I traveled to Nicollet as my dad had to have an angiogram. It turned out that he has no major bloclages but would benefit from an internal defibulator, which he may have done on June 21st. Once we got him back to his apartment I came to the Leonard hotel only to find that Julia was not feeling the best (103 temp-crabby-not eating or drinking). She went to the doctor on Friday to find that she has an ear infection. You know something is amiss when this usually happy chatty go a mile a minute gal just sits around. By Sunday she had not eaten or drank enough to keep a bird going so off to the ER she went. No dehydration-yet- just an awful ear infection that had gone to her lymphnodes. We also noticed that when she did get up to walk she was pretty unsteady on her feet. Her equilibrium was off due to the infection so she was given some anti nausea pills. Phew she is finally on the mend but no school yet today, gamma is still here. Her first good food intake was a strawberry ice cream cone yesterday.....oh the healing powers of ice cream:)


While she is napping I am futzing with my pictures just for fun. And just for fun I am sharing. I have some shots of an ordinary milk weed.....




There really is nothing ordinary about a milkweed to my eye as they are quite nice to photograph.....

















But when you play with the coloring you can get a burst of yellow amongst the reds


And what appears to be one floating in the night




Or an iridescent flower against a bright blue background

Yup the milkweed, a great flower to 'play with' as long as you don't get the 'milk' all over your hands.

It's Running

Since David has not been able to run the bobcat (due to his surgery) he has been doing some other projects that have been on hold. The most fun is our water feature. It sits outside of our living room window so we can not only watch the water flow but we can hear it as well.

The water that makes this feature comes from the pond/swimming pool. That water is pumped up to the water feature, it then runs down the creek bed and back into the pond. This actually will help the pond stay clean and fresh as the water is recycling constantly. Our rain gutters are also piped so that the rain from the roof goes right into the creek bed as well helping to fill the pond.

Turn on your sound and enjoy. We sure do...

I Had To Do It

It has been raining all week and I have things that need to be planted. When you mail order plants and bushes and they come as a bare root you just can't wait for Mother Nature to come out of her funk. So I mucked in the mud and clay and got most of my stuff in the ground while dashing through the rain drops.
I have decided to do roses this year. Have not ever tried them before but if they bloom the front of the house will not only be gorgeous but fragrant as well.

And three Potentilla bushes by the dry creek bed. Planting these was interesting as it is total clay. At least when clay is wet it is much easier to dig although really heavy to haul away!


And when it was all said and done this is what I had to deal with. Eeewwww....

Because our woods is too wet to walk in we have been taking the dogs on parts of the North Country Trail. We found that one leg of this trail had been logged. Logging is a great debate. It really is good for the forest because it promotes new growth. However when they 'clear cut' they chop down everything including what they don't use.
And they let the scraps lay where they fall.
This is not the trail. It is a swath that was cut through the woods. The trail is alongside of this clear cut.
A surviving woodland flower.
And a family of ducks made this walk extra enjoyable.
Dear Mother Nature, please let the sun shine for a few days.

Happy Mother's Day

To all of the mom's out there no matter how you fill the role. Whether it be a Mom-mom, step mom, mom in law, bonus mom etc this day is for you. Enjoy it and your children.
I miss you mom........
I 'stole' this from the Dood's Brood sight and had to share it. Thanks cousin Lisa......

You can shed tears that she is gone,
Or you can smile because she has lived.
You can close your eyes and pray that she’ll come back,
Or you can open your eyes and see all she’s left.
Your heart can be empty because you can’t see her,
Or you can be full of the love you shared.
You can remember only that she is gone,
Or you can cherish her memory and let it live on.

~~ David Harkins

Happy Birthday Grandpa

Not the best photo of you my dear but you were post surgery:)
And what a fine 'Gampa' he is so says Julia



Dezbah
And Abigail
Today David entered his 6th decade. Yup he is 60. And not only is he a great gampa but is a fabulous friend, husband and soul mate.