A Bit of Summer

Well, I can get to my blog on this new laptop, but I'm not having any luck moving pictures...yet.

Wow! Got one.

This owl hung out on a tree outside my kitchen window for several hours. At first he had his back to me, watching the open field. The squirrels went into hiding. Then they seemed to figure out where he was looking and began to move behind him. That's when he turned around so I could get this picture.

It wasn't super hot, but Ursula had a great time playing around the ponds. She caught tadpoles with her bare hands and had frogs diving into the water.

Just running the rocks around both the swimming pond and the silt pond (behind her) was fun, though the silt pond was muddier around its edges.

That's where the waterfall came in handy...a convenient way to clean off any mud.

On another visit Ursula brought a remote control boat. She and her father had fun "driving" that around the pond. It was fast so they had to pay close attention to make sure the boat didn't run into the side of the pond, but instead would run in circles.

See the round tube tucked between two rocks with water poring out of it? That's the culvert leading to the silt pond. It allows clean surface water to move from the silt pond into the swimming pond. Jeb Porter, our local "rock" man, came up with this plan. It stops flowing for awhile during the dry days of August. This year we have had a drought in August and the pond became a sad looking puddle.

flowers above the pond area...the computer decided to add this picture...

Plants are beginning to flourish in the rock crannies and there are my 3 ceramic mushrooms.

This summer I added a free standing "tree house" near the silt pond. It also gives me a space to store garden supplies.

This is the silt pond. In the upper right-hand corner is the new shade garden that you could see next to the "tree" house in the picture above. One of my big planters broke over the winter...we are experimenting...hoping to get the bigger pieces to be part of the pond edge. The 3 ceramic fish are reflected in the water, though there are goldfish actually living in this pond. The wet rocks are where the water pours in from the hillside.

That Japanese willow (shrub) should get 3 meters wide. The red flowers are bee balm which likes to spread. I'm hoping it will take over this area eventually. 

This mass of red bee balm started with one small plant a few years ago.