It So Hot Here …

  I put ice cubes in the hummingbird feeder!

  Why? 

  

  When I was cleaning it, the nectar I poured out was really hot and I figured it just might burn those tiny hummingbird tongues.  

  Can’t have that! 

  Speaking of birds, we have had fun with a pair of Carolina wrens this summer. They are very noisy, very friendly, active, and messy little birds. We like them a lot and have encouraged them to nest in our YARD with two very nice bird houses …

but one very determined pair had other ideas. They seemed to want to be near us. In our sunroom, to be exact. Over a couple days we removed several nest starts, hoping to encourage them to build elsewhere. Then one afternoon we came home to …

a done deal! 

  I didn’t get a picture, but there was a jacket slung over my bike handlebars and tucked inside it was a completed nest. Inside the nest were …

  Yes, four little spotted eggs, each the size of my fingernail! 

  They had us! It was too late take it down this time. 

  What to do? 

 

 I carefully removed the very sloppy, loosely constructed nest from the jacket and placed it in a small wicker basket I hung on my handlebars. We were surprised when mama wren came right back to the nest as if nothing had changed and settled in. From then on we gave over all use of the sunroom to the wrens and had to leave all four sliding glass doors open night and day. 

  We have to walk through the sunroom a dozen times a day to get in and out of the house but it didn’t seem to faze the wren parents in the least. In 13 days the eggs hatched. 

  Feathers grew.

 Then one morning 12 days later we came out and the babies were gone. They had somehow made their way out of the nest, out of the sunroom doors, and were hanging out in the azalea bushes, being shepherded and fed by their excited parents. 

    Carolina wrens are monogamous, mate for life, and raise up to three broods a year. Ours have apparently sought a change of scenery for their next family. We miss them but we are glad to have our sunroom back. 

Inspired by Frida Kahlo



  A national tour of art inspired by Mexican artist Frida Kahlo that began to tour the country in 2019 is at its final stop in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. That’s about an hour north of us and we were fortunate to get to go see it this week. 

  Ninety-five entries, selected from artists all over the world, inspired by her life and her art, interpreted The World of Frida Kahlo in paintings, prints, photography, collage, sculpture, textiles, and mixed media.

  

 

  It was a colorful and exuberant extravaganza of a tribute and it was fascinating to see the ways Kahlo has inspired creativity in her admirers. We enjoyed it so much!

An iconic Frida, clothed in monarch 

butterflies

Silk and metallic crewel embroidery

“Diego’s Chica”

Brussels, Belgium artist, “Trying to be Frieda”. 

Photograph

Clay sculpture

Appliqué and embroidery, Hamburg, Germany.

 “Larger Than Life” 

  Kahlo was severely crippled as a young woman when she broke her back in a bus accident, and later lost her foot from health complications. Her life was filled with severe pain and she lived and painted mostly in a wheelchair and flat on her back in bed. 

 I love the way this artist imagined her as beautiful and free from those painful limitations.  

 “Frida With Birds” 

     Embroidery!

A medium of expression for everyone! 

Paper collage

Collage detail

  Do-It-Yourself project in the 

museum gift shop

 (Anyone else paint these when you were a kid? I loved them, and actually learned quite a bit about painting with oils doing them.)

  I hope you enjoyed seeing a few pieces from this exhibit. I want to tell you if it ever comes your way, do go, but as I said, this is its last stop and the pieces will be going back to their artists when they leave here.

  I haven’t been posting on my blog for a while for a couple reasons. One was that my last few posts had so few comments I decided I wasn’t writing about anything anyone cared about and it didn’t seem worth the effort. Well, this week I was poking around and discovered that for some unknown reason a lot of comments were in the SPAM folder and never published! I don’t understand why.

  Has that happened to anyone else? Anyway, I moved them and  I will be feeling more inspired to write now!  

🌈.  🌈.  🌈

Somebody’s Birthday!

Bob’s thirteen!!!

    They used to say one human year equals seven dog years, which would make our girl 91 today. Now there seems to be a more complicated formula. The American Veterinary Medical Association believes the first year of a dog’s life equals 15 human years. Year two equals nine years and after that, add five year for each human year. By my calculations, that’s adds up to 79 candles this year for Bob. 

  I thought I’d do a little interview with Bob for you on her day. 

  Me: Bob, I know you’re a girl. How did you come to have a boy’s name?

  Bob: (Big yawn) I’m tired of answering that. Ask The Writer. Hey, have you seen my ball?

  Me: Okay, I’ll ask him in a minute. What’s your favorite treat? 

  Bob: Peanut butter cookies from Trader Joe’s. Did you hide my tennis ball again?

  Me: No I did not! Do you do any dog tricks? 

  Bob:  Sheesh, why would you ask me that. Of course not. Tricks are for poodles.  I need that tennis ball. 

  Me: Why do you hide your tennis balls under things and all over the yard? 

  Bob: For occasions just like this! Gotta have one, gotta have one, gotta have one now. 

  Me: Okay, just a couple more questions first. Why do you always take the long way through the house instead of going through the kitchen?

  Bob: You can’t figure that out for yourself? Years ago when I was a wee small pup I once walked through the kitchen when the floor was wet and slippery. I will NEVER do it again. Ever. Got it? Now gimmee my ball. 

  Me: Last one. What would you like for your birthday? 

  Bob: Really? You don’t know that? I worry about my humans sometimes!

Happy birthday to a very good girl!

  

  

Life is Full of Surprises

Dear Friends,

  As many of you know, my plucky mom is 96 years old and has been living alone since my dad died many years ago. Sadly, there was a health crisis recently and she went to the hospital. She lives a 10 hour drive away from us and we dropped everything to rush to be with her. We are now at her home dealing with the many things involved, day by day: back and forth to the hospital, setting up rehab, and finding a permanent care home that will meet her needs. 

  It’s sad, it’s hard, it’s scary to contemplate one’s own inevitable future, and it’s exhausting.

  We haven’t had time to do anything worthy of a blog, but yesterday we stopped on the way back from the grocery store to spend a few minutes at this pretty place … 

Penjing Bonsai Gardens

 The owner, Feng Gu, originally from Shanghai, China, learned the art of bonsai from his grandfather in China.

  He started the gardens near Melbourne in 1988 (some of the plants, as you will see, are even older than that).

 Besides selling plants, you can watch Gary, as he is now called, as he tends to hundreds of miniature trees with his tiny tools and scissors.

  Or like me you can just wander around and admire.

  The above two trees are about four feet tall and since they only grow two to five inches a year, you can guess that these would be very old. 

There are benches to sit on by the different 

koi ponds, watch the fish, listen to  music of the water, 

and 

just 

breathe!

   It was a wonderful break in a tough day!

Answers

  Here are the figures of speech you and I and others found in the drawing. Anyone know what the thing is at the right end of his shadow?

• Tied in knots
• Knock your socks off
• It’s a piece of cake
• Something’s fishy
• Bird brain
• Shadow of himself
• Handed to him on a silver platter
• Step on your shadow
• Cherry on top
• Holding the cards
• Spill the beans
• A screw loose
• In one ear, out the other
• Nailed it
• Ace up his sleeve
• Kick the bucket
• Rags to riches
• Eggs in one basket
• Born with a silver spoon on his mouth
• Bird brain
• Time flies 
• Heart on his sleeve

  Didn’t quite make it to 27, but we are close.

  We are camping this week, a nice spot in the National Forest on the water. I hope to have some photos to share later. Enjoy your week! 

Just For Fun

  
    It’s a beautiful spring afternoon here, full of sunshine and hummingbirds rediscovering the feeder on the front porch. If you’re having a quiet Sunday afternoon relaxing, too,I thought you might enjoy having a go at this puzzle. 

  I’ll wait a day or two to see how many you get before putting up the answers.

  Have fun!

The Bank of Trio

  Trio, South Carolina, is one of those wide spots in the road we often pass driving the backroads of our state. Once a small but thriving little town, all that is left of Trio is the bank/post office building, and across the road, a small store. 

  The town was named by a trio of brothers — William, Walter, and James Bryan — who came from North Carolina around 1880 to establish a turpentine business. The railroad came through the area in 1882 and the next year the three registered Trio as a town and anchored it with a large brick bank and post office. 

  Turpentine and tar were important and profitable products in the 1700s and 1800s and the great Longleaf Pine forests of South Carolina were a good source. In a laborious process, pitch from the tree was gathered by men who stripped swaths of the bark, allowing resin to ooze down the tree into containers at the foot of the tree. The resin was made into tar or turpentine.

  Tar and pitch were used here on the coast for a century in ship-building, repair, and maintenance. Turpentine was important in the manufacture of axle grease, lamp oil, medicine, paint, and other products. 

  The building later housed Rowell’s General Store until it closed in the early 2000s. Now Trio’s Zip Code has been retired and its only building sits empty, sagging, cracked, and nearly alone. 

  The only other structure left where a town once stood is a nameless store across the road. We’ve never noticed any customers when we were passing by, but the proprietor is always sitting out on a bench outside, just like in times gone by. The story of a trio of brothers who named a town for themselves is nearly lost as well. Now even the locals no longer say Trio. They pronounce it Try-Oh.