butterfly — Page 13

A Walk, A Butterfly, and a New CD!

October 11, 2015 at 6:40 am by Claudia

Saturday was another gorgeous fall day. Heavens, it was beautiful.

A trail walk:

10-11 trail walk

We stopped by the Vet’s to get Scout’s dog food and saw this:

10-11 monarch 1

10-11 monarch 2

He was loving that butterfly bush so much that I was able to get quite a few pictures. Sweet Monarch Butterfly….a little Saturday miracle.

Good news! Don’s CD is now available to order online. He’s done so much work getting it ready. He designed the cover and the inside of the CD. He arranged for the recording session. He sent it in to be mastered. He’s listened and listened and listened to it, making sure everything is A-OK. All that and that doesn’t include writing the words and music for each song.

Very, very proud of my talented husband.

readyfortheradio

The inside of it is also very cool!

Some of you have mentioned wanting to order it, and of course that makes us very happy, so here’s the information. It’s on a site called CD Baby – they are great, by the way – and you can order it as a digital download or as a CD in the packaging you see above.

To buy it, sample the tracks, or just see the site, click here. I’ll eventually have something on my sidebar, as well.

We’re very excited here at the Hill-Sparks household. This is something Don has wanted to do for literally (and you know I use that word ‘literally’) years: to make a professionally recorded and mastered CD.

On a personal note, to watch Don doggedly pursue this and make it happen has been a joy.

Yay Don!

Next Saturday is the CD Release Party at our local eatery. That will be a lot of fun. Don and Dan are performing, along with several of their musician friends.

They’re very, very good, you know.

I’m off to the city today.

Happy Sunday.

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The Defiant Ones

October 10, 2015 at 9:43 am by Claudia

Throughout the garden there are signs of the inevitable decline that comes at this time of year. Flowers have stopped blooming; in many cases, there are dried up stems where once there were beautiful, green plants. I’ve been looking at all of it through the camera’s lens for the past couple of days.

There are, hidden among the fallen leaves and debris, a few defiant ones – flowers that still bloom despite the disarray around them.

All of the purple coneflowers look like this:

10-10 dried up coneflowers

But, almost hidden away in the side garden, I saw this:

10-10 coneflower

The last man standing. So beautiful.

10-10 brown-eyed susans

A few defiant brown-eyed susans.

10-10 rose

The last of the roses.

10-10 butterfly bush

A bloom hidden deep within the butterfly bush.

10-10 catmint

There are some catmint flowers here and there.

10-10 spirea

The spirea is giving us one last burst of flowers.

10-10 phlox

And the phlox isn’t giving up without a fight.

My goodness, there is such a beauty in this decline, these flashes of color amid the fading greens and browns of the Autumn garden. It’s easy to focus on what was, instead of what is. And what is, is completely gorgeous in its own right.

Oh, I saw a Monarch Butterfly the other day! I didn’t have my camera and it was flying quickly around the property. It was gorgeous. Sadly, I don’t see them much anymore, so when I do, I stop and watch it until it fades out of sight.

Today is another beautiful, sunny fall day. I’m lapping all of this up. Tomorrow, I head into the city again to watch a run-through of the show.

I stopped by the library the other day.

10-10 library haul

I’m pretty sure the Sue Grafton books I’ve missed reading are S through V. Fortunately, my little local library had them on the shelf. I’ve heard a lot of good things about Ace Atkins but have yet to read any of his books. This one was on display, so I grabbed it. I had been in the queue for All the Light We Cannot See and it finally came in.

Just as it did when I was a little girl going to the bookmobile every week, a stack of library books makes me very, very happy.

Happy Saturday.

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The Garden, A Butterfly & Some Top Secret Work

August 7, 2015 at 8:18 am by Claudia

I’m fast approaching that time in the late summer garden when I stop caring quite so much. As the month turns to August and the light changes ever subtly and parts of the garden are starting to look a wee bit tired, I pull back from the whole thing. Self-protection? Just plain tired of pulling weeds? Probably a little of both. I did yank some weeds the other day for all of two minutes, but that was it.

I still check for daily changes. I await more morning glories. I snap photos. I water the pots and the chicken wire fence garden. But I don’t do a whole lot of cleaning up. Too much energy that I simply cannot summon up. I liken it to pulling away in a relationship; you know it’s going to go south, and your instincts kick in as you create some distance between you and the object of your adoration.

I let many of the plants go to seed, and nothing is cut back or pruned. The birds need those plants, for seeds and shelter. I’ll cut them back next spring.

8-7 hens and chicks

I did summon up the energy to repot the hens and chicks that are on the Funky Patio. They were overgrowing their original container. They needed more space.

This one will come indoors with me for the winter.

8-7 swallowtail

This black swallowtail was enamored of the geraniums, but his wings were fluttering so quickly that it was hard to get a picture. This is the best of the bunch. I love these beauties. At one point yesterday, there was an Eastern Swallowtail and a Black Swallowtail circling each other, swooping, soaring, and (I suspect) competing for the tastiest blossoms.

Don: Don’t Read Any Further!

I grabbed some time yesterday to paint and install two more windows in the Top Secret Project.

8-7 project window 2

These windows also open and can swing in or out.

8-7 project red

This will give you a hint as to the color I’m going to use on the outside walls. Yes, it’s reminiscent of our real-life shed. It was Don’s idea to paint the shed red, so his studio is going to be in the same color range.

Happy Friday.

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A Walk, A Butterfly, and a New CD!

The Defiant Ones

The Garden, A Butterfly & Some Top Secret Work

Lambs Like to Party

A Note

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