Photo taken by Don in the wee hours of the morning. I missed my little girl.

What a long day yesterday was! Flying across Pennsylvania in an unbelievably loud prop plane. Transferring to another flight in Philadelphia after a two and a half hour layover.

And I’m going to be frank here, trapped inside a plane with the horrendous smell of someone repeatedly passing gas. Hey, we’ve all been there, haven’t we? I don’t know what that person ate, but it definitely contained something spicy. Between trying to block out the loud drone of the prop plane and the aforementioned gas, I definitely had my work cut out for me.

Glad to be home.

A quick peek out the window this morning revealed wildly overgrown garden beds, weeds that seem to have taken over, and a lot more blooms than when I left.

The first bloom of many of the roses is fading, but I see plenty of buds. The bugs have had a feeding frenzy this year, but we don’t use pesticides on this property, so it is what it is.

The impatiens that I nursed through the winter, pinched back, and despaired of ever blooming again?

Well, they’re blooming! Yippee! Don did a good job of watering. Unfortunately, he doesn’t weed, nor would I want him to because he’s unsure just what is a weed and what is a legitimate member of the garden bed.

I have never seen so many weeds, so you can see I will be busy this week! I already yanked some when I snuck outside to take these photos.

Today, we will have a little birthday celebration for sweet Don. Maybe Don will make me some dinner (fingers crossed.) We’ll watch 24. Don will open his presents.

The week ahead? My sister’s birthday. The anniversary of the day we met. My brother-in-law’s birthday. Celebrating the blessing of family.

Happy Monday.

I had no idea what day of the week it was when I woke up this morning. Monday? Saturday?

I finally hit on Sunday.

Where am I?

I feel like I’m in Brigadoon. Out of the fog, a magical and utterly charming little town springs up on the shores of a lake. Since it’s very foggy this morning, I am going to go with that fantasy. Chautauqua is by far the prettiest place I’ve ever coached. No contest.

Today is my day off, so I will be walking around Chautauqua taking iPhone pictures. I am now regretting my decision not to bring my big girl camera. I keep looking for it. It feels like I’m missing an appendage. But at the last minute, with a full suitcase and a large canvas bag filled with laptop, paperwork, chargers, and back up hard drive, I just couldn’t face the task of trying to fit it in.

Live and learn.

I picked some daisies from the edge of the road and put them in a plastic glass which is now a vase. No, I’m not a member of the Chautauqua Golf Club.

How about some more pictures of what’s blooming back at the ranch? I miss my garden. But I don’t miss all the weeds that have taken up residence after all the rain we’ve had this week.

The catalpas are about to bloom. I won’t be there for that. Sob.

The spirea was just starting to bloom when I left.

I told Don to go cut some peonies and put them in a vase. I’m sure the rains have beaten them down to the ground and I hate to think of them lying there. If I was home, I’d have taken care of that.

Sigh. So gloriously beautiful.

It’s Father’s Day. Happy day to my dad and to the father of this one:

I miss that little scamp. Fortunately, the stage manager has a dog named Stella. If you can’t find me at rehearsal, I’m probably petting Stella and scratching her tummy.

A quick story: there is a scene in the play where the Younger family is packing their things, preparing for a move. The young actress who is playing Ruth Younger has a lot of stage business to do during that scene. While she’s talking, she’s constantly packing things from the living room. During the staging of the scene, she grabbed the 1950s-era phone from the table, ready to shove it in a box. The director said, “Whoa! You can’t pack that.” She looked surprised. So we proceeded to explain to her that there was a time when you didn’t own your phone, when you actually rented it from the phone company.

That was an entirely foreign concept to her.

Boy, do I feel old!

(You can follow along on my Instagram feed if you want to see the most recent photos of my adventure here in Chautauqua.

Happy Sunday.