Scout — Page 108

The Blob & the Tunnel

July 19, 2010 at 4:00 pm by Claudia

Thanks for all the lovely comments about the porch. We really love it. However, in the interest of full disclosure, I must talk about the elephant in the room – or on the porch. This is a photo of my husband taken before I left for California. You can see there are no leaves on the trees yet.

He had just come home with this exercise bike…found at the curb in a neighboring town. Yes, he’s awfully cute, but we had nowhere to put it. I will say, for the 999th time, that our house is very small. The usual conversation ensued.

“Are you going to use it?”

“Yes!”

“Okay, if you promise to use it. And you’d better cover it with a drop cloth so it doesn’t rust when it rains.”

I didn’t like the idea of this big drop cloth covered blob on the porch, but I was leaving town so I let it go.

And there it remains. Unused. It sits there, with my husband’s bike that he’s thinking of selling – under the drop cloth. You wouldn’t believe how many times I have tried to shoot something on that porch with it looming in the viewfinder. I have expressed my desire to see it disappear. I’ll keep you posted.

Around here we say the words, “in the tunnel” a lot. What is the tunnel, you ask? It is Scout’s favorite place to lie on the floor. Definition: A ‘tunnel’ is the place on the floor between one’s legs and the piece of furniture one is sitting on. When Scout indicates she wants to go in the tunnel, I have to lift my legs in the air and hold them there until she gets in place. This can be exhausting if she is especially fidgety. Or if I am working on the laptop or balancing my dinner on a tray. In fact, she’s in the tunnel right now:

I am by far the most popular person for the tunnel. Don gets the request occasionally. Me – all the time. But honestly, could you say no to that face? I sure can’t.

More soon.

Sunday Morning on the Porch

July 18, 2010 at 11:24 am by Claudia

Lately, we’ve had to grab time on the porch in the morning or not at all. It is too darn hot the rest of the day. Yesterday, like an idiot, I decide to clear out an overgrown area of the back forty in the peak heat hours. What was I thinking? To be honest, I was a mite irritated that this area I had so painstakingly cleared out before I left for California had not been attended to. The guilty party shall remain nameless. It wasn’t Scout or Riley, although they look like they’ve been put in the slammer in these photos.

More of the porch:

Vintage Sue sent me these rocks from the Eastern Shore and I’ve used them in my indoor potted plants and here on the picnic table.

This table, as well as several benches that live on the porch were a lucky find by my husband. We walk the dogs just down the way on a quiet little road. One day he was walking along and saw all the furniture by the side of the road. He asked about the price. $25.00 for all of it, if we transported it ourselves. Deal.

The bittersweet part of this story and what makes the furniture doubly dear to us is that the former owner of the furniture was this man’s mother-in-law, who had recently moved in with them. I’d seen her walking around their property. A few months after we bought the furniture, there was a terrible car accident just across the road from us. An elderly woman lost control of her car and it plunged down an embankment. She didn’t survive the crash. It wasn’t until later that we realized that she was the same woman who sold us this furniture. You can see why it means so much to us. We spoke to her daughter one day and expressed our sympathy, offering to return the furniture if she wanted it back. She graciously told us to keep it and that she was happy to know it was a part of our little cottage just down the road.

Everything has a story. It has been loved by someone. Usually, we buy something vintage or weathered and wonder about its story. Who owned it? Where did it live before we found it? What stories can it tell? Thankfully, we know a bit of this story. And we are grateful.

Glimpses of the Garden

July 12, 2010 at 8:48 am by Claudia

We had a nice gentle rain the other day. Yesterday, the sky got all dark and thundery and we sat on the porch eagerly awaiting a big old rainstorm. We got a few drops. The weather report assures us that there are thunderstorms on the way over the next several days. Please?

Today: 90 degrees. Don’t like.

How about some garden photos? I’ve been walking around the garden the last few days, snapping away.

While I was away, my husband kept telling me about this plant that was taking over the garden. I suspected it was my Jacobs Ladder and I was right. Yikes! When I got home and investigated, I found it everywhere. My first go at the garden was mainly yanking out some of the over-eager Jacobs Ladder. It is a fabulous plant for under my maple tree because it works so well in the shade. It just needs some firm discipline from Mama Gardener – me.

This hosta was already established when we bought the cottage. I’ve added several more since we moved in. The area right by the porch entrance is shaded by the maple and hostas work very well there.