There she be! The newly bricked chimney is finished. The metal you see around the top is a cement mold and it will be removed in a week or so. I wanted the bricks to have a faded look and they do.
No more of the blue tarp that has been covering the bricks for at least three years. We had to come up with the money for this job and that took a while and when we were ready to have it done last year, they were already booked through the season. But they put us on their list for this year and we said goodbye to the tarp and it looks normal again up there.
The climbing hydrangea is in bloom. Someday, someday, I hope that it will be completely covered in blooms. I can’t get too close to the hydrangea because that’s where the nest is that Mama Robin is guarding so closely. I did peek in the other day and I saw two little heads peeking out of the nest. But I backed off quickly because I didn’t want to stress Mama.
These roses are making me very happy! Bloom after bloom is opening. My goodness, they’re gorgeous!
The peonies have bloomed (save one – I’ll have to check it today) and are winding down.
The catalpa tree is in full, glorious bloom but it’s so hard to get a good photo of it, partly because it’s a huge tree and partly because the white flowers, which are everywhere, look like little specks. I’ll work on that today. I can assure you, the scent is heavenly.
The remembrance rose is starting to open. My cup of roses runneth over.
Today? It will be warm but not nearly so hot and humid as yesterday, so it’s mowing time. It takes me two days to mow everything and Friday looks like it will be rainy. We never got the predicted thunderstorms yesterday, though there were rumbles of thunder.
I guess I’ll have to water again today!
I’m off to eat some breakfast and get ready to mow.
Happy Wednesday.
Thank you for sharing the flowers. They add such a brightness to sad day coming from the news of a shooter shooting at members of congress practicing baseball for an event tomorrow night.
Horrifying news, Trina. What is this world coming to?
I was greeted this morning by the news of that horrible shooting. We live in such an angry world! So looking at your lovely flowers is always a soothing moment. The chimney looks great. Careful with the mowing and enjoy the lower temps. It was steamy here yesterday. Hugs!
Finished the mowing and took a shower – now off to the grocery store.
When I was in fifth grade, outbreak teacher carried out. A garden club “for the girls” once a month. One meeting day, I excitedly told the club about my Mother’s beautiful p-long e-long o nies! She looked at me very exasperated and said it is peonese, peonese. I was horribly embarrassed! I never spoke out in garden club again!
Lovely pictures! Love the chimney! Have a great summer afternoon! Becky
You said it the right way, Becky!
Haven’t pulled up headlines yet and now I’m cringing because I know what’s going to greet me.
So nice to get home projects done; a relief. One less thing on the list. Chimney looks awesome. When they took ours down (basically cut it in half; was teetery/unsafe) and capped it at the old cottage (previous home) I kept the pile of bricks from 1923 but I found them mostly not usable/crumbly. Hopefully you won’t have that problem. I love the look of old brick in the garden. Or anywhere. I’d hoped to make a curving path…
Glad you have some baby birds…they’re ones who survived when the others didn’t, ‘…bless the beasts and the children’…
It’s horrific, Vicki. Violence of any kind never solved anything. Now we find out he had been charged with domestic abuse in the past. Apparently this is often the pattern.
Baby birds all over the place – there were sure a lot of nests around here.
I haven’t heard anything about this monster-shooter; I’ll watch some news programs tonight. We all know violence solves nothing. It’s horrible to think that divisive politics puts an already-sick/mental/deranged person over the edge. There again, the what-ifs; what if he hadn’t had a gun? Apparently the baseball players had the protection of a locked gate to the diamond, which kept this bad guy out…but not his gun.
I saw the ‘live’ press conference with the lawmaker from Texas (on crutches) giving a first-person account and I was tearing up; his emotion/gratitude, all of it…can’t imagine what those guys and the police went through; so frightening. I also felt for the innocent people just walking their dogs in that nearby/adjacent park…they didn’t have any way to take cover.
Like me, with my big shepherd, how would I, in such a dangerous situation, get both her and myself under any kind of cover (and keep her quiet and both of us hidden, in all the noise and chaos, especially gun fire which sounds like fireworks to a poor animal whose ears are so sensitive). If the shooter was near me, if I had a ‘window’ and could try to take him down or off guard, should I do it/would I do it? I always recall the guys in 911 on that plane which crashed in Pennsylvania; how they likely rushed the terrorists to try to save the plane; they were so brave. Would I be brave? You can’t help but think to yourself, ‘what would I do?’ None of us are ‘trained’ (unless we’re police, first-responders, etc.) to know how to get out of harm’s way, or to tackle a gunman, or ‘go in’ when others flee. I’ve just often wondered, in terms of myself, what instinct would kick in, could I save myself or someone else, would I freeze, could I be smart enough to figure out a way to get myself out of a dangerous scenario, even if I was, say, in an earthquake and found myself trapped; do I have enough ingenuity, does my mind work like that? I think there’s actually a TV show on ABC which is called, “What Would You Do?” although I’ve never watched it (maybe I should). I think some of the hypothetical scenes they demonstrate/discuss (with experts) are, like, if someone is harassed or beaten…you witness something awful happening…how do bystanders react? Do they step in, do they run the other direction…
Other bits and pieces of news today are calling upon everybody, including all the politicians, to tone down the rhetoric. That’s probably going to be a hot topic in the next days.
It had to be terrifying for everyone involved, the politicians, the police, the people who were near or in the park.
And every time I hear something like this, I again question why guns are so readily available. This man had been in trouble with the police, if we had stricter laws, he wouldn’t have had ready access to a gun. And, I’m not trying to be overtly political given this horrifying situation, but when politicians continually refuse to enact stricter guns laws, even make it easier for the mentally ill to get guns, I wonder now if this group who went through such horror today will better understand the terror those children in Sandy Hook felt, among so many others.
I feel passionately about this. I lost a student to gun violence. Someone who had access to a gun just decided to shoot someone and they killed my student, just about to receive his master’s degree. No one will ever convince me that we need such lax gun laws.
Oh, Claudia, I’m so sorry you lost your student to gun violence. It’s of course very personal to you; so awful. To think, of all the things that good student could have contributed to the world only to be lost before his time; so unfair, so senseless. I remember you saying something of it before but the way you said it just now, it’s just crushing and I’m sure the memory of it all will always be too fresh in your mind. You have every right to voice your opinion on gun control. I hate guns. Anything about them terrifies me. My dad and my brother did like guns and to shoot mechanical targets, never to wound an animal; not the hunt. They liked the precision of the instrument; the craftsmanship. Our ancestors/our family in 1700s-America were gunmakers (the long rifle). My dad had army medals for being a specialized sharpshooter from when he was in the army in WWII. He didn’t go out to the private range/gun club very often; it had become mostly my brother’s hobby. When my brother died (medical issue), my dad got rid of most of the guns but not all of them. When my dad died (also a medical issue), we turned every last gun in the house over to the police; we let them dispose of them even though nothing we had was illegal. Both my husband, me and Mom wanted no part of any of it. My brother always wanted to buy a small gun for me to keep in my handbag and I said ‘no’ (he was only trying, in his mind/way, to keep me safe, because he loved me so much).
My uncle was a recent widower; then, he found out he had inoperable/late-stage pancreatic cancer. If he hadn’t had a gun in the house, he wouldn’t have taken his own life, but it was there, he was alone, and he made his decision, his choice (with his mind clouded by grief and fear and hopelessness). He didn’t give any of us a chance to try to help or find resources for him. I didn’t get to say goodbye and tell him how much he meant to me. I say again, I hate guns.
I do, too, Vicki. I do, too.
Really enjoying the pics while listening to horrible news. I think grass grows faster with this heat! Take care! ;)
And now another mass shooting in San Francisco. It never stops.
Your cottage and grounds are so lovely, Claudia. Your and Don’s piece of heaven. Glad it’s cooled ambit for the mowing and hurray for fixed chimney!
Yes, I accomplished a lot of mowing this morning in the cool temps. All done for today!
Horrific news. Was anyone else taken back by the fact that all of these congressional people practice on a reserved field,,,, same place, same time, every day ~ but unless Scalese was there with his assigned security detail, there was no security at all…? Same for the Dems. It seems like it was an event waiting to happen.
It is still HOT here today. Was just outside w/ the dogs, and all 3 of us were more than ready to come back inside. The chimney looks wonderful, Claudia! Hope you have a peaceful Wednesday!
There should always be a security detail – especially in this angry time.
I imagine they will be amending those rules in the face of this shooting.
I worked for a Fortune 100 in my past and we had five planes at the time; one was a private jet. There was a short hop to a meeting, like a half-hour flight between cities, and there was engine trouble; smoke started filling the plane; emergency landing. On board, if I recall, were two corporate VPs, the CFO, the CEO/Chairman. They were all okay but, after that, they’d break up the travel and never again put that many key people in one plane. The corporation could have been crippled had those men lost their lives all at the same time. It’s like they don’t think about it ahead of time…until something happens,
I also worked for a woman once who was a high-ranking company manager. But her caution bled over to her personal life. When she’d go on vacation, she would take a commercial flight with one child. Her husband would take another commercial flight with their other child. If they drove, they’d take two cars and do the same thing. I thought it was overkill at the time and wondered how they managed to even share one house between them…but clearly something had influenced her to do that sort of thing.
Something most likely happened to her or someone she knew that influenced taking those precautions.
Those roses are beautiful. Catalpa trees are all in bloom here, too. It’s still very hot here, in the 90’s. We have a chance of storms tonight and the next couple of days, and I certainly hope it happens. We desperately need rain – it’s been over three weeks. The grass is starting to turn brown already.
I hope you get rain, Melanie! We’ve had so much of it but last year we didn’t and I remember how low our rivers were and how brown our lawns were.
Those flowers are gorgeous. Glad your chimney is fixed. We have a baby squirrel in our nut tree. He lays flat on his stomach but does leave at times. The other day the mama squirrel was feeding him. It is so cute.
Marilyn
Oh, I bet it’s adorable! Lucky you!
Beautiful blooms Claudia…and dad news once again..
Sad news…
xo
Thanks, Nancy!
Your house looks lovely.
Thanks, Kay! xo