flowers

Under the spell of a torpid heat wave it's hard to keep the focus sharp.  But the garden is loving these tropical temperatures...

The day lilies are obviously happy amidst the raspberry suckers and grasses

that we're too heat-weary to pull.

Hummingbirds love this flower.

Bee balm or bergamot, that my knowledgeable Wally calls monarda didyma,

was used by the Oswego tribes of northeast upper state New York for a tisane,

the not-so-secret ingredient that the British came to add to their black tea,

 inventing the wonderful Earl Grey tea.

I know,  I know,  you can find all this stuff in any seed catalogue,  but it fascinates me that,

 after the most bitter winter temperatures,  this all comes back often stronger than before!

Angelica Arch Angelica is the king of the garden.  I should have caught its magnificent green flowers covered in black butterflies a month ago,  but even now these giant seed heads

on rosy hollow stalks amaze me.   These babies can grow up to 8 feet high!

 

These lovely "weeds" grow all over the lawn like summer snow.

Why should we cut the grass anyway??

Don't these fuschias look like little fairies with their rosy heads and wings and their magenta dresses?

They have way too many feet, but then, what do we really know about them?

The cilantro has gone to seed, as has my cooking.  Who can cook in this weather?

 I love these little florets that I'm supposed to pluck if I want my cilantro to keep producing for me.

There are other little flowers that bloom...in the garden of my heart...

like this 4 month old...

who is honest and perfect in every way...

though she has no idea; 

what a centrepoint of immaculate energyshe is.

This is a little watercolour done in drybrush technique

that I will put in my etsy shop in the next day or two.

I send my heart's wish for your comfort and joy.

Song of the East

We are into it now- the richness of summer. The leaves on the trees are lush, the blossoms have fallen from the blackberry and raspberry bushes as their green hulls incubate their berry goodness.  Our cultivated flowers are sparse having made lovely appetizers for our deer visitors, but the wildflowers abound.

I have returned to an earlier piece you can see  below in my June 20th post entitled On the Edge of Solstice in its beginning stage, and have pronounced it finished!   It is a piece that makes me infinitely happier than my last attempt, and so it has gone directly into my etsy shop to which I invite you for a more detailed account and closer detail shots.

Song of the East

I can hear thunder rumbling in the distance even though it is sunny and warm here.

I will leave you with my wish for joy in your heart and peace in your thoughts.

Deer Me

 

 

As you may have noticed,  I have pulled the portrait on the last post from my etsy shop.   I thought it was creepy,  and when a friend of mine agreed,  that was it; down it came.   What can I say, except.. "the best laid plans of mice and men gang oft astray".    I know, I know; this wasn't an act of fate,  but when you think about it,  many of the choices we make are somewhat predestined by all the pieces we put in place prior to that pivot in time.  I admit I had misgivings about posting the piece in the first place,  but I was so determined to get something up,  that I jumped before I felt it out.   Yes, felt it out,  for I also think we rarely make choices through thought but through our feelings rationalized.

In the meantime I will have something new to show you in the next day or two.

The last morning of June.  I couldn't wish for a more wonderful gift to celebrate .

Amidst the bracken, raspberry and sweet william, this little fellow stands at the edge of the forest.

Yesterday was Canada Day,  the nation's 144th birthday.   The day passed happily with friends and good food.   We watched the celebrations in Ottawa on TV last night and prepared for bed to the booming of fireworks in the distance.  And the next morning,

this morning:

 

 

We had 2 new visitors, the Pansy Eaters, who decimated our planters halfway up the front stairs.

 

The morning sun began to lift the dew from the long grasses, daisies and Indian paintbrush.

The Fawn

 

and back to Mom

These are the quiet joys of life in the country.   We are lucky in a million ways.

 

We are lucky to have such a camera.  And the skill to doctor these shots taken through our, as yet, unclean windows still covered in tree pollen from the spring.   And just to live here. I have to put the camera down so I can really drink in the experience.   Behind my glasses, behind the camera, behind the window,  I am thrice removed from reality.   We are not here just to witness but,  indeed,  to engage.   That's where the creativity comes in.  

 Creating a life for ourselves,  not just being in reaction to what happens to us,

 but creating in action that which we would have in our lives:

 love, good health,  peace,  beauty,  freedom,  choice,  you name it....