So Long, September! Glad You're Gone.

The last weekend of September we combined eight birthdays and had one gigantic party.

We have been buying Kathy's Rum Cakes for over a decade. This was our first time trying Spumoni--and it has become our new favorite! It has the same flavors as the traditional Spumoni ice cream. The pink and orange frosting are captured pretty well in this photo. It's a strange color combo at first glance, but it grows on you.

One more September birthday was added on the last day of the month--when my great grandson decided we needed one more September birthday. We are now up to 8! This family seems to attract Virgos and Libras!

After grilled burgers and bratwurst and an array of salads, we had homemade sugar cookies , miniature cheese cakes and coffee, along with the Spumoni cake. The dessert table looked tempting, but I stuck with my diet! We had a great time, and it's so much easier to just have the one party.

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Just getting started on the demolition.......

After...

I lost the two large rosemary shrubs, but somehow my lone rain lily and bell pepper survived! You can see how much we have lowered the planter walls. Even though it was 108 the day we did most of the demo, we plugged right along in order to finish by my October 1st deadline--so I'd have time to put in the winter flowers and veggies!

I'm glad September is over! So far, October has brought cooler temperatures and I'm feeling a little refreshed.

Afternoon Surprise!

This morning started with a beautiful sunrise--promising a wonderful day ahead!

And then, this afternoon, I was presented with a gift of pure bliss! My first great grandson, a baby boy--6 lbs. 11oz and 19 1/2 inches long.

It can't get any better than this! Mother and baby healthy and happy!

Home From The Beaver State

East of Phoenix

I went with Aiyana for a few days to Oregon. When we arrived it was 90 degrees, with higher humidity than we are accustomed to, but the temperature came down for the rest of the trip, making a nice change for a great mini vacation!

Every day we picked cherry and Italian container tomatoes growing on the patio. They are much sweeter than I have ever grown. It must be the difference in the soil pH.

Each morning on our way to a beautiful resort-style private back yard for breakfast, we had to sweep the area for invisible spider webs that spiders worked on through the night! The homeowner has been working single handedly for about two years preparing his landscape. What a gorgeous yard!

These little guys seemingly make webs in thin air! They are everywhere.

There are still a few flowers blooming, but fall is definitely on the way there.

A beautiful yellow rose in the yard.

I had to stop at a local nursery to check out this wall of petunias!

This is the inside chain link fence. Why can't I grow flowers like that? Oh yeah, I live in Arizona. Our flower season is just getting started and I can't wait the plant!!!! My back yard is almost finished....

This Koi pond was a beautiful addition to the nursery. What a sight! Walls of flowers, a pond, and hundreds of plants I've never seen before.

Another thing we don't see here in the desert are tree roots exposed above ground like these I saw in Oregon. The sun would cook them here in a few hours! I thought the photo of the roots was interesting.


I got home in time to report for Grand Jury duty. I'm excited to go. I will go a couple times a week for 5 weeks!

Old Blue...And Other Stuff

Blue, so named because he has blue eyes, is a mixed wolf/lab that my daughter has had for 14 years now. About once a week for the past few years, he jumps a 6-foot block wall, runs to the lake (less than a block away) jumps in, then heads running for home. They have tried everything to stop him, but not a thing will deter him from this ritual! They have a swimming pool, and a few times a day, he jumps in to cool off, but he still has had the need to escape to the lake! Last week, a car hit him as he was running home. He couldn't walk and was in a lot of pain, so they rushed him to the vet. He didn't have any broken bones, but was just very sore and pitiful! He's very lucky--my daughter not so much after a $900 vet bill, plus pain pills and a lot of tears.








His blue eyes don't show up here, but they are really striking. I guess that's the wolf half coming through.

This is a purple fountain grass clump at my daughter's. I love the change of colors on the leaves and plumes of this massive planting.

This metal scorpion looks pretty scary in my front yard. At night, it would cause someone to jump in fright if they didn't know it was there!

Found this pretty creeping daisy at Lowe's today. It's a perennial, blooms almost year round, and it tolerates desert heat. After I planted it, I reread the tag and it stated, MORNING SUN ONLY! Well--that means a pot on the patio! Hoping Hubby will water it while I'm away on my Oregon trip! He is as forgetful as I am anymore....

(I just read that it will be 90 degrees in Eugene, Oregon the next few days. Aiyana, the friend I'm going with, is going to be livid--she wanted to go to get out of the heat. This is the second trip she's taken in a month and didn't escape the heat the last time! But, I guess 90 degrees in Oregon is better than 105 plus here!)

Can't Stop Progress

The neighborhood grocery store and several other shops I mentioned before that had planned for a fall grand opening have a new wrinkle. The anchor grocery store went bankrupt! Building is continuing and still no word if and when another grocery will take its place. I'm hoping for a speciality organic, low priced grocer. I doubt that will happen. I suppose there's no such thing as a low priced specialty organic, and probably most of the shoppers aren't all that interested in organic products if they cost more, especially now.

You can't even tell now that about one-fourth of the mountain was blown away to build these shops. I've heard there will be pizza shop, a preschool, a bank, a pharmacy, and a beauty shop going in. I'm sure the first to open will be a mani/pedi shop as it seems that would be the easiest to open fast.

You may wonder why having this small shopping center is a big deal. We have to drive 13 miles to a grocer, drug store, bank, etc. The residents have waited for this for many years. This community has been here about 20 years now. However, not everyone is in favor of having this shopping center in the community, as they see it as destroying the character of the community and also that more traffic, crime and other stuff will increase. I guess we'll just have to wait and see. After it's in, then people will probably decide it's just too convenient to pass up and forget they ever objected!

The shops are beautiful, and I would love to open a health food store here! Just dreaming...I had a health food store for many years and then I sold and retired six years ago. I need to leave it at that!

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A couple of tips on " How To Stay Young".

Accept change

You can't stop progress

Be grateful that you can walk to shop when they take your car keys away!

Busy, Busy Week

My major planter renovation is slowly progressing! I will have to transplant the two large trailing Rosemary plants in the highest planter, and I'm not sure they will make it in this heat so we are saving that job for last. All the planters are coming down, and a new wall about two feet high will add another three feet to the area.


Next week I am going for a short visit with Aiyana to Eugene, Oregon to get out of the heat here. I offered to go along when she wrote about going on her blog, and she took me up on my offer! So, next week looks as busy as the last few have been. It's still so darn hot and dry here that the possibility of seeing some cool weather sounds wonderful!


I'm hoping that most of the work on the planters will be finished when I return from my trip. That is the secret reason I wanted to go away--not just to get out of the heat!

Hey Julie---Here's my first One Stroke painting project. I started a class a couple weeks ago, and I think I will continue for a while longer. Each class lasts two hours and I come home with a finished project! Right up my alley!!

I spotted this perfect puffed heart prickly pear cactus pad on the way to visit my friend who is in the hospital. It really cheered me up. Maybe I'll use this photo as a Valentine's Day card.

Recently I helped set up my Grand Daughter's baby shower, and I was in charge of this dessert table on a kitchen island. By the time we finished with this table it had a few more desserts that went all around the island, including a cake on the top tier. I know this is hard to believe, but...I only had one cream puff and a few mixed nuts! I was so busy setting up and talking that I just wasn't tempted! Maybe that should be a clue: boredom = overeating. I need a job! Just kidding!

It's really a baby boy, and due in about a month! It's hard for some people to make it out. The shower was a lot of fun and my Grand Daughter received lots and lots of nice gifts. She was so pleased to have the shower. Even cleaning up was fun!

And now you know how my week was spent!

Sunday Sundry

I don't have a thing to blog about, and nary a bloom in the garden! I found this lantana in bloom at my daughter's house. I think lantanas are far more interesting up close than from a distance, where you miss the details of each miniature flower head on the cluster.


In the heat of July, my son-in-law transplanted a dying sprig of lantana. Turned the hose on drip and kept it on for over 2 weeks straight! I told him that he was wasting his time--it was too hot to transplant, and then to add so much water. By August the cutting was all filled out and full of blooms! He has yet to say, "I told you so", but I know he secretly wants too. He definitely has a green thumb!

Ruellia brittoniana, also called Desert Petunia or Purple Showers.

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In the passed two weeks I have attended two funerals. A total of five friends have passed away in the past two weeks and one is in ICU. It's been a sad week and year in many ways.

We have had record heat and the monsoon has been a big zero. Even desert plants are dying from the record heat and lack of rainfall. My large prickly pear is drooping and pads are falling off, even though it gets water. The sun's relentless intensity is just too much. It has been one hell of a time around here! But today, despite the heat, we are filling my two extended planters with soil and mulch. I'm ending up with 10 additional feet for more flowers this fall, winter and spring. Water lines are in, walls stuccoed and painted, seeds bought, and I'm just waiting for a couple weeks to pass to start planting! That is, if the heat lets up. I may have to wait a while longer if that happens, but then, the whole schedule is off and the plants suffer on the other end.