How do I connect my coddiwomple thoughts and photos for 3 blog prompts including a color theme? Some days, it’s harder than others, but I don’t let those days win. First, I tap into the resilience of nature and pause to connect with the earth.
A walk in nature, walks the soul back home.
Mary Davis
Then, since our yard has odd things in it, including turkey poop due to their daily visits to the yard, I put back on the flip-flops to wander around looking up and down to see what I can see. Our catalpa tree that the fungi and the woodpecker challenged is persevering. 💪🏻
This week, I traveled the yard to see if my only pastel yellow lily plant had bloomed. The rest of the garden beds have this color iris. I love the colors. The buds look like they would be a dark purple, but nope, it’s this rusty, pinkish, purplish, and yellowish blend.
Growing not far from the one above is a rouge fern…speaking of that…I’m green with envy of its resilience.
YES! The star of the pastel shows appeared amongst the weeds in a garden bed that gets very little attention from me.
Here it is after opening up a couple of days later. I think its growth is stunted, it doesn’t quite open up like the other bearded irises. Yet, every year, it appears!
The contemplation of nature can free one of the ego – the great troublemaker.
Eckhart Tolle
I moved on and discovered unexpected visitors. This year, my tiger lilies were attacked by scoundrels, therefore none have bloomed. I have a wild garden where usually one or two will bloom, but this year, I fear…the dreaded lily leaf beetle will win the battle of the bloom. Aren’t these beetles the ugliest of ugly? Yet fascinating at the same time.
I moved to another part of the yard and discovered this rough-looking tree regrowing – an example of nature’s resilience and connection to the earth, sun, rain, and open space to grow.
I go to nature to be soothed, healed and have my senses put in order.
John Burroughs
My bleeding heart plants have neared the end of their blooming season. The vivid pinks of the first blooms have faded to pastel pink as the blossoms continue one by one to drop off.
Speaking of dropping off things, in the mail this week some free cards arrived. Great quotes, right? I tossed them here in the post because they’re pastel pink and represent the resilience of those fighting breast cancer.
Yesterday, I heard a scrambling noise on our fence. I saw a baby squirrel who had learned to find food by climbing over the fence panels. I scared him off and then saw the momma who taught herself how to be resourceful.
She ate (or carried off, or a turkey ate it when it fell to the ground) one of the plastic inserts in the bird feeder. After removing it, she had easy access to the bird seeds. Clever, right? Resourceful, yes. See how she hangs on while doing her dirty deed of stealing food?
I sprayed her with the hose. Don’t diss me, it’s just water – she tries to climb the birdbath without luck so I thought I’d help her get a dose of water. She took off. When she came back I had my camera at the ready to catch some photos of her running along the fence, she paused to pose.
And again. Silly thing.
In her bat-woman move, she hung down to see her shadow.
Then she leaped down on the sun-faded bucket to take a refreshing rainwater drink.
Critters know how not to let the hard days of finding food & water win.
Post Inspiration – Linda G. Hill’s Stream of Consciousness Saturday – Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “start with a question.” Begin your post with the first question that comes to mind when you sit down to write your post. Bonus points if you end your post with a question too. Have fun! And Donna from Windkisses for Lens-Artists Challenge #303 – Connections (a special thank you to her for the post a few weeks ago where she shared a picture of the t-shirt above and when I asked her where she got it, she graciously gave me the info to order them from Til Valhalla Project fitting for D-Day this year). And Terri Webster Schrandt’s Sunday Stills June 9 Monthly Color Challenge: Pastels (I’m linking to her main Sunday Stills page instead of her post for June 9th – see reason below).
PS – I’ll be slow to reply to your thoughts today, we’re taking a road trip to say goodbye to some dear loved ones who passed away during the pandemic, and their family arranged for their celebrations of life today. Don’t fear, though I may be slow, please know I treasure reading your thoughts and I will reply soon. In the meantime, please feel free to talk amongst yourselves 🥰🤗😉
Good morning from coolish-warmish Washington, Shelley! Hot days, cool nights here, thanks goodness. I’m still chuckling over your squirrel shots and the fact that a hose-dousing isn’t much of a deterrent to keeping them a way from the feeders. Great way to tie in three challenges. Your pastel flowers are so pretty. I love how you said you neglect the irises and they grow in spite of you 🙂 By the way, I own two pair of ooffos sandals, and one clog. We’re definitely footwear buddies.
Good morning to you too! Our weather is much the same, with added wind that seems relentless. Glad you appreciated my efforts to share water with the squirrel. We’re not winning the battle. We found out our neighbors stopped filling their feeders to deter the turkeys from visiting so often. That means the squirrels aren’t visiting there either, thus the determination. Our gardens are a place only for the survival of the fittest with the least amount of TLC needed from me to survive.
I chuckled at your footwear buddies comment – I love it! 😍🥰
Wonderful photos, Shelley! I once built a squirrel-proof feeder back in Michigan years ago. It’s fun to watch them try so hard to get the seeds and fail!
Thank you, John! I can see you enjoying and chuckling at the show of the squirrel-proof feeder working its magic. We’ve been outsmarted by this squirrel and need to figure something out to keep it away from the seed. It appears that it can’t figure out how to get on top of the birdbath…
I can send you the materials list if I can recall the parts!
Yay, thank you! I’ll send you a message on Instagram of where to email the list to! Unless you want to share it here so others can read it too? 🤔😉
Very successful linkage! We also have 1 turkey, 2 sandhill cranes, a thousand squirrels, 1 raccoon, several dozen chipmunks, and uncountable numbers of birds visit our yard daily. I have given up trying to discourage them.
Hi Dawn – thank you! Only one turkey, I wonder when the rest will show up? Your yard sounds like the place to be no wonder you can get so many great photos! I agree, once they claim their spots in our yards, it is hard to discourage them to move on. 🤔😉
I see your photo of the bleeding hearts and I remember how I liked growing them before we lost our shady deer resistant spot for them. The birch trees died and with them the shade for the bleeding hearts. I hope you enjoy as much as possible the celebration of life.
Hi Ally! Aw, I’m sad to read that you can’t grow the bleeding hearts near your house anymore. My bleeding heart gets am/early pm sunshine and late day shade. My MIL’s gets all shade in the am and full sun in the pm. Her bleeding heart this year has both white and pink buds. Neither one of us has ever planted a white one and we’re not sure how hers started blooming white? I hope your other flowers are doing well and bringing you joy each time you admire them.
Thank you, the celebration of life for my aunt and uncle was beautiful (despite the relentless wind at the top of the hill). I think/hope everyone could hear me when I read the bible verse I was assigned to read.
The photo of the fern really jumped out at me. I like ferns a lot. Whenever I’m walking in a forest I hope to see groups of ferns. There’s a gentle “simplicity” to ferns.
Hi Neil, thank you for the feedback. I’m glad you enjoyed the fern photo. I enjoy seeing ferns in the forest too – I’m perplexed as to how they found their way to my garden bed there. I don’t have the heart to remove them, so they’ll spread. Perhaps I’ve solved the problem of what to grow there that will persevere!
Lovely and active photos, Shelley. I’m glad you let nature surround you and share the beauty with us.
Thank you, Dan, I’m glad you enjoyed the photos!
You covered a lot of challenges in this post Shelley. Your Bleeding Heart are hanging on nicely as are the Iris filling your yard with color and your heart with joy. Not so joyful is the little red squirrel, who is resourceful, but also a pain in the neck. Back when I fed the birds I did not have a problem with squirrels because I gave them their own grub to eat, (peanuts), so that’s a possibility. I did have issues with the Birdola Seed Block/Bars that I used to put out in the Wintertime and that was because there was no special feeder or stake for them, just a small hanger at the top. I had to put them on a round wrought-iron table which worked out pretty good, except for the occasional piggy squirrel. You could try to deter the squirrel(s) climbing up the pole and accessing the feeder by putting a slinky on it. They will not be harmed by it and it will keep them from scaling it as they bounce up and down. 🙂
Aw, yes the flowers are brightening my days, thank you, Linda. 😊 You know, now that you mention the peanuts, we just purchased a new bag of bird seed and there are less peanuts in it. We’re not sure if it is seasonal for the birds that might still come to the feeder during the summer or if they changed the mix? If the squirrels come for the peanuts maybe they’ll be less interested in the feeders now? I had to chase the dang squirrel twice last night. I’ll mention the slinky idea to Mr.! 😊
If you give the squirrels their own food they are not piggy with the bird food, although at the Park the squirrels feast on black oiler sunflower seeds which I bring for the birds. Hope that idea helps!
I appreciate your ideas and encouragement. I tend to think this momma squirrel is piggy no matter what. I could be wrong about that, but so far, she’s getting more and more brazen in her control of the yard and the food sources. It is fun seeing her tease the turkey, even the Tom, enough that they move on and let her climb the feeder. 😂
Bold and brazen … sometimes women rule don’t they (even if it’s only at the feeder)! 🙂
I love this post, Shelley! The resilience of nature is amazing, and your photos and your quotes demonstrate it beautifully! I love that you even included a photo of the beetles! I would love to see the show of you spraying the squirrel with the hose! Too funny! Thank you for this lovely post – I’m feeling very inspired now!
Aw, Michelle, thank you, I’m glad you enjoyed the post and feel inspired! The beetles are fascinating and very determined. They start out at the bottom of the plant and work their way to the top – they must feel quite accomplished. 🤔😉
I wish I could’ve taken a video of the squirrel spraying. Perhaps I’ll have a chance as it doesn’t seem to scared of me… 🤔
So I don’t forget, sorry for the loss of your friends. Too many. Also sorry for the delay in finding you. For some reason I didn’t get the link or tag. WP woes, I am sure. I found you when looking through Sunday-Stills so THAT is a good thing. It is a great week for pastels, and do love your blended iris as you promised. I love that you walked us through your garden and while somethings make it and some things don’t, I am still always impressed that nature seems to do what it THINKs it is supposed to do. Your tree trying to recover is a great example.
I loved the whole post Shelley, a great Stream of Consciousness, and didn’t the Women quotes come at the perfect time? Thanks for connecting with me in a bunch of ways this week. I am so glad you found the T-shirt. I really need to get one too and I still love it every time my husband wears it. Ya…D-day. Wished we had planned better we were only a day drive from the ceremonies in Normandy, but had our trip planned 15moths prior and didn’t make the connection soon enough. A wonderful post. Thanks. And I am glad I found you.
Aw, Donna, thank you for the sympathy (my dear friend on one week and my aunt and uncle on the next week, saying goodbye has been emotional indeed). Thank you too for finding my post before I made it over to your post to share how much I connected with your challenge for Lens-Artists this week. I love the variety of photos you shared and your words of wisdom on how to notice connections all over the world. Connections are indeed special here in the blogosphere and I shall always remember and be thankful for how we first connected here on WP! I still don’t get how come pingbacks work on some blogs and don’t on others. 🤔😏😣😉
Thank you again for taking the time to share where you got the t-shirt, Mr. and I are going to wear them and be twins this weekend. Yes, the quotes came at the perfect timing too. That’s a bummer that you didn’t get to see the ceremonies for D-Day, I’m positive your heart was there with all of them though.
Thank YOU again for finding my post.
Yes. connections. This most wonderful blogging space that we somehow all become a bit of a family. I will always remember our meeting too lol . I am glad you found the shirts.
Yes it’s like a blogging family, I love it! Me too!!!!!!!!!!!!!