Saturday

Guess who came to see me today. Allright, he didn't come to see me but I'm thankful that Travis had the camera handy. Yes, my sweet hubbie took this picture. Isn't he gorgeous? I never thought I'd get one this close up.

I had such big plans for this Saturday. Really. And I still feel not so fantastic. Even so I was determined to work through it and do my big project anyway. But my body won and I'll be watching a movie with the girls instead. Bummer. I *really* wanted to get this thing done. On the upside though Travis is doing the floors inside the hall closet and I really hope that he'll have the other finish work done on the floors by the end of the weekend. Oh and there's my birdie friend again.... And again. He's hard to see in this one but look towards the top. You get "Where's Waldo" points if you find him. Travis was very determined to sneak up on him and get some good pictures for me. He loves me. And thus concludes my blogging week. I'm a bit bummed that I didn't blog on Tuesday but I'll just have to be OK with it. Now I'm going to grab a blanket and lay on the couch and watch something ridiculous with my kids. It never ceases to amaze me that they can watch the same thing over and over and over. I'm still hoping I can summon the strength to do my project. I'm determined to get it done this week. I'll let you know what it is once we're done.

My Birdie Friends Are Back!

I love sunflowers. Have I mentioned that before? I don't think I'll ever not grow them. I mean, they grow anywhere. I see random ones all over the place here. You know a bird had to have dropped a seed if it's in the middle of chest-high weeds. Bumble bees love them. Their fat little hind legs get completely covered in bright yellow pollen and it's the cutest thing ever. I'd take a picture but my camera just isn't equipped for that. I love my point and shoot but one day...I'll have a "real" camera. Back to the flowers. Hummingbirds love them too. It's so sweet to watch them and little finches that eat the seeds. The one pictured is a girl so she's not as pretty but she ate seeds for a really long time. I'm a dork but I love watching them. And they don't bother my tomatoes. Speaking of tomatoes, again, I thought that this little guy might be responsible for my messed up tomatoes. I've known that they were there eating my parsley which didn't bother me because they turn into really pretty butterflies and I don't really use the parsley for anything. But I did see one of them on my tomato plant which intermingles with the parsley plant. The info I read didn't say they would eat tomatoes though so I'm not sure. It's just that the info I've found on tomato plant diseases looks particularly vile in the pictures and my plants don't look like that. But I don't want to bore you with any more plant stuff. I'm not starting a gardening blog or anything. It is one of the big bright spots in my summer though. Seeing as how we have 5 months of brown grass and trees with no leaves to look forward to in the next few months. Autumn I'm totally looking forward to, winter not so much.

I'm also looking forward to making some house progress this weekend. Travis and I were both sick with some not-so-fun virus but we're both feeling a lot better today. That should get us through the weekend. I have some projects in mind but I'm really not sure what I'm going to tackle. Our project(s) will be mostly limited to the supplies we have on hand since our remodeling budget is really slim. Which brings out the creativity, right? Right. I'm sure it will be fun.

This Was Going to be Garlic Thursday

I had every intention of making today garlic Thursday. Mostly because when Travis said it, I almost fell out of my chair laughing. And also because I love to cook and it would just be fun. Although I doubt that I can impart any special cooking knowledge to anyone that reads this blog since every single on that I know personally is a fabulous cook in their own right. Yes, even Travis, at least he makes some great eggs. And if I ever actually let him cook he'd probably make even better stuff than that. But we got a phone call at close to 10:00 Tuesday night and it was our life group leader asking us to lead worship at a different life group the next night. Recently our life group multiplied out because there were too many of us. We stayed in the same life group and we're one of 5 worship leaders in our group- we take turns so we lead worship about once every 6 weeks more or less depending on who's sick or whatever. But the group that went out has 1 guy that leads worship but he's also in a group that travels a lot so he can't be there all the time and that's why she called us. So yesterday was a mad rush to get ready for that and that's why we're not having garlic Thursday. But next week we will. I suppose I should add that we're also considering switching life groups. It seems that if one place has an abundance of worship leaders and another group has none then we should at least consider filling that gap.

OK, I'm not actually showcasing my flowers this time. For the past several weeks we've had these beautiful little yellow and black winged visitors that are apparently camera shy. I could drive the car past them and they just sit there and look at me but if I'm not in the car they fly off. So I started keeping the camera right next to the kitchen window and after several attempts I got a picture of this one. I've seen hummingbirds several times too but I don't think there's a chance of me catching one on camera. These little guys like the sunflower seeds. Chloe harvested a handful which is more than we need to grow sunflowers next year so I figure we'll just leave the rest for the birds. And a little word of warning if you want to grow sunflowers next season- birds will snatch them right out of the ground, I lost 5 or 6 that way this year. Southern Living says to start them indoors in peat pots (that will disentigrate after planting) and then plant them when they're about 2 inches high. I think the plants I lost were taller than that but it could have been bunnies I guess. Anyway, watch for birds. Sunflowers make me happy.
And here's a little picture of the end of my street from our front door of the nice hazy-fog-drizzle-rain that Fay left us the other day. OK, ignore the power lines- we live on a hill so they're eye level- and the fact that it was garbage day because I love the view of the hills we have from here. And I love living on a hill at times like this. I can't imagine the kind of flood we'd have to have in order to have any issues.

I got a lot of good ideas from everyone on the fall party post- thanks so much! I think I have a pretty good plan in my head now and I'm not really freaked out anymore. I'll make sure to take pictures. And I'm not even sure when it is. It's fall so that could be Halloween or Thanksgiving which means that it's kind of far away. Now I'm kind of bummed. *BUT* if we change life groups they're having a fall party and I could try out some of the more elaborate autumn desserts on them. Amber mentioned a really pretty cake and Christy mentioned a pumpkin dump cake that I can't wait to get the recipe for...yum!