Just Be Glad I'm Not Making You Look at These Pics on My Smartphone

Meet Angeline the Baker and Darlin' Cory -- the newest members of our family.

At last the time seemed right to remedy our catless state, so yesterday I went to our local animal shelter and came home with these two month old sisters. . .

And spent the rest of the day watching the girls  explore the kitchen . . .

The names are from Old Time String Band music -- and Cory is a nod to a cat-enabling friend who's getting ready to move to the west coast

There's not much that's more fun than watching kittens play . . .

 

As I said, aren't you glad I don't have you trapped somewhere showing you all these pictures? And there are even more I didn't post. . .

 Meeting William . .

   

Darlin' Cory has more white on her . . .

  

And she spent less time in hiding . . .

Angeline's markings are more symmetrical and she reminds me of the late Miss Susie Hutchins . . . 

These girls had just been spayed the day before -- obviously, the surgery didn't  slow them down. . . .

They played with the rag rugs and wasps and sunbeams . . .

And even with their new cat toys . . .

Pretty adorable . . . 

   

If It Had Been a Snake . . .

About that missing earring . . .

Yesterday on Facebook, where I post my blog daily, someone suggested the errant hoop might have hooked onto something like the bed skirt. Someone else suggested I check the vacuum cleaner bag. 

After delicate exploratory surgery on a bag that proved to be full of dirt, dog hair, and dead lady bugs, I returned to check the bed skirt and the pulls on the chest of drawers.  No joy. 

 Early in my search, I'd picked up this gold link necklace and given it a shake to see if the earring was tangled in it -- and no earring fell out. But this time, something caught my eye . . . 

There it was, hiding in plain sight. As folks say, if it had been a snake, it would have bitten me.

As my husband said, if it had been a snake, I'd have seen it. 

 

Obsession

It was a gorgeous day --perfect for getting out and doing some garden cleanup . . . . 

But first, I thought, I'll just find that other earring -- it dropped a few weeks ago when I was in a hurry and I didn't see where it landed.  At the time, I'd looked and it wasn't on the rug and it wasn't under the dresser. Therefore, I reasoned, it must have gone into the top drawer  -- which was a gaum (see past post) of such daunting proportions that I postponed the search. 

But now it was time -- I'm fond of that earring and it's solid gold -- worth looking for. So I took EVERYTHING out of the top drawer, did some much needed throwing out -- though not as much as is probably really needed -- among other things, I still have a silk scarf from India that I bought at the UN in 1960. . . I gave it to my mother to use in one of those transparent Lucite handbags that were trendy back then. And then when my mother died, it came back to me -- the scarf -- the Lucite purse is long gone.

The top drawer was edited and tidy. But no earring. On to the middle drawer . . . 

 

Wherein I found this quaint night gown which I made thirty-something  years ago. A friend had learned to smock and was willing to teach a bunch of us. We met regularly at my house and made all sorts of smocked things. We called our teacher "Mother Smocker" and we were the Smockettes. Ah, memories . . .  

 All three drawers were turned out and edited. And the day was half over. What the hell, I thought. I might as well tackle my closet -- the repository of mysterious boxes and quite a few dust bunnies, as well as garments and shoes I will never wear again. Onward!

 

First you have to pull everything out -- making another big gaum . . .

 Boxes of framed photos, boxes of books, boxes of snapshots and newspaper clippings that never made it into scrapbooks . . . at the end of the day I had two bags of clothing for a local charity, two large bags of trash, and a much nicer closet. 

But I never found that earring.

 

Spring Altered

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Random, Much-Needed, Sort of a Day

The fish are awakening from their winter coma...

Toads emerge around the pond.. .

Pieris japonica's graceful blooms appear . . .

Another toad sends his chirping call . . .  to the lady in the water?

A new hatched swallowtail enjoying the forsythia . . .

A new bumblebee, just getting her bearings . . .

A new rooster -- a gift from a friend -- gets to know the ladies in Justin and Claui's chicken yard.  He's a Buff Orpington and Justin named him Buff Gently, after Douglas Adams' Dirk Gently.

New chicks . .  .

Some destined for the egg laying flock, others for the freezer. 

A bluebird looking for suitable accomodations . . .

Peach blossoms. . .

Oriental magnolia bud . . .
 
Tiny, tiny flowers in the grass . . .

 

Reflections . . . I sat by the pond for quite a while, trying to get a picture of a blue dragonfly that was doing laps around its circumference. . .

About twenty shots for this one fuzzy capture.

There was also a little brown bat flitting about and getting sips of water -- first time I've seen this in mid-afternoon but Mr. Google says it can happen if bats have been disturbed or if they're migrating . . . I tried to get a picture but no luck . . .

 

But then, as I walked back to the barn, there was another bat in the air just above me. . .

And I managed another fuzzy capture before he disappeared under the eaves.

The pear blossoms were more obliging . . .

As was the tulip by Justin and Claui's porch . . .

Friends were out at the farm, enjoying the beautiful warm day . . .

The young uns tempted me with a gin and tonic . . .

 The bride and groom . . .

 

 Folks not as fancy as last weekend . . .

Work to be done . . . 

  More chunks of pavement to be installed as stepping stones . . .

 On my way back up the hill, I spot yellow trilliums  and bloodroot . . .

 And then I follow Willa home.