Hot Summer Daze

But first!

Not long ago, I got a surprise package delivered. Mary came to visit me and go on adventures. Immediately I had to follow her around to see what she would be up to.

She seems quite comfortable going on adventures and exploring. I even found her holding 'court' with my dinosaurs.

Mary doesn't look perturbed at all. She looks as though she has everything under control. It must be her sunny attitude they admire. One dino even brought her Forget-me-nots!

In 'other' non important news:

The heat has been exceptional. The dew point and humidity are some of the factors that make it feel so unbearable.

Of course the dogs wanted to be outside for a while. I was with them to make sure Charlie didn't overheat. He has a hard time with intense heat because of his Dachshund and Pekinese background.

Hannah isn't quite as bothered by the heat, she often goes out to lay on the gravel driveway in the sunshine.

I put my shallow stock tank out the day before and put water in it so it wouldn't be super cold for them. The water was actually warm, but it seems that they didn't mind. Hannah jumped in and out of the water while Charlie just stood there quietly.

I thought I'd do a little bit of 'work' with Hannah. She, like Charlie, is food driven. Unlike Charlie, she is extremely brave and curious. It took only a second for her to notice I put a dog treat in the Lego Robot's hand. 

We worked on 'wait' so I could try to get a photo of her taking the cookie from the Robot. Anything more than a two second 'wait' is a bit beyond her at this point, so I had to work fast.

Charlie wanted a treat too but he wasn't willing to push Hannah to the side to get it. He waited patiently. He was still soaking wet from his time in the stock tank.

I didn't know that Wednesday could get that much worse but it did. The humidity is worse and the breezes we had the past two days stopped. With that wonderful combination, the smoke from the Minnesota and  Canadian wildfires have descended on our area.

Just a couple of hours ago my son in Wausau sent me a photo looking down his street. It looked as if brown fog had descended down his street. It is about a 3 hr drive northeastward to where he lives. 

No wind. Smoke, humidity, and heat. Looks like another good day to read a book and work on crafty things. 

Sticks, glue, moss, and cardboard. Maybe a new 'forest house' for my Lego Minifigures. Hey the stuff is free out in the yard and forest, I just have to build it!

No night shots right now unless the mosquitoes let up a bit. Right after dark and just before dawn they are murderous. 

It isn't worth going out and trying to shoot stars when I'd get carried off by monster Skeeters.

Stay cool if you can. Doing chores this evening is going to be a soaker.

 

Wet Weather

3:30 am on Wednesday...

Hannah started to growl and do some quiet 'woofing'. She was standing at the foot of the bed looking out the window.

I woke up and was surprised to see lightening and heard thunder. I grabbed my cell phone and checked the radar and the weather.

Thunderstorm warning with hail was expected shortly. I ran outside and moved my car into the machine shed.

After day break, I moved the car back out. The weather seemed to have passed over.

Two hours later? I moved the car back into the shed. Another line of heavy storms were on the way.

The dogs and I enjoyed some time on the porch with the cooler temps that the storms temporarily brought.

I had to deal with some little dog that once again tried to lick open her incision. She went out to go do her morning business and ended up chasing a rabbit through the mud with her pink shirt on. 

I grabbed Charlie's Hawaiian shirt [he used to wear that shirt when visiting nursing homes]. 

Charlie didn't care as he is not a dog who likes dog clothes.

She is darned cute with it on and doesn't seem to mind it at all.

I just want her to heal up and we can get back to our normal exciting life.

It was still muggy and humid, but I went to Kristi's. I wore shorts and decided to ride bareback. I found a blanket in my totes of horse blankets that Kristi really liked. Since I had one for Rich and one for me, I gave her this flag blanket. It looks amazing on her Black Bay horse.

Since we'd had so much rain we decided to ride along the dead end road to one of her pastures. I don't often try to take any photos while riding unless I have my point and shoot camera along. I don't like messing with the cell phone while riding. Especially bareback.

Halfway around the field Johnny was surprised by something and leapt sideways in a spook. Sunshine jumped to her left to avoid being bumped into. I caught some air over her back and amazingly settled where I was supposed to be.

The incident lasted less than a second and we humans looked at each other with surprise while our mounts just moseyed along as if nothing had occurred. What caused his momentary spook? We won't know but we were down in a field next to the forest.

I laughed and told Kristi that the ground there was soft anyway and I was riding a short mule. 

Despite the glitch, we had a nice quiet ride that felt so good. 

When I got home I found that I'd gotten a surprise package.....

How lucky can I be that I got a visit from a very good blogging friend!

Say hello to my friend Mary. She even brought a bench along so we could visit in comfort.

Thursday:

Overnight we had some rain. Okay, that is an understatement. By 6am we had 4 inches of rain, by 8am we had 5 inches.

The Sheriff just announced that there are roads that have had mudslides on them and that another local highway will be closed soon for water over the road.

Thursday seems to be a good day to stay home and go see what happened in the valley if the rain ever stops today. However, the forecast says that it will rain until some time on Friday.

If this keeps up, I will have to go empty the rain gauge. We are creeping above 5 inches and it is only 9am.

May the 4th Be with you...

 Some of my favorite Star Wars
May the 4th shots....

Enjoy

It's been a few days

I decided to divide my time between with some more fun with the Medieval Village.  After all, I have to do something while waiting for paint to dry.

Below. The Elfin Twins enjoy a morning chat with Charlie who happens to adore their herd of goats. Charlie wants the goats to come out to play. The Twins say, "Not today!"

Yet, this happens. Below Charlie explains to the Blacksmith that he thought he'd just take the goat herd for a walk. He assures everyone that he has everything under control.

Sometimes my brain does these things. It seems the chain of events just pops into my head and I have to set it up. 

Many Lego Photographers usually highlight just one character in a scene. I admit, that is much easier to do.

But I like to create a scene that shows more.

Lego 'portrait' scenes look like this:

I try to make the scenes epic. Well, at least so the viewer thinks it looks like something out of an epic movie.

I had a brilliant idea. Well, I thought it was brilliant. I took a Lego Building in a tote through the woods [not far from the house] to try a scene I thought of in my head.

I wanted it to look like it came out of the movie The Hobbit. I had everything set up and the sound of shots from a mile away echoed through the woods.

Charlie who was with me, jumped through the wizard's cart and knocked things around. I spent the next 20 minutes digging through leaves to recover minifigures. Charlie kept trying to get in my lap and shaking. 

So, my epic shot never happened. I packed everything up and walked back to the house. However..........

IF I go back to this spot after the hunting season is over, I will rake all the leaves away and prepare the sight for the next day that I can try this again. It will take quite a few tries to get what I imagined. I'd like to do this once more on a very foggy day and see what happens.

Note to self. Do not take Charlie.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, that was earlier this week and now I can make a quick comment the chair I am doing. I've gone with some blues for the main part of the chair with a 'shimmering Rose Pink' color for the very top. It looks red, but is a rose pink.

Gold and silver nobbies and hues of blues for the rest so far. I'll finish off the top and seal coat it before the weekend so the chair can be used if my youngest son and his crew come to visit.

My Lego build is going well. 

Here is a hint at what I am making:

Each day I think about getting out for a walk and just as I think I can go, I hear gun shots. Yesterday morning someone very close shot. Close enough for us to feel the concussion. The mules actually had a bit of a freak out while looking west at my neighbor's farm.

The next morning I got to see what the ruckus was all about.

My theory from the mess in the snow was that the deer that was shot at came through my winter fence and knocked down  a section by getting tangled in the hot wire. 

My mules took the opportunity to go looking for greener pastures last night.

They were fine and not too far off. They were in a section on a knoll which is not where I want them when hunters are out shooting.

They had gathered quite a bit of burdock in their tails and short manes.

They enjoyed their time out overnight and were happy to find a huge pile of hay with some grain in it when I walked them back to the winter pasture. They are good girls, I just came up and asked them to follow me back and they did.

Today is Thanksgiving Day. Normally we don't do anything after it became too difficult to haul both hubby and his mom to his daughter's house. I couldn't do it with wheel chairs, oxygen, and medications. So in the end Rich and I would have Lasagna, pie, and build Legos together.

I had an invite to go to a friend's house [actually a few friends from the gym invited me --isn't that incredible of them?--]. 

We've had a good friendship with Kristi and her family for nearly 10 years. Her husband was my husband's Hospice Nurse.

I'm pleased to decide to go. There was a point in which I thought I'd turn down invites so I could stay home and relish some time to feel sad and sorry for myself.

How nice. I'm not going to!

Tomorrow will be a busy day, IF my youngest decides to fight the snowstorm and come on Saturday, then I need to get some things on Friday. This means I will break my rule of NEVER shopping on Black Friday. 

But this year has been full of changes and adjustments for me.

Ding Dong Doggy

Charlie loves loves loves his toy that he got from Rich's daughter! It is the first toy he has not destroyed in 7 years. It has lasted more than 3 days which is a record!

He loves it so much, he lays it down on the carpet next to his master and rolls on it. What a goof! We laugh so hard when he does this. Oh yeah, the oxygen tubing? You should have heard my hubby get excited when Charlie got caught in the tubing and dragged it away. 

Ouch. Says Rich. That hurts my ear!

But really, can you get angry at this funny pooch? I think not.

I think I'm getting close to go back to the Princess Sara stories. I have so many things I want to do and enjoy the process of a story. I often go off in tangents to other places. But still, the story should be about Princess Sara and her quest to save the world.

Don't we all need heroes or heroines these days?

The Twin Sister warriors converse 
with the Jungle Dragon.
They hear about Princess Sara's
Quest
and decide to join her and
offer their assistance against 
the rock monsters.

No worries if you don't get what's going on either. Sometimes I don't even know.

But it is getting close to spring and that is when I believe things will start happening again with Princess Sara.

In every fantasy tale there is always a quest isn't there? 

I have to check in soon with the Princess and see what she has been up to!

With so much weighing heavily on my mind, I do need these beautiful distractions. This weekend will be busy both Ariel and Dennis will be coming on different days to spend the weekend.

I wonder if the kids will be impressed by the desk in my spare 'toy' room.

I took the whole day and washed walls, dusted, and organized the spare room. It was in desperate need of picking things up. Good that the kids both decided to visit so I could get this job [I've been putting off] done. 

There is a Futon Bed in this room for surprise visits. It folds up to make a nice little couch when not in use. But it isn't for the faint hearted to sleep on as it lays right on the floor.

However in years past it has made an awesome bed for company and kids.

Birds and Stuff

Meanwhile during the snowstorm. 

We spotted a bluebird!

The bird never turned around for me and I had to get this hind end shot.

I couldn't help myself.  I had to go out and mess around looking for some fun in the bright white snow.

I thought the guy who plows would have showed up, but he didn't. The snow was supposed to melt quickly. Under the white snow, we had dirty slush from the dust in TX I think. This is the second time we've had dust and dirt in our snow/rain.

I decided the driveway might be too iffy for the visiting Home Health person to go up and down, so we cancelled that for this week.  My 'Ru could handle the hill and the snow, but maybe not the cars they have for Hospice workers. Though, I did notice that three of them drive Subaru CrossTreks. 

While I let Charlie wander the yard looking for mice or voles, I thought it would be fun to 'shoot' this Pegasus on a snow covered stump in the yard. White on white.

The hood of the Subaru provided a nice ski slope for my minifigs. They enjoyed using it over and over again!
I wish I had their energy.

While my minifigs were playing, I heard a 'goose' like sound in the sky east of me. I looked up and saw swans! I've missed many opportunities this year to go watch the Eagles on the Mississippi or hunt for Sandhill Cranes and Swans at the KVR.

So, I was quite tickled to watch these guys fly overhead.

With nothing on my schedule, I waited for hubby's afternoon nap to take a walk.  Charlie is being such a good boy, but he does need some hiking time too to keep up his musculature and health.

We went east through my favorite woods and ended up in a round about way in the valley and then followed the creek back up to our land and up different trails to get back to the house.

~~~~

So the day before the storm we had this going on in our yard! I never really saw until I shot this series ... that Robins actually get airborne to dive into the ground! Like a fox catching a mouse under the snow!

Such a common bird, but still so great to see them appear to let us know spring is near...

The snow melted quickly and when I went out to check the meadow and the fence, I came across dozens of Cedar Waxwings.

The photo isn't great, but I didn't have a long lens ... but there you go. Birds are moving about and it is so pleasing to hear all of their songs again.

....

I still have to get to the rest of the fun photos I am doing for the new minifigs that arrived from Aurora!

Here is a taste...

Princess Sara, the Dragon Quest

I'm thoroughly enjoying the process of following my toys and conjuring up a quest for Princess Sara. 

The greatest part is the absence of rules, allowing me to invent as I proceed. Do you recall the freedom of play as a child? We would take our toys and spontaneously craft stories without needing a structured plot.

I remember the trolls my sister and I cherished in our youth. We'd bring them outdoors, where they might be found constructing sandcastles one day or aboard my grandmother's boat the next, leaping from one escapade to another without a final destination.

The narratives didn't need to be logical; we were immersed in the play of the moment.

Adults always want a definitive beginning and a logical outline for a story. But the child's play is more inventive and creative with no bounds.

I find this holds true for Princess Sara's Quest. The Quest can veer in any direction, entwining countless subplots. I certainly didn't intend for it to be that way. But I follow where inspiration and imagination takes me without constraints.

The concept is to not dwell on the little details, but to relish the journey.

Below, the Rock Monsters have absconded with the Magical Dragon Egg and are concealing it.

Emerald, the Forest Dragon, confers with a clan member, stressing the imperative to retrieve the Dragon Egg at all costs. The egg is believed to contain a dragon destined to bring peace to their kind and ensure their survival. However, not all clan members are persuaded.

Emerald is aware of the Rock Monsters' formidable magic and their merciless leader. Rumors suggest that the Little People hold the key to vanquishing the Rock Monsters.

Yet, trust in the Little People is scarce among Dragons, who have been hunted by them for ages.

Despite this, Emerald is certain of the legend's authenticity and thus seeks counsel from the wise ancient Dragon sage, Sago. [LOL, think Yoda??]

Sago summons the Wise Old Frog.

Together they will find the Little People and speak to them.

And so the Quest goes....

why not?