Snugglers

Mo has been going up to Eva and putting his head down so she can lick him. He was trying to get her to do that today, but she wasn't interested. They have really been getting along well lately and are almost snuggling.

Seashell Topiary

I've collected a bunch of seashells over the years, although most are from my childhood. I've been keeping the piled in a pot, but of course you can't see them all. I decided to turn them into a topiary. I'm really pleased with how it turned out. I need to stabilize it a bit more, but I think it looks cool. I only burned 3 fingers touching the hot glue!

Flower bed

Wow...this was a lot of work for Tony! :-) We finally dug around the flower bed to add an edge and place rocks around it. It was backbreaking work to dig through clay and rock to get down 4"! Anyway--I think it looks nice, and Tony figures he burned about 800 calories.

Vacation

We headed off to the Big Island for a lovely 8 day trip. Since we didn't see the whole island last time, we decided to do the full circuit. We flew into Hilo and headed up to Waimea to see Mauna Kea, then drove back around to Hilo, the volcano and to Kona. It was a bit too much hopping around, but fun to see all the island. We loved going back up to Mauna Kea for astronomy stuff, and it was fun to see more activity at the volcano. And of course relaxing at the beach in Kona and snorkeling was fabulous.

You can check out pictures at:

Rosemaling

We did a rosemaling project last Saturday at the monthly HOTT meeting. I painted it on a tin tray. At first I didn't think I liked it, but as usual after a few days I realize it's not bad at all! :-) It was an Arlene Newman design.

Flower update

Well the flowers in the bed aren't doing well. Most have been burned to a crisp. I know why though--the flower bed doesn't get complete coverage from the sprinklers! D'oh! Hopefully that will get fixed and I'll have better luck.

The pansies and snapdragons weren't doing well with the heat, so I pulled them out of the pot by the front door and planted Mealy Blue Sage (Salvia farinacea). It's a Texas native, and seems to be doing well with our 80-90 degree weather. It should bloom until the fall.

I also bought Texas Lantana (Lantana urticoides), and put that on the back porch. It's doing pretty well too. Although I think I'm going to need to find either a bigger pot or a permanent home for it. It was an impulse purchase, and it's really a shrub and not a flower. Hopefully this summer I'll work out a landscape plan using Texas natives.

Bird Entertainment

We've been getting a lot of birds since we put the feeder up. Sometimes the cats don't seem interested. Today there was a bird on the fence that just got them chattering up a storm. Meanwhile there were birds on the feeder, but I guess that's old news.