Inside the Last of the Tulips

Jon said one day that flowers were like living fireworks. They start out in small buds and burst into colors that drop and leave nothing. I absolutely agree. This last vase of tulips were doing the fireworks thing and I decided to take photos of  them. 

 For some reason Blogspot isn't cooperating, I've attempted to move the photos into the order they were taken, but no matter, they are all kind of cool. I wanted to get the alien sort of creature things inside the flower and was able to do that. You can tell what outside photos go with which inside ones~

 I liked how this bluish center made the glow of the stigma and pistal stand out when I put the lens inside the bloom. .

 These made me laugh. such an alien creature with the anther and filaments around it! The first one is blurry, but you can see all of his funky face in the last shot!

April Showers on April's flowers

This has been an odd spring. Last year, at the end of April, very few bulbs had bloomed. This year, my gardens are full of a variety of colors, shapes, and scents. The tulips are raising cups of color to be filled with sunshine or rain. It was especially lovely this Resurrection Sunday to see  the droplets reflecting and shimmering like crystals scattered on an Easter dress. 

 Once again, I cannot change the orientation on this last photo. It was taken upright, but it appears it prefers to load onto sites sideways. I hope you can see the tulip bed in the drops-they seem to show up better when it is upright. Strange? Yes!

Day 2 of Locust Trimming

I took 57 photos and it was difficult to choose which ones to share. The first photo is from December 2014. This is one of the few pics I have of the second tree that was trimmed (this is the tree Brian trimmed with the aid of the truck). 

 Equipment in the yard prior to use.

 Kila was fascinated with the entertainment our tree guy provided. Much more fun than watching birds!

 The following are pics from the trimming of the first locust, the tree next to the little house. Until he started removing limbs and branches, I had no idea how much was really dead up there. He also discovered one of the scars is most likely from a lightening strike! They are old trees and the strike was from years ago, but it did startle me!

 I believe these are from the second tree. After he finished the first one, his assistant remarked, "now it looks like a tree!" she was absolutely right!

 This tree was a bit scarier to watch him trim as he needed to use Twister moves. Some of these whippy branches were tangled together tighter than a hair knot in a restless toddler's tresses.

 As the trimming went on, the yard began to resemble something out of Snow White. I need to get one more photo of the mess back there before we get it all tidied up!

 Finished and ready for Easter! These locust trees put on their dress last and are now ready for spring. Lovely work done by a wonderful couple of people.

Locust Removal-part 1

Brian was very careful about my plants. I was glad the daffodil border was pretty much done. He carefully straddled the triangle bed and everyone was happy! 

 This is the 'limb' he wanted to use the truck on. Not the huge limb, but the part over the house. He's sending another guy over to climb in the trees to cut them later this week~

 Meepette was carefully keeping her eyes on things.

 These are most of the photos from this afternoon's trimming session.

 I kept thinking of Shakespeare's Birnam woods as Brian was 'hiding' behind giant limbs as they moved thru the sky.

                       Almost done! This is the litter from step one. Thank You, Columbia Tree Care!!

Happy Birthday, Mum!

Today is Mum's birthday. She is now &% years old. It has been a very long &% years and I can tell you the 50 I have been a part of have been truly different. I don't have too many photos of the two of us.  Probably for the same reason I am not in many photos in my kids 'albums'. 

In the early 70's we moved to Alaska and mom never left. My sister is still there and so is my heart. Mum knows a lot of people on the Kenai. From Homer to Nikiski she has helped change kids lives in so many areas. She has taught in many different venues, volunteered with 4-H, Forensics (which in Ak is public speaking), and a zillion other things. Mum has been a part of the United Methodist Church in Kenai since the 80's and there is a ton more. 

Mum volunteered in my classes starting with Kindergarten. I'll never forget the very cool purple under water finger painting she did one day. The super awesome birthday party she helped plan..and I missed due to the measles. 

Mum worked a great deal. She spent most of her life teaching and going to school to be a better one. But, she started out working in Alaska on the Homer Spit in a cannery. She got to bring home some odd things they found on the line. 

I am always amazed when I meet people that know mom. There was one day I was in a brand new Fred Meyer store in Tillamook, Oregon. It had been open less than a week and I went in to look around. A gal from the jewelry store was outside lurking for customers and stopped me. She stared at me and asked if I was from Alaska. (I cautiously said yes, thinking how on EARTH does she know this. I have NOTHING on me that says 'Alaska') She then asked if I was from Kenai. (this made me blink. NO ONE knows where Kenai is, much less how to say it properly. Although, Nikiski is worse...). She then asked if  my mom was Mrs. Egbert. Turned out this young lady had once been taught by mom and I apparently look a great deal like her.  The kids mom taught are everywhere and they know mom VERY well. I was in the Kenai mall (yeah, AGES ago) with mom once and this kid was being a brat. Mom looked at him and poof. Kid straightened up. The grandma came over to my mom and asked what she had done because 'I can never get him to behave!' Well, obviously, this kid knew mom and knew that when she gives 'that look' you just change your attitude FAST. It appears that knowledge never goes away. When mom was working in the juvie home in Kenai, one of the kids said to her something like, "my parents know you. they told me I better behave, or else." I kinda felt bad those kids hadn't been raised by mom. They wouldn't have been there if she had. 

Mum is always up for a laugh. She embarrassed me completely and totally the summer after I graduated from HS. I was all cool and hotstuff and was in a State Fair beauty pageant. (yeah, it was an Alaskan girl thing to do to get scholarship monies) Mum, bless her heart--now!-- was in charge of 4H kids. I, was out flirting with security guards. As I was watching a tiny television at one of the booths one night, one of the kids came up frantic. It appeared one of the giant rabbits had gotten out and they needed help finding it. Flashlights were trained on the ground as guards and people searched under and around buildings trying to find this bunny. Then, out of the darkness hopped the giant rabbit. It was definitely a one of a kind creature. Yup, it was my dear mum. Dressed from head to paw, in a rabbit costume. I will NEVER EVER forget that. 

I am sure I could blog on for pages about mum, but I'm gonna stop. I'm looking forward to going home this summer where I can experience MORE mum stories. Here's to many more years of adventure, Mum. 

Valentine's Day~

It's Valentine's Day and that means candy, camo, and being in the outdoors. The mountain ranch looks really different with the grass all flat. You can easily see for miles and miles across the rolling hills. 

 We arrived at the lower place and discovered the sign down. Probably from the wind.

 At the lower place, near the bus, there is a crick where the rocks for the fire pit were. It was lovely to see water in it! There were also animal tracks around it. The pond it feeds was full of ducks. However, those are on a different property and we could only see them with binoculars.

 Steve always has more precise methods of doing things, Jon prefers to just get it done. He usually does the job thoroughly, just not quite like Dad would! But, in the end, it worked. The fire pit was dug and there were exactly enough rocks to surround it!

 The reason we went up today was to go shooting. I discovered I need a lot more practice. Or the broad side of a barn. The guys however,  had  a lot of fun!

 I almost deleted this photo, but when I saw it on the computer, I noticed the bottle was 'jumping'. I was pretty impressed to get the almost falling can in the next photo. The last one in these three, Jon liked. It appears that when the bullet went thru the plastic bottle, it exploded the bottom. Physics is very cool!

The other thing I learned is to make sure all containers and food stuffs are put away before shooting. Or you may end up with spent 22 shells in your Bugles.