In the early morning, the mountain looked green at times...
At other times, purple.
And then there was rain! No two days were exactly the same!
Shortly after my arrival in my BC hometown, I set out on my own to explore historic downtown...
(It's the part of town that I remember.)
I had weekly lessons at my piano teacher's house above...
The old movie theatre now houses a Timmy's!
We kept our boat at the yacht club - which was much smaller then...
My mother attended this church when she lived around the corner.
This clock looks familiar... But the library I knew is gone - as is the high school I attended.
The city park has changed a bit. There used to be an "aquatic" at the end of this path.
My parents knew the original owners of this motel...
Lots of memories!
Around noon I headed back to my uncle and aunt's home...
I decided to take a shortcut - and go straight up the hill!
Fortunately I made it up without mishap, logging over 18,000 steps that day!
(Did I think I was still a teenager?!)
A new "season" of flowers has arrived. I think of them as my late spring flowers (after the hellebores, scilla, tulips, and daffodils - have disappeared.)
Anemones appear among the grasses. They will return to bloom again in late summer.
In shaded corners of the yard are lily of the valley....
Nearby, blue and pink "forget-me-nots".
The most recent additions to our garden beds are irises, large and small...
A whole new wave of flowers has appeared!
I've been cutting my son's hair ever since the pandemic began. It wasn't hard - he just wanted all his hair shaved off.
But recently he negotiated a new look - with a new family stylist: his sister.
It's hard for me to keep up with what's in style - but I like it!
I'm relatively new to the world of amaryllis bulbs. I got my first bulb in January 2022. (Post Christmas sale!) it was already sprouting in the box.
In November 2022 I bought a pack of 3 waxed amaryllis bulbs at Costco. They bloomed beautifully that winter with virtually no care. Then last spring I removed the wax and potted them in soil for the summer. I let them grow outdoors in indirect sunlight. In fall, I removed the bulbs from the soil, put them in a brown bag and left them for several months without watering them - basically ignoring them - before repotting them again and bringing them back into the light last October. I water them as I would any houseplant. All grew long green leaves but so far only two grew flowers.
But NOW... I notice that a third bulb is growing a fourth leaf...or is it a stem?!
Maybe it will have some SPRING amaryllis flowers!!
Today Franktown, Ontario, a small community about 45 minutes west of Ottawa - between Carleton Place and Smiths Falls - celebrates the many lilacs in their community...
They were...
Lilac Lane was quiet, though we crossed paths with two cars driving through. During the festival, horse-drawn wagons carry visitors up and down the lane.
We wandered a little farther and saw a frisbee golf course... and some homes.
A beautiful place to visit - especially in lilac season.
I take a lot of pictures - some, to help me remember places and events; others to illustrate things I mention in my blog.
I used to use a digital camera, but these days, I take all my pictures using the camera on my phone.
One reason is that the phone is always in my pocket - since I also use it as my pedometer.
All this information - the photos, my daily number of steps - and more - are all automatically saved on the phone... But a backup copy is also sent to a hard drive located SOMEWHERE (not sure where!!) called a "cloud."
Every once in a while I get an email from the "cloud" telling me that I've exceeded my free data storage and now I need to pay a monthly fee - something I'm reluctant to do.
At this point, I usually choose the option of deleting information and photos on my phone and on the "cloud." But there may also be another option...
One day recently, my daughter, scrolling through the photos on my phone, commented: No wonder you're always running out of cloud storage. All your pictures are "live" - they're few-second videos. That takes up more memory...
Well, that has to change!
Can I remember to change the camera setting every time I use it...? (I've discovered that it switches back to live every time I open up the camera!)
So much to learn!
The ducks have arrived... on our neighbours' roof!
The male watches from overhead...
While the female rests on the cool evening grass.
In this light she looks striped!
I wonder where they'll make their nest...
Not long ago, Terry and I had fun playing catch with our four-year-old grandson. Actually the game started as a game of "basketball" - with us tossing a ball into recycle bins.
That evolved into a new game - tossing the ball to each other. Here we had our fair share of misses... which led to yet another game - chasing the ball down. This involved Grandma and the little guy both running for the ball. Who would get there first?!
Of course Grandma is no runner, so she lost every time!
So... will this little guy have a future in basketball ... or baseball?! His body language definitely reminds me of an umpire or a referee!
Fun to be able to play outdoors again!
I enjoy it when photo apps remind me of the past by bringing up photos from 11...
Or 10 years ago...
We haven't changed that much... (Or have we?!!) ... I still wear some of the same clothing... But MAYBE we looked younger...
That's part of the surprise!
One day last week, the view was breathtaking in every direction.
Flames of light in the north west....
Low-hanging cloud in the east...
Beautiful views... in every direction!
