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Our backyard used to be filled with butterflies. When we moved here 20+ years ago, not a day went by without seeing a dozen flutter by.
Now?
They’re a rare sight.
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Which is why I run for my phone when one does make an appearance.
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Such delicate beauty..
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I miss them.
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💕
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We spent a nice evening with some friends recently. Drinks and appetizers were shared outside in the garden.
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Which is where we met Dave.
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Dave lives on the property and hides his peanuts in dead trees.
Can you see him?
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Dave is an extremely spoiled chipmunk and quite well fed.
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He’s so well fed he came out of hibernation almost a month later than the other chippies because his larder was well stocked.
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Dave had no problem begging in front of company.
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Shy he’s not.
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And he does love his peanuts.
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🙂
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Day lilies.
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Day lilies are what’s blooming at Casa River.
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Almost everyone in Maine has this orange variety, for some reason they’re prolific, hardy and can withstand our crazy weather better than the others.
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It’s a shame they don’t last longer…
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They’re a wonderful blast of color.
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These two are my favorites.
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Deep, dark…
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And gloriously rich shades.
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Someone needs to invent the technology and WordPress needs to adopt it.
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Because our apple trees are in full bloom and the scent is beyond heavenly.
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I wish the pictures did them more justice.
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The white and pink blossoms really pop in person.
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And from the looks of the quantity, it’s going to be an autumn filled with pie.
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And cobbler, and torte, and crisp, and cake, and muffins…
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Well, you get the idea.
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Yeah, yeah… still the husband. Soul mate, best friend, whatever.
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But today I’m talking about critters.
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Whimsical…
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Magical….
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Absolutely adorable….
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Little critters.
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Yes, even the pesky red squirrel.
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And the mice that make their winter nests in our garage.
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The fact that these creatures are ephemeral and disappear with the first gust of wind just makes it bittersweet.
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I don’t know why I get such a kick out of seeing these little fellows in the garden….
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But I always do.
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Hummingbird moths!
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They don’t look anything like a hummingbird, or a moth for that matter.
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But they’re cute as the proverbial bug in a rug.
Without the rug, of course.
And yes, I mean that literally.
Continue at your own risk.
Remember, you were warned.
And I’m not talking about a little poo. No.
To be precise….
It’s a dozen piles of crap.
On top of our stone wall.
What?
Why?
All along the top of the wall….
Crap.
It looks like skunk to me, although why the little devil feels the need to climb up there and poop every night is beyond me.
Have I mentioned how much I love the baby woodchucks?
If not, get used to it… because I’ve been spending a lot of time making friends with them.
I’ve found sliced apples are a great ice breaker.
And if I’m enjoying a little Crown Royal apple while making woodchuck friends… all the better.
It took a while for them to get used to me and they were pretty hesitant to come out with me so close.
But the lure of apples proved too much.
Admit it.
That’s pretty damned cute.
Do you see him?
There, on the end of the stone wall.
It’s a little baby chucker.
And I am totally in love with these guys.
They’ve started to use the wall as their own personal jungle gym….
And scamper around like little Tasmanian devils.
It’s entertaining as hell.
At the top of Diana’s Baths we found a cairn garden.
Cairns…
Everywhere you looked.
Small cairns, big cairns.
Precariously balanced cairns…
Even one slightly Zen cairn…
Although technically not, as it’s singular.
But I liked it all the same.
Cairn:
A cairn is a man-made pile (or stack) of stones. The word cairn comes from the Scottish Gaelic: càrn[ˈkʰaːrˠn̪ˠ] (plural càirn[ˈkʰaːrˠɲ]).[1]
Cairns have been and are used for a broad variety of purposes, from prehistoric times to the present.
In modern times, cairns are often erected as landmarks, a use they have had since ancient times. However, since prehistory, they have also been built and used as burial monuments; for defense and hunting; for ceremonial purposes, sometimes relating to astronomy; to locate buried items, such as caches of food or objects; and to mark trails, among other purposes.
Of course you know as soon as the husband saw all these constructs…
He was going to have to build one of his own.
And it was going to have to be made with boulders.
Oh… the effort and planning that went into this.
Meticulously searching the shore for the perfect shaped rocks.
The rearranging… the balancing.
Men.
Don’t let them tell you size doesn’t matter.
His cairn.
His very large cairn.
He particularly liked the way the bottom stone looked from this angle.
For his sake, I’m hoping the first high wind doesn’t knock it over.
FYI…. there are no cairn memes that don’t involve cute little dogs.
And when I searched Giphy for “stone cairn” ?
Epic fail.
River's world..... 