Vicki Lane's Blog, page 566

Queen of the Night

With all the carrying on here at the house, it was lucky that I stepped into the greenhouse yesterday morning and noticed the single swelling bud on the night blooming cereus.

These blooms open at dark and close forever with the coming of dawn. It's a one shot deal and easy to miss -- but as we finished supper, I remembered to take a flashlight and check to see if this was the night.

The intense fragrance greeted me as soon as I opened the door and there she was, in all her glory -- the Queen ...

No Worries.

So, there were seven of us for dinner last night, plus a three year old and a lap baby. And our four dogs plus three more.
(Miss Susie Hutchins decided to observe from afar.)
It was very, very hot.
And then the oven quit working.
No worries -- move the sweet potato oven fries to the grill-- the chicken's in the new smoker. Forget the cobbler or tarte you were going to make -- ice cream and blueberries will be just fine.
The shower drain is clogged and one of the visiting dogs has just rolled in...

Bab and Cousin Herbert

I knew her as Aunt Barbara Dupree -- an elegant octogenarian and sister to my husband's grandfather.

Before she was Aunt Barbara though, before she was Mrs. William Dupree,  she was a sausage-curled  Southern belle known to her friends as Bab Knight.


Is that an armful of hydrangeas she's holding?

Bab married William Dupree, a prominent Tampa attorney who, while recuperating from a serious automobile accident that kept him from his practice, began to develop a 25 acre tract outside Tampa into

Judgement Call

Is it a better picture with or without the shoes?
Discuss.

The Guest Room

As I made up the bed  in preparation for the arrival on Friday of the first of our guests for the weekend, I was thinking about about guest rooms I've stayed in.

Some have been quite posh -- complete with fruit basket, fluffy terry robe, and lovely toiletries -- others have been less so but still quite welcoming and comfortable.

The one thing I really like in a guest room, beside a reasonably comfortable bed, is a decent bedside reading light.
When we first moved here to the farm, I was...

Order from Chaos

Tuesday dawned clear and dry and blessedly cool.  Thunderstorms are forecast for the rest of the week -- and house guests are forecast for the weekend -- so I took advantage of the fine weather to work in the garden. The corn needed thinning and hoeing; the cabbage and kale and broccoli, which were being ravaged by caterpillars, got sprayed with Bt; and the rest of the garden got hoed. 
 
Miss Susie Hutchins looked on in approval. I came back in the late afternoon, after the box bed garden...

June is Blue and White

I've been rather wordy recently -- today's post is just pictures -- and captions, of course.

The Gordons - A Magpie Tale

The following is  written as a response to the prompt picture posted by Willow over at Magpie Tales.


Debbe McIntosh rattled her car keys and glanced at her watch. Typical, she thought. 

Heaving  a martyred sigh, she turned toward the empty staircase and called, pitching her voice to carry.

"Samantha! We're  going to be late for your gymnastics class if you don't get down here this instant. Do you hear me-"
"Relax, honey," Biff McIntosh, flushed and sweaty from his morning run, poked his head...

A Sunday Tanka

Bright colored blossoms --Summer's fragile, fragrant vow --So soon forgotten --While in the greenwood's solemn         Depths, the grave, grey stones endure.

Sepia Saturday ~ The Stranger

I figured him for a preacher man, 'long of that dark suit and the Bible under his arm. He come walking down our road, where from, I couldn't say. Nothing up there but fields and woods and the grave yard. Reckon he could of been visiting kin that's buried up there – folks do come from away and make the climb, just to brush the gravestones clean or say a prayer for one that's gone.  But it seemed queer didn't none of us see him on his way up the road. At the least, we should of heard a dog...