Amphibians...

On 4th of July weekend, Ethan just HAD to shoot off some bottle rockets and Jaimie, Kira and Dad HAD to help, don't cha know. Kira saw something jump out of the corner of her eye and found a toad. We had just been saying it would be cool to have a toad or a frog for the pond. Gee, ask and ye shall receive. After taking a bunch of pictures of the toad, she put him down on a rock, and I sure hope he's still around, because we haven't seen him since.

Amphibians II...

So tonight, on her way home from work, she calls Dad and says "There's a frog on my car!! I'm driving down the freeway and it's stuck to my car!" Well you can guess what Dad's answer to that was "Find something to put it in and bring it home." She stopped the car, got her eyeglass case and put it in there. We're thinking it's a tree frog. Sure is cute. Dad put him on a rock by the pond, so providing nothing eats him, we have a frog to go along with our toad.

Hole...

Hmmm, what do ya think?? Should I splurge and get a new pair of garden shoes before I step on something that makes it's way into the hole in the bottom of my shoe? Rather sad isn't it?

I knew if I layed in bed any longer this morning, I was going to end up with one heck of a headache, so I took my daughter's advice and took my camera outside and put it to work. It was early, and the next door neighbors go to their lake every weekend, so I figured I was safe in leaving my jammies on to wander the yard. (They were cute jammies) I took quite a few pictures manually and automatic. My camera takes very blue photos when on manual, even changing from portrait to landscape to standard etc, they are all blue. I guess maybe I should bite the bullet and get out the manual, huh?? Anyway, I futzed with all of them to get the color better, and this is what I came up with. Just a few things around my yard.

Honorary Bass...

Greg was fortunate enough to be included as an Honorary Bass for the party, even though he is only a Tenor...shudder! Just kidding Greg.

Bass Patrol...

BASS party, this annual event was held at Phil and Bonnies house on their new deck. The weather was beautiful, cool and a little breezy, but no rain (like was forcasted). We ate a hearty Gumbo filled with corn, okra, crawfish, shrimp, rice? and assorted sea food (that I only knew about AFTER I ate it), and probably more thinks that I wasn't aware of because I was busy devouring it. There was also crusty bread and butter, salad with citrus slices and walnuts, assorted beverages and brownies for dessert.

Once we were stuffed, fine cigars were lit, aged Scotch was poured and conversations continued. Bass sung music was played in the backround and at times the guys sang along. Dan (also our organist), David, Phil, Jerry, and Bernard make up Parkway UCC's Bass section of the choir. The ladies present drank other spirits and had other conversations. Mingling, but not. We even had a reporter join us, getting information for a book she's writing, all about the BASS voice and why...

Pretty flowers...

We have fishies too...we started out with 15 and now have at least 18 I think. They went and had babies...how cool is that?

Pretty water lillies. We have pink, yellow, white and peach.

Waterfall in the making...

This is the beginning of the waterfall for our pond. Yes, that is carpet my husband is laying down. He dug out a bunch of dirt, put patio blocks on end for the sides, then layed the carpet and then the liner. Next will come the flagstones for the waterfall, and rocks and boulders for the sides. Actually the liner and some rocks are already in place, but I don't have a picture of that...sorry!

Raspberry Malt

Fresh picked raspberries from the garden,

Breyer's Light Vanilla Bean ice cream,

malt and a little skim milk.

Using my Bamix, I put the above ingredients into a pitcher

and mixed it all together.

Yummm, heavenly!

MIA

Kira and I went to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts today. I haven't been there in a very long time, and I was kind of balking at the idea of walking around looking at paintings. I think I had a better time than she did. For some reason, I had a much better understanding of the work and talent that went into the pieces. Especially the busts carved out of marble. Unbelieveable! I've included some of the pieces I took pictures of, some that Kira took too, although I'll let her post her pictures on her blog.

We got most of the way through the 3rd floor when we decided we were hungry. D'amico and Sons have a cafe there so we thought that would be a good idea. Well, it closes at 2:30 and we got hungry at 3:15. We opted for finishing up another day, and going to Rosedale to get the salad bar at Ruby Tuesdays. A very good idea...Kira had the salad bar and the two little turkey burgers with swiss cheese and endless fries. I had the salad bar and a bowl of white chicken chili. Wonderful. We both had lemonades, raspberry for me and strawberry for her. We topped it off by taking home a huge slice of cheesecake with blackberry topping.

Back at Kira's we watched "Bottle Shock", a great movie about California wine and ate out yummy cheesecake.

Singing??

Well I found out a little bit ago that I'm singing in church tomorrow. I could have sworn I specifically did NOT sign up for the 4th of July Sunday. There is never anyone in church, they've all gone on vacation or out of town, and I've sung on this Sunday before and it's a little depressing. Boy am I gonna be embarrassed if I really did pick that date. Oh well...I found a song to sing, one that I've actually heard before. It's from "A Walk to Remember" with Mandy Moore. The song is titled, "Only Hope" by Jonathan Foreman. It's very pretty, and my daughter was over when I listened to it and she said, 'Oh, I know that song. That was the first song I ever signed to. I should get up early, come to church and sign it while you sing.' Well, I wasn't going to pass that up. Yeah! It should be pretty cool.
I'm also on the Diaconate and July is my month to be in charge. Yippee! Besides singing, I also have to get communion ready, which I have never done myself. This ought to be an interesting day.