What’s outside

This summer I have not gotten a lot of flowers like I usually do every summer. Usually as soon as the greenhouses hang their baskets I like to go and pick out flowers for all my pots and to plant around.  But this year I am hampered with not using my shoulder so I have only the minimum.

I bought two of these to put in the pots on the arch which is outside the kitchen door. I used my new phone’s special effects and took this picture below. 

Here are some other photos of outdoors...

On my walk

Everyday I am feeling a little stronger so yesterday I called my friend Sandy and we went for a little walk around the Willow Dale Cemetery. It was fun connecting again and chatting. Before my surgery Sandy and I would walk every single day for a mile. 

     I saw something on my walk that I hadn’t ever seen...

It was a tree that had been pecked by a pileated woodpecker. He was busy getting insects out of the dead tree and evidently he has been very busy as you can tell from all the wood shavings underneath the tree. 

Pileated Woodpeckers drill distinctive rectangular-shaped holes in rotten wood to get at carpenter ants and other insects. They are loud birds with whinnying calls. They also drum on dead trees in a deep, slow, rolling pattern, and even the heavy chopping sound of foraging carries well. Their flight undulates like other woodpeckers, which helps separate them from a crow’s straight flight path.

Memories

“Yet occasionally we discover in the folds of an old handkerchief a shell or insignificant stone that had once embodied our happiest of afternoons.” 

-- Patti Smith, Just Kids

This quote reminded me of the two stones that I have. One stone I picked up from the Mediterranean sea when I was on vacation in Provence in France. I went with my friend Yrsa. The other is from the Baltic Sea. It was my first trip overseas when I went to Denmark with my friend Yrsa. I had never travel to Europe before and it was a wonderful experience being with all Her relatives. Just seeing those stones brings back such a warm feeling. It reminds me of all the good times that we had together. I will never forget Those trips.

Surgery update 3

I am on my eighth week of recovery now from rotator cuff surgery. I had a large tear of a tendon away from the bone caused by bone Spurs which eventually tore it in half. The surgery went well and I had to be in a sling for six weeks. The first week was really rough but my sisters took very good care of me. Don took over those duties for a few weeks till I felt like doing things again. Now I am on my second third of recovery going to physical therapy two times a week and doing exercises twice a day at home. I still don’t have a lot of strength in my right hand and still have pain from using it too much but I know it will be a long recovery.

Who knew Reese was a mouser. We kept her in the house since Thanksgiving and I intended her to be an indoors cat. But she had other ideas and finally wore us down by constantly sneaking out the door and pestering us with meowing. She sticks around the house close and loves to pounce on critters. I don’t know how she does it with no front claws . (We didn’t do that, she was a stray and already declawed.). She is so proud of her catches and tries to bring them inside.