She's A Lone Free Ranger

She is Penny.
Lucky Penny.
Henny Penny.
She has a silver tail.
She dashes, quicksilver, through the garden
Tiny Penny, unassuming, last to come for supper,
first to wander off and find her own way.
Dear Penny, you are a darling daring chook.

{this moment}

A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment.
A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

:: Inspired by Soule Mama ::

If you're inspired to do the same, leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments, for all to find and see.

The Peonies Are Here

If it's early spring, and I've found a fragrant bouquet of sweet peas, I know in my heart that I have found my favorite flowers. However, when I was watering our flower pots in the front yard, I stooped to smell the pert, white carnations, and when I inhaled their floral spice, I declared these are my favorite flowers.
Last summer we planted zinnias, whose colors burst with vibrancy and heat, and they have me recall long ago summers, and the flowers my mother grew, and I feel such an affinity for those, my favorite flowers. Lilacs, pansies, petunias, dahlias, cosmos, poppies, plumeria, daffodils, wisteria, apple blossoms, roses, lupines... peonies. In any given moment, I always seem to know, with absolute certainty, my favorite. Do you have a favorite flower, too?

I Won A Bet

Not five pounds. Not seven, nine, or ten pounds! Paul, Janece, and Geoff await the crucial results...

We were figuring out how much each section of roof on the Chicken run is weighing, and Geoff picked up a measured and cut roll of the hardware cloth... five pounds, he figured.
No way, I declared. You see, I measure all mass in terms of five pound sacks of flour. New born baby? That's probably about a sack and a half. Healthy cat? Oh, maybe two sacks. It's solid science, I tell ya. Seeing the roll of wire, and having lifted a few in my life, I knew it had to be more than one sack of flour, and I said, it's ten pounds, at least.

Geoff picked it up, and raised his guess to seven pounds. Paul guessed ten pounds, and William chose nine pounds. Decisively, I detected 2.4 sacks of flour, and said twelve pounds! Out came the hanging scale, and a carabiner. Yup. I guessed it right!

The prize? A pair of unders, custom bedazzled, with the _gift_ that came in my Mother's Day Piñata. Which do I explain first, the piñata tradition, or the bedazzler?

I know this much, I should have held out for a better prize!

Dust If You Must

After a lovely weekend with friends, of sewing, baking, playing, and adding to the coop and run... I feel grand.

Dust if you must, but wouldn’t it be better
To paint a picture, or write a letter,
Bake a cake, or plant a seed;
Ponder the difference between want and need?

Dust if you must, but there’s not much time,
With rivers to swim, and mountains to climb;
Music to hear, and books to read;
Friends to cherish, and life to lead.

Dust if you must, but the world’s out there
With the sun in your eyes, and the wind in your hair;
A flutter of snow, a shower of rain,
This day will not come around again.

Dust if you must, but bear in mind,
Old age will come and it’s not kind.
And when you go (and go you must)
You, yourself, will make more dust.

by Rose Milligan