Last Thursday in August

Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers, much appreciated. 

My heart goes out to all of those who have lost their homes from flooding from Isaac. It makes what we went through tiny in perspective. We just hoped and prayed the rain would stop and our cottage, etc. wouldn’t be flooded. We only got a little more rain after that last big deluge, and the sun is shining and it is very hot and humid today. Swampy smelling too.

This morning I went out to trim the Mexican sunflowers, after that I trimmed the Louis Philippe roses and the bougainvillea growing up over my shed. I had made me up a quart of Gatorade to drink and was good to go. After doing the trimming and cutting up and bagging the debris to be picked up Friday, I decided to mow.  I just took it slow and easy and kept drinking my Gatorade. We found it in powder form and it’s much cheaper to buy it that way than buying it already made up.

While I was mowing I noticed the front drivers side tire was looking kind of flat. I told DH and he came out to look. His neck is still bothering him, so he showed me how to read a tire gauge and put air in the tire.  Then he had me slowly back the car up and turn the wheel sharp so that a good portion of the wheel was out of the well, so that he could see if there was a nail or something. He didn’t see anything. But, we did hear a hiss of air when the tire got to a certain spot. I mixed up some soapy water then we put some on the tire until we saw where the air was bubbling out, making more bubbles. It was a split in my tire. For Pete’s sake. So, my car is now sitting at the tire place getting two new front tires, another unexpected expense. Last month it was a master cylinder and a new radiator. My little Mazda MPV is old, made in 1990. Runs great though, although the ac pooped out soon after we bought it.

I had sent DH an email I got about living in the moment the other day, and reread it again after we got home from leaving my car to have the tires put on. Every day is a gift and there are lessons to be learned, there is beauty to behold and we have much to be thankful for. Things could be oh so much worse.

****

Part of this peach colored flowering Porterweed broke off in the winds from Isaac. Zebras love these flowers.

This is a needlework piece I started in March, and hadn’t done any more on it until someone mentioned it to me when she saw it in a photo of my workspace. I bought a yard pf the background fabric yesterday and love it.  

I’ve still more to do on this as I don’t feel it’s finished yet. Many hours have already gone into this piece, but I can’t seem to stop. I made the crocheted flowers and edging bits and the heart. When the creative work is all done, I’m just going to mount the heart on to the background fabric, (after the fabric has been washed and pressed) and leave it at that.

Well, that’s it from Plum Cottage.

Count your blessings.

FlowerLady Lorraine

More heavy rains that just keep on and on and on

We have lived in our little cottage here in s.e. FL for 39 years and we’ve never had rain like we’ve had from Isaac.

Isaac is not even near here now, but is a widespread system and it just keeps dragging up our side of the coast.

Photos from around 3:30 this afternoon.

I took this photo this morning before we got all of this extra rain. There were two zebra longwing butterflies flitting around, but I could only get the one. This was taken from my creative space looking out to the front patio.

This is our driveway and east patio off the kitchen under water.

I’m inside our cottage looking out the backdoor, zoomed in on the Catrium north door flooding all around.

Catrium, I was surprised no screening blew out.

Paths all around the main garden as well as the garden under water.

Rail barrel filled to overflowing. The overflow drain pipe sends water via a French drain out to the street.

Dreary, depressing rainy view out bedroom window of main garden.

Flooded patio area.

Water about 2-3 inches deep in the lower part of our kitchen patio. The little screen panel is a way to get under the house. You can see that the water under the house has come up into this area. Even the drain we put in patio for rain water, isn’t effective with this drenching we’ve had.

DH went out to check out the street and a big bolt of lightening happened with a loud clap of thunder right before he headed out with the camera. Sheesh!  Thankfully it didn’t do that again.

Here are the photos he took.

From inside our front gate looking south, water is up over the sidewalk up to our higher front sidewalk inside the gate.

This was taken as he is standing beside the neighboring property east of us, this flooding didn’t even go much further behind him. You can see our green front along the water’s edge.

Our driveway looking north.

Our driveway is running like a stream to the street.

From the back of our property. With that I will end this post. It hasn’t rained in awhile and hopefully we will not get a whole lot more of this ‘liquid sunshine’.

I just checked the radar again and we’ve still got a line of rain coming up the coast from Miami. I hope tomorrow we’ll see clearer skies and a lot less rain.

FlowerLady Lorraine

***

Be still, sad heart, and cease repining;
Behind the clouds the sun is shining;
Thy fate is the common fate of all,
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Flooding, winds and we’re ready for a bit of sunshine

Good morning everyone ~ I didn’t sleep all that well last night as we had strong winds with gusting winds to 61 mph, and heavy, heavy blowing rains. Our house is up on a cement block foundation, and we see this morning that there is water under our house. We are thankful it has not gotten up to floor level. Our county has had 10-13 inches of rain and power outages too. I read that our area was the hardest his by this storm.  Isaac is well off the FL coast, but the size of it is what caused us to have so much rain and wind. Wind gusts in the 30’s are expected today, and only 1-3 inches of rain. We will not be doing errands today. One road that we travel, northwest of us was 2 ft. underwater.  That is hard to imagine, except for the fact that the rain was steady and heavy for hours.

One of my tall Mexican sunflower shrubs broke, and the other is leaning, so I’ll be topping them so that they will bush out more. I hope I don’t lose anything because of too much water, time will tell. I’m glad I mowed the other day while I had the chance. My jungle gardens will definitely need pruning after all of this.

Fences are still standing, we’re dry and cozy in our tiny cottage and thankful things aren’t worse. I’m starting to get cabin fever, with gray days, rain and wind, and staying indoors. I can see why you all who live up north get depressed during your winters, especially near the end. You are so ready to get outside and play.

No pictures this morning. It’s starting to rain from the next band of stormy weather passing over. It should be easing off as the day progresses. We got the worst of it during the night.

Have a great week ~ FlowerLady Lorraine

Water-logged Sunday

Good morning Friends ~ Just and update on our weather. The photo below shows Isaac as of 10:45 this morning. The orange circle with black dot, is Isaac, not a hurricane yet. We are on the east side of FL near the blue blob which is Lake Okeechobee. We are under tropical storm warnings. The rain and winds come in circular bands. 4.92 inches of rain is expected over the next couple of days. It would be nice if we could send some of this rain where it is needed.

Here is a live radar picture, you can see the bands and that we have lots of rain in store. Isaac is off of Cuba right now, moving wnw at 20 mph, about 110 miles east-southeast of the Keys. Max. winds are at 65 mph for the hurricane. Our winds have been around 23 mph, gustier at times, but that is mild, although it sounds worse at times.

We’re having a cup of herbal tea, just relaxing indoors today. I’ve been working on a needlework piece, a heart, sewing on more beads. This piece is definitely a work in progress, as I have no plans, just winging it. Each bead has the thread run through it twice to hold it onto the fabric more securely, all time consuming, but I’m almost done with these for this part of the piece.

Enjoy your day whatever you are doing, count your blessings and have a great week.

FlowerLady Lorraine

Watching Isaac

Good morning Folks ~ Well, we’ve had t-storms during the night, lots of heavy rain, then it slacked off, then more rain just a little while ago.  This will probably be the pattern for the next three days. I don’t know if I’m going in to work today or not, I’ll see how it is when it’s time to leave home.

Isaac is predicted to stay west of us and we sure hope so, as we have not gotten our windows boarded up. The rains started yesterday while I was at work. DH’s neck is still very sore and stiff, (we realized the horrific cramping in his neck was from dehydration), so IF we do any boarding up it will have to be done very carefully. We are in tropical storm warnings and Isaac is predicted to sweep the keys and up the Gulf Coast. Thoughts and prayers for those in the path. Hopefully this storm stays weak.

Miss Tork spent the night indoors last night. She hides under the bed when she hears thunder, but last night she braved the noisy, stormy weather and snuggled in between us in the bed. This morning now that we are up, she’s back under the bed. She usually sleeps out in the screened ‘catrium’ off the back of our cottage, but she may not be doing that for the new few nights.

I want to thank all of you for your kind comments on my latest needlework project, they inspire and encourage me to keep on doing something I love. Being creative with needle, thread, hooks and thread, beads and now some ‘real’ shells added to the mix is very soothing to me and makes me feel joyful.  I want to thank the ladies who have generously sent me thread, beads and books, I am truly grateful.

Thank you too for thoughts and prayers for DH. Be careful working outdoors in the heat. Drinking water is NOT enough, as you sweat out electrolytes and drinking water doesn’t re-supply those. Having your electrolytes depleted causes severe cramping. I’ve been massaging his neck with a basil essential oil blend,  then switch to Tiger Balm. Both very good and have helped him a lot. We bought one of those cervical collars and that has helped too. Plus our neighbor loaned us her gel pack that you put in the freezer then on your neck. He’s taking herbs and vitamins too. These things have all helped in healing this area. And we’ve ordered some tissue rejuvinator and electrolyte capsules. I read while doing research on this that the older we get the less electrolytes we produce, sheesh. The things you learn through living each day. Our minds still feel like we can do anything, but our bodies let us know otherwise.Now we will be more aware of that when we work outside sweating buckets.

Now, on to lovelier things, like flowers that have been blooming around here. Specifically the Prosperity roses. My goodness. This rose is very happy in it’s location growing on the fencing surrounding my potting area. I couldn’t believe the spray of roses. The coloring reminds me of old lace. The scent is delicately sweet.

 

Look who had made a web near these wonderful blooms an Argiope or zig-zag or writing spider.

Here is a vibrant bloom from Vincent Godsiff.

Then these next images are of sweet Kathleen. ( I just went outside, now that it’s light out and saw this shrub looking poorly. I don’t know if it’s from the battering of wind and rain that it got during the night or because I ‘jerked’ weeds out of the huge pot it is growing in or what. I took three cuttings, dipped the scraped ends in a root promoting powder, put them in some seed starting potting mix and am hoping for the best. I’ve had this rose for many, many years and would sure hate to lose her now. I can’t afford to just go out and buy more that’s for sure. Not a necessity.)

Here is a Gult Fritiallry butterfly sipping nectar from Porterweed blooms.

While outside I saw my nice potted, rooted cutting of that wonderful amanda knocked over, dirt out and roots showing. I hurriedly set it right and moved it out of the rain, added more dirt to cover the roots and am hoping for the best with that too.

Well, guess that’s it for now.  I hope you all have nice weekends. Ours is going to be really wet.

FlowerLady Lorraine

***

Wherever you go,

no matter what the weather,

always bring your own sunshine. 

Anthony J. D'Angelo, The College Blue Book