Maymont Flower & Garden Show

Sorry for the delay in posting this, but I was having trouble with uploading my pixs on blogger. Finally had to do them 1 or 2 at a time.

On Sat., Feb. 20th, Harold and I took my friend Bobbie to the Maymont Flower Show in Richmond at the Greater Richmond Convention Ctr. It was small, but very nice. As you know I love flowers and taking pictures of them, so I did that while she and Harold looked around. My knees were giving me some trouble that day, so I sat as often as I could. Here are a few of the pictures I took.

The fancy backyard set ups were beautiful.

(that is Bobbie behind the candles taking a pix of the outdoor kitchen)

And here is that kitchen area....isn't it amazing.

A giant earthworm, with a red hat even - LOL!

Crocus and a mini lily - love the deep rich purple colors.

Who wouldn't love to have a little tree house like this to play in?

And for the guys - a train zipping thru the garden - How cool is that!

Welcome to the Shire.

We had never seen this little flower bush before and thought it was beautiful...I want one.

It is called Daphne Odora (Winter Daphne).

Tulips everywhere!

Wouldn't a whole field of daffodils with the sun shining down on them be absolutely gorgeous.

Birthday Luncheon for Melodye

On the 15th, I met up with my girlfriends to give Melodye (Feb. 8) a belated birthday celebration at Olive Garden.I love their wonderful Soup and Salad. It is always fun to get together with them and we don't get to do it as often as we would like to. The only one that was unable to come was Mary, hopefully next time we can get all of us together, but usually someone is out of town or working or something.

Margarethe, Cindy (me), Gayle, Melodye (in pink), Lydia

Margarethe had ordered the new milk carton die from Stampin' Up! and let me try it out before bringing her order to her. So I threw together some little Valentine Treats to give each of them.

Valentine Treats

(The butterflies are from the new Beautiful Wings Embosslit Die)

Valentine's Day

Hope everyone had a very "Happy Valentine's Day!"

We went out to dinner at our favorite - Carlos O'Kelly's Mexican restaurant on Sat. and today we tried to go to the movies, but the one we wanted to see was sold out - Lightning Thief. We may try tomorrow. Harold gave me some beautiful flowers and I gave him a small box of chocolates and a card. Now for the last 3 years the cards I have made him have managed to have a mouse on them and I decided to keep with the new tradition. However, I did not have a new mouse stamp to use, but then I remembered this little punch mouse that was being made at Christmas and decided he was perfect and I had to make him.

Birdwatching in our backyard

I am not an avid birdwatcher, as I don't go hunting them down, but I do love to see them in my yard, especially after a snow as they are so stricking against the snow. I was glad that for once I remembered to go and get some more birdseed and actually got it put in the feeder before the storm. It took a while for them to come out and find it, but it was worth the wait. One Wed., 2/10 we had a lot of visitors. Some of the names I knew, some I was advised by friends and some I found in my Field & Guide to North American Birds.

Chickadee

Blue Jay
I love the markings on his back - Beautiful!

Junkos (aka snowbirds)

Tufted Black-crested Titmouse

We even had a little tift between the Downy Woodpecker and the Titmouse - Downy started it!

Northern Cardinal (female) and sparrow

Red-bellied Woodpecker

Then on Thurs., 2/11 we had some different birds show up.

Northern Cardinal (male)

This is the only squirrel I have seen out since the snow.

He was enjoying the seeds with the birds.

Sparrow

Dove

Rofous-sided Towhee

Northern Yellow-shafted Flicker

Harold was excited to have seen 3 different types of woodpeckers. Those are his favorite along with cardinals and mine are the blue jays.

Mockingbird -This one is normally to be found in the front yard terrorizing all of the other birds (and squirrels) and keeping them away from the holly bush and its berries in front of the house. She eats the ones in the neighbors yard that she lives in during the winter and mine is in reserve for the spring. She won't let any other birds near it.

More of that White Stuff

Well, this weekend we got some more snow...we still had a few inches left from the last one that had not melted off yet in the yard. We got at least another 20 inches. It was beautiful to look at, but we lost power on Sat. around 2pm. One Sunday we went over to my friend, Mary's house to take showers, warm up and watch the Super Bowl. We had planned to go over to Margarethe's and stay at her place that night as it was going to be colder than it had been on Sat. night. However, luckily (per our neighbor) the power came back on during half-time and we got to return home after the game and stay home. We still have a lot of our camping equipment from when George was in Scouts - camp stove, battery and propane lanterns and a propane heater. I did cook dinner on the camp stove on Sat. Here are a few pictures of the snow on Sat. and Sun.

Harold decided to clean off the grill after he finished clearing the heat pump.

This is the holly bush on the corner of the front of the house...I love how it looks covered in snow with the red berries on it. You can't really see them in the picture, but they really stand out in real life.

The front of the house after Harold cleared some of the snow.

The back yard on Sat. Kinda gloomy day, but it was still beautiful.

This is how it looked on Sunday morning about 9:30 am., but the snow on the bushes was melted off by mid-day.

I did finally get birdseed in the feeder before it snowed again, but I think the birds decided it was too cold to come out and were hunkered in their nests trying to stay warm...The squirrels did come out and try to get some the next day. Sure the birds did too, I just didn't get to look out to see them.

Today it started snowing again in the late afternoon. More of a sleet/snow mix, but is to change to fluffy snow during the night and possibly back to sleet/snow tomorrow. They are estimating 6-8 inches for us. I guess we just have to be happy that we aren't getting as much as they are just a little further north, towards DC.

Making Cards with a Friend

On Feb. 2, my friend, Melodye came over to have me help her make some cards...she wanted to make some cards to send to my son, Jacob, for him and others to use to send home. She brought her stamps with her and we made a few cards.








Melodye loves bunnies, so we used my Bee Bunny stamp and her bunny stamp. Love the little butterflies we added to it from the Beautiful Wings Embosslit Die in the Stampin' Up! Occassions Mini catalog right now. They are sooooo beautiful.


These are some cards she made by cutting up an old Kliban calendar. I think she did a great job on them and I love the colors.

More of that Fluffy White Stuff

This past weekend it snowed again...great big fluffy flakes. I love it! Here is one bird that braved coming out while it was still coming down. Unfortunately, I had no food in my birdfeeder. Need to go get some and refill it.

This spiderweb had been built between the sliding glass door and the guard rail (no deck yet). I didn't think it was attached to the door, but turned out it was, so I damaged the bottom half of it when I opened the door. It was sooo pretty with the snow on it. Needless to say, no spider in site, he was hiding somewhere warmer.

The people across the way were out cleaning the snow off one of their cars and the kids were playing frizbee with their black lab. He was having a blast in the snow.

Here is a view of part of the back yard on Saturday. Can't tell here but it was still snowing.

Here it is on Sunday. Already starting to melt some.

Here is the front of the house mid-Sunday afternoon. I hate that the sun shines so bright on our front yard...our side of the street it always the first to melt.