Summer's here...07/31/11...1pm...80

Lettuce, onions, carrots and garlic

Wonderful morning!..Coffee and scrabble to start the day...Then the garden harvest...today we will dine on fresh carrots, onions, lettuce and garlic...might put it all in a taco salad and enjoy it while sitting on the deck...Spent about an hour deadheading, pulling or digging weeds in the flower beds and another hour trying to get photo's to put in my blog... Herb pulled some rhubarb so we can have a cobbler along with our taco salad...I must get it made!

Gave Herb a haircut, then trusted him with the thinning shears to remove some of the bulk from my hair...Now we are freshly sheared, shampooed and showered, and relaxing on the deck.

Chief Joseph Days is officially over for another year...Last night we awoke several times after the last rodeo was over, to the sounds of people partying..."Indian war hoops" echoed through the valley, screams and fireworks broke into our dreams...Police sirens pierced the night air until about 4am, when someone shot off several "booming" fireworks...Then all was quiet and I slept until 7am...Early this morning we could hear the music from the cowboy church service held at the rodeo grounds...Now all is quiet on Barton Heights as most of the neighbors company have left for home, and everything is back to normal.

I received my critique from Katey on my essay, "Whistlin Joe"...I did some rewriting using her suggestions from last month and she is pleased with my progress...I'm quite sick of this story right now though so will work on some others, then get back to it later...Or maybe her suggestions will give me new energy to work on it.

The following paragraph is an excerpt from this essay.

At the age of ten Joe’s father sent him out to a sheep camp to herd sheep, while he took care of business matters.  Joe had no choice but to do as his father told him.  He talked little about his childhood but admitted to being afraid going to the camp alone. I can imagine that during the daylight hours he did quite well, keeping the herd together, and with the help of his dog, bringing them close to camp, where they bedded down for the night.  As darkness fell he would have felt brave, though surely on the inside he was as frightened as the lambs he had been sent to protect. Terrified at night with only a dog for company, he would lay staring at the stars, listening to the howl of coyotes and prayed that all the sheep in his care, would still be alive come the next morning. 

This day is moving fast so I must get back to scrabble, (Cienna is whipping up on me), so I need to work harder!..and get the rhubarb pie in the oven...OWAV:))