Here’s Sydney in the snow…she will do just about anything for a treat. For the rest of the day, she got excited every time she saw me get the camera.


Here’s the ice lantern in the snow….


and here it is melting…just like frosty the snowman at the end of the song.





good bye winter! It is already 65 outside today!

It is the time of Cedar Fever here in Central Texas. Austinites are shooting sprays up their noses, putting drops in their eyes, taking antihistamines in maximum doses and still wishing they lived in bubbles. I am sufferring with cedar allergies worse this year than any I can remember and have considered whether scratching my eyes out would actually somehow feel better. My nose has been stopped up for a week and counting. And yes, before you ask, I’ve tried a netti pot.

However, today, I have something to smile about. Some kind of large animal (possibly a coyote or two) dug into our large trash can and got out a bag and dispersed the trash evenly all over the back porch. TH got home from work and after noticing the trash, he went to let Sydney out of her crate. A smell hit him as he was walking down the hall to the laundry room. Evidently, the room smelled so bad that he couldn’t stand to be in it. He took her out and shut the door behind him. He picked up all the trash and bathed the dog because she smelled that bad. To him, the room still smelled so bad that he couldn’t stand to go in there and get her food. It seems she worked herself into a tizzy while the animal was on the back porch very close to her. She sweated and seems to have thrown up a bit and who knows what all. I went in the room to clean her cage and had to smile to myself. I can’t smell a thing. really. I expected to be gagging or at least uncomfortable. nope. not bad at all. I can tell there is a smell. that’s it. So, as I scrubbed her cage from top to bottom, I had to kind of giggle to myself. Who am I kidding. I was actually half inside a dog crate scrubbing and laughing to myself. Cedar fever has a positive side after all.

Sometimes, I have a picture-taking idea and it doesn’t turn out at all and sometimes I have an idea that I’m pleased with. I went outside with Sydney to take pictures of her in the fields of wild morning glories that have sprung up after the Hermine flood. On the way, our kolanchoe looked so red, I couldn’t resist snapping a couple.

The pictures in the pink flowers did not turn out as well since she was very distracted by the tall weeds tickling her nose and the smells blowing by on the wind…but we had fun nonetheless.


p.s. I should explain that sometimes, I have to manage my own expectations. The red flowers are about 6 inches tall, so the camera was sitting pretty much in the dirt and I couldn’t really see the view finder very well and had kind of taken it for granted that Sydney might not even be in those pictures much less be in focus. So, I was terribly pleased and surprised that not only was she in the pictures, but she was centered and in focus!