Seven Years By My side

It's another celebration, 7 years old.  A slushy walk in the drizzling rain with all the girls.  Winter is here, and so are the birthdays.  This one extra special.  Willow Sunshine ... My take everywhere dog, proving to be a good agility dog, and my soul dog.

 Agility photos by Joann Gerde photoraphy

Shorline Get-a-way

After a summer of caring for everyone else's dogs, it was time we went on a road trip.

 

 One afternoon a run through the fields across the river.  It's been ages since we have been there.

Not many pictures taken of this first trip to Guilford without my boy - Nash

 A short weekend to Guilford, CT - Happy girls.  Luna spent the weekend with us, so LOTS of dogs.  Every morning trips of two down to the park and beach-comb.  Beach alive with hermit crabs.

 Pearl - usual seaside pose

 Willow Sunshine

 Gleeful Willow Sunshine

 Grace and Halo

Snowy egret 

VERY Happy Luna

 This was the weekend hurricane Florence was pummeling the Carolina's - clouds stretching up to our beach

Maine Bound with the Girls a Year Later - Nash

     Moments from travel.  Car is packed, one last sweep of the house, one last pee before hitting the road.  Hot, Hot, Hot.  Grateful we will be in an AC car.

     This will be our first trip to the cottage since we were there last with Nash, where peace was made.   I expect a flood of memories.  In spirit Willow n Nash. Yes, they will be coming along in spirit and in ashes. 

And - Nash's granddaughter with a belly full of puppies - we are hoping.  

Until our return. The Girls are giddy with anticipation.  

You Tube Video

 One Day in Maine

May 1st - May Day

     May Day - It is a special date for me, it conjures up a childhood memory.  I was six or seven years old. In elementary school the class made paper "May Day" baskets.  They weren't useful in any way. A two dimensional cut out of a basket with paisley white paper that resembled  a doily. 
    When  presented to Ma when I got home, she suggested giving it to Mrs. Pekarz. She was an elderly woman, I thought in her 80's, probably no where near, who lived in a mysterious stone house. Mysterious, because it was the only stone house in the neighborhood.  It sat up on a little hill on the corner of Nut Plains and Half Mile road. Even then my little brain wondered and swirled with questions of its existence, who would build such a fortress and why? I loved everything about that little stone house, as it sat up there shaded by maple trees with a big sloping yard to one side, and a U shaped driveway.  To me it was a castle.  I lived in a neighborhood with a castle! 
    Anyway, Mrs Pekarz had a thick foreign accent, and always had Chihuahuas. Nasty little Chihuahuas with bulging, weeping eyes, and spindly little legs that split into toes, with long nails that clicked on warn floor boards. Chihuahuas who bit, and bit her often.  When Ma and I knocked on the back door you could hear the vicious yapping of her little dog  - only one - and the shuffling of Mrs Pekarz's plastic soled slipper-shoes on kitchen linoleum. The house smelled like many old people lived there, mixed with spiced cooking.  Mrs. Pekarz struck me as a rugged woman, and as mysterious as the house in which she lived.
    My carefully crafted gift was well received with enthusiasm and joy. 
    "I know exactly where to put this", she said.
    Out the back door she shuffled, down concrete steps, across a well worn grassy path  to her garden shed.  Ma and I trundled behind.  This garden shed was a bit well used, worn, tired, and if I recall cram packed with tools, and bits of gardening supplies.  She pushed open its fragile door, turned and placed my May Day basket above the door frame, just inside her tired old garden shed. the one small piece of color and youth.
    I wonder, after all these years if it's still there?  If not how long did it remain. Certainly Mrs. Pekar is long gone.   May Day mysteries. 
    Ma and I walked back home under a warm spring sun, across a sloping lawn leaving behind the mysterious stone castle, and little old woman with the nasty little dog.

Happy May Day

Caccha's on Half Mile Rd, taken in the 80's

Spring to Summer in 2015 Nash and Willow Sunshine - Film

    

       I get side tract often when searching for a particular photo - this was one of those times.  I came across these wonderful shots of  Nash (15 1/2) and Willow Sunshine (3 1/2) and one of Luna.  

     All taken with film - Kodak Ektar 100.  I refuse to give up my SLR cameras - one from the 80's (my first a gift from Dad when I was 15 years old) and the other from the 90's (my Dad's camera I inherited when he passed away).

 There is a rich quality to film photographs, and a sense of longevity not found in digital. 

 Instant feedback and gratification's delayed.

  There is a place for both, don't give up on the old. 

   

Pearl and Grace

Squirrel and bird watching and relax.

Zoe Come for Sleep Over

Things always get a bit rowdy when Zoe comes (Willow Sunshine sister)

 Zoe/Willow Snshine, Grace/Halo with toy

 Willow Sunshine/Zoe

What's in Front of Your Woodstove

  

 Pearl

     Patiently they wait to go out again.  It's that time of day, late afternoon. 

I procrastinate. We are going to get wet. 

 Splash, Luna, Halo, Pearl

      Splash, Luna, Halo, Pearl, Willow Sunshine, Cleo on my lap

     Weather still tosses about.  Snowflakes have transformed into rain drops. It gives the illusion air is warming, but wind  makes temperature feel cold.  It is a cold and damp day. Plain and simple. It's a befuddled day of mixed up weather. Winter wrestles Spring.  She doesn't want to give in just yet.

Luna and Pearl

 Grace

Grace