The Mountain Thymes

Had a three-month follow-up with the doctor this morning.  I've so-o-o- careful about watching what I consume because I had easily gained four pounds in a short span and that weight put more stress on the knees and ankles.  I weighed myself at home before going so I knew what I had lost but when the adorable young nurse did my weigh-in and kept moving the weight higher and higher I hoped the scale was off balance.  The doctor had quietly walked up behind me and placed his foot on the scale.  He said he just couldn't resist the temptation and was testing my mood.  Visit was great and don't have to return until September unless I do something careless and injure myself.  I'm trying to behave. Cliff helped me construct a rustic bottle tree.  This is before John and Carolyn's weekend with us. By the time they left............... Not really.  A few of the bottles I had saved but hadn't removed labels yet.  But we did enjoy our wine and ...

Saturday John and Carolyn hopped a jet from Kansas City to Atlanta, picked up their rental car, and arrived on our mountain around 3 pm.  Before they got here I told Cliff we needed to get lots of pictures doing things together so I could post them.  Taking pictures has never been on his mind.  I have to ask him to take them of me doing things so I can post which is why you never see me on my posts.  Saturday afternoon and evening were spent sitting on the back porch relaxing and enjoying the calm.  Sunday we took them to the Ocoee Gorge to watch the kayaks and rafts navigate the rapids.  From there Cliff drove us to Hawg Wild in Hiawasee, GA for Fathers Day lunch.  Hawg Wild has the best bar-b-que.  The manager told us there would be a thirty-minute wait which was expected on Fathers Day. We had feeling it would be longer upon seeing lots of empty booths and tables and very few servers.  About an hour later we were seated.  Our server a...

After weeks and weeks of no rain, the weather pattern has finally changed and we're getting a wonderful thunderstorm.  Since I can't go out and play, I'll blog and make a chicken, spinach and orzo soup for tonight.  It's a toss up between the chicken soup or a nice bowl of pasta. I have a fresh bag of spinach and a bunch of Swiss chard from the farmers market that need to be eaten.  My garden chard has been slow to mature without the rain but after this rainy week we have ahead, the vegetables shouldn't be thirsty anymore.  The beets and carrots need to plump up. The flower beds were planted from packets of mixed seeds strewn onto the ground, patted down, and watered.  After that I never bothered with them.  I also don't know what some of the flowers are. After researching flower images, I found out these are larkspurs. These tall beautiful larkspurs grew from that mix of  broadcast seeds.  When we first moved here and Cliff joined st...