Fifty Shades of Pink

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If you were expecting to find something kinky, sorry to disappoint! Instead you get photos of sexy pink roses, hollyhocks and a bumblebee. The first rose is a David Austin that we don’t have labeled, so I don’t have a name for it. The bumblebee is on volunteer hollyhocks that are very happy in the dry conditions. The third photo is of Pink Promise — under New Mexico sun, Pink Promise is milky white with subtle shades of pink. It is the official rose of the National Breast Cancer Foundation. The fourth photo is of Rainbow Sorbet, which offers a wide range of pinks with a bit of yellow in the base. The last photo is of Simply Marvelous which is more lavender colored than pink, but it has a few shades of the lower 50 pinks.

HollyhockBumble

PinkPromise

ReainbowSorbet

SimplyMarvelous

Cool of the Evening

DamselFly

 

I finally got to irrigate after 7 weeks, so the wet soil and mulch made for a cool evening for the kitties, bumblebees and damselflies to hangout in the clover. Laurie was sketching the yard, sans power poles, and Mama Manx was using her head to help Laurie hold up her sketchpad.

 

PuckBench

 

MamaLaur

 

BumbleBee

 

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MamaClover

 

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Six Differences

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A happy dragon fly was flitting around this morning. We did a lot of yard work today. Can you find six differences between the 2nd and 3rd photos?  Rosencrantz was sitting in the window by the front door wanting in, but I was on the deck. Instead of going through and letting him in, I photographed him through the glass in the door to the sunroom. He finally gave up and walked around the house to join us on the deck and lay on the table with Guildenstern.

 

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Rain Smuggler

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Don’t tell anyone, but I did sneak a little bit of rain past customs. It’s a piddling amount, just enough to turn the dust on the cars into muddy drops, but it’s rain all the same. When I went out to photograph the clouds, a hummingbird hovered at what it thought was a safe distance from my lens, but even in the low light of overcast skies at dusk, I got a clear shot of it hovering in front of clouds. A crow flew through my photo of the backlit clouds, and as it flew over me I could see it had something in its beak, but it was so strongly silhouetted against the clouds, I couldn’t see what it had.

JuneClouds

OldCrow

Home

RedRose

 

I tried to bring rain home with me from Paris, but I couldn’t get it past TSA — no liquids on the plane.  Even though there has been zero rain in the Albuquerque area in 2013, Tristan and David ran the drip systems and soaker hoses I set up before we left, so we at least we came home to a colorful garden.

 

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Paris to Albuquerque

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When we left Paris yesterday morning it was cloudy and 60º F, when when we touched down in Albuquerque it was sunny and 100º F — from cold and wet to hot and dry. Soon after take-off from Paris we above the clouds and it stayed cloudy until a break in the clouds over Hudson bay showed ice breaking up, and then we flew over the area of the bay that looks like land cracked with water, and it was covered with snow and ice. Then we had mostly cloud cover again until we were almost to Salt Lake City. From SLC to Albuquerque the sky had some high clouds but there was a lot of haze in the air from the fires.

 

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France Day 30 Last Day In Paris

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We spent our last day in Paris getting ready to leave — checking in for the flight, cleaning the apartment, preparing food and packing. We went out for a walk in the Tuileries got our last look at the Louvre in the late afternoon sunlight, and I took random photos in the Tuileries and on the street walking back to the apartment. We are leaving for the airport at 6:30 this morning.

Tuleries

StutueLaur

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TeamBlue

TheBikeGirl

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TheGuyDalmation

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