Ladybug

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I got up close and personal with a ladybug after going out to check the water level in the Rio Grande at 7:30 am. The river was back to normal with no indication that the water got higher than in was in my photos from yesterday’s blog. I was going to go out and see what the water level in the river was when I woke up at 2:00 am, but it was pouring rain, so I stayed in bed. We got another 3/4 inch of rain over night giving us a total of 9 inches for the year.

The white flower was blooming on the levee in the early morning and the rain drops on the roses where like viewing the world through tiny crystal balls with my macro lens.

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Bungle in the Jungle

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Our yard has gone from a parched desert in the beginning of July, when we had less than 9/10 for an inch of rain for the entire first half of 2013, to a colorful jungle since we have received over 6 inches of rain since the beginning of July. I took the photos just after sunrise, before I spent the day pulling morning glories off of rose bushes and other plants, clearing paths, laying cardboard on the paths and spreading mulch on the cardboard. It’s still a jungle out there, but at least we don’t need a machete to cut our way from one end of the garden to the other.

 

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A Very Small Array

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New Mexico has the VLA near Socorro – a very large array of radio telescopes for viewing the cosmos. We have a VSA in our garden – a very small array of cosmos.   Speaking of the cosmos, the low sun shining through the clouds on I-40 was quite a scene.

 

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Yellow and Green

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The little yellow butterflies, brown eyed Susans and sunflowers are coming out in force. The two tiny butterflies in the last photo lined up for takeoff on a leaf — I told them they weren’t cleared for takeoff until I finished photographing them.

 

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The Blog Before The Storm

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I took this photo just after midnight on Friday morning. It was so windy and so much rain on Friday night, that the lightning was never clear, just bright flashes and loud crashes. Since the clouds are building up again, I thought I better get the blog posted before the storm hits and we lose power again. We got home at 4:30 pm yesterday and by the clocks that keep a memory of the time they went off, the power had been restored just an hour before we got home, which, if correct, means we were without power for 21 hours. The June bugs and roses are happy after the heavy rains, and Rosencrantz was enjoying a patch of catnip in the late afternoon light that was falling between the thunderheads building up in the western skies.

 

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Wet and Dark

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We had been without power for 15 hours when we left for Tristan’s and David’s to charge devices and get on the Internet. About 7:00 pm last night very high winds and pouring rain that took out the power. Puck was out during most of the storm and finally came in soaking wet about 8:30, bringing a good amount of the 2 inches of rain we got with him. He reluctantly posed for photos illuminated by our flashlights, but finally gave me a nice “Chat Noir” pose. The neighbor’s corrals and arena were still flooded this morning, and the horses were fed on the high spots along the edges. The morning sun was brilliant in the fresh air, and the sunflowers and bees were happy after the rains.

 

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