House Mountain

This past weekend, we went to Lexington, VA for Paul's 10th college reunion at Washington and Lee University. The area is beautiful, of course, but one mountain kind of dominates the scenery from Lexington, and that's House Mountain. We've been up to the saddle (Paul's hiked all the way with some friends), and the saddle alone was punishing enough - so I don't know why this time I let him talk me into the whole thing. It's about 3600' feet up, and I'm surprised we're still not sore.
Here's more information about the hike.


There's acreage (~27) for sale near the parking area of the mountain. For $375K, you can have lots of land and that view - of course, you'd have to build a place to live... but I can think of worse things.

The view from the saddle. What you don't see are the wild apple trees - and luckily, you don't see the absolute swarms of gnats either.

"You sure we're going to go all the way up THERE?"

The "balancing rock" along the top of the mountain. From here, we had to traipse along the ridge until we found the lookout points, and I don't even want to talk about how we fell - I mean FOUND - our way back to the trail. It was harrowing. No really. And without Paul, I would still be up there, probably mumbling to myself and living among the wildlife.


But make it we did!


...and there's the proof.

So often, small moments of reflection can occur to you in the most stressful of situations. This occurred to me fleetingly then, when I was so "over it" - but now that I have had time to remember being there and the moments that were just so beautiful, in amongst the selfishness and whining and just plain "UGH" that comes from a strenuous effort (like a 6 hour hike when you're more than slightly out of shape) - you later may say it was "worth it" - but why? It wasn't because of the workout, let me assure you! What did occur to me was a poem, of all things. It wasn't one I just knew, I was introduced to it by our amazing organist at St. Andrew's who set it to music for our post-communion anthem- it's from George Herbert, a Welsh Anglican priest from the 17th century and it's every bit as breathtaking as the views from the mountain.

A broken ALTAR, Lord, thy servant rears,

Made of a heart and cemented with tears;

Whose parts are as thy hand did frame;

No workman’s tool hath touch’d the same.

A HEART alone

Is such a stone,

As nothing but

Thy pow’r doth cut.

Wherefore each part

Of my hard heart

Meets in this frame

To praise thy name.

That if I chance to hold my peace,

These stones to praise thee may not cease.

Oh, let thy blessed SACRIFICE be mine,

And sanctify this ALTAR to be thine.

Grace perfects nature...

And these girls need all the extra they can get!

It's been a while since we've had a gratuitous greyhound shot, so here's once of Bugs being blessed at the St. Francis gathering a couple Sundays ago.

We don't have a comparably good one of Lana receiving a blessing, but here's a cute pic from that day.

Elle

We have become godparents to the most beautiful little girl, Elizabeth Anne, or "Elle". She is truly a blessing to all of us!

...yes, even a blessing to the Bukus.

"Tablescapes"

Sandra Lee of Semi-Homemade Cooking is one of the most annoying people on earth. I've noticed an especially asinine term she's popularized is "tablescape." A rose by any other name... but I guess I'm just as guilty because I do like to take pictures of the table, once set, to show it off... that vase is the most wonderful thing. Right now it has dried mushroom stalks and artichokes along with other grasses and cattail-like things for a fall theme, and it looks great.

Kitchen Makeover

I'd long wanted to paint the kitchen. It was a really ugly yellow color and, being so small, just seemed so boring and sloppy. I loved this green - Paul initially thought it too dark, so stripes of it sat on the yellow wall for months while we half pondered, half procrastinated whether it would "go". Well, at the spring TACA fair I bought a great piece of stained glass for the window. It was really inspiring, and we decided to paint the kitchen that very weekend.

The pot rack was my birthday gift, to show off the copper pots that was my Christmas gift the first year we dated - now 8 years ago. It's also very functional, as you can tell, and frees up a lot of cabinet space in our otherwise tiny kitchen.

The windowsill got this awesome pewter Christus Rex (Laurel folks - I got it at Quinn Pharmacy), and a flower from the hydrangeas throughout their blooming season. This one was especially beautiful.

Various yard shots

Some herbs and petunias (you'll see more of those shortly)... behind you can see some of the great jasmine Danya gave me.

Some more jasmine, a foxglove, and some other things that were later repotted. That area's not as great for growing as I thought. The jasmine remains, but I think I'll do something different next year.
These are almost like before and after shots of the windowbox. They got even more enormous after this, too. The best petunias I've found are Supertunias by Proven Winners - almost everything PW does is amazing. The Swedish Ivy, according to our Aunt, will overwinter nicely inside. I've still got a ton in pots on the back porch, so it may be worth a try. Now, there are pansies, violas and creeping jenny in the boxes for the fall and winter. Pictures of those will appear soon enough, I'm sure.

My birthday

Grandfather got very sick and I came back to Laurel first of June, so I was there at my birthday. Tammy orchestrated a beautiful birthday cake, which I enjoyed and brought back to Paul, which he, too, enjoyed...

And the morning of my birthday, the Sunday I came back to Nashville, I had my "other" birthday cakes... If your family doesn't have a red plate, you don't know what you're missing! Makes a great gift, too! They even have coffee mugs!