Mish Mash Monday

If you had trouble waking up this morning, you are not alone. Scroll to the bottom of this post to discover why. 

Beaten down by yesterday's storm, a rescued sunflower.

We had one of those great 50-50 storms yesterday ~ when it's black as night on one side of my house: thunder, lightening, torrential downpour ~ all the while the sun is shining brightly on the other side of the house.

Storm clouds over Deer Valley.

Of course, it rained on the sunny side of the house, too. While the sun was shining. One of the many odd things about life in the mountains.

But, it cooled things down a bit and, for that, I am grateful.

Meg & Phantom, hanging out under the apple tree.

The heat of summer is beginning to wear on me, though I'm sad to see that we're inching ever closer to the Dead Season.

Spelling an end to gardening. And, horseback riding. Poking about the less traveled trails, in search of new, delightful wildflowers.

High Uintah Trail

I'm soooo ahead of the game, this year. All ready for winter. Which is odd, given that it's the last week of hot cha cha August and the a/c is still blasting away.

This Wild Columbine was the very first flower I purchased for the garden. 

Let's all wish her a happy 10th birthday.

Had 3 biggy projects that needed to be done before the snow flies. Fully intended to procrastinate on that to-do list right up until it was too late to do anything about it.

But, the gal at the dry cleaners wasn't having any of that business. She handed me a card and said 'call my husband.' He can do anything. And, she wasn't kidding. He fixed the broken driveway. Fixed the broken garage door. He even fixed the hallway disaster that had been a nightmare for so long it never occurred to me there was any way out from under that mess.

Wild Prairie Coneflowers are a great water indicator for Western gardens.

When they begin to weep, your water-wise flowers are ready for a drink.

Mr. Over-Achieving Handyman gets bonus points for not rolling his eyes at my creativity.

I have a half moon shaped driveway, with a gigantic crack that goes across the entire thing, and in the center is the Big Rock Garden.

When I heard he was planning to fill said crack with new cement, I scampered off to Homely Depot to pick up the biggest, baddest, heaviest, dutiest outdoor electrical cord I could find.

Dianthus rarely get a tip of the hat in this blog, which is too bad. I'm hugely dependent upon these little ladies for spots of bright color, all summer long.

We squished the cord into the fresh cement and bada bing! Bada boom! I now have electrical power in the Big Rock Garden.

Yeah, yeah, I know most folks would have hired an electrician to do some type of fancy outdoor outlet thingy that wouldn't electrocute passers by. But my cutting corners method achieved the same result for next to nothing. And, I have home owner's insurance. So, whateva.

Here's a fab example of what NOT to do. 

When planting annual seeds, in whiskey barrels, first check to see just how big they grow... and, clearly, you should not take any planting advice from me.

Hot Tip:
If you're a tomato grower, at high altitude, now's the time for you to get creative, too. Place flat rocks around the base of your plants. The rocks heat up during the day, and radiate that heat in the evenings. Keeping tomato plants toasty warm.

Why bother? Because tomatoes switch sugar production when the temps drop below 50 degrees. They're more interested in keeping their vines healthy than providing you with an award-winning tomater. This is a great way to fool them into thinking it's still July.

Here's hoping y'all survived the weekend. I did. Barely.

= ^^..^^ =

If you had trouble waking up this morning, you are not alone. And if you are struggling to find a reason to smile, that's not uncommon either. According to researchers, Monday mornings are so depressing that, on average, we don't crack our first smile until 11:16 a.m. Researchers also found that half of employees will be late to work, and will only log about three-and-a-half hours of productive work time. (So, let's ditch work and go play in the garden.)