Fanciful? Me? Pshaw!!

I just planted the first utterly useless, completely impractical plants of the year. Call it whimsy, call it vanity, call it frivolity, but they exist here, beside my front porch, solely to please me. That is their only function. I can't eat them, can them, dehydrate them, or make medicine from them (i don't think...). Their presence here, on the farm, is to do naught but be pretty, smell good, and attract pretty little animals. I will waste water, time, and effort on them. I will fight to keep the chickens away from them. I will sit beside them on my porch and watch as butterflies and hummingbirds frolic among their blossoms. And I will breathe in their delicate scents. They will make me happy and that's all they need to do.

What are they, you ask? What flowers could possibly cause me to so suddenly wax poetic? Nothing exotic or fancy. Just jasmine and gardenias. And, oh man, do they smell good! Already! The jasmine is rife with flowers and the gardenias are laden with buds. Of course, a little of their visual appeal is hampered by the fact that they are surrounded by a crudely constructed chicken wire fence. And they're still a bit too small to actually SEE from the porch. But, whatever. They're pretty and I love them. End of story.
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So I'm trying to figure out the best place to publish a bunch of my photos. I was going to do it here on the blog, but it's not going to work. Upon deciding to post more photos, I went for a nice little walk around the property this morning to see what I could see. I like to photograph small things. I'm not very good at still life or landscapes or portraits, but I'm ok at macro. Not good, just ok. So, expect lots of pictures of little stuff from the woods and gardens. The only addendum to that are photos from our trip out west a couple years ago. The Pacific coast lends itself to good photographs. It's the beauty of the place, not the skill of the capturer.
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In other news, aside from bragging about my pretties, the rest of the seedlings are going in the ground today, ready or not (but mostly ready. I'm not just gonna toss fragile little baby plants out into the cruel, cruel world to fend for themselves.). Which means!!! I get to reclaim my bathroom! That lightstand has been in there for months, since before I moved up here, really. I have no idea what I'll do with all that extra space. I'm giddy with anticipation...although it'll probably end up home to mounds of clutter just like the rest of the house.

I refilled the birdfeeders yesterday. It had been awhile. I kept wondering why all the birds just seemed to disappear when a month ago or so they were all over the place. Duh. All the feeders were empty. I was inspired to check when I saw, for the first time in my life, what I later identified as a scarlet tanager. Freaking gorgeous bird! I want to bribe him to come back and bring all his buddies, so I refilled the bribe dishes! Keep your fingers crossed that he hangs out for a bit.

I'm going to go watch for him right now.


Oh, also, a personal request. After falling victim to the heinous economy, big sister has an interview tomorrow. Send her some good mojo for me, will ya? She's gonna rock it, I know she is.

That is all :)