Picked these this week. Not everyone knows about lemon cucumbers, upper right. Pick them before they get bright yellow, when they really look like lemons! They are quite delicate and delicious.

Happy Macro Monday, Mellow Yellow Monday, and Ruby Tuesday. We are off camping and will return in a few days. Ta-ta!

This old fashioned hydrangea is so easy to grow. I had some hydrangea flowers at my wedding, years ago.

As long as it is kept moist (“hydra” is a clue!) with nice humus-y soil,  it will be happy even in full sun up here in Seattle, but I think it is easier to keep happy in shade or part shade, where it still blooms nicely. Another neat thing about them is that prunings made in the spring are extremely easy to root. Just push the stems into the shaded soil, keep moist, and soon you will have new hydrangeas!

For more lovely flower photos, visit Flowers for Today, now entering its second floriferous year!

We are going camping next week again, this time near Mt. Ranier. In thinking about our trip, of course I had to look at some of the photos from last time, and thought I’d post this late day shot of a nearby campsite. The combination of clear light, tall trees and the late hour makes for some mighty fine shadows. Thank you to Tracy of the Hey Harriet blog, who created of Shadow Shot Sunday, for opening my eyes to the sweet penumbra.

Don’t you just want to sit down at that table?

This is a newer variety of coneflower, or echinacea. It’s more pink than mauve and the petals don’t recurve too much, and it’s not too tall, either. More like a pink daisy, really. Here it is, blooming in my garden, with geraniums I overwintered downstairs and some peach-colored impatiens behind it.

Next year I think I’ll try doing impatiens from seed, as I hear they aren’t too hard and grow easily, plus I could use a lot of them. I read that with extremely fine seed, the thing to do is get a little clean sand and mix the fine seeds well into it; then you can handle a pinch of the sand fairly easily and not get a jillion seeds at a time.

Visit Pink Saturday for more pinkness of all kinds. Such nice people, such sweet pink photos!

And the Color Carnival folks like bright pink, too, ideally combined with red and peach! If you like color, you’ll LOVE Color Carnival.

Browsing through the archives, looking for a good sky photo (it’s been gray lately) I found this one. It was taken on a very cold January day, but the sky was so brilliant! Happy Skywatch Friday to all.

Next week we are going camping again, and my favorite part is the campfires. Not for cooking, because that makes such a mess on the pots and pans, and washing dishes is so hard when camping, but just to gaze at and enjoy. The sight, the smell, and the soft sound of the flames in the quiet woods, is one of my top fave experiences. A photo is a small slice of that, but it reminds us.

In the I Ching, ancient Chinese system for understanding things, the symbol for Pleasure is Lake. Interestingly, the symbol for Danger is Water. But that’s another story.

In any case, this view of crystal-clear waters of a corner of Lake Cushman truly gives me pleasure. You can just see the fishing line of a person out of the frame trying his luck. I am content to just view the water, or perhaps get my feet wet. On second thought, let’s jump in!

For more watery wonders, visit Watery Wednesday.

So now I have this new rose garden, with 18 new rose bushes. It was so much work to create it, but the rewards are immense. I love to go out and clip the fading flowers so the petals don’t strew around in the wind. Sometimes I get a little over-enthusiastic in my deadheading and then I have fullblown roses looking at me soulfully in the clippings bucket. I rescued five of these and put them in a bowl of water.

For more ruby redness in photos, visit Ruby Tuesday.

It’s Macro Monday time. This Black-eyed Susan or rudbeckia plant is a real winner to me because it blooms midsummer and later in sun or shade and survives really tough conditions. This lovely blossom was in my friend Eileen’s garden. And happy Mellow Yellow Monday!

Today (Sunday) is the first anniversary of one of my favorite memes in the blogosphere, Flowers For Today. This idea was created by Luiz Santilli Junior one year ago today, and I am honored to be Guest Friend on this special day. Thank you, Luiz! It’s so true that everyone loves flowers.

Below is my photo which is posted on their site today. It was taken just a few days ago on my patio here in Seattle, and I grew many of the plants from seeds. Dusty, our cat who is posing so nicely, is the kind of kitty who loves everyone. If you visit, she will love you, too. She is an inspiration to me.

I thought I’d post a couple of extra flower pictures today, in honor of this special day. Below are flowers from my friend Cindy’s amazing deck and garden, and one of her dahlias. Enjoy this happy day.

While I was in the folder of Lake Cushman photos for the shadow shot below, I saw this photo, taken on the same day, and knew it needed to be posted for Scenic Sunday. Enjoy!

Here’s a shot from our camping trip to Lake Cushman a couple of weeks ago, before the really hot weather took hold around here. This was a perfect day, temps in the low 80s, and the smell of the woods and the oxygen and the lake nearby was heaven, as far as I am concerned. Thank you to Tracy at Hey Harriet for opening my eyes to shadows in a powerful way. I love shadows! Visit Shadow Shot Sunday for more oh-so-interesting shadows seen everywhere.