It is now July..........

 fluffy clouds gather in the sky, in some of the prettiest pastel colors, along comes welcoming rain showers

The hot, hard packed ground, with a great thirst, soaks it up......what remains are puddles that invite the wild song birds to drink and splash.

I love the way the golden color of the  summer sun spills into the windows and onto the shelves of old dishware, giving the kitchen a warm and comforting  glow at the end of the day.

Vintage glassware beams with a new life as the light shines through.  

It has also been a happy time, as some of our scattered children come home for a visit. They are a  bright ray of sunshine that brightens up these dark troubled days, reminding me that there is still such good.......... away from this world of turmoil.   Fresh cups of hot brewed coffee and long conversation melt the minutes away up into the wee hours of morning as we catch up with each other's lives . How blessed I feel for moments like this. 

 Independence day arrived with  a morning of hot sun and heated wind blowing.  I still kept my plans to cook our holiday dinner outside on the grill........by the time I had it all cooked and on the table, I wondered what was grilled more..........the food.....or myself?

The day ended with a firework display that we could see from our back property. In the distance from over the field and pasture, the dark sky was filled with glittering of red, gold, and blue.   We enjoyed and appreciated the selection of lovely fireworks  that our distant neighbor chose. As soon as this display was over, as if on cue,  the full moon came out from the clouds and lit up the rest of the night. 

Although we have gotten rain, this is the time that triple digit heat is on us.  It has bounced from 102 to 105.  It is predicted to get up to 110 next week.   Despite the heat, it is a cheerful, noisy, place with the wonderful sound of different chirps , tweets, and calls.......... for the water bath in the front yard has attracted many wild birds.  Quail come running down the long graveled drive with their many offspring  following close behind.  Some are still so tiny and they look like little ping pong balls as they roll up to the water bath.  They eat some of the feed I have placed out, and enjoy drinking and splashing in the water.  Then with mother, they all hollow out the ground, nestle close to each other and take a rest in the shade of the tree.

.  It's not long that mother quail gets up and her little ones follow her back up the drive and back to their home tucked away somewhere in the woods.

Other creatures seek out water during this time.  I am always surprised when I gently drop water from the garden hose , in front of the tarantulas, as they walk, their bodies are just above the hot dry ground.  The water drops form a tiny puddle and they instantly stop and dip down into the water and drink.

Lizards come out and drink droplets from the flower leaves that I have watered 

and graceful dragonflies dart in and out of the water sprinkler and land on the wet stalks

The large black witch moth.......although it is brown.......stay in the shaded corners of the house.  By the way.........where do these names come from?

Don't you agree that  this moth deserves a much prettier name? 

The heat has not slowed the egg production of the chickens that my friend has.  She comes for a visit and brings a bounty of wonderful home grown vegetables from her garden and  the most wonderful large eggs in the prettiest colors. For her,  I have a small batch of my very  tiny eggs that my Millie Fleur hens have laid, and a starting of some plants from my flowers.   We enjoy a visit, with chatter of the latest happenings and always chicken talk, over coffee.    Time passes too quickly and our visits never seem long  enough.
( just in case you are wondering?.........it is never too hot or too late for a fresh cup of comforting coffee)  don't  you agree? 

My friend will set the tiny eggs from my hens underneath one of her large hens that is wanting to sit , and in just a short time, she will have these delightful tiny " Millie" chickens, newly hatched.

For me, with all of this bounty of fresh eggs, a homemade angel food cake will be a perfect thing to bake.  I have posted this wonderful recipe a long while back on my cooking blog, so if  you would like the recipe, just click onto this link.  

Heavenly Angel Food Cake

The rest of this month, I expect things to be without change and to go about in the same peaceful manner it has been from  day to day.  I will be dragging a garden hose constantly behind me, trying to keep what I have growing ,protected from the scorching heat.

  I sit out in the early part of morning, when it is cool, underneath the shade of the canopy of trees....... collecting my thoughts and plans on what I need to do, and then, I head inside the rest of the day, avoiding the heat. 

    In the late afternoon,  the temperature has dropped slightly, the loud ringing of the cicada has quieted and the noisy chatter of the birds dies down to just a coo of a dove, drifting over the trees from the woods.  The days seem to go so quickly, even in this "slowed down" time with the current virus and before I know, July will have soon melted into August.

So tell me.........what kinds of birds and creatures are visiting  your back yard? 

Is the summer casting down it's heat or are you enjoying cooler temps? 

I hope this finds that these July summer days are bringing you much  peace and contentment.