August 1? REALLY?

August 06, 2021

The reason that we are constantly commenting that "Time Flies", is that it does. July has been mostly HOT, with a few breaks to open the windows and air out the house from A/C stuffiness. I guess if you think about it, every season is now "roller coaster weather" as it has become the norm for temperatures to swing from high to low constantly.....

Since I am using this blog as a diary, I had better summarize the past month of July:

DH the Younger cme out to visit over the July 4th weekend. He made the trip out this time sans girlfriend as she had to work and he really came out to meet up with old friends who were also congregating for the Holiday weekend. It was nice to have him here and he actually spent more time with us than planned. DS the Elder and his family had other plans out of town, so it was a nice quiet weekend. We did go to a concert with DSY and friends. It was HOT, but that's to be expected, isn't it?

Then just the following Monday, we had a bit of a break in the weather and had some cloudy skies and traces of rain... but not much. I did go ahead and schedule service for the sprinkler system because the Sump drain was dwindling out... and so was my energy for moving the hoses around 2 or 3 times a day.

Really dry lawn...

But the garden has done better than I expected. We even had helpers from time to time...

I especially love this photo.

Around the middle of the month there was a nice break in the heat and we had a few days that were almost cool. On one of those, I cleared out the solar shed and DH helped me to lay down a piece of vinyl flooring. Doesn't it look nice and neat? Much easier to clean and protected from water.

Directly opposite door, which is almost always open.

Clockwise to the right...

Continuing clockwise to the front wall...

And the very next day I found trouble in the garden. This is something I had never seen before; Onion Maggot Fly. I did my homework and found that it is a fly that lays it's eggs at the base of an onion plant. When they hatch, the larvae eat away at the roots and then up into the onion. No root, no nutrition, and the plant dies. In all, I lost 25% of these onions - the plants that I bought from Jung Seeds. My own plants grown from seed and grown in a different bed are fine!

YUCK! Onion maggots!

Then I had a little time-out to sit with a sick baby girl. RSV can sure make a baby feel awful. I even took her to the Doctor. Altogether I had her for 3 days (Mommy was home with her over a 3-day weekend). She's fine now and for once, I did NOT catch the bug!

Shhhh....

I guess we've had the kids several times this month, but it's always fun.

Making smoothies is a favorite thing to do at Grandma's.

And reading with Grandpa....

Baby Girl loves to be carried around by Big Brother.

On another HOT day I got back down to my sewing room. Here is a game called "Pattern Tetris". I got it all on and it is almost finished by now.

Beautiful fabric from my stash - I've been saving it for something special.

It will be a skirt and top.

One day later in the month, I went with DH on one of his out-of-town jobs and this is what we came upon: SMOKE! Not local - it was from wildfires from Canada and Montana! It was all across the State but more dense farther North. By the time we got back home later in the day it was less, but you could still see and smell it for another couple of days - until the wind turned and it rained.

Smoke haze on US Rt. 14 between Huron, SD and Brookings, SD.

And so we have made it to August. The garden is doing well, the grass is coming back (thanks to both the sprinklers and a couple of good rain showers) and the family is in good shape.