Another beautiful day in so many ways. Ate my breakfast on the porch and watched the wood thrushes hop and skip around the yard. They are handsome birds, regal in their carriage, enjoying the freshly cut lawn. Haven’t seen the grosbeak flock today. Maybe they’ll be dusk visitors. Hope they haven’t gone further south yet. They are some of my favorites. The males’ chest feathers look just like they have a bandana tied around their necks. The females look kinda mean with their stern eyes. They are bossy to the other birds.

The light blue sky has been sunny and gray cloudy all day. When the sun came through it was summertime hot. The bird symphony has been pleasant background music for my yard work. Just a slight occasional breeze but not enough to strike the wind chimes together. The wind chime across the street is singing but mine are holding quiet.

Got my new swing pillow covers today in the mail. Black and white polka dots for the big swing cushions and red and white polka dots for the small cushions. Took me forever to get the long cushions in the cases. Would have made a preacher cuss trying to get the cushions in those cases. I use body size pillows and it takes some wrangling to get them in. The smaller cases were too little for the pillow inserts I was using so I got the bright idea to cut the pillow inserts in half. Bad idea! I’ve done some dumb things and this was another dumb thing. Couldn’t cut the pillow and made a mess. Went all over the house getting throw pillows to try till I found two that fit the covers. Gotta order some pillow inserts the right size.

Got a surprise in the mail today from a friend. It was wrapped like a professional post office worker had wrapped it. Almost had to use Chief’s ax to chop the package open. That girl can wrap! I was so happy to find a small daily devotional book inside. I’m reading mine for a second year so I was delighted to have a new book. Sweet note inside the book, too. Thanks, friend!

Late afternoon I put pine straw around my vegetables in their pots. I have tomatoes, bell peppers, yellow squash, mint, and cucumbers. I love to put mint my sweet tea. The pansies I planted in the ground are doing well. They were fainting in the cement urns. I put pine straw around them, too. So far they haven’t wilted from the heat. Interested to see if they survive the summer sunshine.

Visiting the grandchildren again this week to attend the boys’ band concerts. So enjoying being able to be involved in some of their activities with them living closer. Band was such a big part of my life in school and I loved every minute. They both had 100 averages in their band grades so guess they are excelling. Alexander is playing the French horn for the second year and Emerson is playing my trumpet in his first year of beginning band.

Talking to my nephew the other day about how wonderful the feeling of being free is when you retire. He’s retiring at the end of the school year and is looking forward to many happy days out in the woods hunting. He’s been counting down the days. I love going to sleep every night and knowing tomorrow has no agenda. I can do whatever I want, whenever I want, and I can march to my own drum beat. I can even say no to things I don’t want to do.

I love this quote because it makes me think of my life when I first moved here to Roanoke without Chief. I had to learn to fly again and trust where my wings would take me.

“I have come to accept the feeling of not knowing where I am going. And I have trained myself to love it. Because it is only when we are suspended in mid-air with no landing in sight, that we force our wings to unravel and alas begin our flight. And as we fly, we still may not know where we are going to. But the miracle is in the unfolding of the wings. You may not know where you’re going, but you know that so long as you spread your wings, the winds will carry you.” — C. Joy Bell C.