Yes I Know It's Hot Outside

But if you don't come outside with me you'll miss the view!

Just look at that wisteria reaching for the sunshine.

Puffy clouds on a summer day.

Do you think it will rain?

Spotted this butterfly from inside the house.

I came outside to look at her and she didn't seem to mind.

The pennywort is filling in very nicely in the path.

Little baby frogs or toads jump all around here when you walk by.

Do you remember studying about Pavlov's dogs?

These are Paul's fish.

Same thing.

I just love a summer day!

Linking to Show and Tell Friday at My Romantic Home.

Please visit Cindy's beautiful blog to find a list of other participants.

Sweet Summer Time

It's a Hot Tamale kind of day today!

The kind of day when you could be tempted not to leave the air conditioning.

But the view outside is so much clearer.

The locusts are singing just like I remember from childhood.

I just love summer!!

Hope you are having a wonderful day today.

Have a Great Labor Day Weekend!

I'm signing off early since as I mentioned yesterday, I'm going on a little camping trip to Lake Cachuma. I hope you all have a great Labor Day weekend! I'll see you next week! xoxo

Camping at Lake Cachuma

Today I will be spending the evening packing for a little family camping trip. We're taking advantage of the last summer days and the long weekend to visit the beautiful Lake Cachuma in Santa Barbara. Going to this lake is particularly special for me because its where I got engaged!

Around this time two years ago, here's how it went down:

After some persuasion I agreed to join David on a late night walk to take advantage of the beautiful night. I was feeling lazy from the day's activities and just wanted to sleep on the hammock and it took awhile for him to get me to get up. Anyways, I followed him as he took me through the trees, past all the other campsites...I could barely see in the dark... until we began to approach the lake where the moon was reflecting on the water...and it was just gorgeous. He led me towards a point at the edge of the lake. As we approached it, I noticed several small candles arranged amongst the rocky platform. He stopped and turned to look at me. As I turned, I noticed a bright flash of light in my face. My sister and her boyfriend had been following us with a video camera (either they were really slick or I must have been half asleep because I can't believe I didn't notice!). At that instant I realized exactly what was going on...I took in the moment... "Will you marry me?" he asked as he pulled out a pink ring he had gotten from a 25 cent machine (seriously) that we had previously joked about giving me as a proposal ring. He told me my real ring wasn't ready (the jeweler messed up the engraving) but that he wanted to propose at the lake and reminded me that i said i wouldn't mind if I was proposed to with a 25 cent ring. I laughed and said yes of course I would marry him!!!

I have video (which we have yet to transfer to a digital format) but no photographs of the actual proposal. The pictures above are set on the scene of the proposal. Imagine it at night...with the moon light reflecting on the lake...and small candles spread among the rocks...

Color Collage #1

One of the many reasons I collect images is for the color inspiration! I had been meaning to put together a color collage to include in a post but hadn't because Illustrator, the software I like to use to arrange images, has been down and I haven't gotten around to fixing it yet. Anyway, I decided to get around that and just use a different software instead.

This particular collage was inspired by the energizing brightness of summer. Hope you like it!

Click on images to enlarge