Double rainbow

my peonies are finally in bloom

Beautiful orchid that Steve's cousin gave us

patriotic rice krispie treats Shanna made

Hannah smiles with momma but not with me

Naomi and Hannah

Daniel was thrilled to hold his cousin. Hannah, not so much

Josh and his baby

Maya and Allie

red coyote. It was dark and he was moving

The double rainbow after rain shortened our BBQ

a good year for dogwood even though our tree is mostly dead

painted daisies

hibiscus

the pond that I spent so much time cleaning last week. Will look better as the planters fill in

I was on the road by 5:50 am just as the sun was coming up to get my long bike ride in early before I had to babysit Maya and prepare for the BBQ later that day. For Mother's Day and maybe a few birthdays, I was given an Apple watch, which has a too steep learning curve for me but I am finally getting the hang of it. It has a built in GPS. According to it, I went 32.00 miles versus the 32.4 on my odometer. Which is more accurate? Does the watch account for me swerving around potholes? It keeps track of my heartbeat. Average while biking:120 bpm. Average while running:160. Average on the torture device (elliptical trainer: 165) Average lying down at the end of the day: 54 bpm. I am getting faster on the bike too but yesterday I had almost ideal conditions (except the sun still was low to the east  blinding me. There is a 4 mile section that I go due east which is mostly dirt (and muddy from the rain the night before).

I had just been thinking that it had been a while since I've seen a fox and then one runs in front of me. This wasn't long after I saw an indigo bunting (sadly dead) and heard peacocks. It was a great ride. The watch keeps track of how much I climb too, not much compared to what I will be doing in 6 weeks.  My iphones of course have GPS tracking systems on them too but they are a major drain on the phone's battery. The power on my watch only went down 9% after tracking me for almost 3 hours so that's good.

Maya came shortly after I returned. She likes to help: put food in the bird feeders, drag out cushions for the patio chairs. We are now keeping the hummingbird feeders on flimsy branches (won't support Rocky's weight) I don't get to hear them any more but can still see them flitting about.

I am trying not to be doing too much food prep when I rather visit with guests so I tried to get everything done before they come (two days in a row). Much less work yesterday as the kids brought salad and dessert as did Julie's father who joins us for family dinners. So our house is chock full of desserts from 2 days worth. His cousin had brought homemade biscotti. Maybe I will freeze it. And we bought pre-made Bellinis which actually tasted good. We did get all the fixings for Moscow Mules. No Tessa yesterday as she had a 24 hour bug. Her dad stayed home to watch. We thought we'd keep the labor down by using paper plates (used antique Wedgewood for his cousins) but then a strong wind picked up which made keeping them earthbound a chore. And our beautiful sunny day quickly turned to an unforecasted rain so they all decided it was time to go.

But it was fun having the cousins interact. Maya would ask every 10 minutes when Tessa was coming and then she didn't come. she had Allie who is much easier to boss around.

Today is my day of rest. I still ran and did all my basement exercises but I didn't have to do too much more. A lazy day.