Snap By Snap

Considering how often thunderstorms roll through Indiana, it's a good thing our family really likes them. Mark and I both grew up in California and thunderstorms were not very common -even rain was an event. But here in the sweltering summers of the Midwest, the sky is alive with boiling thunderheads that tower 50,000 feet into the sky. They are spectacular.
We've been known to stand outside to watch and listen to the storm (under cover, of course). Or sometimes at night we'll open the blinds, darken the house, and watch the lightning punctuate the horizon. A couple of yeas ago, Amy and I went next door to chat with our Spanish speaking neighbors for a Spanish class project she had been assigned. As we talked about our families, they asked us if Mark had a hobby. Evidently, they'd seen him taking pictures of lightning, and had decided that he must be looking for aliens, which they thought was hilarious. I mean, who would take pictures of a beautiful storm, right? So now, watching a storm is generally referred to in our family as "watching for aliens."

Tonight, we went for a walk at a local park, enjoying a break in the summer's high temperatures and humidity. I took my camera, like the nerd I am, and snapped pictures of flowers and scenery. As I walked back up from the lake after taking the above photo, a lady walking by said, "what's down there?" Judging by the look on her face, "Pretty flowers" seemed a ridiculous answer.

Are we looking at the same world?

Here are a few more pictures the alien hunting flower lovers took tonight -

And God saw all that He had made, and it was very good.  -Genesis 1:31

Do you have a bedtime routine? Goldie does. Each night at 10:00 pm, usually within 10 minutes give or take, Goldie gets ready for bed.
We keep her blanket stored in a basket, and she leaves it alone all day until 10pm. Then she paws over the basket and keeps at it until she has the entire thing out on the floor. She obsessively paws it, noses it, and sometimes grabs it in her mouth and pulls it until she gets it just right. Just right looks like this, tonight:
"Perfect" generally lasts for about five minutes until more pawing, nosing, and pulling is necessary to get the blanket back in shape. She works it from one side of the room to the other, getting out of breath and so frustrated that she sometimes walks away completely and gives up. But she always comes back. Or she pauses in the midst of her work and snorts out a heavy sigh and looks at us as if to say, "This is hard work!"

When we turn out the lights and go to bed, she finally quits her obsession for the night and goes to her bed.  If we're out of the house for the evening, however, she leaves the blanket in its basket. This is somehow a social project. I wonder if she knows it makes us smile each evening?