I seem to have taken the summer off...

It wasn't intentional. It just happened. I wrote my last blog post about our Morocco trip in May and then I haven't written since. I don't know what has happened with my blog. It used to be a big part of my life, but in the last few years, not so much. I started writing it almost 13 years ago and I was mad for all the blogs out there. Now there is so much content on the internet it's hard to keep up and so many of the blogs I read and loved have disappeared. In the early years I spent a lot of time thinking about "blog fodder"—stories to tell, observations to make. It seemed nothing was too trivial to immortalize on my blog –"look! I got new glasses!"  It's a little embarrassing. At the same time it was a good record of my life, what I was thinking about,what I was working on, where I'd been. I don't feel so inclined to record and share it all these days. These are different times and I am reluctant to use my blog to air my complaints and general sadness about so many things that have changed in the past 13 years. BUT, I do want to continue blogging in some form. So here's, maybe, a new start. Not so often, not so trivial, more art?  So this morning I looked back at the pictures I've taken this summer to remind myself what we've been up to. 

I think I post nearly identical photos of flowers and garden every year, but that's what sings me through the summer. Ray works really hard in our garden. I don't, but I appreciate the heck out of it. It has been a record-breaking hot summer and the last two photos were taken last week when Portland had the second worst air quality of a a major city IN THE WORLD. ugh. And it's not over. See the chairs on the front porch? They are new. In 2009 I blogged about an old chair I dragged home from a yard sale (https://andsewitgoes.blogspot.com/2009/05/another-chair.html) It has been on the front porch since, but it has gotten tired and faded and in need of paint.  It needed some love and attention and I put it on my mental list to tackle. I put it off. It seemed like so much work. Then in a moment of clarity I asked Ray to drag it down to the end of the driveway. We put a "free" sign on it and went and bought two new chairs and a little table. The old chair was gone when we got home. This is the new, "mature" me. I'm not so up for big projects as I used to be. Am I getting old? Probably. 

There are more photos and more summer posts, so I think I'm back. I was going to hit you with the whole summer in this one post, but I've thought better of that. We'll just deal with one thing at a time. Don't give up on me, yet! 

One more photo—