Mt. Adams

Last weekend we took advantage of a pleasant fall evening to trek up to Mt. Adams, which overlooks downtown Cincinnati. The streets of Mt. Adams are steep and narrow, many really only wide enough for one car. One must creep slowly and carefully to avoid parked cars and night-life-loving pedestrians. It's a fun place at night - colorful lights, throngs of people having fun, and great views at every turn. We parked near the old Rookwood restaurant (now named Porkopolis Tavern, which does it no justice) and found our way to a wonderful overlook that gave a panoramic view of downtown Cincinnati, the river, and on across to the Kentucky side.

Chris used his tripod and got some great pictures ~ however, my little Fuji doesn't nearly do the job in showing how colorful the view was. I need to get him to start a blog to share his pictures and his perspective - it can be quite different than mine.

We left the overlook and hiked up many many steps to (what we thought was) the Church of the Immaculata. Well, it turns out we were just climbing up to the Monastery apartments, high atop one of the many hills...so we kept on going until we came to the bar area, near the "Monk Whose Cup Runneth Over" statue at the corner of Pavilion and St. Gregory Sts. Evidently this bronze statue was created to honor the wine-making heritage of Mt. Adams (which I knew nothing about until I looked it up)... for a brief period in the early 1800's, Mt. Adams was well known for its wines. Go figure.

We continued on, making our way downhill past old rowhouses, most now renovated and beautiful, occupied by those who love the lifestyle in Mt. Adams. This particular group of homes had an almost haunted feel to them .....

We finally found our way to Holy Cross - Immaculata Church on Guido St. and of course that involved climbing yet another set of steps (huff, puff, pause, gasp, continue on to the next set ...). It sits atop one of the highest points in Cincinnati, overlooking the river. There was a misty full moon, and the view was wonderful.

We worked our way back to the car, making a false turn or two ... should have left a trail of crumbs to follow. It was a great to be out walking around, enjoying the scene in Mt. Adams, but I must say I loved getting home to a nice soft bed! Little did I know that that evening was just a warm-up for our adventure in Kentucky the next day...

Homecoming 2007

Senior year, the last Homecoming Dance of her high school career .... she looked soooo tall in her fancy shoes, and plum colored dress! We allowed her to drive, picking up 3 girlfriends, and they met up with 4 others for dinner at LaRosa's before going to school for the dance. (One boy, 7 girls!) Then more food afterwards ... a late night, and (according to her) the dance was "sort of boring."

At this time next year she'll have flown the coop - where is time going?

I Think It Just Rained...

After a summer of relentless heat and virtually no rain for months, it has just ... rained. Only for about 10 minutes, but it rained! And there was lightning! But now as I glance out the window, just a few moments later, the sun is out again and that's the end of it.

Unfortunately any amount of rain at this point is "too little, too late." The leaves are dropping from the trees all over town - dead, crunchy brown leaves everywhere underfoot. It looks like we'll have very few colorful trees to enjoy in October. This is one summer that needs to be OVER!

Happiness Is....

A new baby kitten in the house! Introducing Pepper, 1 lb. 15 ounces of pure furry fun. Dr. Jeff has declared her a healthy 8 week-old, and she already had her first shot.

We went to a family birthday party last Sunday, and my sister let us know that we weren't allowed to leave without a kitten. Seems some low-life (call 'em as you see 'em) dumped 5 little kittens in a drainage ditch, barely 6 weeks old, and my sister was good enough to take them in. After one week in our household, Pepper is getting to know her way around and she's decided that the dogs mean nothing to her ... NO FEAR!

Each of the dogs is reacting differently to her, as expected. Tango could care less about her as long as she still gets some love and affection; Tyson is mildly interested in her but has figured out that she's not edible, so he leaves her alone for the most part; and Tandie - well Tandie has always been an idiot when she sees a cat she doesn't recognize. So we have to keep an eye on her because she can get a little rough as she "inspects" the poor thing.

Beanie has quickly become friends with the kitten, I think remembering how things were when Baby Kitty was still here. They play (well, Beanie lays in one spot while Pepper jumps, flails around and generally does kitten-activities in circles around him.) and nap together, and Beanie gives her a good washing when he's feeling motherly. They're going to be BFF.

Petunias

As the sun drops low in the sky tonight ...

More Reasons To Love Spring ...

Goldfinches, At Last!

We got rid of our old thistle feeder - it wasn't attracting the finches, and it was getting all clogged up - and it appears that our new model is doing the job! I actually saw 3 finches hanging on at one time, having a snack. Hurray! Now if the dogs would just quit scaring them away ....

Awards Banquet

One of the many items on my calendar for the month of May - the annual high school Awards Banquet. We arrived promptly at 5:30 when the doors opened, secured some seats at a table that was not too far from the speakers, and not too far from the buffet line. We shared a table with Kelly's good friend RJ and her mom, and another family.

They got through the meal, awards and recognition in record time - we actually left the Convention Center while it was still daylight!

A Special Day

My niece was beautiful in her First Communion dress this past Sunday. She was running around barefoot when we arrived at her house, greeting the visitors and playing with the dogs. The girl does know how to ham it up for the camera!

When I asked "What kind of shoes did you wear?" she ran down to the front door and picked up one of her shoes to show me. Pretty!

Now Making An Appearance

One of my favorite spring garden events is underway - the purple iris are beginning to bloom! I just cut an armful to bring into the house. They're such majestic and beautiful flowers, it's too bad they last such a short time.

Too Much HGTV

Over the past couple of weekends I've dragged Chris into my grand plans for updating our back deck area. We've always enjoyed our backyard but I've been wanting to upgrade our look, so I've been scheming and dreaming, plotting and planning what I could do to give the deck a fresh start this spring. We started by removing all the stuff off the deck - and we do have a lot of stuff! - furniture, grills, gardening items, lawn chairs. It all went out in the grass while we scrubbed off the deck. We moved only the necessary items back when it dried, and came up with a new arrangement. We also headed over to SWM and bought a storage bench that looks much better than our old mismatched Rubbermaid tubs - very nice! - and splurged on a new glass-top table and 4 chairs at Lowe's.

I've re-painted a new "rug" on the floor, a medium blue with a dark brown border - easy to take care of, no vacuuming required. And I bought some inexpensive sheer curtains which we hung at the corners of the deck. The only projects left to do - repaint a couple of our garage-sale side tables a dark glossy brown to give them a new look, and sew a fabric skirt to cover the lower portion of my potting table (lots of gardening clutter under there).

It's amazing how different it feels in our outdoor room - our own little oasis! (Well, maybe that's a stretch ... but it's so fun to go out there now.)

Perfectly Normal Women ...

.. Do the strangest things at bridal showers. This is a game we played at Emily's bridal luncheon a few weeks back. We had to scoop cotton balls onto our heads, the goal being to keep as many as possible on board after we let go with the spoons. I believe the winner had 17?

Another game was a team competition, whereby a wedding gown was to be created using numerous rolls of toilet paper. While this was fun, I found myself on the losing end of the deal because I was the model, and my teammates were not destined to be the winning designers. The other 2 girls looked a whole heck of a lot better than I did when time was up. Kelly kind of looks like the Blessed Virgin Mary, don't you think? And I ended up looking like a geeky flapper of some sort.

Then and Now

Tyson got his summer haircut at the groomer last week! He looks so much better and must feel so much cooler. We've already had a couple of days in the upper 80's here, so we had this done just in time. Tandie's at the groomer right now - she's just getting a bath, a "comb out" and her nails trimmed - no shave for her.