Look who's all grown up!

Sounds like a segue to some photos of my daughters, but it's not! Sorry to disappoint, although I am hoping to get some first day of school photos next week. It'll be a miracle if they cooperate.

The one I'm talking about being all grown up is the baby deer that spent the day in the flowerbed between my driveway and house, about five feet from my side door earlier in the spring. Do you remember that? I posted about the fawn back on May 4. Oh my goodness it was so small that day... like the size of a cat, but with a long neck and big ears and spots on its back.

Turns out a friend who had been jogging down the street past my house early that day, saw the baby deer run with wobbly legs across the street into my yard. We all wondered if it had been reunited with its mother. Several weeks after that day, I spotted a mother deer with not one, but two baby deer in our neighborhood very early one morning. I liked to think one of those babies was the fawn that had been in our yard back in May. Since then, we've seen a whole lot of evidence that these deer were thriving... coming to the gourmet organic buffet in the form of MY YARD!

This afternoon, I spotted this young deer in my yard munching on the liriope (monkey grass) that is blooming with dainty little lavender colored flowers right now in my front yard landscape:
I think it is one of the two fawns I saw that early morning with the doe and quite possibly the fawn who spent several hours in the shade of the ornamental grasses in my perennial garden.

What do you think?

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Although I didn't get to everything on my to do list this weekend, I actually had quite a productive weekend. I can't usually claim that. LOL.

I went out riding [bike] both Saturday and today. My husband and I usually ride together on Saturdays, but he wasn't feeling so great, so I rode by myself then. Sunday I usually go to spin class, but there are no classes at my gym from today through Labor Day, so I met up with two friends from the gym who are experienced riders and you know what? I was able to keep up with them just fine. It's not like we were competing or training or anything like that, but still, it was nice to be at comparable skill levels. We'll be riding together again over the next ten days or so until classes start up again--including tomorrow morning. : )

Saturday night I was up to my elbows in basil and garlic as I turned five big bunches of organic basil that I special ordered through my co-op into several jars of pesto! I plan on sharing my recipe for pesto this week.

Today I took my youngest shopping and then cleaned and organized her room and closets. Both daunting tasks to take on in one day. I think I deserve a medal. LOL. I actually got a lot of hugs and even a few kisses out of her, which trust me... is HUGE coming from her these days. We managed to get her two new pairs of sneakers (one for her gym locker and one to wear whenever), jeggings (jean leggings... all the rage this year), and four shirts. You'd think we would have come home with a full wardrobe for the time we spent shopping, but the clothes out there were so ... "meh" and she's pretty picky on top of that.

We also shopped for a new comforter set for her bed. She's been in her "new" room since we moved back in the house after the addition over a year ago and we never updated her bedding. In fact, she's been using a hand-me-down set from her sister for years, so it was about time she got her very own stuff. Finding the right set was near impossible. Again, she's very picky. And to make matters worse, we found the perfect comforter set for my teen about a month ago and of course, my youngest wants the same set. Her sister said no go, so I felt I should honor that and insist that the younger one pick out something different. So after a few hours, she found something and we got it set up on her bed and to help make it stick... I helped her clean and organize her room from top to bottom. Okay, well I cleaned and organized her room and she laid on her "new" bed and watched me. For an hour and then she went downstairs to watch TV. LOL. We also went through all of her clothes and hand me downs from my teen... picking out what still fits her and making piles of the rest to give away to my college friend who has three girls younger than my youngest. What a task, but we did it! I feel so accomplished.

What I didn't get around to doing this weekend was to make peach jam and a peach kuchen with the dozen or more peaches I have from my co-op, save the seeds of some flowering annuals in my yard before I yank them up--they're looking pretty weedy AND read this month's In Death book for the challenge. I think I read 30 pages or so yesterday, and nothing today. I can't believe there's only two more days left of August!

What were you up to this weekend?

I hope you were having fun and had time to relax and enjoy these last few lazy days of summer.

Cheers!