Pembina County Fair

Alycia and I loaded the fur-kids in the car and drove up to visit her parents in Cavalier, North Dakota for the Fourth of July.  After spending some time visiting with them and wandering around their garden with the dogs, we left the dogs with them and headed over to nearby Hamilton, North Dakota (Pop. 61) for the Pembina County Fair.  It was nearing 7 pm on a warm, breezy, picture perfect summer evening. 

The Pembina County Fair is the oldest county fair in North Dakota.  It's exactly what I thought county fairs were supposed to be.  I grew up in San Diego and went to the San Diego County Fair every few years.  It's a huge month-long exhibition that attracts over a million people during its run.  It was fun (and HOT), but short on animals and "fair stuff" and seemed more concerned with separating you from your money.  At the Pembina County Fair? 

The 4-H folks were out in force and well represented.  There were cows...

...pigs...

...and a handful of sheep.  This fair was big on animals and agriculture, and also held on the hallowed ground and in the sacred halls where Alycia displayed her award winning guinea pig, Mokey, back in the day.  That's right, while other kids were wrangling cows and horses, Alycia was taming one of the most fearsome beasts ever domesticated by humans - the guinea pig.  Alycia claimed that there was a gold plaque somewhere that commemorated her local dominance in showing guinea pigs, but no such plaque was to be found. 

Tito's Summer Plucking

Tito is proudly part Corgi and often demonstrates typical Corgi characteristics, herding, nipping, being generally OCD.  He also has the Corgi power to shed, in fact for a dog his size, Tito is a champion shedder.

In late Spring or early summer Alycia tries her best to help get some of the hair/fur off Tito.  Since he hates (I can't emphasize enough how much he hates it) being brushed, the best that Alycia can do is to pluck out as much of his thick undercoat as possible. 

Alycia plucks Tito as he looks particularly pathetic.  You can see the pile of fur or "mini-Tito" that is forming to his left.  Again, for a dog as small as he is, Tito sheds like a champ.

Avast ye mini-Tito, ye shall rise up and be powerful. 

New Plants in the Garden

A month back I got a fairly regular e-mail from one of the Internet sites I've purchased from in the past (Blooming Bulb) that advertised a huge growers overstock sale with significant savings.  I clicked on the link and well, you know how this story goes.  Before my better senses could take over I'd ordered 125 root divisions.  Granted they were only being sold in increments of 25 and they were quite cheap, but still.  This was yet another case of my gardening eyes being bigger than my gardening stomach. 

That's why it's been quiet on the blog here, I've been planting (and panting) like crazy the last week getting everything in the ground.  It shouldn't be long before we have a whole lot of cool new flowers around here.  So what did I add?  25 each of the following:

• Zing Rose Maiden Pink Dianthus
• Summer Sun Heliopsis
• Paprika Yarrow
• Arizona Sun Gaillardia
• Caradonna Salvia  

Maybe in another month or so I'll have some new flower pictures to post, so stay tuned.   

Awesome Nephew Pics

It's been a while since I posted pictures of my awesome little nephew.  Well today you get a special 2-for-1, Jacob and his little brother (awesome nephew #2) James. 

Deaf Dog Pool Opening

The official Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes pool opened over the weekend.

It was near 90 degrees and quite humid and Shadowfax had a grand time splashing around and cooling off in the pool.  She's trying to get her white lacrosse ball that has sunk to the bottom and is completely ignoring the awesome green GoughNuts Ball that's floating on the surface. 

She mostly likes to stand in the pool, splash around and sometimes lie down in the cool water.  This is the deepest body of water she's ever been in, so we're not really sure how strong of a swimmer she is.

Peonies, Daisies, Geraniums, and other Blooms

We've had a late bloom and a slow start to the growing season this year.  Combined with the early warm weather and very early Spring from last year, our year over year garden comparisons are striking. 

The peonies bloomed almost a full month later this year compared to last year.  Sadly we had some big thunderstorms the night before these photos were taken and the peonies have all fallen over.  Every year I vow to stake these up so the heavy buds and blossoms don't fall over, and every year I never get around to it.  Behold and witness my gardeners shame!

This entire row of peonies were planted by the previous owners.  I don't love (or know enough about) peonies to plant them on my own, but this display is quite stunning when everything is blooming.

We removed a huge stand of overgrown messy lilacs from this area last year and filled it almost entirely with plant divisions and extras from one of Alycia's friends at work (thanks Sarah!).  There are daisies, so-called "wild" geraniums, and irises that have filled in quite nicely. This mound is not quite complete, we're going to wait and see where there are holes and fill them with other perennials. 

The purple geraniums and purple irises contrast well with the white daisies.  We're fairly happy with how this area turned out considering that I have no formal garden training and all these plants were free.  My joy with how this turned out balances out the gardening shame for not staking the peonies and puts me back at even.  

Upside Down Dog

No, not a yoga pose, our dog Shaak Ti.

Shaak Ti spends more time upside down than any other dog I've ever met.  And not just when she's sleeping, oftentimes she'll be awake, just hanging out, upside down. 

That's our little girl. The deaf, blue-eyed, upside down dog. 

Just Married

It's been a little quiet here on Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes over the last week.   But we have a good excuse. Perhaps the best excuse.  You see Alycia and I got married.

The wedding was in Yosemite National Park in California at the historic Ahwahnee Hotel.  It was a small crowd of 40 people, and we beheld the natural beauty of Yosemite in late Spring and basked in the delicious food, refreshing beverages, and splendor of our family and friends. 

Alycia looked amazing in her dress and I couldn't have been a happier camper or prouder groom.  Our photographer Patrick Pike spent almost the whole day with us and the shots we saw on the digital display of his camera looked fantastic, I can only imagine how great the actual photos will look.  And Patrick, if you're reading, this isn't a passive-aggressive "OMG where are my photos already?!?!?", I just thought we'd give you a shout out on this world famous blog.  Seriously, this is like six figures of free advertising.

And to all my regular readers, sorry for the superfluous and flowery language.  At least I didn't describe anything as "magical" (even though it kinda was). Your regularly programmed cynical and sarcastic author will be back shortly in the next post later this week...