Up On The Roof (But Not For Long)

Why was I up on the roof, you may ask? Well, ok you didn't ask, but I'll explain anyway.  Last Saturday I was watering the planters in front of the garage when I noticed the nails on a few of the edge shingles were coming up a bit, so I asked Carl to hold the ladder for me while I went up there to check it out.  

There was a time not so long ago that I wouldn't have needed anyone to hold a ladder for me; we've always roofed houses for ourselves and friends and I'm not afraid of heights at all.   But lately, I'm not as sure of myself as I once was.  I guess it's age catching up with me, or maybe common sense, or a little bit of both.  The last time we put a new roof on the house and garage was eleven years ago.  In fact, Ann and I (yes, we've been friends and partners in crime for that long and longer) put the roof on the garage ourselves while Carl was at work and the boys were in school.  I was 42 and Ann was 29----good grief, where did that time go??

Anyway, once I got up there I noticed for the first time how the sky to the northwest was looking rather grim; there was a fierce-looking thunderstorm approaching rapidly.  I asked Carl to go get the camera for me so I could take pictures of the garden from the roof before the storm (possibly) destroyed the view.  

There Carl goes (all you can see is his hat, lol), off to get a hammer to fix the roof.

We had temps in the upper 80's last weekend and the roof was excruciatingly hot, when I put my hands down on the shingles it felt like touching a hot stove burner. I was thankful all we had to do was hammer down a few nails; I cannot imagine shingling a house in that heat, though I know people do it.  All I can say is, Ouch!

I had the camera in my hand and thunder was echoing off the woods in the distance, so I figured it was high-time to take some pictures.  I stood up on the roof and found that when I tried to focus with one eye closed, my equilibrium faltered ever so slightly, in other words, sit down before you fall down!  So I crept to the edge of the roof on my hands and knees and took a picture:

You can just see the dark blue sky in the upper right-hand corner, that's the storm, and it's coming in fast.

I'm still a little shaky up there yet, but I decided there was no time like the present to take some pictures since the early storm reports were not good; this one had the potential for all sorts of madness and mayhem--hail, straight line winds, torrential downpours, and lions and tigers and bears, oh my.  (Try to overlook the life jackets and other assorted canoeing/kayaking apparel haphazardly draped over the railings on the gazebo.  Doesn't everyone keep life jackets in their back yard?)

There's my washlines, too.  (At least the laundry wasn't on the line, though a second rinse and a flap-dry ain't necessarily a bad thing, lol.)

I'm getting a little bolder now, and forgot all about hammering down the nails as I watch the storm come in closer.  Carl came up on the roof and took care of the shingles while I ooohed and ahhhed over the clouds.  "Just keep taking pictures," he advised. 

Too bad I couldn't add sound effects to this, there was a steady rumble of thunder, but no close lightning yet.  (And I wonder where Joel gets the tendency to go out and try to capture lightning pictures....?)  

Hang in there, ol' Aermotor windmill...but then I got to thinking about how many storms that old thing has endured in its lifetime.  It is WAY older than I am (yes, people, there is something older than me out there.) 

While I was sitting there, a red-tailed hawk flew by, headed for the safety of the woods.  He had a tailwind helping him along, but he was still flapping for all he was worth. 

Getting really dark to the northwest now, but then the sun broke through for awhile.  (I can't get over how much our River Bed looks like a giant caterpillar from the air, lol)

I flopped down on my belly (dang, those shingles are still hot) and took this picture leaning over the peak of the garage.  The urn looks really different from the top down.  That's 'Jester' millet and portulaca.

Sitting up again, I notice the storm is now much closer, though it is still as still can be.  Ah, yes, the Calm Before the Storm.

Ok, the 'calm' is being broken by some really loud thunder.  Maybe it's time to climb down?

One last parting shot of the windmill....notice it's just sitting, not turning at all yet.

Ok, back on Terra Firma, phew, I had some issues with figuring out how to get off the roof; do I try to sit on my ample backside and put my feet on the ladder and then turn around or turn around first on my hands and knees and then back down?  The thunder made my mind up for me, just MOVE!

Yup, that's a storm, all right.

There goes Carl, off to rescue the wheelbarrow. 

Still no wind to speak of yet, I figured we might not have anything to look at after this storm, so I kept taking pictures.

I climbed up on the stepladder to take this one, that's right, I'm not close enough to the lightning, might as well meet it halfway.

Then it really got dark out, but it's so interesting to see how lighting changes make the flowers look different...hmmm...and I thought it was too bad I hadn't staked those tall OT lilies in the background.  Phooey. 

Looking mighty impressive, but still not much going on except a lot of thundering.  And then the wind finally showed up.  RUN!

Good thing willows know how to bend....hmmmmmm.......'up on the roof'......'willows know how to bend'........apparently I'm channeling some old songs here.

I headed for the safety of our screened-in porch on the front of the house.  I love to sit here and watch it rain and smell it rain too, love the smell of rain!  Carl ran inside to watch the radar.

Soon the rain was pouring down by the buckets and my view through the screen looked like a watercolor painting.

Wow, did it rain!  The eavetroughs could not keep up with it, the water was pouring off the roof too fast.  Water was starting to pool on the lawn and this was only ten minutes into the storm.

Kind of hard to see, but the ditch on the other side of the driveway is already 3/4 full, it just came down in buckets.

Finally it started to ease off a bit, but look how much water is already standing on the lawn.  We ended up with 3.5 inches in less than an hour. Just as quickly as it had come, it was over and the sun came out.

Time to go and see how the garden held up.  I never thought the tall lilies would come through all that wind, but they did.  These are over 6' tall.

Pollen smeared a little bit, but other than that, good to go.

The old fenceposts probably helped support the lilies somewhat.  I'm so glad the neighbor brought them over, I wish I had enough money to put split-rail fences all over the gardens.

Hard to believe the difference a few hours makes in the sky conditions.  We were very lucky, the storm did major tree damage in many places, even less than a mile away.

We had a few limbs down on the willow, but everything else came through just fine.  Things were squishy, though.

The windmill made it through, too.

The lilies over by the Formal Garden had no problems, either, not even so much as a missing petal.  We were really lucky.

So calm and peaceful after the storm (except for the mosquitoes, who were having a field day chewing on me.)

This is the time of day I love the most, sunset.  Especially after a rain.

The impatiens were glad of the rain, they have rather tough sledding near Iceberg, our big granite rock.

You'd never think there was a storm raging less than two hours before.  And this year, we have water in the Quarry Pond, just like last year.  Normally, this time of year we have a puddle because the pond is not lined and we have to rely on the ground water levels.

The trees were still dripping, and so was I, though it looks cool and refreshing out, it was very hot and muggy.

 

The 'Tiger Eye' sumac looked really neat backlit by the sun.  When I bought the shrub there were promises that it didn't run like normal sumac (and we all know that was a fib) but despite it's habit of popping up here and there, I still like it.

'Annabelle' hydrangea, wet and weary, but still hanging on.

Even stuff on the front of the house came through really well, those tall grasses can take a lot of wind, too.

My goodness, I have long legs in this photo, lol.

I liked the way the impatiens flowers arranged themselves almost like orchids. 

Even over on the lane bed in Daylily Land (these are reject daylilies given to us by a hybridizer friend) the garden came through ok.  This bed is one of our experiments with planting a shrub and tree border.  So far, well, it doesn't look bad, but it's going to need some serious pruning or something in the future.  I'd have to look for an older picture, but we used to have thirty hybrid poplar trees planted along the lane and they grew to be huge and shaded out the hosta bed too much, so we took them down in 2004 and planted this shrub border instead. 

I guess it all depends on whether or not we don't mind if the spruce and pine and shrubs all touch each other.  In the past, I've been trying to keep a reasonable spacing between the trees, but I guess it's not really all that important.  This border gives us a windbreak from the nor'easterly winds that plague us, especially in the fall and winter, and if it's crowded, I guess, what's the difference?  There's 'Fat Albert' spruce, several Serbian spruces, Tiger Eye sumac and white pine, tamarack and assorted shrubberies.  Yeah, we got a little carried away.

It's a long border, over 150' , and I have an infestation of sow thistle in here and no amount of smothering it with mulch or pulling it by hand seems to slow it down.  I guess I'll have to get after it with some chemical or other, though I hate to use chemicals.  We were thinking if we dug out the daylilies we could battle the weed more easily, but then the daylilies bloom and well........I lose all my desire to dig them out and get rid of them.  For a few weeks, they are amazingly beautiful in this bed.

Hard to believe, but these are our friend's 'rejects' from his hybridizing....can you imagine what his 'keepers' look like??

I'm walking down the road here, swatting the skeeters and taking pictures as I go.  The only damage I saw was the lone willow branch in the foreground. 

We made it through another storm. 

I was glad there was something left for the Red Hat Ladies to see this past Monday.  Oh, the Red Hat Ladies!  I plumb (almost) forgot about their visit, because on Tuesday we had our wonderful Texas guests, Cindy & Shawn here.  

The Red Hatters were a very fun group, but it was so hot when they came.  I have pictures to share on their visit, too, but this one is way too long already.  I'm so far behind on blogging again, we went to Symco last Sunday, so I have tractors to talk about too, and then this weekend is the big Hamburger Celebration in town (with the possibility of hot air balloons landing here again, keeping fingers crossed for the right wind direction) and more guest photographers and this coming Sunday I have another Red Hat group coming for a tea party....so Stay Tuned....things just keep on keepin' on around here.  Never a dull moment.

I'm linking up with Tootsie's Most Excellent Fertilizer Friday

 and all of the fun on her blog.  Don't miss it!