A special birthday and of course...pumpkins.

This tree is in our back yard and marks the corner of our property.

I love this tree.

It is so big and I think it is neat that it is "owned" by no one.  

It sits on three different pieces of property.

I will apologize now for the pumpkin intensive post...again.

But..this is sort of an obsession for me. 

I will be sad when I have to cut the vine.

I LOVE hanging out with my pumpkin...we have lots of chats about weather

and other things going on in life.  Pumpkins are very understanding and have deep knowledge of 

life and great insight into issues surrounding us.  :)

They also keep me from being sad about Smudge's issues.

She has been doing okay lately and I will be taking her in to the vet this week for 

even more blood tests.  We are doing a more thorough test on her thyroid function. 

Keep your fingers and toes crossed that we may find some answers to her problems. 

Sparky the pumpkin has really been doing well.

We are up to approx. 430 lb. 

That was the last measurement that I took on the 18th.

I missed measuring her on the 19th....so I am sure she is probably over 450 by now.

Smudge is still not cooperating when I try to take her picture.

I get this.....

Or this...most of the time.

This is my neighbor's golf course. 

We love playing golf here and I got another hole in one the other day!!!

Yay!!

That is Elk Knob State Park in the background. 

Love that place too!

I think that Smudge has been talking to Zippy!

Now this is a bit better..

I have been seeing a lot of mushrooms lately.

The wild thing is that many of them have been heart shaped.

This beautiful guy stopped in to snack on a culled pumpkin that I threw 

into the mule pasture.  LOVE the red coat they have right now.  Not to mention the 

beautiful velvet antlers.  

This is a really pretty antique bottle that we have and I took a picture of it for 

a photo challenge shot.  

I was in the yard the other day checking on...of course...one of my pumpkins and Scatter

cat climbed the arbor that I made to get a birds-eye-view of the situation...

Or maybe it was just to get a bird...

Ha ha ha..

Another view.

All right!!

Much better posing! 

Zippy and I took a walk up to the neighbor's meadow.

I could stay here all day.

The Queen Anne's Lace was incredible.  

Once again...

Elk Knob State Park.

Zippy.

So....this is the kind of respect that I get....

At least it is a fun loving and more interesting pose.

Grrrr...

I see...back to the norm.

Sparky is really plumping up here. 

Love these Salpiglosses.

Such beautiful pattern and color!

Okay....so you threw me a bone...Ha ha ha..

Nice to see your smiling face, Smudge.

Mr. Cool.

(I had a cookie in my hand)

Smudge....

Hey......

hand over that cookie!

Another Salpiglosses.

This sign says...."Stop here on Red".  

So glad they pointed that out.

I usually stop on the other side of the light.  Ha ha ha.....

I forgot my cookies.

This is what happens when you forget your cookies.

Aug. the 18th was a very very special day....

It was Zippy's Birthday!!!!!

He was 9 years old on the 18th. 

He got a bright new Kong ball for his birthday.

Pretty much the only toy he can actually play with...

He is Zippy the Destroyer of Toys....

Plus....some more cookies.

Love you Mr. Zippster.

I just can't stop taking pictures of these flowers.

The COLOR!!!

Hey....Let me in!!!!

Just look at that cute face.

Oh...wait....that is not so cute.

Ha ha ha..

Resting her ear and lip on the deck railing.

Zippy off playing with his new ball...

He rolls it down the hill and then chases it.

Hilarious.

This is the beginnings of Chuck the Oak Hill Iron dog's hanging concrete head. 

Just the scratch coat of concrete on top of the armature.

I will apply the sculpting coat next! 

Stay tuned.

Pond monsters and pumpkins.

A very very rare (well..not really) look at the 

Smudge-Ness monster. 

or 

Swamp Thing

She had just had a bath.....

This is Sparky the pumpkin and her growth over the past week or so.

She has been gaining anywhere from 16-20lb. per day.  

I have high hopes for Sparky.

She is named after Sparky The Gourd Lady.

Here she is in her infancy.  

Disregard that angry model....she was mad because I asked her

(very nicely, I might add) to leave the pumpkin alone.

Sparky gaining ground.

Getting bigger...

This is around the time that my main pumpkin model started to give me more attitude.

Closing her eyes at just the wrong moment and standing right in front of Sparky.

Hey.....Smudge..turn around so that we can see your smiling face.

Come on...I will give you a biscuit.....

Yeah....whatever....

This is much, much better.  

I will just have to revert to my stand-in model...Zippy The Destroyer of Toys.

Just look at that!  What a great model he is.....

By the way...you can find Zippy in the 2013 Pet Prints Standard Breed 

Bull Terrier calendar. Photo taken by Close Encounters of the Furry Kind. 

Zippy is a professional model.  He has even been on the cover and centerfold of 

Dog World magazine.  Of course he never lets any of that go to his head...

Well...maybe he does...

Zippy would not get out of bed on this morning for his photo shoot. 

So....I used my coffee cup.  

I guess that I will have to revert back to my original model..

I don't know if you can tell in this shot, but Smudge was stung by a stinging insect of some 

sort and her face and nose are really swollen.  

This is the same day....after we got back from yet another vet visit. 

This is also after the swelling had gone down.

She was having difficulty breathing, and I had to rush her in to see our wonderful vet.

With the epilepsy medications that she is on, I was unsure of what to use to stop the swelling.

Luckily it went down very quickly.

Two days later....we were at the vet again for seizures.  

I could not get them to stop and had to take her in for observation.

I gave her one Valium immediately after the first seizure and then another an hour later to get them 

to stop.  It was scary and I am so glad that my vet was there to help us.  

We have now added Potassium Bromide to Smudge's list of medications. 

I am hoping that it will help.

We will also be going in for a CT scan as soon as monetarily possible.

Before this episode, it had been 20 days since her last seizure.

Hey....does this pumpkin make my butt look big?  

Ha ha ha..

Her Smudgeness...

Smudge stole Oracle's Jolly Ball the other day and has really been enjoying it.

She was upset in this shot because her bone was stuck under the chair. 

Really loving the Jolly Ball

The front garden is looking very nice this year.

Except for the smallness of everything and the Viburnum that was 

burned by the late freeze that we had....Better than I thought it would look though.

Miss May the donkey....such a sweet girl.

Danza....she is a little camera shy.

Zippy!

I can't tell you how much we are really enjoying our new deck railing.

It has been great in keeping the dogs out of trouble.

One dog in particular....

Zippy and Smudge.

Screen damage by Merle.

The cat uses it for a cat door.  

My last spiral planter.

Zippy standing with his concrete dog head.

Surprisingly he does not bark at this one.  

Another view of the front garden.

This is the first spiral birdbath that I made.

I made it a bit too deep for the stand that it was going to fit into.

So....I kept it. 

I am going to make more of these with a matching stand. 

This is the second one.

It fit much better.  

This was a commission and the stand was one that the client had and loved.

The basin that was in it broke and she needed a replacement. 

Have a great week everyone!!