Hi,

What a beautiful day.  Started fairly chilly, in the 30’s but officially hit sixty six degrees, but was over seventy by my thermostat.

Yesterday and today I finished up the Courtyard.  The gardens are all weeded and mulched.  The elephant ears are planted.  The water feature is cleaned and up and running.  It’s so cool to walk out into the courtyard and hear the water.  The buds on the white lilac tree have grown noticeably since Sunday.

Modcloth www.modcloth.com was here today to do their photo shoot for a new retro line of clothes they are debuting.    Very nice people, lots of pictures.  The outfits they were shooting were very cool also.  They were taking shots on the Veranda, in front of the Carriage House and even on the beach.  I look forward to when they post them to see how the backdrops (my spaces) look hopefully accentuating the outfits.

Spent some time sitting on the front porch reading my book, Turning Stones into Schools, by Greg Mortenson.  It is so nice to be able to sit on the porch again.  With as much as I love the Courtyard and hanging out on the Veranda, I also love sitting on the front porch watching the street traffic and seeing friends and neighbors you don’t see anywhere as much in the winter.  And speaking of Turning Stones into Schools, it’s a great book for anyone.  It about the Central Asia Institute (CAI) and their goal of stopping fanaticism by education.  They have been building schools in the remote areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan.  They’ve built schools in the heart of the Taliban controlled areas and extremely remote locations in the Himalayan mountains.  And they are focused on educating girls, because under the Taliban, girls have been pretty much forbidden to receive education.  What I found most interesting is how Greg describes the inner relationships that are important in those cultures.  His enthusiasm is contagious also.

Tomorrow is Soup Night at Calvary Methodist Church, my good friend Lisa from Fabled Table www.fabledtable.com runs it.  She’s a great cook (chef) and they offer tasty inexpensive food.  It’s from five p.m. until seven p.m. if anyone local reads this.

I think that’s about it for today,

ed