a rose is a rose...

here's a view for you o' today's cuttings along with the pretty blue sky floatin' above moland this mornin'. i have to admit the shot was taken by accident and the blooms weren't snipped by me nor did they end up inside with me.

i have blogged previously that my memory isn't great but i was beginnin' to think it had taken quite a turn toward really bad. if you do any gardenin' o' flowers for cuttin', you probably do like me and keep sort of an inventory in your head of what's bloomin' and gauge where you're gonna be snippin'. but for the last coupla' weeks the explosion o' roses stored in my mind and what i actually found the next day was completely out o' sync.

since jo's taste runs more toward botany that needs to be dust-busted once o' year and mimi is workin' too hard tryin' to get discovered by a hollywood producer (or win the lottery) to care about nature, i knew they weren't pinchin' my precious pink profusion o' petals...and though mini has taken to wearin' a rose in her carefully coiffed tresses or on the lapel o' one o' her vintage 'uniforms', she can't afford to sacrifice any o' her mornin' mirror time and demands her daddy deliver the day's decoration to her dressin' room door. so...i have been left scratchin' my faux blonde noggin' tryin' to figure out the dilemma o' the disappearin' roses.

today the answer to the dilemma was discovered! when i headed outdoors with the heavy canon on my shoulder and my favored orange handled fiskars in hand i discovered my one-time neighbor's housekeeper weldin' her own orange handled tool. the accidental photo was snapped while i stood tryin' to figure out what she was doin' in my garden cuttin' my roses and stuffin' 'em into her basket. i was left rather speechless when she turned and waved to me and as i got closer, startin' tellin' me how glad she was that the roses were so big this year. i'm not sure i ever did say anything before she picked up the basket o' my roses, carried 'em the distance out the gate and down the long driveway and across the wide street to her car.

the ex-neighbor who is at this moment enjoyin' my roses hasn't been my neighbor for at least six years. when she was my neighbor she had asked on a number o' occasions if she could send her housekeeper over to cut a coupla' flowers when she was runnin' low. i had never had a garden for a neighbor to covet before so i assumed this was equivalent to borrowin' a cup o' sugar or such and i always said 'sure'. i may be wrong but i am thinkin' that sendin' your housekeeper across town to fill a huge basket o' 'borrowed' blooms to beautify your boudoir borders on beastly behavior. at least now i know my memory hasn't gotten worse - altho i think i would prefer that over tryin' to figure out how to tell the ex-neighbor that a rose is a rose is a rose....but the rose belongs to me if it grew in my yard and that i am no longer in the bloom lendin' business.

before i go find mini's old locker combination lock to attach to the side gate, i will finally tell all o' you who have written and asked...how i put the old border on the photos. sorry it has taken me so long to remember! in photoshop o' almost any version, while on the layer with the photo you wanna put the border on, choose 'stroke' under 'edit'....when the box opens, enter a number o' pixels you want for the width....choose to add the border to the 'outside'....then click on the color choice in the same box and choose the color you want the border...leave everything else the same and hit 'okay'....and ta da! you gotcherself a picture with a border! i am horrible at givin' directions so if you give this a whirl and it doesn't work feel free to email me and i'll get jo to write out the process...before i have her call the ex-neighbor!not_my_neighbors_garden

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