The Download

I love to see other people's phones and apps.  The Wall Street Journal Weekend Edition has a regular feature of celebrities' phones, I can discover and learn new tricks and apps.  So here is mine as of last night. 

Number of contacts in phone:  201

Number of unread emails: 55, 186 (!) -- and 46 voice mail messages, more like missed calls as I'm trying to find my phone

First app checked in the morning:  Instagram and Facebook

Last app checked before bedtime:  Pinterest

Site that sucks me in:  YouTube and Pinterest 

Most-used app:  My Fitness Pal and Facebook

Favorite Instagram feed:  My daughter's and gerald_bulldog and yogainspiration

Most listened-to music:  My iTunes playlists

Favorite podcast/s:  Happier with Gretchen Rubin, The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe,  Smithsonian Channel Pick of the Week, The New York Public Library

Cities listed in weather app:  Houston, Austin, Rochester, Sydney

App most likely to be viewed while in a checkout line:  Facebook

Game you really wish you could delete (or the people next to me):  Boggle (it's noisy)

Funniest text message of the week:   GIFs my daughter and I exchange

Most surprising app I depend on:  Waze (I just earned my crown!)

Favorite fitness/workout app:  Map My Walk and YogaGlo

Favorite shopping app:  Amazon

Most-watched entertainment app:  Hulu and Netflix

Most-liked photo in my Instagram feed:  A video of my front garden sprinkler spinning

Favorite Instagram photo filter/s:  Clarendon I'm using more, Juno has always been my go-to from the get-go

Favorite food related app:  Yelp

Favorite ringtone:  Between the raindrops

Craziest place I've lost my phone:  On top of the refrigerator, That's why I still keep my landline phone.

North by North South East West

Inverted dinner and salad plates for circles!

A traced quarter made the perfect center circle!

Whoops - went over the lines!
I got distracted
watching the Astronaut Wives Club on TV
That's OK, that's now North!
And the center - The Moon!

Voila!
Two coats of sealant makes the chalk disappear
and the pearl paint really pop

We needed a stepping stone near our front gate - to step over the mud and water when it rains.  Checking out Lowe's, hubby found a 12" square concrete stone and suggested I paint it.  Why not?  And why not a compass, oriented to the North on our land.  And on our iPhones.  Thank you, Apple!

Easy-peasy to do!    I used Craft Smart acrylic paint in Navy and Pool Blue (Craft Smart is Michael's house brand paint) and Martha Stewart's Mardi Gras Beads (purple outlined circles), Habanero (red), Carrot and Mother of Pearl.   FYI:  The Martha Stewart Mother of Pearl is a really good paint.  Grab it next time you are in Michael's and can't find anything to use your coupon on...you'll love it.

Spring is in the Pink!

Pink Star Jasmine

LOVE the iPhone 6 camera!

Fun With Focus

Love how the raindrops reverse the palm trees!

Rainy day in Galveston at Stewart Beach. . .

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Clementine

Julep Tulip

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September showers bring. . .

Rain lilies!

Snapped this morning right after the rain passed through

(And mosquito invasions, too.   Sigh.)

All colors are the friends of their neighbors and the lovers of their opposites. ~ Marc Chagall

Color me happy!

Getting ready for next inspiration and to load the color numbers into My Markers app.  (Available for iPhone and Android)  I select what color appeals to me instead of the number.  But maybe this will help keep me from buying the same colors.  I likes what I likes.

Friday Flower

Unretouched pink Gerbera daisy from the new Fiesta Market Place bouquet taken with my iPhone.

To Celebrate Sewing Machine Day, I painted a rock. . .

But I still have another chance, for September 10 is also Sewing Machine Day!

My front garden needed some stepping stones to make it easier to get around to weed and maintain.

Paver rock from Lowe's

Fifteen minutes of listening (trying to) Songza on the iPhone and some Martha Stewart paints. . .

I just need to glaze the top before placing outside.  

And figure out which stations/channels to listen to on Songza.  I do like how they offer suggestions for different times of day.  And they play a very wide variety.  But honestly, I'm still still liking Pandora better.   Songza may be more for my daughter's generation.

Now to see when Paint a Rock Day is!

We have lots of lady bugs!

Update:  It just needed a little extra touch!
And I found the Soft Pop Rock Wake-Up channel on Songza. . .

Garden Update - Tickled Pink!

The rain lilies bloomed -- a cascade of white in the front garden

This was taken the day before. . .

The petals of the unretouched pink lily from the side garden looks like brushstrokes of paint.
(gotta love my iPhone camera!)

My "Scentimental" rose smells as pretty as it looks!

Cora Apricot Vinca

Not pink, but this looked so pretty - "Diamond Frost" Euphorbia.

It looks nice and cool and airy, doesn't it?  Especially when it is 90+ degrees outside - at home and while shopping at Another Place in Time
When two clerks tell me how wonderful it is, why of course it had to come home with me, too.
This was on their description card, "Clouds of airy white flowers all summer into fall on a 2-3' plant.  Sun/Pt. Sun.  Heat and drought tolerant.  Hardy to 30 degrees.  Have had nothing but positive remarks from customers." 

Perfect Timing!

My purple shamrocks for St. Patrick's Day!

Oxalis Triangularis

I am so loving my new iPhone!

Moonrise at Sunset

Houston, Texas had a GREAT sunset tonight!  While I was busy taking pictures to the west, I turned to my left and saw. . . THIS!