Fun Monday - the View from Here

Pamela at The Dust Will Wait is hosting this week's Fun Monday! Rather than dusting, she wants us to look outside - through our front door! She writes:

The very first Fun Monday granted us all a view from every front porch. It was winter in the Northern Hemisphere and summer in the Southern Hemisphere. Not everyone has a front porch. Therefore, the rules will be more flexible for this photograph. (Of course Swampwitch has long ago tied them in pretzel knots with her interpretations.)

Here they are:I want to see what you see on any given morning this week; from somewhere very near where you live. Front porch, back porch, down the street, around the corner. Just makes sure it's your neighborhood. Post a photo that will send me to the travel agent to book a weekend at your local Bed & Breakfast.Post your October View on Monday, October 8 .Write a little or write a lot.

I wasn't doing Fun Monday last October when everyone else peeked out their front doors to see what they could see. So I'm going to do what everyone else did last year. Rather than find somewhere close to home, I stayed close - to my front door.

My front door - from the inside.

Then, when I step out, and look to my right, I see my front porch. The wreath came out of my trunk when I cleaned out my car. One of these days it will actually make it inside my house. The little plant on the table is a gourd that my son is growing.

Turning in a circle from right to left, there's the plant the former owner planted for us - and it's still alive! I'm not sure exactly what it is - the flowers look a little like impatients/vinca but the foilage is all wrong. Next is the bed with the pepper plant in it. My son made the stepping stone a couple of years ago. It's beautiful... Like all the acorns? When they fall on the neighbor's roof, they sound like a giant cracking his knuckles over there.



If you look straight out, you can see our front yard (which slopes down towards the house) with it's green green grass. This is the first house I've owned where the grass actually grows! Directly across the street are neighbors we've never met. I know someone lives there because there are lights on at night and the cars disappear during the day, but you never actually see the people. To the left of them is John and Gen. Gen is John's mother. John is in his mid-fifties. He works as a handy man and is in the garage all day. He smokes and drinks and I have a feeling Mom said you can't do either in the house, so he practically lives in the garage. He's friendly and waves but we don't talk much. Sometimes he'll come knock on the door to talk to my husband but that's about it.

This little corner of the front bed is very special... The little pot with the daisy in it in front - the daisy is from my grandmother. She gave it to me as a housewarming present when Darling Man and I moved into our first home after we were married (1995). It lived on our front deck, but at the end of the summer, it looked like it had died. It was tossed into the woods, along with every other failed front yard planting. One day, Darling Man and ZBoy were traipsing around out there when they discovered this daisy - still alive! They put it in a pot and it came back to live on the front deck again. It died back every year, but came back in the spring. Grandma died a few years ago, but her daisy still lives and moves with us. I am always thrilled to see it come back. The little bear statue is a birthday present from Darling Man back when I thought I could grow roses. Turns out I can't . And the long, rectangular rock? A souvenier from our honeymoon in North Carolina.

And what is a post about hearth and home without one of my cats putting in an appearance? This one is Yoda. He's all grown up now! The next photo is of my failed attempt to put a little color near the front door. Last week these were all beautiful yellow, red, and purple mums. Until one day it rained like hell, and the end of the porch roof is right in the middle of the bed. It was like running a pressure washer into the flowers. Mud splattered up and all over them. I tried rinsing them off, but every day it's the same thing. 4pm and the heavens open up. I will have to think of a solution to this... And finally, my mother-in-law's pothos plant. It's grown quite a bit since it moved in. She put the little cardinal in there. I was going to pull it out, but I've grown to like it, so it stayed. And next to it? Those would be Darling Man's wet shoes.


That's the view from my front door!