This family of birds was living in the rafters at the Longstreet Farm in Holmdel, New Jersey.
My daughter had the opportunity to milk a cow at the farm. On the left is that cow’s calf, whose birth helped the cow be a plentiful nurser.
In local sad news, the mama of the guinea pigs we adopted for the summer has died. We buried her in our backyard. In the words of my veterinarian friend, she was “geriatric” (over four years old). The guinea pigs’ original owner comforted me over the phone, saying, I was afraid this might happen. I think I was more upset than my daughter. My daughter noticed that I’ve been checking on the remaining two a lot, and she said I’m glad you don’t fret over me like that.
For more Nature Notes, visit:
In memory of Bobbie (click to read Michelle’s memorable post about her dear friend):
Tea Set from 1890's at Longstreet Farm in Holmdel, New Jersey
It’s been quite a while since I did a blog review, and I owe a few people links, so I will aim to do them when I can on a Sunday morning instead of a Friday. I have more photos from the Longstreet Farm, but it was such a hot and sunny day that many of the pictures I took came out too bright. I may need to ton them down in Photoshop. The above one is a model of what might have appeared in the Longstreet farmhouse in the 1890’s. The original farmhouse was built in 1775 and more parts were added on in later years.
Ilana-Davita posted an apricot cake recipe, and it inspired me to make a peach cake, though I used an apple cake recipe and modified it.
Mrs. S. recommends the book Don’t Go Near the Water: “This wonderful, lighthearted, and hilariously funny novel focuses on a US naval PR unit based on Tulura (a fictional Pacific island) during World War II.”
On the subject of funny books, Jew Wishes recommends The Frozen Rabbi. But she didn’t like the end. Too bad.
Here’s the scene a few hours before the fireworks on the 4th of July at Asbury Park beach on the New Jersey shore. It was a great place to people watch. We had been sitting in the area where there are white nets shown in the picture, but then some policemen nicely kicked us off that part of the beach because the fireworks were going to be there. It was worth the hot drive down to the shore, the waiting around in a crowded area, and the annoyance of needing to move our stuff for the 15 minutes of fireworks. See a few of the fireworks on my Skywatch post.
Sky Watch Friday is a photo meme with photos of sunrises, sunsets, blue skies, gray skies, pink skies, orange skies, fireworks skies and any other kind of sky posted by bloggers all over the planet.
We enjoyed spending the evening of July 4th on the beach of Asbury Park, New Jersey. Asbury Park was a fancy place to visit in the early twentieth century; in the late twentieth century, it took a severe downturn. Recently, it has been revived, with restaurants, shops, arcades and theater. One of the famous landmarks in Asbury Park is the Stone Pony, where Bruce Springsteen used to play. My husband, who grew up near Asbury Park, said we were a few blocks away from the Stone Pony.
This sky faces west. The silhouette of a building is the theater. The sky in the top photo with the green shell faces northeast. Both sky photos were taken within about ten minutes of each other. My husband and daughter went for a ride on the lit up Ferris wheel while my son and I held a spot on the beach.
Ah, the sky now turns red.
Finally, the part we were waiting for as we sat on a corner of the beach: the fireworks.
