Another wildflower surprise

In this sea of yellow/brown plains coreopsis....

... I was surprised the other day to find these:

A rather nice little mutation, don'tcha think?

It's official!

I have a new housekitten! This is Josie:

She spent the night in the house last night and is doing well, although I'm sure she misses her mommy and siblings. But she's also been wild and crazy and has had a lot of fun. And I've had a lot of laughs at her antics.

I got her just in the nick of time. The other kittens are gone. ALL. GONE. Mama has taken the rest of the them out for their first hunting lesson, I guess... even the two that aren't hers. When I went out to get Josie yesterday afternoon, not even sure I'd be keeping her in the house, there wasn't a kitten in the machine shed. So I went out to the long grass where I'd seen them playing before, and there I found Josie and Miss Purrkins. Well, I couldn't take just Josie and leave the other by herself. But there out of the grass went Mama with a mouse in her mouth, so I followed her, and sure enough, she led me to the others. I left Miss P. there and took Josie to the house.

Last evening just before dark, I went out to see if they were still there, and all the rest of the kittens were snuggled together in a little pile. This morning, they were gone, apparently off on the hunt.

I'm so glad I got Josie when I did. I'm sure Mama will bring the others back, but whether she'll bring them all back remains to be seen. Mama cats typically take their kittens out, but often they don't all make it back. Whether the mama loses one, or something happens to it, or what, is hard to say. But I wasn't taking any chances of Josie not coming back, because she's the best of them all, in my opinion. :-)

It's going to be a challenge. Wispy hates her. There's been lots of hissing and growling. I always lock Wispy in the entry overnight, but I didn't dare leave Josie out there with her, so she (Josie) spent the night in the bathroom.

Right now Josie's warming my lap (well, a small part of it, anyway), sound asleep. One of the first things on our agenda for today is a manicure for her. Or I guess that'd be a pedicure. Anyway, I must clip those teensy-tiny razor sharp claws! I have many, many puncture marks in my skin. Later will be a bath to get rid of the dirty machine shed smell. Poor kitty... tough day ahead. ;-)

Oh... don't tell Courtney that Josie's in the house! This will be a grand surprise for her tomorrow!

Not exactly fireworks...

... but pretty enough that they could be.

This is how my million bells look now.

Quite lovely, I think... and well worth the effort to keep them from the 'coons/skunks/cats and/or whatever else. I love 'em!

Happy Independence Day to all my American readers! I hope you get to take in some REAL fireworks this weekend!

What are they?

Anybody know what these pink flowers are called? They just appeared in with my wildflowers this year. I've never seen them before, and I didn't plant any new seeds this year... or last year, either, if I remember right.

(Click to enlarge.)

Are they weeds? Maybe I need to hurry up and get 'em out of there before they go to seed?

From the garden

It's not quite something to harvest, but very pretty! Courtney and I saw this dragonfly in the garden on Tuesday. It kept coming back over and over again to sit on the top of that onion plant. Isn't it lovely?

(Do click to enlarge!)