Hola! we felt like shouting out to the sun this morning. What has become a rarity occurred this morning; we were greeted by clear blue skies and a renascent sun. It hasn't forgotten how to light up our world after all!

So out we went with the puppies for a stroll about the gardens, checking to see what's been happening in the rain, after the rain, and finding some work needs to be done. A bit of tidying up here and there. Tying up some things, snipping back others. In due time. The day is yet young.

Although there was no rain overnight or this morning, there was heavy morning dew. Which never fails to convince Jillie that the best place for her is atop a garden bench, lest her dainty little paws come in contact with despised wet grass. Jackie doesn't mind. Like a typical little male, he will disport himself everywhere and anywhere, and challenges Jillie to join him, which she sometimes does.

More often she will just stand there, intently peering at him, and sometimes still stand there while he rampages furiously about the place, racing nonstop in an excess animated appreciation of existence in general and his in particular.

A spin about the gardens in the front takes more time and arrests our attention more vividly. In the backyard, lilies are beginning their bloom, though they've already started in the front. Monarda, in bright red, stands taller now than I've ever before seen it; a product of an excess of rain, and the flowers are beginning to bloom bright and beautiful.

Stella d'Oro lilies, front and back, are sending up their cheerful little flowerheads and they can be depended upon to bloom to the end of the summer. The lovely carpet rose that we planted several years ago has blooms that turn from white to pink to yellow. Rose mallow is blooming and so are the daisies  and those peculiar types of perennial digitalis, alongside bellflowers.

Everything is wonderfully bright and colourful, with gorgeous texture and layering. An excess of beauty if such an anomaly can be said to exist, overwhelming our aesthetic senses.