Went To A Garden Party

After Shae had her tea party with Tinkerbell, she kicked around my mother-in-law's garden for a while, trying to see what kind of trouble she could stir up.

More than you might think, actually.

I am pretty sure that she found this impatien on the ground, and didn't pull it off a plant, but I can never be 100% sure with this one. She's kind of a ninja.

She also spent about 15 minutes tormenting a huge fat squirrel -- and while, in theory, I whole-heartedly approve of squirrel harassment (squirrels in my neck of the woods have far too much power), it's still not setting a good precedent to allow her to torture the neighbors by screaming like a tree-rat, so we had a brief time-out.

How she manages to turn even time-out into an opportunity to give "good face," the world may never know. I know I sure as hell don't.

The red mandevilla is probably my favorite plant in my mother-in-law's garden. I'm more of a "medicinal wildflower" kind of gal (my own garden has a lot of bee balm, purple coneflowers, and mountain bluets, plus the butterfly bush that ate Cleveland), and generally speaking I prefer roses and native perennials to tropical transplants (primarily because they're a hell of a lot easier to maintain), but I can appreciate a good showy vine once in a while. And the red of that particular mandevilla is quite otherworldly and divine.