Post-Weekend, Sneezing

Saturday was a pretty nice day:  started off with the baptism of our sweet 8-year-old friend from next door.  How lovely to be invited.  Ended up with the General Relief Society meeting which is one of my very favorite meetings of the year.  This one was only 1 hour 20 minutes long.  Still, though, I found some messages to lift my heart.  (If only the threesome sitting next to us on the bench had gone with the intent to be lifted. Between the cell-phones constantly being used and passed around, the chatting, the constant rummaging in purses and the rustling of food wrappers from behind us, it was a challenge to remain focused. I shall try to forget the distraction and remember the meeting's goodness.)

Causes sneezing fits!

I've been interested in the shifting of my seasonal allergies from the springtime to the fall.  The cause of most of my sneezing distress is the blooming sage.  A nastier smell is hard to imagine. It tickles the inside of my nose with great vigor - causing so many sneezes that I begin to wonder if I'm not getting a cold.  I don't leave the house without an ample supply of tissues.  This plant is indigenous so it is everywhere!! Hopefully we'll have a hard freeze soon and the blooming (and sneezing) will cease.

This guy thought I had breakfast.  Sorry, bud.

Finally managed to acquire some Nashi pears.  With a price increase of 50% it is mentally difficult to share them as generously as we have in the past.  (The free ones were so wormy we had to dispose of them.  I still shudder when I remember that long wiggling worm falling out onto my kitchen counter.  Eliminated my appetite for the proceeds of that particular benefactor's orchard instantly!!)

Today's gratitude:  for the sunrise.
 I so love waking up before the sun and watching it bring light to the world around me.  I realize that (natural) morning people (like me) are in the minority, but that doesn't lessen my enjoyment of the dawning of each new day that I witness.