My Old Kentucky Home

I promised some photos from Kentucky, so here they are at last! We were here for just 12 days, but we visited lots of friends and family, and put many miles on the car. No photo journal of Kentucky is complete without horse photos, so I will start with that!

.

The thing I like best about Kentucky is the green trees and rolling hills. As we drove along the highways, we were always surrounded by green, green, green. I love it!

.

We spent time with my sister Mary and her husband, as well as her children and grandchildren.

.

Mary has a new granddaughter named Hannah, who was adopted by my nephew and his wife. She came from China just six weeks ago. Here is Mary with Hannah.

.

My favorite photo of my brother-in-law shows him in his comfortable gardening chair.

.

We also visited my brother John, a retired sheriff who still lives in our home town of Owensboro. He is a great cook and landscaper, and enjoys his moments of fame announcing football games for the high school we went to. (American football season has already started, and my brothers are pretty fanatic about it.)

A highlight of this trip to my hometown was a visit with my former sister-in-law Fumie from Japan. She and my eldest brother were married when I was just 12 years old, and I credit her with the beginnings of my love for Asia. Sadly, she and my brother divorced, and I had not seen Fumie for 20 years. I was so happy that I found her on this trip. It was an answered prayer and a very sweet reunion, and I am delighted that we are connected again..

Our last few days were spent with my brother Joe and his family in Lexington. Joe is a judge and his wife Jeanne is a nurse. They have three kids, aged 32,22 and 12. The oldest is already married. David, age 12 keeps busy playing (you guessed it!) FOOTBALL. Harley the beagle hound is the latest addition to their family.

We enjoyed our brief days in Kentucky with family and dear friends, and are looking forward to the next stop . . . seeing our kids in Texas.

Beautiful British Columbia

"Beautiful British Columbia!" That's what it says on their license plates. And it is a beautiful province. It's filled with trees, many of them tall majestic, evergreens. Trees, flowers, mountains, lakes, intense blue skies -- absolutely breathtaking!

A lovely double rose.

A silly little carved moose, diligently guarding Olga's garden!

The awesome Canadian Rockies. . .

My handsome husband!

A huge dahlia, about 7 inches in diameter.

Pretty yellow pansies . . . not magnificent, just cute.

Just a river and some rocks, but somehow it's still beautiful. A person could spend years exploring British Columbia, and there would still be more beauty to discover.

The Beauty of Western Canada -- Alberta

This is my favorite photo of our trip. These are llamas, used by some Canadian farmers to guard their sheep. There were sheep grazing in this field too, and the sheep totally ignored me. The llamas were resting when I approached them, but as soon as they saw me coming near the sheep, they all stood up at once, turned to face me, and watched intently while I snapped their photo. Since I didn't bother the sheep, the llamas didn't bother me.

The eastern part of Alberta looks a lot like Saskatchewan.

This is a field of alfalfa, a common crop in Saskatchewan and Alberta.

This is a close-up photo of the pretty blue alfalfa blossoms. I am not a farm girl, so I find all these things fascinating and beautiful!

This is a field of barley--for people, not for cows! The farmers have had a good crop this year.

This is just a weed. It's called foxtail -- used for nothing. But I thought it was nice, so I photographed it!

This is a herd of bison. Not common now, but hundreds of years ago, North America was inhabited by thousands of wild bison.

This is a wildflower called "brown-eyed Susan." No use for this one either, but it's beautiful.

Here I am enjoying a field full of brown-eyed Susans.

As we continued to drive westward through Alberta, the land was still flat, but we could see the Rocky Mountains in the distance.