One of the joys of summer is eating al fresco. We particularly like to have Sunday lunch down by the pool. I load everything we’ll need on a tray and make my way carefully down two sets of deck stairs. I like to set a nice table with tablecloth and cloth napkins and a bouquet of flowers cut freshly from my own yard.

This week’s Sunday lunch was a vegetable risotto with fresh peas, asparagus and spinach.

Of course to have a proper Sunday lunch you simply must open up a bottle of nice wine. We enjoyed an Alsatian Gewurztraminer with our risotto.

The weather was lovely, warm but not too hot. After lunch we ended up spending most of the afternoon in the pool. A truly decadent way to spend a summer afternoon.

Dragonflies are cool creatures. On wings of gossamer they flit here and there, rarely stopping for a moment. From a distance they are beautiful, but on closer inspection they look like what they are: insects. Still, their different colored bodies and wings demand a closer look.

Over the weekend, I noticed the dragonflies just resting on the lilies. Mostly they seemed to like the spent buds the best. They begged to have their photos taken while in this uncommon state of repose. So, I give you Dragonflies at Rest.

Here is a slow motion video Rick took last year of a dragonfly in motion. Take a look!

If a lily could fly
it could certainly not ask
for anything more beautiful
to take it to the sky.

more ethereal dragonfly pics to come ...

A group of Indian Pipe Plants emerge from the ground at the same time. To me they look like they are all taking a bow after a great performance.

Mid-June to early July is Lily Time in New Jersey. Not only do I have a proliferation of these beautiful flowers in my own yard, but they line the roadsides everywhere you go. You can’t drive down a road without seeing their orangey splashes of color. I call them daylilies, but people around here call them tiger lilies (not to be confused with the oriental variety of tiger lily).

I just love how they seem to throw themselves open with wild abandon, seemingly taking in everything they can get from the world around them.

They seem to love the somewhat rocky, sunny flower bed next to the pool. They share the space with lush ferns.

Along our driveway at the edge of a patch of woods this lily grows. It never opens further than this and has different leaves than the other lilies. I don’t know if it’s a hybrid, a mistake, or just its own kind.

Soon their flowering season will be over. I’ll miss them but know that they will return again next year to brighten up my yard and the highways and byways of New Jersey.