Hanna, how could you?

So I leave town to work for the weekend, and come home to find out Hanna stopped by (uninvited, I may add).




Granted, we really only got hit with bucket loads of rain, so it could have been a whole, WHOLE lot worse. Unfortunately, the event I was working on was outdoors, so I got to spend some up close and personal time with that bit--, er, lady myself.

Once home, I assessed the damage and tied up the plants as best I could. I noticed the corn cobs were....missing! Most of them, in fact. Had they blown away in the storm? Had someone (gasp!) stolen them?

I looked around and found the answer.

Freakin' squirrels.

Even the ears still on the stalks look a little picked over.

In fairness, I didn't actually *see* the squirrels, so I shouldn't blame them. Could be raccoons, or opossums, but whomever did it is on my you-know-what list.

Well, at least the corn stalks looked kind of cool in front of the house. It's almost time to cut them and let them dry out to create a festive fall display for the porch. Thankfully the man doesn't read this blog or that last sentence may freak him out ("You're going to do what with the corn stalks on our porch?!").

There is one giant beauty (about 9') that was just starting to bloom Monday morning. I'll be back at the house Wednesday night to see how she's held up.

As for some of the sunflowers that couldn't be saved, I decided to make a festive bouquet to cheer myself up.

I have a lot to catch up on. While I was on blog sabbatical, hundreds of unread blog posts queued up in my Google Reader archives, and one of my favorite bloggers even announced she was expecting a new little blogger (congrats, Courtney! :-). Thank you to ALL of the amazing folks who stopped here from The Inspired Room's Fall Nesting Party. Many of you were new to me so it's been great to see your blogs, too, and to read your thoughtful comments. Mahalo.

I've picked up some super cool little bargains over the past couple of weeks (the thrifty gods have finally smiled on me!) so I'll be sure to post them over the next week.