I'm up and out early, stepping cautiously past the lavender at the corner of our house in case I surprise something in the backyard. It could be a fisher cat or the raccoon that ripped the nest, hatchlings, and mom out of their bird box and left only feathers. Dad chirped incessantly for 4 days, and I grieved with him until he wooed another mate and got busy. His second brood survived as luck would have it, but I still feel sad when I think about his first family. I saw four sweet, little, chirping heads the day before the tragic event.

Behind me is the hose that I'm dragging across the lawn to water the potatoes, which are now knee-high and still growing. Some of the tops have been nibbled off by the deer. That's okay, it won't hurt the potatoes lying deep in the loamy soil. We have more deer in our tiny backyard than I ever saw out my back door in Idaho. I often marvel at the amount of wildlife that inhabits the thin corridor between the houses in our dense neighborhood and the river. Despite all the years I lived in Utah and Idaho with my two cats, it was here, in Rhode Island, that a coyote took my half-Siamese, half-Maine Coon, Grub. I don't begrudge their empty belly. It happened in daylight, mid-March, and they had pups to feed. The year before, Grub fought off two coyotes and got away with only long scratches down his back and all his claws broken down to nubs. He fought hard and survived. He was 19 lbs of solid muscle and attitude. We kept him in way before dusk until well past dawn after that. The coyotes waited.

This has been a boomer year for nature's babies: four chipmunks, who love to chase each other and have made extra plunge holes in our yard, as if they each need one of their own; a downy woodpecker, fed by a doting parent, clinging side by side at the thistle/sunflower chip feeder; a cardinal who appears to be fending for herself now; a pair of red-winged blackbirds fed by Dad with his flashy red epaulets; fledglings of sparrows with stubby tails, trying out their wings; and all sorts of bunnies, the smallest of which is oblivious to us and naive in the ways of the world. I worry about them. The coyotes are ever present, as are the cats, so life seems unusually abundant for July. A hawk nipped off a bird later that afternoon, and I tried to figure out who's missing by the downy clumps of feathers scattered in a circle on the neighbor's lawn. Hard to tell; some are ruled out and safe.

On my way back to clean and fill the birdbath, I douse the lavender with the hose and am instantly inebriated by its scent, breathing deeply as I step back around the corner. I wish I could linger here, but there are prints to be made, a pile of sewing to stitch, and orders to fill. 

Lavender sachets, hand-printed, 5" square.