Mountain Lady's Slipper

Be still my beating heart.
Would you just LOOK at that stunning flower???
Seriously, I think I would just fall over and float away if I found such a treasure in the wild!
Totally amazing blossoms!!! The elegance and color just blow me away. Each inset is fantastic too, you had to jump up and down when you spotted these beauties!
These are definitely one of my favorite orchid shapes, their puffy "slipper" combined with the wonderful twisting sepals (?) tick all of the boxes for me. *shakes head* You lucky stinker. :)

Then to read about this flower, I had to take a peeky at your stream to see the normal form...holy hallelujah man. You've got JILLIONS of pictures of these flowers in normal, hybrid and albino forms! Such a treat to slobber all over myself as I enjoy your fine photography of these exotic flowers...I am reminded how awesome it is to be able to take pictures of subjects which does them proper justice--I certainly remember times long ago when I struggled with my skills. What a motivator to become a better photographer....you sure do an outstanding job showing us what you find! :) Perhaps one season will line up for us some day and you can take me along with you to find orchids together! :)

Oh my, such a tome you wrote for me...heh...it's fun to chatter on, isn't it? I do love it! :)

Glad you enjoyed my damselfly portrait...how lucky I was the little guy was brave and refused to fly away! I too, feel the same way about damsel-, dragon- and butterflies...they simply adore waiting until they sense my finger is pressing down on the shutter button...then they fly away, turning their little noggins behind them so they can blow raspberries back at me followed by tittering giggles of gleeful mirth. THE STINKERS!! Thus, when I get the rare awesome shot, I'm extremely pleased with my good fortune! Fact is, if only I was PATIENT (what does that word mean, anyway?! :D), I could, I don't know...WAIT for critters to land on flowers etc nearby, but I just cannot hold still! :D The funniest thing would be to watch me pursuing one of these guys...it's rather sad, really, as my success rate it abysmal, but I've thought many times that the sight would have me rolling around cackling to watch the show! :)

Espresso tonic? Never heard of them before! Looked them up online, how interesting! Learned about the dif between tonic and other carbonated water too. Fascinated to learn that tonic water is very sweet along with its bitter taste...I don't remember ever liking it so forgot that it's sweetened. So yeah, it would be off our list but it would be simple to use normal carbonated water, something which we love (We have a Soda Stream in our RV AND in our house...gotta have da bubbles!) .... 20 minutes later... heh...there are ways to make a keto-friendly tonic for those who want to jump through the hoops. I couldn't resist looking! I don't know about you but having the internet is so darn awesome for researching and learning! Truly, I hated being away from ipernity and my dear friends online, but confound it all, I just can't stand not being able to look up stuff!! I bet you know exactly what I'm talking about! :D
(There was a darling rodent running around our Diamond Lake campground...it had a short tail, looked like a form of ground squirrel but *yells and screams* I couldn't look online to check and it drove me batty not to be able to FIND OUT! I did find out much much way too much later that it was, indeed, a ground squirrel species! Heh..)

I sent a link to a recipe for espresso tonic to Steve, as he might be interested...as for me, I'm not much of a fan of mixing my espresso with anything except cream these days, but I bet Steve would love the idea! :) It's certainly interesting! I loved the varients that you described, though I would be much happier to watch you enjoy them, hee hee...(holds my beloved creamy espresso close to my heart and away from meddling additives) :D

Taro...never tried it but I'm aware of it. Looked it up...did it taste a bit like sweet potato? I read that it absorbs flavors very well, which would be a nice thing! Also, have you ever heard of "bubble tea"? I've seen this for sale but never tried it either...taro is offered as a flavor which is interesting too. Alas, the world is running over with carbohydrates and taro is another thing in that category. Would love to try it sometime and bet I'd love it too!

Chocolate souffle...mmmm, I'm sure you guys were in heaven! Now that's one that can be made fully keto...for example...
simplysohealthy.com/low-carb-chocolate-souffle-recipe
Nom nom...actually, there is a "1-minute mug cake" which we used to make all the time, it's very much like a souffle imo...well, ok maybe not but the rich, dark chocolate flavor reminds me of them...a search result in case you are interested:
www.google.com/search?ei=B3kiXf-uEIuJ0wLrzoTIDQ&q=keto+1+minute+mug+cake&oq=keto+1+mi&gs_l=psy-ab.1.1.0l6j0i22i30l2j0i22i10i30j0i22i30.528877.532796..535992...1.0..0.109.982.6j4......0....1..gws-wiz.......0i71j35i39j0i67j0i20i263j0i131i67.UP1ynftvyH4

Your daughter in law is like Steve...he often invents/reinvents recipes. I too, do that...in fact just today I made our nommy sausage egg muffins, all from scratch, no recipe. I don't prefer to be the cook but if I have the urge or need to, I'm able to create easily...it's a super skill to have!

Lupines: nature does it best of course, but gosh the cultivated flowers are incredible to see! And you've seen some of the cultivated flowers naturalized? How cool is that?! I must say that it's very annoying when you try to grow hybrid colors of a flower...the first year they are amazing. The next year they are normal wild types because the color doesn't "fix" in many/most cultivated flowers grown from seed.

Heh on Mr. Sleepy Boy...I read your first part last night and thought I'd reply today after you'd had a chance to finish your letter... :) Glad you're enjoying your tonics! And all of those berries...how wonderful! There were TONS of berries of many varieties getting ready at L.L. Stubb...blackberries, raspberries, thimble berries, salmon berries, maybe huckleberries and elderberries too...they were EVERYWHERE! We can eat berries on keto as long as we don't overdo it, but heh...if they were all ripe I'd have turned into a BEAR! :D

Those crepes sounded DIVINE...we have a glorious pancake recipe which would work well for crepes too...we plan to have some at some point...yum yum yum yum yum!!

How gratifying and satisfying it must have been to share backpacking with your daughter and have her fall so in love with it. Many adventures to come I'm sure, how cool.

Heh...pictures...too many pictures...well, we'll survive and as you said, it just doesn't matter. We'll get to them or we won't. Part of the fun is taking them, part of the fun is looking at them. It's all good!

Ok, I'm out! Have a super evening!