Category Archives: Garden & Yard

Redwork Update, 1st corn harvest, surprise squash

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I finally chose a fabric for the borders of my redwork block. I ordered it and it should be here in a couple weeks. The fabric company I ordered from has good prices, but they are slower with shipping than I’m used too. I hope the fabric is the right weight to work well with my blocks. The weight of fabric is one of the hardest parts about shopping online. Oh well, I’ll know soon enough.
As close as I can figure, I’ve got 2 more redwork blocks to go. I’m enjoying making them, but I’ll be glad when they’re all finished and ready to be made into a quilt top. Here’s an edited photo of the blocks I’ve finished so far since I returned to doing my redwork project.

My husband harvested 4 ears of peaches and cream corn for our supper Sunday evening. It was really good, but it wasn’t as sweet and tasty as in previous years. We wonder if might have something to do with the dry Summer we’ve had.

While harvesting squash the other day, my husband discovered that we have a light color acorn squash growing. Since we planted only dark green Early Acorn squash seeds, the light color one on a separate vine is quite a surprise. I think it may be called a golden acorn squash. I hope it gets the chance to mature before the evil squash vine borers kills the vine. Surprise veggies put an extra bit of fun in gardening.

Wishing you all have a fun week.

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Blooming 8 o’clocks video

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In October of 2017 I made a post about wondering if a volunteer plant might be an 8 o’clock flower. I’m happy to tell you that the plant is an 8 o’clock flower (evening primrose) After about 13 years a little dormant seed has grown into a real beauty that brings an extra smile to our evening.Every evening my we go outside (and light the mosquito lamps) and watch the 8 o’clocks bloom. The 8 o’clocks start blooming around 8:15pm and continue to bloom until about 8:30pm. It’s so fun to watch a flower bloom. We’re like two old silly-hearts out there, oohing and aahing with each petal moving and blooming. A bit like watching fireworks.It’s hard to get a good photo in the dimming evening light. To get a better photo of the flowers,  I go out in the mornings and take photos of them. The blooms are so lovely I wish they’d last all day, but they don’t.

I’ve made a video of one of the blooms opening. It’s hard to film at the time in the evening, but it turned out pretty good I think. I sped the video up where it’s 8x faster than normal. Speeding it up lessens the megabytes. I hope you enjoy it.

I hope your week is a pleasant one.

 

 

 

Black Swallowtail Butterfly Egg, 1st tomato & bell pepper, squash and corn

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We made a fennel bed Black Swallowtail Butterfly nursery. I planted parsley and carrots in it because they also like to use it for a nursery too. We put it out near the woods and hopefully far enough from our backporch that the caterpillars will go to the woods to chrysalis.
We’ve anxiously waited for the butterflies to use the fennel bed and we worried that they hadn’t yet.
However Friday I checked the bed and I’m happy to say that there are several Black Swallowtail Butterfly eggs scattered about on the fennel. ~happy dance~We harvested our first tomato and first bell pepper out of the garden. For us, it’s fun harvesting our veggies. We harvested a dozen yellow squash too.Our corn is standing strong and silking beautifully. Hopefully, we’ll have a nice harvest of peaches and cream corn this year.The rains have been a blessing, but I’m glad the forecast is clear for the next few days.

Here’s wishing you all a great rest of the weekend.

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Stormy Wednesday – Shelibean – Mr. & Mrs. Cardinal

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We’re in the midst of storms. It storms awhile and then stops awhile then repeats. I appreciate the rain, but the glay-gloomy cloud cover not so much. The thunder clashing, lightning flashing, rain pounding and the electricity flicking off and on just ruins Shelibean’s day. He sports his thunder-shirt and lays under a blanket as close to me as he can get. Bless his heart.

Here’s a photo of Sheli in his thunder-shirt that I took earlier this month. He was acting unsettled that day and I put his t-shirt on him and it calmed him. His thunder shirt is a neck tube with two slits cut for his front legs and a u shaped dip cut out from the bottom side to keep him getting it wet when he tinkles. As you can see, it’s a little big in the neck area and hangs low, but Sheli doesn’t seem to mind and it still serves the purpose. Shelibean’s home-fashioned thunder shirt has been a big help in keeping him more calm when he gets scared or unsettled.Here’s a few photos of a bright and fun couple that visits my herb bed alot. I think they’re cheerful bits of color to share on this gray gloomy day.

Wishing you all a cheerful Wednesday.

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1st Lettuce 1st Squash

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I’m happy that I finally got a small harvest of romaine lettuce. I have different ages of the lettuce growing. I had to replant them because of two lovely doves eating the seeds. That worked out well because I don’t have to worry about harvesting and storing the lettuce. So I guess I owe the doves a thank you. 🙂 I harvested my first squash. I’m looking forward to cooking them up in a stir fry with this fresh mess of green onions.We haven’t had enough rain to make our garden flourish. If the rain would come for more than a passing shower, we’d be covered in squash.

I hope all your gardens
whether vegetable and/or flower
produce a bounty of goodness for you.

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