Tag Archives: herbs

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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2018 WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge – Growth – Herbs

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2018 WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge
~Growth~
“Evoke the excitement of entering a new year
with a photo that shows growth.”
~*~

Right now it’s so cold in our region that the only thing that’s showing any growth around my home is one of my basil plants. I transplanted them from my herb bed last fall to a container to set on the window sill. I’m surprised one of them is doing so well. I haven’t had the heart to use it yet, but it’s just now finally tall enough to use. I’m going to start using a few of it’s leaves for seasoning food sometime soon.

Below is a photo I used in the WordPress Weekly Challenge last August for Textures.
The healthy growth of my herb bed evokes the excitement of the promise of a new gardening season in this new year .

 Wishing you all fun with another year
of the WordPress Weekly photo challenge!

 

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Herb bed, Rose Cutting, a Chrysalis and stormy weather

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We cleaned up the herb bed Sunday.
We cut back the Stevia and pulled up and bagged the dead herbs and flowers.
It looks better, but still sad after the lush year it had.
I discovered that my accidental rose cutting is trying to bud.
I’m so surprised. I doubt the weather stays warm long enough for it to bloom, but I’ll keep an eye on it and see how far along it gets.
My husband came in from working outside and told me to come and look at something. He said it was something I needed to see.
I followed him to the shed with my camera in hand.
He pointed to a space in the shed door and said, “Look at that.”
I was so tickled to see a black swallowtail butterfly chrysalis in the space. It’s overwintering there. How cool is that?
It’s been storming all night here and it’s still going on. It’s the whole show complete with lightning and sound effects along with curtains of wind and rain. Shelibean is not happy at all. He’s snuggled down under a blanket beside me feeling quite protected from the weather-at-large.

Here’s wishing you all gentle weather this Tuesday.

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Rose cutting update & Basil Babies

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My accidental rose cutting is thriving in the herb bed. I planted it close to the birdbath in hopes of giving it a bit of protection through the winter. I plan to transplant it next Spring to a more open spot. ~*~

I noticed some baby basil plants growing on the ground by the adult ones. I decided to try and get a couple to grow indoors for the winter. I have my doubts as to how long I can get them to survive in the house, but it’s worth a try. I found two nice size basil seedlings snuggled down between the rocks and stems of the adult plants. They’ve been quite well protected. I transplanted them in a small pot.I put netting over the pot to keep the bugs out. Our nights are quite cool now and since the babies don’t have the same protection around them, I bring them in at night and set them outside during the day.Hopefully they’ll continue to thrive and I’ll have fresh basil for a while.

~*~

My herb bed is full with the matured plants. It’s quite crowded and messy.
I’ve enjoyed my herb bed. I’m sad to know that soon it’ll go to sleep for winter.

~*~

My plans for next season are already in the making.
Just 5 to 6 months and
I’ll be back out there starting the gardening season again.

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Black Swallowtail Caterpillars, Sunset, Moonrise & Ice Cream

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I’ve always wanted to have black swallowtail caterpillars in my flower beds. They’re so bright and pretty and make beautiful butterflies.
My blogging buddy Patti has a flower bed and posts pretty photos of the black swallowtail caterpillars. I asked her about them. She told me to plant fennel for them.
The only fennel I could find is a bronze fennel. I bought 4 peat pots of them. I planted 2 in my herb bed and 2 in one of my small flower beds. The 2 in the herb bed are flourishing, but the 2 fennel plants in my flower bed are slow growing.

The fennel in my herb bed is where the caterpillars are. There’s oodles of the lovely critters munching in the fennel.
“Thank you so very much Patti! I’m glad I listened to you.”

Unfortunately, I didn’t plan the ones in the herb bed very well because I bet the birds who come to bath in our bird baths will eat up all the caterpillars. But the birds haven’t eaten them all so far, so maybe a few of the caterpillars will mature into butterflies.However, Maybe the fennel in my small flower bed by the porch will take a growth spurt and the butterflies will lay some eggs on them. The birds never are in that flower bed because my rain chain and dangly chain keeps them scared off.

Oh yes and also, I planted a small dill plant in the herb bed and was surprised to see that it has 2 black swallowtail caterpillars on it. I didn’t know the caterpillars would hatch and grow on dill. Cool!~*~
June 1 2017 had a glorious fiery sunset.
It was a beautiful sight to see.

~*~
June 2, 2017 was clear and the moon in it’s first quarter stood out clearly in the early-evening blue sky.~*~
Oh one more thing, we won the lottery! That’s right folks our ticket brought in a whopping $2.00.
We were selfish and blew the whole winnings on a couple of vanilla ice cream cones.
The ice cream was a rare fun treat and a tasty way to enjoy our lottery winnings.

Wishing you all joy and fun
and oodles of good fortune.

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No-Filter Friday – Pineapple Sage Bloom

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9-30-2016-pineapple-sageWishing you all a pleasant weekend!
~*~

CherryWillow is doing a ‘No-Filter Friday’. She posts a photo on Fridays that she took that have only ‘sizing and adding a copyright’ being the only editing/filtering done to them.
I probably won’t join in every Friday. I get busy and sidetracked, but today, I’m joining in on the fun.
I hope you’ll join in some Friday too.

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Easy Basil & Tomato Cream Cheese Spread

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P1040896I had a couple packs of herbed cheeses. We really enjoyed the tomato and basil cheese. We haven’t tried the other yet. I liked the tomato and basil cheese so much that I decided to make some.

I went in search of a recipe. The recipes were either too overdone with oodles of ingredients or made too large amounts for my small family. As usual I ended up making up my own recipe. The recipes gave me a good idea what ingredients to use. I decided on using just 3 ingredients.

My husband really enjoyed my homemade spread. It’s so easy to make. I plan to use this simple recipe as a spring board and add some other ingredients with it to make some other spreads and dips.

——————
Basil & Tomato Cream Cheese Spread

8 oz. softened cream cheese
2/3 cup chopped fresh tomatoes or chopped sun dried tomatoes
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil (or 2 tbsp dried basil)
1/4 tsp Mrs. Dash garlic & herb seasoning

In a medium size bowl, use a fork to thoroughly mix all 4 ingredients together.
Refrigerate for a few hours or overnight so the cream cheese can soak up the flavors.

Serve with crackers or chips
——————–

Happy Snacking!

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Fine Feathered Banana

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pml-2016This collage photo is compliments of my BFF.  This is her parakeet, Banana.
BFF grows herbs for Banana to keep him healthy and happy. Usually she’ll put the herbs in his cage, but the other day she had an idea to put him on a stand next to a basil plant. Oh what a jolly good time Banana had snacking on the plant.

Thank you BFF for sharing your collage of sweet little Banana, he’s is adorable.

Wishing you all a jolly good day.

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Bumblebee, Basil, Carrots, Corn & June Bugs

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P1040328I noticed a bumblebee has taken a liking to my basil. I bet if it made honey, it’d be a mighty interesting flavor; sweet basil, cinnamon basil and lemon basil
P1040421My basil grew so tall that I had to transplant them into 5 gallon buckets. It’s interesting how much shorter the lemon basil is than the other two.
The sweet basil and cinnamon basil are my favorite. To me, the Lemon Basil smells like a cheap perfumed dishwashing liquid.
When a breeze crosses my porch the basils wonderful mingled aroma wafts through.

P1040587The mixed color carrots has mostly produced oodles of white carrots. I picked several carrots and had a few of other colors.  The color ones have more of a carroty taste than the white ones. They all have an edge of hot taste like radishes.
*I’m glad we grew and tried them to see what they taste like.
**In my opinion, for the taste, a normal orange carrot is the best bet to grow.
purplecarrotsThe purple carrots were a fun surprise. They’re orange on the inside. I chuckled when I saw it. 😀

P1040531My husband noticed this weird looking ear of corn growing in the top of a tassel with 3 june bugs feeding on it. P1040530There’s several stalks with weird little corn ears growing high up on the stalks. We’ve never seen corn grow like this. The little ears don’t look fit to eat, so we’ll leave them for the critters.P1040532

P1040545We harvested a few ears of sweet corn to have for supper. Homegrown fresh corn on the cob is mighty tasty and a dandy of a way to top off the season.P1040613

P1040569My husband picked a few ears of the ornamental corn for me to take a photo of. The ornamental corn is maturing nicely and the kernels are getting really tough. We grew the ornamental corn mainly for the wildlife, but I plan to use some for crafts and also for decoration.

P1040523My garden is about all gone now. It’s a bittersweet joy to see the end of the season. We’re already planning for next years garden.

P1040582aThis will be the last harvest of such a mixed variety of veggies now that the main parts of the garden are done.
P1040582In the red container is my rosemary that I posted about earlier this season. I stopped using the netting because the wind kept knocking it over. Rosemary does great outdoors and uncovered. I discovered something about this rosemary. It doesn’t grow any larger than the container. I clip it, use it, it grows back to the same size.
My rosemary out in the herb garden has about doubled in size. So maybe rosemary grows to the size or space available.
I think that’s pretty neat.

Happy August 1st everyone. I hope you have a pleasant month filled with some nice cool breezes breaking up the heat of these sweltering days.

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