Category: Lawn and garden

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Cool rain catchers

During the summer I went to visit a friend of mine. On her porch she had what she called rain chains. I had never seen them before, and she explained that they caught the rain and watered the plant below, that was in a pot with the chains attached to it. She had a lots of really cool ones all around her house. I knew right away that I wanted to get some for my gardens, yard, porch and gazebo next summer. I asked where she had gotten them and she told me she went online for them.

I of course got online and found the garden rain chains that I totally love and want for my gardens next year. So then that led me to start doing more garden planning for spring. I’ve listed all the seeds and plants I want and how I want to redo some of my gardens just for these chains. They will make really nice additions to my front gardens as well. I have a lot of little fairies and what I call peeky people situated in places that one would least expect them, but can be seen if a person looks closely.

While browsing, I found a gutter rain chain and thought that would be a great idea for dispersing more rain water than what my boarder flowers would normally get because of the overhang on the porch.

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Welcome September

September (free clip art)
September (free clip art)

September is one of my favorite months. Temperatures start to cool off, and there are a lot of family birthdays to celebrate. Fresh apples are readily available to use to make caramel-candied apples, and fresh apple cider is available in the stores (no preservatives added – my favorite!) Fall festivals abound, and the whole world seems to start getting ready to hunker down for winter. Some evenings and mornings I can smell one of the neighbor’s wood fire wafting in the air. There is a clean, crisp feel to the early morning air, and I love watching the squirrels gathering their acorns and the leaves on the deciduous trees start to change color.

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Memorial Day garage sales

Around this area, Memorial Day weekend is the biggest yard, garage, estate and what ever type of sale one could ever want, weekend. I try to get up at the crack of dawn and get whoever is going with me around to be on the streets and roads by 8:00 am. It’s fun to make a girls day out of it. I’ve found though, lately my two sons have been wanting to come along. The problem with them going, is that they get tired of looking and road cruising, and then we have to take them back home.

This weekend, my daughters and I are planing on going to the sales and do some other shopping and errands that need to be done. It should be nice if the weather holds. Even if it doesn’t, I know of a lot of barn sales that are going on also. There are at least three flea markets we can hit that are inside, but with the temperatures staying on the warm side, it’s doubtful many garage sales or even tented sales will shut down.

 

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Easter and garden supplies out

I went shopping yesterday and could not believe it!! Easter items are out already. To me, this is getting a bit out of hand. I asked the store clerk how long they had been out, since it looked like the shelves were pretty much picked over and I hadn’t gone to that store in awhile. He told me they had stocked Easter things right after Valentines Day. (SMH)

The great thing though, is that the garden supply section is now nearly fully stocked. Looks like I’m going to get an even bigger jump on shopping this year for my garden. I’m at least excited about that!

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Carving Our Pumpkin Today

Every year I buy a pumpkin to carve for Halloween from a local farmer who has a produce stand a few miles from my house. This year he had a small crop of pumpkins for sale, and they seemed to be a lot higher this year than last. I asked him about that and he said that the drought we had this summer really took a toll on his pumpkin crop. Evidently, the crop was only about one quarter of what it was last year, because growing big pumpkins requires a lot of water and we just did not have enough rain to make a good crop.

With that in mind, I had to decide if I wanted to be extravagant and buy a big one from the few, expensive big ones that he had, or settle for a smaller one that fit my budget. It also occurred to me that I could just not buy my pumpkin from him this year and go to WalMart to buy one for about ten bucks. But I really don’t want to give my money to WalMart when I have a good local option, and I believe in supporting the local businesses and farmers as much as possible. I decided to buy a smaller pumpkin and stick to my budget, and hope that next year’s crop is bigger and better for everyone.

I’m going to carve something like the design on this photo. I like the idea of a more intricate design than just a grinning face. I’m not sure how to make this work on a smaller pumpkin, but I guess I will figure it out tonight when I carve the pumpkin and put it out on my front porch.

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Storms Are Brewing

Like all over the US, we are having some really scary weather. I have to now get a new roof, since I lost so many shingles this year. Not only the need to get a new roof being a big issue, I  also need to replace lawn and patio furniture, gathering up the wood from the trees that went down in the yard. I have to say, it could have been a whole lot worse.

To my readers… Please take precautions and Stay Safe.

Looks like I’m going to have to start looking for construction workers and also someone to cut my trees up into fire wood for the summer. I’d do it myself, but age is settling in and I’m not as strong as I was a few years ago. It’s a drag.

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Holidays are behind us now

With the holidays behind us, it is time to start planning our next vacation, and also my personal favorite…getting ready for spring! I know folks, I have have quite a few months to go until spring, but I love to look through my last year catalogs to get ideas for more herbs and flowers to put in my gardens.

I should of course take down the Christmas tree first and also find a place for the gifts I have yet to put away. Yes, I know it’s kind of late to still be doing this, but it seems like company didn’t stop coming around until yesterday! The holidays were nice though, with only a few minor upsets. For this, I am thankful.

It’s been so bitter cold and there has been so much snow, it seems like spring will not come fast enough, and the almanac is forecasting some really bad weather still to come. Maybe burying my nose in catalogs looking at flowers will take my mind off the nasty cold.

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Time to pull up the flowers

Today I have to go outside and pull up all the flowers and vines that I planted and then put down some winter mulch so the soil will be easy to turn next spring. I’m not looking forward to doing this, since it makes me sort of sad. We’ve had some beautiful weather this October, but I have a feeling that the winter is going to be bitter cold.

I have leaves in the yard that have blown in from other people’s yards. Makes for not only my maple’s leaves to rake, but every one else’s in the neighborhood too!

I miss the kids being small and playing in the leaves while I rake. Even the grand kids are too old to do this they think, so it’s just me and the dogs to tumble and play! At least the with the dogs out playing with me, it makes it so I don’t look like a crazy adult playing in leaves by myself!

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One long weekend to come

Two weeks ago, we had a storm come through while I was at the other house in Ohio. The high winds and rain along with hail flattened my tall zinnias which were one of the show pieces of the gardens. The trellis that was holding my Hyacinth vines tipped over and was pulled down by the wind and also the weight of the vines. I did some hasty repair jobs in order to get the flowers to stand up again with the help of twine but this weekend, I’m going to have to pull the flowers up.

This season was too short to allow me to get as much produce as I usually harvest. It seems to have taken forever for the cherry tomatoes to grow and ripen, and the husky tomatoes on grew the size of golf balls. I wasn’t happy with the zinnias in the front of the house. I had planted what I thought were the giant flowers I usually plant and it turned out that I must have gathered the seeds last year and put them in the packs then marked the contents wrong.

This weekend I’m going to have to pull up all the things in the garden that was flattened by the storm. We had another mega storm come through last night and I’m sure I’ll have more of a mess than I originally have seen. Where the heck did our summer go?

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Cherry Tomatoes and No Sun

I’m sad readers. I have planted cherry tomatoes again and they just aren’t getting the sun that they need to turn red. There are plenty of little green tomatoes on the cherry tomato vines, and the other tomatoes I planted was a type of cherry, but more like a husky one. To me…they would just be an in between cherry tomato and beef steak! LOL!

I suppose I could use what doesn’t turn red on the cherry t’s vine as mini fried green tomatoes.  I’ve not ever looked it up or heard of anyone making these bite size snacks, which I actually am in love with. But I’m going to try it. Maybe “husky” fried  green tomatoes are in order not also!

Summer seems to have hit us for about a week of real summer days. I loved it. But now…judging from my plants…not just the tomatoes, the prices of the produce will double in the cost this  year, like beef has in the last two. Just my take on it folks!