Though the garden does have some green beans still to be harvested, it’s pretty much done and dusted for this year. I’ve figured out a lot, learning from both my mistakes and my successes, and plans are underway for an even more spectacular garden next year.
June
sweet cherry 100s
June
July
butternut squashsweet cherry 100s
July
August
August
September
What the September gardens lack in fruit, they make up for in flowers…
While the Peace/Bird garden’s seem like their blooms are gone, the birds still spend considerable time munching on the black cone remains, and will continue to throughout the winter…
Autumn is still teasing us with heat, but we’ve had a lot of rain and the temps are dropping, so I’m hoping for a colorful display of leaves this year.
We’ll be in Disney World for a week, leaving 10/10, but we have some plans to divide and move some perennials upon our return. At the end of every garden season, we plan for the next!
Hope the flowers are blooming in your neck of the woods..!
Despite the charming fantasy of Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, the Actual, Factual, honest-to-goodness middle of summer here at Sonnystone is/was August 7. Many of our Spring-plantings have now aged out and we have just enough time to get in a second planting, so I’ve spent the week (mostly) pulling up and replanting, trimming, and harvesting.
Out in the Edible Garden, our tomatoes and bell peppers slowed to a halt under the heat dome, but they are slowly recovering, producing a half-dozen or so new fruits. By early October, we should have a big harvest of green beans, squash, and cucumbers…
The Big Show is the Sunflowers…
Or Maybe it’s the zinnias…
The Peace/Bird Garden is a little faded, but otherwise doing well.
We have a big week ahead – two birthdays, daughter-in-law and son-in-law, as well as our 45th wedding anniversary. We had some plans for this week-end, but Casey is having some dental problems, and we had to adapt so he’ll be better able to enjoy!
45 years is a long time. We never dreamed we’d get this old… Oh, well, beats the alternative. Hope there’s Love flowing around your neck of the woods.
Not much to report this week, but a picture is worth a thousand words…
Tuesday I have the cataract removed from my left eye and I should be seeing in 3D by Wednesday. The W.C. Handy Blues Festival starts Wednesday, as well, and I hope to feel well enough to attend – and that the weather is co-operative. Surely we’ve had enough rain this week to last us a couple… New Harmony Antiques Show is the 14-15th, and the Wilson Auction House over there will be having a seriously good selection of collectibles for us to bid on, so I should have lots more to share with you next Sunday!
And since all this loveliness can not be Heaven, I know in my heart it is June.” —Abba Louisa Goold Woolson.
After a cool and rainy May, June met us with Sunshine and balmy breezes. My cataract surgery went super great and I’ve been outside breaking all the rules to finish up the gardens and porches. I have been careful, but I couldn’t resist.
Let’s take a walk around the house, starting in the Edible Garden. Along our trellis, the cantaloupe, butternut squash, cucumber. and watermelons are all coming right along. None of the lima beans I put in sprouted, but I’ve got two more cucumber plants to fill the bare space soon.
On the outside of each side of the trellis are 14 bell pepper plants – 8 California Wonders and 6 Big Berthas. In between the peppers and the trellis are sunflowers of all kinds and they are going to town! At the south end of each side are moonflower vines, sure to shine.
In the back and on the sides are nine tomato plants – 4 Better Boys, 1 Early Girl Bush, 1 Celebrity, a sweet cherry 100, a husky red cherry, and one called chocolate sprinkle that is alleged to taste like a black cherry.
Nine squash – five zucchini, four yellow straightneck prolific – are having the time of their lives, flowering like champs, but where are the bees? I have anise hyssop to attract them, not to mention a yard full of clover, but so far I’ve seen very few.
The peas are flush with edible pods (Oregon sugar pods II) and I’m often out there snacking.
I’ve been so bored with my own cooking lately – like for the past year – and decided to learn a new style: a countertop griddle. So far, Casey is better at it than I am, but I warned him if he is tooo good, he’ll end up doing all the cooking. We used an old highway sign as a heat shield, which I think is kinda cute.
Around here on the front porch, walking in from the north side, I’ve moved all the coleus that I propagated last winter and they look great! I guess I’ll end up with twice as many next year….help!
In the Peace/Bird garden, the hummingbirds are back buzz-bombing each other at the feeder, and Casey had a skirmish with a squirrel (he won) the other day. This garden is all native perennials and they are so reliable and calm – you might say peaceful. I am so thrilled to be able to see the avian display with a clarity I’ve never experienced. It’s a dang miracle.
I think I’ll grab a handful of those sugar peas, sit out on the swing, and enjoy. Wish you were here…
I have had to be on Prednisone for ten of the last fourteen days, finally finished up a couple of days ago, and it has been excruciating for my brain. That stuff makes me so speedy, I can’t focus, I can’t sleep, I’m irritable, my stomach hurts…I’ve done too much griping and had one day of out-of-the-blue tears. I guess the upside is that my back and right arm are not giving me even a wince of discomfort and my head is back to its normal thinking, which is probably not normal, but you know what I mean.
We went to the Shannon’s School of Dance Recital last night and it was great! Really super. I haven’t seen the Jr girls in a while, so just being around them was a treat.
Samantha and Nova
In between storms, we’ve been able to get most of the garden planted and it’s looking good.
I still need to plant the green beans, and have plans to get a flat of marigolds and stick them around everywhere I can fit them. My nasturtium is starting to bloom out on the South Porch, but I want to move them back to the Edible Garden, and that involves a lot of switchy-changey of containers.
The Peace/Bird Garden has been loving all this rain.
This will all need to be completed by Memorial Day, as I have my first cataract surgery the day after. While I don’t mind not being able to weed, I Love to plant, so it’s working out well to have it all done beforehand.
I’ve talked to several people who’ve had the cataract surgery and each had different ideas about what lens to implant, but none had any problems with their procedure. That’s reassuring.
We’re planning the Cemetery Loop from Mount Carmel to Parkersburg to Marion Church to Albion to Grayville and say hello to the Ancestors. It’s been a year since Casey and I spent some time cleaning some 100plus-year-old gravestones and I’m curious to see how they look. We scrubbed and used some stuff called “wet and forget” that is supposed to continue to work over time, so we’ll see. We don’t usually leave decorations in those old cemeteries, but I will be doin’ up the Eatons’ front-row plot in Grayville with a saddle this year.
Hope this missive finds you well and enjoying the season!
We’ve been out in the Peace/Bird Garden all day, moving around purple coneflower, autumn sedum, bee balm, a few surviving rudbeckia, and discovering forgotten gladiolus bulbs scattered throughout. I had already moved a lot of bricks to make the peace sign a double circle and I’ve been imagining where I wanted to move the echinacea for a while now. The day was perfect and we got a lot done.
Later this week, after a few cold mornings get past us, I’ll add in the perennials that I overwintered: garden phlox, delphinium, and liatris.
I’m feeling the Springtime vibe and lovin’ it, so excited to visit Hillside Gardens for tomatoes and peppers and hit up Rural King for seeds and who-knows-what! Hope you’re feeling Spring-y where you are.
I’ve been sick since Wednesday, flat out on the couch both Thursday and Friday, finally somewhat upright yesterday. My little brain has been doing the Nursing Process since the onset of symptoms — that is Analyze, Diagnose, Plan, Implement, Evaluate — and as I’ve analyzed the hell out of the illness, I have no diagnosis. Isn’t everything Covid now? It’s not a cold (what happened to our old familiar rhinovirus?), but the body aching is reminiscent of flu. The coughing could be either/or, low-grade temp same. After my #3 vaccine, I was sick for a day, and somehow this feels the same, only with lots of coughing/snot. I’m calling it Covid because I want to finally face this thing I prepared for all these years…
Even though the diagnosis is iffy, the Plan is the same, so I implemented decongestants, cough drops, tylenol, plenty of fluids. The most important treatment, for me, is to lie down with a box of tissues at hand, and let my body do its healing thing. Our immune systems are wonderful and hats off to mine for its valor and ongoing dedication to my well-being. I still feel rundown, and definitely brain-fogged, as if I’ve been gone for a while, but I have rallied, so I’ll evaluate the Plan as a winner and carry on.
It’s been rainy, a good time to be stuck on the couch, and of course the gardens love it…
(I didn’t realize that I had the long lens on my Nikon when I shuffled off to get these pictures between rains, but it’s an interesting change of our usual view…)
The Edible Garden
The Peace/Bird Garden
The Jose’ Family is moving into a new apartment even as we speak…err, write. Their new place has a large terrace and I’m excited to help Melissa plant and grow a nice garden. They still plan on visiting here at the Acres in a couple of weeks, so I’m gearing up for Camp. I’ll let you know as soon as I know when they’ll be here and we’ll plan parties!
Take care of yourselves! Watch out for mystery viruses!
Sorry for my absence, but I’ve been caught up in the World of Irish Dance, on the edge of my seat for the North American Irish Dancing Competition that was held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada this year. Emma placed #5 in the U16 group and Eliza placed #17 in the U11 pack. The Jose’ family, consisting of my daughter, Melissa, and son-in-law, Eric, as well as the two EE’s are having the time of their lives and it’s sweet to see.
In the meantime…the garden grows on…
What you don’t see — the bloopers, if you will — are this year’s fails. It seems all of our zucchini plants are boys, so no zucch forthcoming; something broke/ate the bottom stem of one of the canteloupe plants (we have three back-up); after a dozen nice sweet peppers, there is no sign of bloom or fruit. But, we’re feasting on tomatoes, brought in a couple of pounds of potatoes, and will soon have a bumper crop of cucumbers and green beans. I think we’re in the black…
It’s Day 3 of my News Block. I feel exactly like I did on election day 2016 — sick to my stomach and afraid. I cannot allow myself to be emotionally manipulated by media, both social and otherwise. I have put up the Forcefields to block the anger from entering into my Peace. I am struggling to Be Here Now, in The Present with The Presence.
I’m so glad I have my gardens and my grove where I can throw myself into the trimming, the harvesting, or the contemplation of birdsongs or the purpose of creepy-crawlies. There have been a lot of bees around, a good reason to rejoice, and I’m feasting on homegrown tomatoes and peppers. Gratitude abounds here in the Present Moment…
Edible Garden
Coneflowers in the Peace/Bird Garden
I’m calling this Shady Grove now; an excellent spot for Contemplation.
Casey’s been staying busy remodeling Goldie’s interior, my design, of course, and she’s beckoning us to take a trip off-grid…
I hope that you will take the time to clear your mind of the “slime from your video” (Frank Zappa) and your timeline. Come back to the Present and receive the power you need to go forward in Love and
The News from Sonnystone Acres 