Wednesday's Ways and Means.......

My wave petunias are blooming but they don't seem to be too excited about growing.  I suppose that the earlier they are planted and put outside that the chances are better for it to grow vigorously. I am expecting it to pick up the pace as the fall season hits.  Cooler weather will help it out. Today's high humidity should help it to with the buckets of water that is in the air.

The over active swallowtail was feeding on the phlox yesterday afternoon. It was moving so fast I can't believe that it is getting any nectar from the blooms. This is a file photo from a few days ago as there was no way to get a photo of it flipping back and forth.

My sedum looks good this year.  The high rain amounts have kept the plant greener than usual.  It did start to sprawl out but I got ahead of it with a ball of jute twine.  I have the most of it cinched together this year.  I had seen a gardener in a magazine that used a strap with a device to tighten it.  I have an extra framing strap to hold frames while gluing but I had the jute string available when tying up tomatoes. It did work and it won't be so dry that I will see blooms this year.

The second bloom has opened on this lily stem. The plant has a few more buds on it and it looks like it is going to slowly open up one at a time for a ling period of time. 

I planted steak tomato seeds and roma tomato seeds but somehow in one of those packets was a cherry tomato seed.  I am sure the processing areas for seed are not so accurate and a stray seed could get into a packet.  This plant looks better than the one that I bought earlier in the season from Wally World.

There is no change on the romas stages of development. I hope they all  don't ripen at the same time.  We will have to freeze them when that happens. I have a friend who grows tomatoes that says the weather has caused us all to have more foliage this year than tomatoes.  I do know mine are now taller than the fence that they are growing against.

I attended a teacher reunion yesterday for coffee and cookies.  It was good to catch up with them.  The principal guy who hired me back in 1976 was there.  I worked at the school 31 years so I have collected a lot of friends. So many staff persons have come and gone during that time.  It was a small group yesterday but it was good to catch up with them and their families.

My experience is different than all of them because I returned to sub these past five years.  I am going to return for a 10 week period to cover for a woman who is having a baby around the first days of school.  They all were picking my brain for info as to how things were going on in that building.  It was unusual as I am now friends of all of the present staff there who most of the past people have never met, and vice versa. School starts for me on the 29th.

It is going to be a bad day outside as the humidity is going to be very high.  It is getting to be state fair time in Iowa and normally it is a hot time of the year.  The humidity thrown in makes for it to be pretty miserable to be outside.  I have outside work to do but.........I may not do it.