Almost Forgot..........to Blog.

The zinnias are starting to crash.  The front rows are laying down on the ground and the back third row is leaning the other direction. I take so many shots of the flowers that I sometimes don't remember which ones that I have posted.

I like them in all colors but the bright hues like this really are striking. I am still in a quandary in to water or not to water.  I should go out and water when I get bored and just do it.

Some of the plants do just bloom all by themselves and didn't blend in with all of the other plants. The sunflowers are starting to get hit by the feeding birds.  They have to stand on the back side of the flower and lean over to pick out a seed. When I check the seeds, they really are pretty soft and moist.

I picked tomatoes again last n night and they still sit in the chair on the downstairs patio.  Maybe I can correct that when I force myself to water the flowers. We had BLT last night and they are so good. I think we can be eating them for another month if things go our way.

It warmed up to 70 degrees F. and no higher than that.  It is getting so cold so fast making it seem like true fall weather.  I can't imagine when we will get our first snowfall but I can wait for that for a long time. My grass seed that I planted a few weeks ago on my bare dirt patch has all sprouted but the days don't seem warm enough to really encourage much growth.  It may be a muddy mess in the spring if things don't grow any better.

Well, I did forget to blog today.  I did catch it when I opened up the computer this later afternoon, I did have photos, I just forgot to do it. We have a joint effort of peach cobbler in the oven right now as I write.  Thanks for stopping by today.

Friday's Finds.......

 They are just white spots in the sky. I think they were snow geese. Eight or more of them flew over, not in formation.  They were hard to identify.  The bodies where too thick and moving too slow to be white pigeons. They didn't make a sound but seemed to be moving to a new location with water. Our lake is a good thing for migration but we also have lots of bayous around the area of the lake that makes a good feeding and resting place as they travel south. The herons and sea gulls are migrating right now as the fly through.

I mow like a farmer.  I helped mow a yard for a lady up the street at the old place. She informed me very firmly that I was not to mow it like a  farmer.  Right now I am tired, my time is limited and I don't care to have my yard looking like a golf course. My grass was very tall so it matted down when the wheels passed over it. I have nice lines making great patterns all over the yard. My neighbor guys would probably go back and mow it again in a different direction.

 The geese got a major move yesterday making us look twice when we gaze out our windows and see them.

My knock out roses are in transition again.  I have a mess of dead heading to do and maybe I will give them a chance to bloom one more time.  The cold weather is slowing things down so I can't really predict another round of blooms.

The green grass is so nice to see after the whole yard being dormant. Things are dying in the herb garden area but the flowers are holding their  own.

Project with a problem is still not drying. I was touching up spots with stain and decided I would just coat the whole thing.  Apparently the finish on it won't let it sink in and it won't dry.  Maybe later today I will wipe it all off. I am hoping I haven't created a big mess.  My wife said we can always paint it.  I will decide that this afternoon. I may wipe it with a cloth dipped in paint thinner.  Project results will be published when I get time to get to it.

I am off to the old place again today. If I were ten years younger, I would have been done with everything up there but no, it it taking a lot of time.  We are cold this morning but it will warm up again.  Have a great weekend everyone,  Thanks for stopping by at my post.

Thursday's Tails and Tales........

Barney lays in the sun and begs for more treats. He is feeling so much better.  His back legs can be bad on certain days but he now is back to moving around without any assistance. Hearing his pitter patter of feet is a great sound as we went through times when he refused to try to get up and walk. This morning he was up and out with me and checking out the jogger going by him.  He isn't seeing very well but he is adapting to that. We try to keep him on a routine and every once in a while he breaks that routine. Last night he got up and went to the bedroom without waiting for me.  He is doing well.

Our guest bedroom is getting squared away now.  We could take in guests without question. We would have to rush and shove things in drawers.  My wife's dolls laid on the bed for about a month as we decided to place them throughout the house. The quilt was a wedding gift from my mom 33 years ago.  We really never had an opportunity to use it for display. I am not trying to find fault but my mom could have used some advice on its design. The pink square in the middle is so heavily quilted with great designs but that center color is too light colored.  Placing it on the bed gives us four spots of design on each corner. Traditionally it might have had a miniature star burst in the middle. I know that I have done paintings and looked back and wondered what was I thinking when I arranged things in the picture.

This is probably a reposting of a photo of the shelf above the bed. The whole room has a hall tree and hope chest with one antique dresser in it.  It is an antique guest room. We still need to decide on a couple of more paintings to hang on the walls.

The impatience plant has been getting transferred to the outdoors once in a while. I like giving it as much light as possible and rainwater is good for it too. It looks strange sitting out in the open but I tend to make sure it is getting enough water if I can see it immediately in the morning.

This is not my project and it is still fun for us to watch it develop.  When we looked at the house in the winter the house looked like it had been started last fall. On weekends process is continuing.  The young dad of two girls and the grandfather are out there continuing the project.  They put on a porch a few weeks ago and now have added a fancy cover over it.

The grandfather spent the past weekend putting on the trim boards on the widows. The young man did help apply some of the boards but he mostly cut them for his dad. I hope they put windows in the opening and the size does indicate that they will. They have left all of the wood out in the open all summer. I hope they don't run out of time to get it finished before winter.

If I can get the rest of the siding replaced and repaired by next week, we will find someone to paint the old house. This is not our old house but the color scheme on this one looks good to us. We are leaning towards a light grey with white trim.

We are looking at color schemes on out neighborhood houses and have gotten some good ideas.  If the siding was perfect on the old house I would choose  a greyed white with white trim. We also like the idea of a light tan that doesn't look yellow and doesn't look pink. We probably will go grey. Some of the houses are so boring with dark green with the same color on the trim.  It seems to easy to just not to choose a trim color.  Our house is a yellow that the vinyl siding company created.  I am good with that but it seems to be permanent unless we reside with wood.

I am taking a day of rest from doing construction work today. I don't like that my old body won't give enough energy for a five day a week schedule.  I do have tall green grass that I will mow today. Living in suburbia is sometime a pain, as I know that I should wait until Friday to mow so it will look good for the weekend. I really don't go with that philosophy.

Well another blog and another day.  I wish everyone well.  The weekend is coming and if you have special plans for that, it is almost here.  Thanks for checking in on my post. s

Afternoon Posting.....

The Canada goose was all alone. I stood on the deck taking shots when I saw the bird headed my way. Just like a goose hunter I swung my camera around and took a blind shot. We rarely see them flying over in our newer place. Normally there are at least three or more.  There are geese over by our grocery store where a pair hatched out a bunch  of small Canadas. Here, this guy must have slept late and is trying to find it's family.

 This is a radom shot of things that were moved to the new place. My dad went through a stage of making clocks from pieces of hardwood. The walnut clock is partially shown here with a real half of a walnut glued to each corner.  My youngest son said he wanted it and sometime he will find it in his mail box.  The viewer is old. I can't throw it away. I don't have cards of dual photos to put in it but I just could not send it the the landfill. While at the town trash, wood dump yesterday, I saw piles of walnuts that were still in their hulls. Some one must have picked them up in there yard and brought them to dump. I think it looked like a lot of work to husk them, dry them, then open and pick out the meats. 

I was told by a friend that I may just have to bring the green tomatoes inside to ripen.  I looked out of the downstairs window and could see there are some that are ripening again. We dropped off a bag of them this afternoon to my wife's friend. She lines them up on her counter and eats them from the row picking out the ripest one first. She mentioned how she loved the small pear tomatoes.  I had put a dozen or more of them into the bag too.

I still find it unusual for the blue spruce to just have cones at the top of the street. Maybe they are just thicker there, I will have to go over and look at the bottom areas to see if there are cones there.  I know the bluejays will like them in the winter time.

I worked at the old place today, patching in  siding pieces on the one area of the house.My hands are a mess.  Even though I double glove the left hand I can tell I will have to take the day off tomorrow. Arthritic hands seem to be more painful that I had imagined.

We finally have sunshine this afternoon and it is warming up.  Tomorrow will be warmer again but our night time temperatures are cold.

I need to shut this late posting down now and wish everyone a good evening. Take care all.

The Tuesday's Times........

Our Sunday afternoon skies looked like this. By Monday morning it was partially cloudy but the rain did start by Monday afternoon.

It was a downpour rain with water bouncing off of the deck and table. We did need more rain and we had almost forgotten what it was like to have a rainy day.

Our totals by my rain gage were larger than the weather people in Des Moines had said.  The plants really enjoyed all the water but the ones sitting out below, without drain holes, were flooded over and soggy.  I had to tip them all over today to drain them off.

Two and one half inches, plus, I would say was our total.  It rained and sprinkled through the night to get that total. There was not previous water in the beaker as I empty it when I check it. Most of the heavies rain was in the afternoon and while we were out at Walmart and Pizza Ranch.  I had a few showers after I had showered from working up at the old place.

Looking out the downstairs bedroom window you can see our grass has come back from being dormant.  I need to mow it but have left it to get tall, just because.  I think that I saved one time mowing by letting it grow up and when I mow it now, it will look level and even in height.

Check out the bucket with the pumpkins in it.  You can see the rain fell through the above deck and filled the bucket. Some old timers know what the bucket really is and its past function. I don't know if the neighbors are appalled but it works well for me in the garden to carry water and hold things.

On my Photo a Day blog today, you can see the location shots of where I took this photo.  I had crossed the Mile Long bridge and located the boat ramp road.  It didn't do me much good, as I still wasn't close to the flock of swans. This grainy shot is just for proof that they were there. I had only my wife's cell phone and I was in bright sun. The cell phone doesn't work well when the sun is so bright that you can't see the screen. When I returned from working at the old place, this flock and the one across Saylorville Lake was also completely gone.

Since I am home today and not working at the house, I was able to get many photos taken. I had run out of shots to share.  This photo is for my sons to see, down in the basement shop. I got the pegboard up with a lot of maneuvering and finally found hooks to use for the hanging of things.  I have not begun to get done as I think it will be a "arrange as I go" situation.  I have another one of these in the garage but it is a long walk to go to the garage from the basement.

I have duplicate of tools from all of my family members who are now gone.  The rock hammer is one that belonged to my dad years ago, and in a pinch you can hammer a nail with it when a real hammer is stuck in a drawer or not in sight. I really need to weed out some of my screw drivers.  There are a lot if difference in them but some of the older ones could be sent away to somewhere else. My wife's friend needs one pliers and two kinds of screwdrivers. I am always trying to put something together for her and she has no tools in her apartment.

I need to close this down for the day.  It is a bleak day this morning but will clear up this afternoon. The sound of a lawnmower  may be in the future. Thanks for checking in today.

Monday Afternoon Posting......

The bradford pears are starting to react to the fall weather. I had one tree at the old place and really liked its red leaves. They are shiny and bright red into the winter season. I have the two in the f front of the house that were planted thirteen years ago when the place was built.  Everyone was required to plant at least two of them when they bought the property.  Now the locals have rebelled and most all of them have been taken down. One neighbor claimed his was having physical growth problems and the other southeast said he didn't like the leaves hanging on through the winter.  I am not taking them down and I can growl about their stark naked-looking front lawns.  I have been dully told by both that at a different time that they had negative feelings about mine.  I will be keeping them for a long time.

I have shared this cabinet on my blog a few years ago. It never got taken to any higher level with its finish.  It came from an old house that my dad had torn down.  The kitchen of the house was lined on two sides with these handmade paneled cupboards.  When I do work on it, I can show how neat it really is. My dad had hung it in his garage to hold stuff and special tools.  I know that it will become an antique toy and object cupboards. It has a set of shelves that are adjustable, hand made devices of wood to allow you to chose the height that you want them.  The fascination I have of this is that it was all made with hand saw and sweat.  Another part of that old house had paneling on one wall that looked just like the front cupboard. I am thinking that was either the dining room or parlor.

I don't remember string the finished taboret that I built from left over shelving. It was particle board with laminate on it. I built it a little larger than a commercial one as I had the larger pieces of wood to design with. The shelves do slide in and out and the end piece will be good for holding drawing tablets or wet canvases. The thing is on rollers now and it was fun to build.  If I shared this before it has been a few months ago and I don't think I discussed it in detail like I did today.

I worked at the old house this morning.  I have a section of siding that did not weather well on the north side of the art gallery. I am replacing all of the bad pieces.  I keep getting distracted or interrupted by passer-bys. I lost 40 minutes today talking with a neighbor about things. I will have to go back tomorrow and finish that area.  I am hoping if I can stay on it all week that it will be done so I can hire a painting company to come in and freshen it up with a new color.  The north side is the only side that needs the siding to be repaired.

We are getting a good rain this afternoon which is really needed. I usually work half days as I am old now.  I would have gotten rained out if I had stayed beyond one o'clock today.  Thanks for stopping by today.

It's Sunday.....

The last smaller stem now has a flower.  I had to photograph it while it swung back and forth in the breeze. It was turned in such an angle that I couldn't ever take a straight right on photo of it.

The birds are watching and waiting. I have been seeing some in the leaves picking off insects.

The sun is always on my left so I seem to only have shots from the one side of these guys. I am not looking forward to cutting them down in the fall as it takes a saw to cut through those stems.

The Sac Air Force Base continues to send their jets out on maneuvers over central Iowa. The sun reflected on this one air stream as it was coming up on the horizon. I could see evidence of three different jets up there making their marks in the sky.  I wonder how long it takes them to travel from the Omaha area over to us.  It usually is seven in the morning when I open up the curtains of the sliding glass door. As I walk out with the sky clear, they are up there.

Have a great Sunday today.  I appreciate your stops to see and to read my post. Thanks......

Saturday's Stuff......

The painted lady butterflies are plentiful this year. I see a stray monarch once in a while but the paints are swarming on the zinnias most of the day.

I went out after supper and watered the zinnias as they were showing the weathering of drought. I also picked some to bring in so we could see them more closely.  I am hoping the watering will revive them a little bit so they will last longer.

I trimmed back branches this morning out there on the corner tree.  I am still thinking it is just a giant pussy willow bush that just kept on growing after 13 years. There are a lot of sucker branches on it and I should have trimmed them back a month ago when they were smaller. I put all my branches and asparagus branches into the truck. On Monday I can dump them at the city burn site at the old house.

A temporary solution to the clutter on the downstair patio is to use this distressed shelf. The pots all sat around and for now they can look a little decorative while being stored on the   patio. The shelf came from an old barn which does not stand anymore.  It was torn down earlier this spring. My wife's family farm is completely cleared now with the future of strip malls being placed on the land.

This windowbox second planting of morning glory seeds seem to be finally blooming. The plan was to have them growing and fill up the whole side of the decks railing. That didn't happen, as the first planing never germinated.  These seeds were  put in a month ago and they were from the old place last years blooms.

I saw the one bud yesterday getting itself ready to bloom but I was surprise to see that there were three buds that bloomed this morning.  First time blooming in late September. My viewers are  now stuck seeing two different color of morning glories until the first freeze.

While out with Barney this noon, I started removing some of the coneflowers that are dead.  I do see there is a little seed coming off of them so I guess I should leave them for awhile longer for the goldfinch birds. The aster is putting out more blooms but it really is suffering in our dry weather.  I am watering it now every few days to help make it last longer.

Our son took this photo of the goats on the roof of a building in Door County, Wisconsin.  It is a sod roof and the goats always like to be on the highest possible height. There is a tourist store below here that is open almost 12 hours a day.

It is Saturday and we are having a stay at home day.  My wife is suffering with a summer, now fall, cold.  She is better but really needs more time to get over it. It is too hot to work outside so it is a good day to do pick up projects. We still are sort of settling in from our move and I moved some more furniture to rearrange the downstairs bedroom. Pictures still need to be hung but that will come later. I wish everyone to have a great weekend.  Thanks for checking up on my posting today.