Thursday's Sharing

 The new tray feeder is successful. It is all newer lumber and construction. I also figured out how to get it to level on that railing. The doves love tray feeders or eating off of the deck,

 

 

My cardinal showed up this morning and he was soaked from the morning rain.  I installed the new tray feeder late in the afternoon yesterday and he didn't show. I was glad to see him out there this morning. 

 The sparrow like sharing the space with the red one as long as he can get some seed. I bought some new sunflower plus safflower seed mixture and it is a hit for sure with the cardinal. I have house finches back in the area now but I don't have a visual to show yet. It is still on my camera chip. 

 

My geraniums in the front are blooming now. I like the flowers on this plant but they do show up as spots in the green rather to be close together. 

 I just realized that I hadn't shared my new tray feeder. I was tired of the old one that wobbled and wouldn't sit level anymore. I used all scrap wood pieces and small clamps keep it on the metal railing without causing a damage. Okay, old age is setting in as yes I did share this already. Check it out again if you want, or scroll on down. 

 The robin's nest next to my sliding glass door light is now being guarded by two birds. I went out for a quick look and was being attacked by one of them. The one is sitting shot gun outside the area. They try to draw you away from the area by flying ten feet away to hope you will follow.

 The other robin was actually sitting closer to the door ready to pounce. I am sure for now that they have eggs in the nest because of their behaviors. I will take the stairs down the deck to get out there now to keep from upsetting them.  Twelve to fourteen days to hatch and then the feed and leave the nest in a very short time. I hope all goes well. 

We got our gifts sent to our granddaughter this morning. She turns seven years old tomorrow. She can open her gifts on Saturday. Thanks for checking in today.  

 

 

 

Middle of the Week

 A perfect sculptural form in the garden. The striking red and white makes it a beautiful specimen.

 The hosta are at their best this year with the heavy rainfall for the mont. The leaves are bigger and there are really more of them. I like how they will grow in and among what ever I challenge them to do to do. 

 My newest purchase has grown large now after the two years that I have planted it. 

 I gave away one part of this purchase and kept two for myself. It is one of my favorites in the collection of hosta.

 I was frustrated with my tray feeder. Today I went into the shop and made a new one from all my scrap lumber. It is better and sits straight on the rail now. I am going to throw the old one away and not try to reuse that wood. I am getting to the point that I like to throw things away. I need to get back to doing more creating in wood. I can move my saw outside now and keep the sawdust down in the basement. 

It was a cooler day today and it only sprinkled once for a very short time. Rain forecasted for tonight again.  Thanks for stopping by today. 

Things for Tuesday......

The red and white stripes are getting to be weathered but these four seem to be looking good. The are semi closed because they are still cold and they haven't warmed up yet from the night air.  I noticed in the picture that a lily is really getting large as it grows up to make buds. I hadn't seen it until I saw this photo. 

 It is like a hidden objects in a puzzle, but can you see the peony buds in the flush of green. I expect that it will be a week before they actually bloom.

 My fernleaf peony still has not put out a good bloom that hasn't been messed up from the rains and hail. This bud may actually give me a good bloom. I hate to see the season to go buy so fast for it and never get some good blooms. I mentioned earlier that two of my friends have these blooming and they look untouched from the weather. 

 

My vining honeysuckle has its first real bloom. I know there is another name for this vine but I am not able to pull it out right now. The whole shrub still looks mostly dead. I don't want to cut it all back because I am not sure that it will restart and grow. 

 I am really happy with this hosta. I am dreading figuring out how to dig away the tulip bulbs that are too close to it. I have another hosta that has this same problem. I dront really want to dig all of it up and then replace the hosta but that may be what I will do. It would be nice if the gardener, me, didn't do such a planting in the first place. 

I spent my morning at the endocrinologist getting things checked out. I am doing better that ever before and was told to keep up the good work monitoring and working with my blood numbers. It isn't easy to do that but I will keep up the effort.  The parking ramp, which is four stories high, is finally repaired. The one thing that is disturbing is that while I am parked at the very top of the ramp, my parked car vibrated and shook as cars drove by.  I am sure they know it is safe but the swaying of it seems to be a problem.  I am sure I was in more danger when people kept trying to pull in front of me in intersections. They were trying to sneak through. I guess that is typical in downtown driving. Again, thanks for checking in today. 

 

First Day of the Week

 All of our rainfall for the month has cause trees and grass to look so healthy. We have had over 7 inches of rain in this month. Our last night's rain was over nd inch. I could hear a little bit of hail mixed in with it as I could hear it on the roof in the middle of the night. The spruce is in a race with the maple in their height gains. I did not plant either on of these but they do seem to be too close together. 

 My fern leafed peony suffers from all of the rain when it comes to have good blooms. The colors are there but the blooms really look beat up. I have seen friends of mine who I gave this peony and their blooms are looking so great. I assume they are planted in a sheltered location. 

 

It was a spur of the moment to put this hosta here but I think it was a good idea. I do tend to garden like a crazy person when I place things willy nilly. 

 

I won't be around to see this be a good tree. It is a Japanese Maple Bloodgood.  I am thinking I will go to a nursery and buy a three or four foot tree like this and move this to some other location. Mail order supplies are not such great ideas in this situation. 

It has been a cloudy day most of the time today. We have just enough wind to make the 72 degree F. temp feel very cold. I went for meds and pizza this afternoon and I got chilled.  I guess I can stand next to the oven as we warm it up for cooking of the pizza.

Thanks for stopping by today.  

Sunday

 It is an old fashion variety with the medium sized blooms. It is and older type as the whole bulk of plants starts blooming all at once. The newer varieties have a long blooming time. I am not sure where I got thie start of this but it may have been a cemetery find. 

 

The blooming of these may seem early but I am sure in southerin Iowa they started a couple of weeks earlier.  

The creeping phlox also is fading as its seasons of bloom is short. It does keep spreading and I will try to stop that. 

 

The privet leafs out again with the great yellow green colors. I moved this shrub from my old place and it has done well planted on the south west corner of the house. 

 We have a pair of cardinals in out neighborhood. The male sneaks in once in a while for seeds. My wife likes to record videos of him in the top of the tree and record its calls. I rarely see it at the feeder as it lands, grabs a seed, and flees for its life. 

We are having a cloudy day today with moderate warm  temperatures.  Rain is predicted again tonight. Maybe we can add enough rain to break over into 7 inch totals for the month. Thanks for stopping by today.

 

Saturday With Sun

 

 

 

I mowed the front and back yards today. The grass was so lush that it had to be done in the backyard. It has been reported that we have had a total of over 6 inches of rain this past month. We may add to that total this coming week.  The weather is such that we still heat the house up in the morning and cool it in the afternoon. Pretty soon we will be hot all the time but for now it is something different each day. I spent the time to get a few groceries  this afternoon. I can tell my 76 year old body will need to rest from mowing as I still am not in shape for it. Tomorrow I will rest.

Thanks for checking in.  

Friday's Report

 

The tulips are starting to fade as the rain and winds have beat them up for the last few days.  We had tornado warnings for a couple of hours last evening and went to the basement for the evening.  We have been through one tornado a few years ago at the old place and we now don't hesitate getting to the shelter space. Back then we had to deal with getting a semi blind 90 year old man down narrow bad steps. I also had to drag the border collie across the dining room wood floor and take him down while the sound of a freight train was roaring our way. We had houses and barns destroyed just across the way. 

 One lone iris bloomed this morning that is on the northern side of the house. There are three or four more buds on it so we will have more color.

 In the front yard gardens these two plantings responded to the heavy rain. I was surprised to see them all opening at about the same time. There too are plenty of buds on these two plants for longer times of blooms.

 

I have plant wars going on here. I guess I will pull or dig out the tulips as the hosta is special and I want it to grow larger.  With them crowded the tulips didn't bloom anyway. I don't know who the crazy gardener was that put the hosta in late in the summer with the tulips not in sight at that time. 

We have a cool 52 degrees F. this morning. I bought and spread some more top soil this morning. I also bought grass seed and have it down in the needed places. Others are out pulling weeds in their yard and a commercial company is busy mowing a neighbor's yard with big equipment. The one other neighbor is out with his new puppy and talking across the fence to another neighbor. The other newest neighbors have bought a new refrigerator and it is being delivered. It is like the whole of the world is out and about after the big long lasting storm.  It is an active place today.

Thanks for stopping by today.  

First Iris....More To Come

 The first iris bloom is out this morning. I have been watching the buds in the front yard but not in the back.  When I saw that one spot of color while working in the backyard I immediately went to see what it was all about. It is one of my cemetery iris.

 

I was out this morning laying  out bags of soil in the back corner of the lot. The grass isn't growing there and now that the tree was removed it is getting good sunlight. I spread the dirt out and looked up to see the crimson king maple leaves from underneath the tree. They actually do look red from the underneath when the sun shines through but all in all the leaves look brown as a whole. 

This is another view of the locust tree in the front. The colors are little different than a regular tree with a green yellowish tint on them. The leaves on the tree are different also by the way that they resemble fern leaves.  

The yellow tulips are a nice addition to the front garden.  the creeping phlox looks good up against their colors. 

 I mentioned these iris in the front yard planter and we will see which one bud will bloom first. With working in the yard this morning with dirt I realized that I didn't buy enough. After the many trips to the hardware to fix the supply water valve yesterday I just didn't want to go back today. I need about two more bags of the treated top soil and also I am out of grass seed. I really could use a new flower pot for the a fern that I bought the other day.  Maybe tomorrow I will go. It is less than a mile up our hill.  Thanks for stopping by today.

Windy and Warm

 This geranium variety has single flowers on its fancy leafted plant. The variety can be invasive but easily cut back,

 while wandering in the front yard I noticed with surprise that this iris has buds on it. It is one of my favorites and originally was in a cemetery where I harvested one rhizome.  Photos will follow as the warm air is helping for the blooms to form. It was a breezy but warm walk out there that seemed pleasant after a long winter. 

 

The next variety of tulips are now in bloom. It is a soft yellow and I seem to have spaced out some of them wildly with big spaces. 

 The locust tree has grown a lot since we moved here. It was a young tree and now is a full large specimen tree dominating our front yard. It is one of the reasons I haven't hurried to replace the one flowering tree that we lost last fall. It may be too many trees as this one keeps getting larger. 

I spent the morning driving back and forth to the hardware store for a water supply valve for our bathroom stool. The one that we had started making load noises as if it were the turn off valve went bad. I bought the first part to replace it and it was not just right. One connection was right but the supply tank connection was too small. I took the new one back, and the hose, and the old one back to the hardware.  I required communication with a guy who knew plumbing at the store. We finally found the right part and I returned home and replaced it. Then I returned one more time to the store because I wanted my money back for the wrong part. I did buy some soil for spreading on my one area in the yard where no grass is growing. I just carried the dirt back and forth with me and I will unload it tomorrow. 

I have too many wrongly purchased parts in my tool room that I really just had to make one more trip to get my money back. The helper showed me how to repackage it for the return. I felt like a yo-yo. They were glad to see me each time.  Thanks for stopping by today. 

Tuesday's Things.....

 I successfully moved some bluebells to the back of the house. It is a strong plant once it gets established. 

 The trees that one inherits when they buy a property can be a good or bad thing. This is a crimson king maple tree. I like the shape and it is a wonderful shade tree. I am not a fan of the dark deep red-brown color of its leaves. There is never any red on the tree except when there is a new sprout of a leaf on the trunk or like right now. The sun is at just the right angle to change the colors to red for a moment. The leaves really are not red but the sun shinning through the new leaves can show that for a moment. In most cases the leaves look black to me and as the tree looses its leaves in the fall they are a dark, blackish color. I am still glad the tree is there. Both of those two trees have grown taller in the eseven years that we have lived here. 

 

I have more of these tulips on the back garden. I must have had a large number of bulbs in that pack. I walked around everywhere and put them in the ground.  

Happiness is when the newly planted hosta come up in the spring. I moved them out to put in a rose bush and these look happy here nest to the front step. The hosta are up everywhere and they will look great with all the rain we have received has made them look good. I have a lot of grass seed in two different locations that just isn't sprouting.  I am still very concerned about three of my rose bushes. The look like I am gonng to have to cut them way back or even take them out of the ground. Our winter was so hot and cold all season so they could have been destroyed by that. I guess I can go buy new ones if the need be. 

Thanks for stopping by today.  

Monday's Mentions

 An afternoon still-life tells a story. The coffee break in the afternoon and a favorite sugar free cookie is waiting for me. A new cup of coffee and a new art magazine is waiting for me to review. My wife and I talk over all that is in the magazine studying the artists and their mediums. 

 Preciously before having coffee I ventured out outside and snapped some much needed photos for blogging. The yard looks good after it has been mowed and the rains have everything looking green. The front planter is starting to take form but flowers have yet to mature to make it look good. Iris will be blooming there and I will plant some annuals in there. 

 It is windy and the greens are swaying and out of focus. The background greens are in focus. It is an amazing tree that has doubled in size in the past years we have lived here. 

 My white and red Rembrandt tulips are a little later in bloom that the red and yellow ones. The hail and rain didn't do to much damage to the newer blooms. The older blooms are tattered. The peonies are not budded but I bet they will be soon. We are having a warmer week this week even though we were at near freezing this morning. 

 The yellow tulips are spotted here and there and are later than all of the others. I can get some good close up shots once they get full developed. We spent the morning buying birthday gifts for our second grandson's birthday. He turned ten and will receive his gifts late. We wrapped and mailed them out this morning and it will take a few days to get to the Chicago area. He has had a few parties and gifts keep flowing for the week so we like to be late at sending our gifts. 

Thanks for stopping by today.