Tuesday's Things to Share.......

On Monday we met the kids at their hotel to have breakfast.  AJ loves breakfast and sits quietly as he devours his fruit and waffle. We spent the morning with them before they took off to return to the Chicago area.

AJ's great grandfather was a farmer but both AJ and his dad, Andy, will never be able to experience or see that farm or all his tractors.  His dad only knew my father as a carpenter and professional retired city person. 

AJ does have a fascination with tractors and his barn set is enjoyable to him.  He would not know how to put animals in corals and move cows back and forth to the barn for milking.  I shared with the family that my metal barn set didn't have enough fencing parts for me so I used clothes pins to make my own large fence area for my animals.  AJ's farm set is from a garage sale and it is really a great looking toy.

For some reason I spaced off the work of editing these photos and they were downloaded without any fixing.  Here is a better shot of the barn.  As with all hotel rooms the glare of the light from the window messed with my photos. I had two different days of photo shooting and it took most of the evening last night to catch up on some of the editing and doing yesterday's blog. Our son sent us a large load of shots that I have yet to view and or borrow for my storage file. I will rest up a little before I even open up his file.

While we visited the kids on Monday morning we received a big rain at home.  Everything needed to be watered and it saved me from having to do that.  I know it was a hard downpour as the flowers look like they have been beaten down from the storm. 

The photo at left was taken before that.  I do have a couple of planters that don't have drain holes which mean I have to find a way to lean them to the side a bit to get some of the excess drained out of the pots. Rains north of us were really heavy cause flooding is some smaller towns who rarely have flooding.The old can that I have morning glories planted in was operated on with a long handled screw driver and a hammer.  I pound drain holes while it was planted.

I have many photos that were taken from the past two days.  I will share a few more on many different days so as not to saturate my blogs with only one theme.  My son carries AJ on his back or shoulders a lot so I have lots of photos of that.  My wife and I both are aching with sore muscles from picking up the little guy.  He is not fat but sturdy so he is almost at the stage where the grandparents will not be picking him up.  I held him a lot on Sunday but had to brace myself to keep him in my arms.  He could be a  squirrel  once in a while when I was holding him so I had to be smarter than a two year old.  I foresaw trouble and would deter some leaning backwards and squirming like a monkey.  We really did enjoy see him and rebonding with him.

We are headed off for some craft supplies this morning and check out the iHop 75 years anniversary.  It is 75 cents, short stack today, and we will go snack on those during our visit in town.  It is too wet to work outside and our air quality remains bad. We do have a little clear view of sunshine this morning but they say it is deceiving.  Last night when I was walking Barney the air was so saturated with smoke and chemical things that it looked more like a heavy fog than what it really was. We kept the house closed up and ran the air to keep it out of the house. 

It is Tuesday and I hope all are well.  Thank you for stopping in today and do stay safe. 

The Day After........

We attended the wedding anniversary party for my oldest brother Ron and his wife Julie. It was a great day being able to be with all of their family.  The have three children with four grandchildren who all live in Arizona.  We don't see them very often and it was a good time catching up with them.

A special guest for us to see was our children Andy and Patricia and our grandson AJ.  He was overwhelmed by such a large group of people that he didn't know.  It didn't take him long to warm up with Grandma and Grandpa and he got to meet a lot of relatives. He loves cake and he savored every bite of white cake and drank punch to wash it down.  I didn't get a photo but he had a big smiled on his face as he played with the frosting and then put it in his mouth happily.

My brother met Julie at an A and W Rootbeer stand where Julie worked. In June, 1965, they were married.  In the transition of dating time, Julie graduated from Nursing school in Des Moines and Ron discharged from the army out at the state of Washington .  They married and drove off in a brand new candy apple red slantback Mustang going to the Phoenix, Arizona area.  They have lived in Mesa ever since then.

As a food critic I can tell you the cake was wonderful with all that frosting on chocolate and white cake. Family was slim for help so I was able to slice sheet cake to speed up some of the work at the table.The cake had been delivered late.  My wife and I whipped out some quick cake on plates as guests were already arriving.

The bashful boy turned into a monkey by the end of the party.  He loved the party because a train track was only a block away and he was able to watch it many different times as it went through town.  The train whistle brought back so many memories from when I lived in the area so many years ago.

Aj is almost 2 and a half years old now and he was so good to see.  He talks very well now and is in his "Why" stage.




I am late blogging today as we spent the morning with the kids, eating breakfast with them and hanging out for a while at their hotel.  We grabbed a sandwich with them and everyone went home.  I had so many photos from two days of photoshoots that it took a long time to download and edit it them all.   I will be sharing a lot of these as time goes by.   Thanks for stopping by today.

Sunshine and Heat........

Field lilies  photograph crazy with the automatic camera.  The bright sun changes colors and so does the shade.

Monarda, bee balm, is starting to show off all its color. There is a bee in the flowers as I took the shot but he is in the back where I could not walk. This is the tallest that I have ever seen this plant.  I have phlox that are also exceeding their normal height.  Lots of foliage and lots of height causes it hard to walk on any of my paths.

I found another garden ornament hiding in the basement.  He was glad to come out side but he doesn't look like he trusts the guy next to him.  The wheat-like straw in front of the turtle are stems that grew from the winters birdseed that fell on the ground.

Sometimes flowers look so similar that I think it is just the same as the one on the other side of the yard.  It is not.  I don't remember this blooming last year but I did take a shot of the other kind to show you for compasison. This daylily above has a star shape of three triangles of petals with smaller ones in between.

There is such a great difference in this flower as the petals all curve back like a tiger lily and the petals are exactly the same size. More yellow inside the trumpet but the base colors are the same.

A busy Sunday ahead for us as we travel to southern Iowa for a 50th anniversary for my oldest brother and his wife.  We are sort of helping with it but once the set up is done the younger people can take over. I haven't shared with that family that our kids from Chicago are coming today.

They, brother and wife, never asked about them so I never told them.  I think the surprise element will be great with AJ running into the room. The event lasst for 2 hours and we will be there early.  We will spend time with Andy and Patricia on Monday as everyone will be tired after today.  We will be eating breakfast with our grandson in the morning and that is always fun.

It is going to be a hot one for us today and that will cause rain storms in on Monday. I hope all will have a good day today.  Thanks for stopping by today.

4th and more...........

My neighbors have hollyhocks.  They are all so wonderful to see.  I don't understand why that mine have all died out.  I do have a few stray ones that won't bloom this year but my majority of plants are just gone.  I guess I live on the wrong side of the street.

On my side of the street I do have a wonderful birch tree.  It is the only one in the entire town.  I had a teacher friend who imitated this planting with the shorter clump birch but no one has a tree. It has to be 35 years old or more now. I gave it a trim yesterday as the tree tends to have its branches hang low and hit me in the face.  I can see by its age that I am going to have to start trimming it up higher and it will be looking very tall with more trunk showing.

The white bark looks great all year round.  I know it is becoming a large tree when I look up and see how thick it has become way up at the top.  Did you know that asprin is made from bark of the birch tree? The native American Indian used the bark fro years as a medicine.

This is the very last bloom of the one yellow Asiantic lily group.  I have many more to yet bloom.  This was the very first to bloom.  I have a large stand of another color that I need to prop up as they are starting to lay down on the ground from the weight of the buds on it.

I bought this for my parents and I now have it in my gardens.  It is planted in to different places and they both started to bloom at exactly the same time.  It is a smaller daylily but very striking in color.

I have saved two of the stems from the smashed daylily.  I doubt they bloom but it doesn't hurt to try.  I will need to research my blog to see what color that it is from last years blooms.  For now I will wait and see.

1965

Here is an oldie but goodie for me to share today.  It was 50 years ago in late June that my oldest brother Ron married Julie.  There is a anniversary party in Murray, Iowa on Sunday.  From the looks of things it seems to be turning into a major family reunion. The couple moved to Mesa, Arizona 50 years ago but are choosing to celebrate the day with friends and family from their old tromping grounds. Julie is from Osceola, a neighboring town to Murray. He father is still living and will be able to attend. I will share more about their kids on another post.

My second oldest brother next to the groom, is Rex, who lives in Yorba Linda, California.  I am the next guy standing tall for being 15 years old.  My brother Dwight, 18 in the photo, passed away in 2008. The bridesmaids are all friends and a sister of the bride and the guys in suits are all cousins from all sides.  The little girl is lives near Lorimor, Iowa and is a cousin on my mom's side.  The best part of the day tomorrow is AJ our grandson and his parents will be attending.

I did a little ranting on my Photo a Day blog while sharing this photo.  I will be calm on this posting and just wish everyone a great holiday weekend.  I wish you all to have a great 4th......and thanks for stopping by today. Enjoy all the dogs, burgers, sweetcorn, and pie everyone !!!!

The Day After.....

As we were having that last cup of coffee, having finished breakfast, I could hear a work crew out at the corner of the property.  I knew that they were going to tear out two squares of our old 1930's sidewalk and rework it with new concrete walk that will ramp up to the new highly elevated street.

Instead of approaching the sidewalk for removal from the road they approached it from the side.  The problem with the side angle was that the plantings I had there were in the direct path.  A small fork lift machine went in on top of it a couple of times tromping down, smashing it all.

This is what it looks like now after I removed all of the smashed plants.  I was exhausted by the time I had dug and replanted every thing so I did not return to collect the two hostas in the back.  I was foolish as they returned to get one more block of cement out of there I lost the hosta on the right.  I know it is trivial things but it is sad that someone of the company or the city mayor who keeps driving by on his golf cart could not warn me that it was going to become no man's land again.  I planted the area  ten years ago when the city came in and took away the large silver maple that sat there.  I planted the garden in memory of the loss of the beautiful tree.

So as a result of this I now have white iris planted all over my property.  I had a large daylily that was very mature which I divided three times and I saved a yucca plant. The remaining hosta was dug after their second work session and I have replanted it in its full glory up the street.  I didn't have the heart to cut it up into parts as it was in full bloom.

I fully understand as to why it had to be done that way but communications of what is happening continues to frustrate the whole neighborhood.  My neighbor guy was out to see me last night while I was walking Barney.  He isn't around during the day to see all that is going on but he wasn't happy.  His sidewalk opposite me was 5 years old and they removed a huge section of and took it away.  The reason is they have to ramp all the sidewalks up to meet the height of the road.  This whole job really questions the new generation of people who are in charge.  When the asphalt has to be removed, they will have all these ramped up sidewalks to match up to again when replacing it again.

This is a smaller daylily that I have in bloom. It is a quieter statement in the garden with its subtle color and small size.  I think this was one of my arboretum purchases in the past years.

I planted a lot of white iris along the back of the house where this is growing.  I put in a couple of parts of the daylily there also. Planting in this area forced me to clear unwanted grasses and weeds before I could plant.  It was on my list to do and I had to move it to the top of the list.  I left all of the green trash on the grass so I will be raking that all up this morning.

While doing my rescue I also found tulip bulbs.  I will replant them in a new area.  I remember that the flower is a small red and white one and I post its blooms every spring.  I don't know what to do with the tiny little ones that are there but I assume I am to plant them at the same height as the larger ones.  I think I am correct that I don't plant these as deep as a normal sized tulip bulb.

I really don't know where I got my start of coneflowers but they are apparently of a lighter colored variety.  Most call them purple coneflowers but mine do not get that dark in color.  I will be scouting wally mart to see what they still have available. The rains have made them grow very tall this year.

The hollyhocks in this area didn't survive the winter. I don't understand why as they have a very long root. I have a few hollyhocks that are out by the old windmill and maybe they will shot up some sprouts for blooms.

Well, yard clean up is still in order and I will need to get some mowing done today.  I should be able to stay on my chosen tasks today and I hope it stays a quiet day.  The furnace was on this morning as we were colder this morning than yesterday.  We are promised to get up to 80 degrees F. so I will shed long sleeves before I get done.  I hope all is well with everyone and that you all have a good day.  Thanks for stopping by today.

Thursday's Things.......

Another daylily that has just started to bloom is this pastel yellow one.  I had bought it for my parents and when we closed the house down I brought it back with me. It is a smaller flower than the hybrid lilies.  It being smaller means it keeps it shape better than the hybrid ones which seem a lot more fragile and wither up more quickly.  I don't know if I caused that camera to do the bluish tint on this shot but I didn't think that I had. It is very colorful to see.

The apples are agin on the roof of the garden shed.  I suppose I should trim that limb but maybe it is a good thing.  I can pick them from the roof and would not be able to with the ladder.  The two factors that are helping out with this tree are my friends bees and all the rains.  The apples look really good this year.  Apple pie will be in order along with some fried apples. Maybe some applesauce if I can get motivated to do it.

One of the jars of cherry jelly looks like this.  Ball has bought out a company and we now use pectin from their company.  It was the only brand we could buy and I am holding back recommendations of the product.

The directions say that it may take a week for the jelly to really firm up and to put them in the refrigerator until they do.  The certo product always worked for us right away and was jelled by the next day with out chilling it.

It will be very frustrating if those jars do not jell.  We had a little problem with me filling the jars to the right amount so I had to put leftover amounts in glass dishes.  The two dishes of jelly that I had in the refrigerator did set up and we had toast and jelly for breakfast.  The taste of the jelly is great.

I do have one tomato on the vine.  My tomato plants are looking really great and it is about time to put in the steel fencing posts to hold up the cages.  It works good to have a post in there and I can sometimes tie a free falling branch up to the post.  I have many blooms and I am sure the tomatoes will start to set. As I look at this photo again I see the other end of the stem is forming one too.  My plants that I started from seed have done very well.  I bought a roma plant at Wally Mart and my plants have caught up with that already.

The stargazer is really showing off with all the multiple blooms.  My  other whiter stargazer has big buds that are ready to start opening.  Maybe today they will start to open.

I have lots of things to do today but a new job has been added to my list today.  While watching the road crew working near my yard, I watched a machine drive on top of my corner garden. They are removing the first two squares of sidewalk to the street and are going to replace the space with a newer section that will ramp up to that tall asphalt road.  I am not mad as much as I am disappointed. A little communication from the city would have given me time to pull up all those plants and move them.  It is consistent with the small town mentality.  The reason they had to drive on the garden is they didn't get it removed before the new road put down. The couldn't drive on the new road so they had to come along side of it.  They had no choice to come in on it as they would rip up my yard if the drove on the yard. 

I had a daylily with dozens of buds on it ready to bloom and that is the location of the large white iris.  I have three hostas there too and all of it can be dug and replanted.  I will add it all to my new garden area.  I have a wheel barrow full of rain to transfer to the tomatoes and I will do that pretty quickly.I then can dig and load up my planting material and go find new places for it.  I like doing that kind of thing anyway but usually I like doing it on my one terms.

We are cold today and it will not warm up so much.  I will not wear a coat but I might have a couple of layers to wear.  Thanks you for checking in on me today. 

Middle Time........

It is the middle of the week and the street construction on the north side of our house is done.  We aren't allowed to drive on it yet so we are parked at our neighbors. The street to our east has not been started.  That street runs the total length of the town so it make take a lot of days to complete it.

The stargazer lily is sending fragrance all over the orchard area.  It is the first time that I have seen it bloom and it is a nice flower.

This is the best that I can do with my camera. The orange moon was outstanding to see but I didn't mess with a tripod to get the shot.  We are told that the smoke from Canada fires is still there. It did change the moon color last night even as the wind was blowing from the east. I could have swiped some great shots of it from facebook but I think mine gives you the fuzzy feeling of it.

The regale lily is almost done and ready to drop one petal at a time from the stem. I have other lilies opening and I will share as they develop. 

This little guy left a mess for me in my driveway.  It is a pile of gravel that will need to be leveled and smoothed before I can drive the car into the drive. I think the new crowned road will be dumping water into the yard now and I will have a creek running parallel to the road.  It is lower about three feet in and the gravel that I level will make a great dam for it.

I need to get this posted as I am about to take photos of it in bloom.  All my hardy geraniums are putting out buds now and soon will be in bloom.  The foliage of those indoor winter plants are now looking like greenhouse plants with natural sunshine light and many rains to water them.

We had to make cherry jelly in two different sessions.  In the morning we made a batch giving us a chance to get the process down.  We returned to the store for the pectin needed for the next two batches. After supper we did the last two batches and now we are done.  We had the juicing done ahead of time so it went faster to just pour in the juice and sugar and make jelly.  We ended up using larger pint sized jars as that is what we had instead of the cute little jelly jars.  We made 12 pints and 3 half pints. That will be it for our jelly tradition this summer as the raspberries are not going to have a big enough harvest for jelly.  I will take a photo of the jars but I didn't get that done as I was busy making jelly.

The field lilies were putting out one bloom a day per stem.  Then all of a sudden the dam bursts and they are blooming multiples on stems.  I have a new bed of field lilies this year as the wild roses died down and these lilies are able to bloom this year.  The are blooming later than this garden area.

Another busy day for me but I will just chug along marking things off the list as  I go.  It is an imaginary list but it is the chore list.  We escaped getting a rain this morning so I can work on drive and do some mowing.  I hear we will have a very pleasant day today with it not being very hot.  It will be good to have a day like that.  Thanks for stopping by today.