Category: The Seasons

The garden is coming along. I have 12 plants in patio pots with tomatoes, eggplants, and green peppers outside on the patio. Our temperatures have been nice enough so we have just been able to leave them outside. I think last week we only had two nights where we dragged the pots into the green house to protect the plants.

Meanwhile the little seedlings are growing by leaps and bounds! I think the best ones are the zucchini and the squashes. The cukes have really struggled, but are starting to look better.

Where we are in the growing charts, it really isn’t safe to plant until after Memorial Day (the end of May). Then we rake up the garden and plant little hills of all the vegetables.

We do have one big disappointment this year. No Cherries! In years past, we have so many that our fingers turn maroon from seeding and eating them. It was this totally wacky spring we have had!

So, sadness all around…no cherries to eat or make my favorite Cherry Jelly!

It does look like we have a fair apple crop, peach and plum crop and possibly a small pear crop. I will be grateful for each piece of fruit grown here.

My snowball bushes should be in full bloom this weekend! They have a nice crop of blossoms this year. That brings back wonderful memories of my childhood.

The news from the green house is good today. I have several little seeds that are attempting to sprout up.

The tomatoes are also growing (like weeds) and I am relieved by this.

However, we are due for well below freezing temperatures and I am still holding my breath.

The trees are so pretty, and when we had the warm temperatures a week ago, the bees were working the blossoms. All it would take now, is one hard freeze and it is over, at least as far as the fruit goes.

I’m not sure many people can understand the loss a farmer feels when he loses his crop. It’s not just personally putting food on his table, but the loss of of putting food on the tables of his community.

Last year we sold over seven hundred pounds of peaches in our community. I still kept plenty to make our jam and give to friends and family.

So, I am praying hard that the Lord will help to spare my trees.

Currently, it is Friday night and the temperatures are falling. We hope the wind keeps up, or they will bottom out and freeze our crop of fruit.

Hubby is worried and so am I. We look forward to the cherries, peaches, plums and apples, not to mention the Concord grapes. Keep your fingers crossed.

I went into the green house and I’ve closed the windows and checked the temperatures. It should be just fine in there.

1. William Shakespeare’s birthday is celebrated on April 23rd…when did you last read Shakespeare? What’s your favorite Shakespeare play?

Romeo and Juliet. It’s the romantic in me, I guess!

2. What food(s) would you recommend a foreign visitor try when they visit your home country?

Either a good old fashioned American Hamburger with Fries, or Lobster with Corn on the cob!

3. What’s a lie you often tell yourself?

That my butt isn’t big! Enough said!

4. What’s something you’re good at that might surprise us? Remember this is a family friendly blog!

You all know I cook, but my first love is baking. As in, bread. I love to bake bread! Unfortunately once baked, I can’t stop eating it, so I had to stop baking it!

5. Who is your favorite animal character from a book?

Lassie. Not only was there a great TV show, but Lassie also was featured in many books. Add to that Bambi and Tigger.

6. April showers bring May flowers…do you have a green thumb?

Only with my vegetable garden. Just about everything else, I kill.

7. Speaking of rainy days…which one of the following activities would you most want to spend time doing on a rainy day-

sort photos and create albums
bake cookies
read a good book
hold an all-day movie marathon
organize closets, cupboards, or bookshelves
try a new recipe
fix something that needs fixing

Of things on that list, it would have to be an all day movie marathon. Sometimes they have NCIS Marathons, and I’ll turn it on while I am cleaning and doing laundry.

8. Insert your own random thought here.

We had RAIN! Finally. This morning the skies have cleared for the most part, and our grass is green. I can see the buds on the trees opening, and soon we will have full lush oaks, and maples and birch trees.

Saturday was planting day. I’m lucky enough to have a green house, so I can start my seeds nice and early. I even found beautiful tomato and green pepper plants and re-potted them in larger pots. Those will remain on my patio all summer. The seeds I planted today, will eventually go into my out door garden. That is, when I am sure we are free of a chance of a frost!

There is nothing more glorious than playing in the dirt, as you plant your seeds!

I also re-potted the tomato plants and the pepper plants. They’ll stay in these pots all summer long. My patio is a wonderful spot, where the sun shines all day long.

It took me several hours to get this done, and cleaned up. Usually, I start these things a little later in the spring, However, this has been such a warm spring, I am now one step ahead.

My next acquisition will be my Ichiban Eggplants. There are none to be found, as the eggplants are too delicate, but they will be arriving in the garden shops in 2-3 weeks.

When I was done I looked around my yard and saw all the beauty! The trees are blossoming and the bees are working hard.

Have a Happy Spring Day Everyone!

Once again, Monday found sunny skies and temperatures up in the 70’s! It seems we went from winter to late spring. Although, we do have some roads that are really, really, muddy. True, we actually live in a part of the world where we have an official “MUD SEASON”.

Mud Season happens when you have a multitude of dirt roads which become deep, sloppy, mess’s, which look like giant vats of chocolate. Sadly, if you should fall into it, it does not taste like chocolate at all! The mud will also suck your car in, right up to it’s axels!

Most of the day today I was busy Networking the house. I have so many things in this house that had to get locked down in the wireless settings. I think I may have to unlock and then relock the TV, as I haven’t been able to access my movies on demand since I did this.

Because it was so nice, I decided to take the two pups, Arnie and Anneliese out for a walk. I leashed them, and off we went for a nice walk. Not only did we have fun, but it was absolutely beautiful!

Hubby’s pruning the fruit trees, as we have no snow at all, and he figures, now’s the time. The trees that really needed to be cut back were the Cherry Trees. I need to get my planting dirt and get my little planters out so I can start germinating seeds.

Oh yes! I am starting to feel “Spring-ish! Oh let the warm temperatures come and the sun shine!

Each year our quiet winter is disturbed by two wonderful events. The Annual Pond Hockey Tournament, and the Annual Ice Fishing Derby.

I live in an area surrounded by lakes, and during the summer, our population swells to nearly triple the size of it’s year round population. In fact after a long summer I am often glad when the tourists go home, and my little town reverts back to it’s charming small self!

However, even charming gets boring after a while. So, when the Pond Hockey and the Ice Fishing Derby come along with the tourists, I welcome them with open arms! (As do our restaurants and hotels!)

The Pond Hockey is happening near my house, so today I walked down, with my ice treads on my boots, and my camera in hand to report on the events!

As I walked down the hill, I caught my first sight of the hockey rinks. 18 separate rinks set up for the teams in New England to play on.

I found this sign to be slightly amusing, don’t you? I learned that this lake has 12 inches of ice on it! I watched cars and pick up trucks drive around and there was not one crack!

As you can see, there were a lot of people there! The players, their families and lots of children! I walked the length of the festivities, and then stopped to talk to my friend Kevin from Kevin’s Cafe and see how things were going. He was selling coffee, hot chocolate, sodas and crab cakes, which are his signature recipe!

The next picture was taken from the sky. All those little ants are actually players practicing on Friday. Amazing, isn’t it?

Sunday is the last day of this event. I’ll report in on Monday which team won the tournament.

Friday found us fending off snow, sleet and rain. It proved to be such a messy day, that neither one of us went out to the Post Office. Hubby was in the driveway, clearing the slush, and I was inside, cleaning, cooking and doing laundry and later when I was done with all that, I wrote a report for the library.

Poor Hubby. It’s at times like this that I think that perhaps taking time off in the south would be better for him. All this snow and slush shoveling is not easy on him. At least we have a vacation to look forward to this spring.

Anneliese went out during some of the heavier rain, and I figured she would be right back. Wrong! The little devil went off and I had to go after her until she decided to turn tail and follow me home. So, now she is on the leash until she starts to listen to me again!

Friday ended with another round of rain showers. Right now I feel that we should build an ark!