Still Catching Up

53°f/13.7°C, clear and dry. 

The last three days have been all about weeds---getting them cut, that is. Both of us have been at it for hours each day and I can finally feel like we are getting caught up. I guess the area we maintain is about 3 acres, and then another 5 acres or so that Larry brushhogs that used to be meadow and pasture. Without the riding mower, it means a lot more work, trimming edges the mower would have cut so that the rest can be done with the tractor. As you can imagine, Larry can't wait to get his mower back!

Then there are my gardens, which I prefer to trim myself because that way if something gets cut accidentally,  I have no one to blame but myself. I still have a little more to do in the vegetable garden. Most of the plants are done bearing, so I cut those down, then trimmed as well as I could around the ones I want to keep going. It was fun to find surprise tomatoes on the volunteer plants, and to see how the zucchini has rooted itself here and there, producing new plants that are going strong even though the original plant is pretty much dead. We still have kale, leeks, chard, zucchini, yellow squash, peppers, a few tomatoes, butternut squash, pumpkins, basil and rainbow corn in the veggie garden, and lots of herbs still thriving in the herb garden.

I have more trimming and tidying up to do in the gardens tomorrow; today I put netting over some plants to protect them from deer, and I have a few more still to cover. In Fall, the deer just don't seem to care if they get shocked by the fence; they will still get in and eat whatever they can.

Yesterday afternoon I began getting out the fall totes  in preparation for taking them to the booths. While I was at it, I put a few decorations out on the porch.

This weird little guy was a thrift find last week. He's motion activated and says things in a creepy voice. Larry loves it! But me, not so much, so he will go to a booth.

I made another quiche yesterday since I had plenty of eggs on hand. This one has onions, peppers, yellow squash, kale, chard, tomato, and basil in it. I sautéed the onions, pepper, squash and basil, and cooked the chard and kale together, then drained well and squeezed out as much liquid as I could. I also put a quarter cup of oats in the bottom of the piecrust to absorb extra liquid, and it worked beautifully once again. I added about a cup of grated cheddar too, because what is quiche without cheese? It was so delicious. 

I had enough piecrust to make a dozen mincemeat tarts too, as I am still trying to use up as much mincemeat as I can. 

A friend and her boyfriend stopped by in the evening. Neither of them had ever had quiche or mincemeat, but they liked both, and took a jar of mincemeat home with them.

After our outside work this morning, we went into town to take the dinette set we sold to its new owner. Afterwards we stopped at Shari's for a late lunch/early supper and visited with our friend Bill for a bit. Then we went to the store to buy some clothes for our trip. I can't remember when we last went clothes shopping! It was kind of fun to see what's in style these days. I admit, I do not like buying clothes, and never try them on. I will find out tomorrow what fits and what has to go back. Larry tried on pants to be sure they fit, a wiser person than I am!

The world is mourning Dolly Parton this evening. She was much loved and leaves a fine legacy of music and generosity. I never liked her obsession with appearance, but her singing was unique and unmistakable, and her passing leaves a huge hole in the heart of country music.

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.

A Day Outside

57°f/about 14°C, beautiful day, and yesterday's predicted storms missed us! Thankful, as the ground is still saturated.

A whole day outside, y'all! For the first time since June, it was comfortable enough to be outside to do some things that have been on hold---like painting the patio furniture.  First, though, i enjoyed the cool morning by having my tea on the porch and watching my silly dogs play. What characters. They were never still enough to get a photo, but I did catch Pip for a second. He looks like he's been up to something,  doesn't he?

It took me 4 hours to get the furniture painted, and not a perfect job, but done. 

Then I spent a while pulling weeds and cutting a few things back, and helping Larry load that #$%* mower one more time. He use it about 15 minutes yesterday before it quit working. So we loaded it yesterday and he took it back. The guy tweaked something, Larry came back, we unloaded it, and guess what? Still didn't run. So this afternoon back it went. I'm here to tell you, that thing is heavy, and I am tired of pushing it! My back is not a bit happy this evening. I tried to get him to call a neighbor to help, but nope. If I didn't help, he was going to try to do it alone. Man has no common sense.

After that,  I took a long hot shower, then went back out to take a few photos of the flowers. 

Not much blooming in this big tub, but still green so there's hope.

The roses have had very small blooms this year. Perhaps because of all the rain? I will give them some fertilizer tomorrow.

The begonias, however, are huge.

And the vinca soldier on.

The blue lace hydrangea turns various shades of purple as they mature. Have I said how much I love this bush?

By the porch, the hostas are done but the new vinca, a peachy color,  are still blooming. 

The big flowerbed:

Look at that sky! The veggies garden is pretty much done, and I know the deer will finish it off while we are away next month.

Only 2 cannas survived the winter. Makes me so sad, because I had planted 10 or 12 last year, yellow, coral, orange and red.

Lantana, however, loves our environment.  Must plant more even if it is an annual.

The zinnias that survived are doing well.

More lantana. I love this stuff.

A roee I brought inside. So pretty!

And finally, firepit time, burning up branches that came down in last week's storms. (The flowers aee silk, just brought them home from a booth and stuck them here.)

That's about it. Still a few blooms, but I know deer will have a field day while we're in Colorado. That's okay, really. The season will pretty much be over by then, and I will get some mums in to tide us over til frost.

Saturday, Not Much

66°f, clear but storms expected this afternoon.

These have been surprisingly quiet days. Partly this is because the garden is nearly done, and partly because my arm has been slowing me down. I have decided that the defining characteristic of aging is Pain, with a capital p. It's the thing no one mentions in all the talk about how we age. Hair loss, wrinkles of course, graying hair, age spots, narrowing lips, thinning skin, the need for fiber, etc, etc---we hear all those but pain? Rarely mentioned, perhaps because it is assumed, a given. So here we are, all aching and hurting and taking pills and doing therapy and trying to eat the anti-inflammatory diet and drink more water and get the right pillow/mattress/bed, and none of it is really a cure. So onward we go, and as the day goes sometimes on the pain eases up, we can go about our day fairly normally, and then come evening, here it comes again. As the old trope says, if you're going to get old, you better be tough.

And that's enough grumping! We did get to our booths and brought in some new things--an oval oak library table at one place along with 2 more really nice lamps, and the green cabinet i just painted at the other place, along with a couple totes at each place. We also went out to dinner at a place we really like. This fairly new restaurant used to serve really special meals. The chef had an herb garden, and they used meats from their own farm. The patio was a lovely outdoor space. Well, the patio is still nice, but the menu has downgraded to things like burgers and fries and the like. Pretty sad! But the main clientele is the plant workers from the nearby aluminum plant and construction workers from the solar farm and lithium plant being built, and these guys want burgers, I guess. Still, it's a nice place, and their salads and pizza are still the best in the county.

So that was Thursday. Yesterday I priced more stuff while Larry did more weedeating, and in the afternoon we went to the farmers market for eggs, the grocery store for odds and ends, and the hardware store for a few things I needed for two projects I am working on. We stopped to check on Larry's mower, found it was ready (an expensive repair!), so when we got home Larry went right back with the truck to pick it up. I stayed here, put away groceries, and then read my book.

I have to say, this book has been such a pleasure, and I am going to be very sad when it is done. It won't appeal to everyone; the story unfolds slowly, and there is a lot of description of both landscape and people.  It would not be for those who enjoy pithy, action-filled stories, but if you enjoy deep character development, a unique setting, gentle  humor, and very human predicaments, I think you will enjoy This Is Happiness by Niall Williams. I will be looking for more by this author.  

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.