I Love To Go A Gardening
Growing Our Life in Northern Michigan
Holes
Sunday evening we had a bit of a storm. It wasn’t that severe, but we did get a little bit of rain. It quickly moved on and left a beautiful double rainbow behind.
Monday was cooler than the previous two days had been. It was still hot, but the temps were in the mid-80s instead of close to 100 (F). We had a little more energy. We took Hannah with us to TSC to get poultry feed for the ducks and chickens and canned cat food for the cats. We stopped at the grocery store. EJ stayed in the car with Hannah while I went into the store to buy a couple things, including Moomer’s ice cream for a special treat. I chose Chocolate Almond Fudge for EJ, which he said was the best chocolate ice cream he has ever had. I chose Carrot Cake ice cream for me. I’ve had it before and it is one of my favorite flavors. Although, as EJ says, when it comes to Moomer’s ice cream there is no wrong answer. All flavors are delicious.
EJ called a septic tank place to come and clean out our septic tank. This will be the first time we’ve done it since we’ve moved here. We have no idea when it was last done. The septic is cleaned out with a large vacuum that sucks up the crap. The guy(s) will be here on Monday, which means I have to deal with them because EJ’s vacation will be over. In preparation for the guy(s) coming out, we had to dig out the septic tank lid so all they have to do is open it. We knew the general area where the septic tank is located, but not the exact spot, so we dug several holes in the back yard trying to find it. I said to EJ, “It’s too bad we don’t have long poles like they use after avalanches to find buried people/items.” When I was a kid, I read a book about a town that was buried in an avalance. EJ said that was a good idea so he went into the garage and found a long thin metal pole. We dug shallow holes in the sand and then he stuck the pole into the softer ground to see if it hit anything. We actually found the septic tank quite quickly after that, and we were able to find the lid. While EJ dug it out so it was completely uncovered, I filled in the other holes. EJ says that from now on it will be easier to locate the septic tank because we know where it is. EJ grew up in the country so he has experience with stuff like this, but until we moved to our Enchanted Forest, I’ve always lived in a town so things like septic tanks are completely new experiences for me. I was afraid it was going to be very, very expensive to get the septic tank pumped out, but it isn’t that bad. It’s always nice when something is LESS expensive than I expect. Usually it’s more.
EJ also called the heating guy yesterday to get moving on getting the compressor fixed. A guy came out and looked at our geo-thermal unit this morning and he said he’d have an estimate ready for us by Thursday. We have no idea what it will cost for the part and labor and only hope it’s not too awfully expensive. I don’t think we’d bother with the air conditioner if it wasn’t that the heating is also affected. The guy who came out today said he had been to our house before. He knows the previous owner, who now lives in Texas. I think it must be weird to see strangers living in a friend’s house. And the house itself looks different: We painted the walls of most of the rooms after we moved in (we just still need to paint the master bathroom) so the colors and our furniture is different from the previous owners’. The house would seem the same, but also different. Weird to think about.
Today was hotter than yesterday but not as hot as the weekend. The temperature was about 90. It was hot enough to make me sweat whenever I did anything, so I would do a task and then sit in front of the fan to cool off before going out to do another chore. I got most of the flower garden in front of the house weeded, did laundry and hung the clothes on the line, and I cleaned the house. EJ sat on the bed to talk to me while I folded clothes and put them away, and Hannah joined us. She and EJ had a bit of a cuddle. It was cute. Danny, our previous dog, was totally devoted to me. Hannah also is devoted to me, but she loves EJ too. I loved Danny’s single-heartedness, but I’m also glad that Hannah is willing to share us. When she plays “fetch” with us, she will bring her ball to me, and then to EJ, then to me, then to him.
Sometimes when EJ has days off, we go off and have adventures, but this week we mostly just want to get things done around the house. It’s very satisfying to check things off our list. Because of this week’s weather, we are not getting as much done as we had hoped–heat and humidity drains us of energy. Still, we are getting quite a few things done.
I made Hannah Joy another “ice bone.” I didn’t have a half-gallon milk carton so I used a paper cup. I filled it with water and put it in the freezer yesterday. Today I got it out and tore off the paper cup. Hannah loved it. I put it on a tray so it doesn’t get everything wet when it melts, but Hannah carries it off to a more desirable place where she can enjoy it in comfort. She growls at the cats if they get close, and I exclaim, “Hannah! The cats don’t want your ice!”
The Mama Turkey has been bringing her babies up near the driveway every day. They like to eat the grasshoppers. I’m glad because we have billions. Yesterday the Mama ate some of the berries from the bushes growing by the big rocks. I saw the family twice today. I’m not sure how many babies there are because they aren’t all in sight at the same time. I kind of don’t like to count them anyway because I know I will be sad if any go missing.
The lilies are blooming. Not that we get to enjoy many of them. We see a few here and there along the driveway but most of the time we find empty stalks where the deer have eaten the blooms. There are a lot of lilies in bloom near the big rocks. I think the deer must leave them along because the ones along the driveway are more accessible. Or maybe there are just so many lilies near the rocks that I don’t miss those they eat.
We can hear fireworks going off. EJ and I went outside to see if we could see any, but the trees block our view. Oh, well. Hannah barked a bit when she heard them, but she didn’t seem to be scared of them. Mostly she is just very protective. She notices every strange sound, every strange smell, every strange movement, and every stranger.
Hannah’s Ice Bone
We didn’t want to go outside in the brutal afternoon heat so EJ and I waited until about 7 p.m. yesterday evening before we walked Hannah–with Josette following–down the driveway to get the mail. On the way back to the house, I noticed a mullein plant drooping. It wasn’t that way earlier. As I shut the poultry up in the coop for the night I also noticed many of the plants in my garden looking wilted. They had looked fine in the morning. The heat was brutal to them. Although I usually just water the plants in the morning, when I saw how wilted everything was I watered last evening as well, including the poor wilted mullein.
Mullien is an interesting plant with a two-year growth cycle. It grows tall–up to 7 feet. Mullein can be used for cough, whooping cough, tuberculosis, bronchitis, hoarseness, pneumonia, earaches, colds, chills, flu, swine flu, fever, allergies, tonsillitis, and sore throat. Other uses include asthma, diarrhea, colic, gastrointestinal bleeding, migraines, joint pain, and gout. You can read more about it in this article titled “Herbs to Know: Mullein.”
The overnight low was about 80 degrees (Fahrenheit) last night. Ugh. It was very difficult to get comfortable, and neither EJ nor I slept well. I woke shortly after 6 a.m., took care of the pets and poultry, and watered the garden, the trees, and the poor mullein, which looked much better than yesterday. After everything was watered, I went back to bed for a little more sleep.
The Excessive Heat Warning continues today. There is a very strong breeze which helps make the heat somewhat bearable. We have all our fans going. Last night I put frozen liter bottles in the coop to cool the it for the ducks and chickens. This morning I put a half-gallon carton of water in the freezer intending to put it in the coop tonight. Hannah seemed irritably hot, so I decided to put the frozen carton in front of a fan. A fan blowing over ice can help cool the air. Hannah had other ideas–she stole the carton and began chewing on it. We were concerned that the plastic wouldn’t be good for her, so I cut open the jug and gave her the carton-shaped ice. She carried it around with her and gnawed on it like a bone. When the cats got too close to her ice, she growled them away. She sure is a funny dog. This video is of Hannah stealing the carton.
EJ decided to call a repair service to fix our central air condition. Our heating/cooling is geo-thermal, which means we get heat/cold drawn up from the earth. Propane is only our back up system. The repair guy says we need a new compressor–and that probably we were heating with propane all last winter instead of the geo-thermal system. It will be quite expensive to get a new compressor installed so we decided we will have to wait to get new flooring until next year. A disappointment, but heating/cooling is much more important. It’s probably best anyway because the flooring cost more than we expected and we would have had to pay part of it with our credit card. This way I can save all year and we can probably pay cash for the flooring next year. It’s going to be rather tough on EJ because the carpet is old and not good for his breathing…but, we can only do what we can do.
The repair guy said our best bet for cooling right now is to get a window air conditioner, which EJ hopes to do tomorrow–if the stores still have any in stock. I’m sure they are in high demand right now.
Storms are moving in. EJ is sitting on the porch watching the storm blow in and listening to his radio and he heard we could get about 70 mph winds with this storm. Great. First we bake in the sun, and then we get blown away by the wind! The good thing is that the storm should cool things off a little bit. Tonight and tomorrow is supposed to be a little cooler (65/82) but the the temps will climb near 90 again the next day. Ugh.
EJ called me outside for a moment before the storm arrived and I saw the Mama turkey and her babies walking up through the tall grass along the driveway. You can just barely see the babies. They are so cute!
Excessive Heat
Beginning on Friday and continuing at least through the weekend–although all this coming week the temps will be in the high 80s (F)–there are Excessive Heat Warnings issued for our area. In fact, I read in the news that this is the first time our local National Weather Service branch has ever issued an Excessive Heat Warning for Northern Michigan. As the woman at the bank who handled our mortgage told me when we first moved to Northern Michigan, Lake Michigan usually acts like an air conditioner that keeps the area cool. Apparently, Lake Michigan’s air conditioning is broke.
Friday morning arrived with a cool, refreshing breeze but knowing that scorching heat was going to follow, I got to work. I turned on the sprinklers to water the garden and the fruit trees and evergreen trees we’ve planted. I also made sure the birdbath was filled and the butterfly puddler was moistened for the critters. Later in the afternoon I turned on the sprinkler for the ducks and gave the chickens a treat of carrots frozen in ice.
I did laundry and hung the wet clothes outside on the line. I could have waited a few days, but EJ has next week off from work and I wanted to start the week off fresh. The clothes dried very quickly in the heat.
I boiled potatoes and our chickens’ eggs, cut up celery, and diced some green onions freshly picked from our garden for a large potato salad. I also shredded half a cabbage and some carrots for coleslaw. Potato salad and coleslaw are foods we can eat cold. I plan to spend as little time cooking in the kitchen as possible.
I walked down to get the mail. I found a bill from our previous propane company charging us a $75 rental fee since we hadn’t bought propane from them for a year. I called them up explaining that we had switched companies a year ago and had called them at that time to pick up their tank and they hadn’t done so…I was prepared to battle them about paying the bill, but the woman told me that they’d send someone to pick up the tank and to disregard the bill. EJ told me later that whenever he called that company, the woman was rude to him, which is one reason he switched companies.
I called Lowes about our flooring. The woman who had measured our flooring had said that they would contact us within 3-5 days with the estimated cost. That was 8 days ago. The man I talked to–the same one we discussed flooring with at the store–said he would look into it. He found our file and emailed me the estimate. It’s more than we had thought, but we are going to do it anyway. Carpeting is actually quite unsanitary, especially when there are a lot of pets in the home, and we are hoping that getting rid of it will help EJ breathe better.
About mid-afternoon, the heat slammed into me and drained all the energy from me. The slightest movement drenched me in sweat. I tried to move as little as possible. I didn’t get much done once the heat hit. The only thing that made the heat survivable was the strong breeze outside–and the multiple fans in our house. Our house is heated by a geo-thermal system that brings up heat and cool air from the earth. (Propane is a backup system that kicks in if the temp goes below 20 Fahrenheit degrees.) Our heater works fine, but the AC quit working last summer. Since we have a huge ToDo list of more pressing projects, and since usually the outside temperature isn’t unbearably hot, getting the AC fixed hasn’t been high on the priority list. EJ has been watching Youtube videos to learn how to fix the AC. With our type of system, it might be a simple fix. However, it was even too hot to work on the air conditioner.
This morning when I went outside to do my chores, the humid heat slammed into me–and it’s only going to get worse later on. People always act as if northern winters are unendurable, insufferable ordeals, but I seriously don’t know how people in the South survive summers. Winters are much easier to deal with. There are many ways to get warmer if a person is cold–put on another blanket, warmer clothing, even heated hand-warmers or a hot cup of coffee to hold and sip. In the Southern heat, a person can stay cool if he stays inside air conditioned buildings, but outside there are only so many things he can take off before he gets arrested. Basically, it seems to me that Southerns are held hostage in their homes by the heat more than Northerners are by the cold. I remember a few years ago we attended EJ’s nephew’s wedding in Tennessee. Whenever we left the air-conditioned hotel, it felt as if we were walking into an oven–or Hell. I could hardly breathe. There is a town in Michigan called “Hell.” Let me tell you, Hell (Michigan) is much cooler than the South. It even freezes over. LOL. Paradise is also in Michigan–in the beautiful Upper Peninsula. I have been to Paradise, but never to Hell.
Ok, I’m beginning to ramble a bit….I imagine that Southerners have techniques to handle heat just as we do to handle cold/snow, but I’ll take cold over hot any day. I suspect that I have snowman DNA because I quickly melt in the heat.
There is still a breeze today, but the morning started out hotter and more humid than yesterday. Ugh. I got the sprinklers running for the gardens and trees, I filled the birdbath, puddler, and saucers for the wildlife, and I gave the ducks and chickens have cool treats later of fruits and veggies frozen in ice water for them to peck at. I gave Hannah some ice cubes to eat. EJ said he read that the heat index (what the temp feels like) is 108 (F) today.
A couple of days ago someone posted in a local resale group on Facebook that he was looking for old mowers. After double-checking with EJ, I told him that he could have our two old ones. He came today and picked them up. He fixes them up and donates them to military veterans who are struggling. EJ talked to the guy for quite a while outside. He said he seemed like a really nice guy. We were glad to help out.
Tomorrow is also supposed to be very hot. I hope it is not this hot all week!
The Bumblebee and Me
I am so freakin’ gonna die this weekend! I can barely tolerate temperatures in the high 70s. I don’t know how I will endure temperatures that feel like they are close to 100.
Because it’s going to be so scorching hot this weekend, I’ve been trying to get as many chores done as I can. As soon as EJ left for work, I started mowing the lawn to take advantage of the morning coolness. Today’s high temperature is forecasted to reach 84, which is still very hot, just not hellishly hot. I had to take several breaks to cool down in front of the fan.
I got the sprinklers going as soon as I mowed the area around the fruit trees. Then every time I took a break, I moved the sprinklers.
After I finished mowing and watering the garden and trees, I took a shower. Usually I take a shower as soon as EJ leaves for work, but I wanted to wait until after I had mowed because I knew that I’d be feeling hot and sweaty and grimy afterwards, and a shower would feel refreshing. After my shower, I sat in my chair and let my hair dry while I debated with myself about whether I wanted to go get groceries today or wait until tomorrow. I decided to get groceries today so I drove to the store, did my shopping, drove home, lugged all the bags into the house, and put everything away. Then I had a lunch of watermelon and pretzels, which isn’t the healthiest lunch, but I was tired, it was already 3 p.m., and supper wasn’t too far in the future.
After lunch, I washed a bunch of eggs and got them boiling and then made egg salad for sandwiches after I went out and gathered duck and chicken eggs. EJ has all next week off from work (yay!), and it’s the holiday weekend, and with the weather so hot, I’m preparing a bunch of easy to make picnic-type meals so I won’t have to do much cooking. Heating up the kitchen on hot days such as we are expecting would be torture.
After much thought, I decided on a location for my magic food dehydrator. I’m putting it on the counter to the left of the sink and dish drainer. There’s just enough room there, and it won’t be in the way of food preparation. Also, there’s an outlet behind it. I don’t know why appliances are designed with such short power cords. It’s crazy. Anyway, I’m very eager to begin using the dehydrator, but they tend to heat up the house so I will wait for some cooler days.
Speaking about the food dehydrator, later yesterday afternoon after I had rested from my ordeal of getting the food dehydrator up the driveway and into the house, I went out to the kitchen to examine it more closely. EJ had wanted metal racks because plastic is unhealthy–and I read reviews from people of plastic trays melting in some of the dehydrators. Well, we had the metal racks all right, but I couldn’t find any control panel. I felt quite disappointed because I had specifically wanted to have temperature controls and a timer. I’ve never had those features before and it seemed to me that they would help me dry herbs at the correct temp and time. I looked the machine over repeatedly and, nope, no control panel. Since it was a Magic Mill brand, I wondered if I needed to say a magic word such as “Abracadabra”–or “Speak Friend and enter” in the elvish tongue like Gandalf had to do to enter the mines of Moria. I don’t know the language of the Elves so that would be a problem. But then I happened to see a faint + and – sign on the top edge of the dehydrator. With rising hope, I plugged the dehydrator into a nearby outlet. And “ABRACADABRA!” a control panel magically lit up at the top edge of the machine. I was utterly enchanted!
Yesterday afternoon I rescued a bumblebee, which is only right since I was responsible for its near-death experience. Here’s what happened:
When I took Hannah outside yesterday afternoon, I happened to notice that the sand in my butterfly puddler was dry so when I took her back into the house, I filled up an empty milk jug with water and moistened the sand in the puddler so the butterflies could drink safely.
Next I checked the water level in the blue plant saucer, which I put on one of the big rocks. I felt sad when I saw a bumblebee lifelessly floating in the water. Obviously, I should have put rocks in the saucer so tiny creatures wouldn’t drown, but I was primarily intending the saucer to be a birdbath or drinking water for larger critters. Too prevent future deaths, I grabbed a few rocks to put in the saucer, and I used one of them to lift the dead bumblebee out of the water because, well, who wants to drink from water with dead things floating in it? As I lifted the bumblebee out, it moved weakly. It was ALIVE! I carefully put the small rock down on the big rock so the bumblebee could dry out in the sun. He was in pretty bad shape and I didn’t know if he would pull through.
I checked on the bumblebee a couple of times over the next few hours. It remained on the rock. Sometimes I wasn’t sure it was even alive but then I’d see a small movement, a leg or antenna waving weakly. I whimsically imagined myself giving the bumblebee mouth-to-mouth respiration as I shouted, “Breathe, dammit! Breathe!” I don’t actually swear, but you’ll have to forgive me because in my mind I heard Dr. Leonard McCoy from the U.S.S. Enterprise fiercely shout those words as he worked on a wounded alien.
The last time I checked on the bumblebee, I thought for sure it was dead. But Josette joined me, as she always does when I’m outside, and she jumped up on the big rock to examine the bumblebee. The bumblebee found the strength to rear back, fists clenched like a prize-fighter, to defend itself from her. I quickly picked up Josette and carried her to the porch, away from the bumblebee, because being almost drowned and then eaten by a cat is just too tragic an ending. When I went out a while later to check on the bumblebee, the rock was empty. I didn’t see any cats near the big rock after I carried Josette away so I’m sure they didn’t get it. I choose to believe that it had recovered and flown away.
It’s probably silly to care so much about the bumblebee, except that I was sad when I thought it was drowned in the water I had set out, and I was thrilled when I saw it was still alive, and my compassion grew from there. Also, I admired its strong will to live and got caught up in its battle to survive. There are some insects that I loathe–like spiders, and ticks, and mosquitoes–and I usually don’t hesitate to kill them. There are some creepy crawlies that I am rather fond of, such as bees, crickets, and butterflies. I confess that when I was a child, I never wanted to be a ballerina, or astronaut, or anything like that. Instead, I always wanted the ability to talk to and understand the animals like Dr. Doolittle. There is something magical about living in an Enchanted Forest and having close encounters with wildlife. It’s not the same as living in a town.
Later I was chatting with JJ on Facebook and I told him that I had rescued a bumblebee. “Do you know what this means?” I asked. “It means that sometime in the future I will find myself in a dire situation and the bumblebee will save me.” That’s how it works in enchanted forests in fairy tales and fables.
Did you know there are many legends in many cultures about bees? Well, not bumblebees, but honey bees? You can search for legends or myths about honeybees on Google. One legend is that a beekeeper must treat his (or her) bees as members of the family. The bees should be informed of all family happenings, from births to deaths and events in-between, especially weddings. Beekeepers also needed calm voices, as the bees did not take harsh words lightly. Either offense could result in the hives not producing honey all the way to leaving their beekeeper. Their leaving was considered very dangerous, as owners who lost their bees were surely doomed to die!
The Delivery
It obviously rained overnight although there was only a light rain falling when I woke up this morning. That soon ended as well, although the day continued to have dark gray clouds and a feeling of dampness in the air. As usual, I stumbled half asleep through my morning chores and then settled into my chair with a steaming cup of coffee. I don’t fully wake until I’ve had two or three cups of coffee.
After EJ left, I did some laundry. I’m trying to do laundry only on Fridays–except for a load of towels midweek–but he asked me to wash his work caps so today became my laundry day. I didn’t try the clothes on the line because, the weather being what it is and all, I didn’t think the clothes would dry. I also didn’t want to have to quickly bring the clothes in if it started to rain again, although the chances of that are slim–or so says the National Weather Service.
Today was the day I expected my new dehydrator to be delivered by UPS. I like to track the packages as they move across the country, and I have text notifications sent to my phone to alert me when packages are delivered. It’s a good thing I do because the UPS man did not bring the dehydrator up to the house. Instead, he left it in The Magic Box. The Magic Box is a large wooden box at the bottom of our driveway. We have been told that the previous owner of our house built it to store his garbage in, safe from bears, until garbage pick up day, but we use it for postal and delivery people to leave our packages in during the winter months when they refuse to attempt driving up our driveway. I have named this box The Magic Box because sometimes packages magically appear in it. Usually the delivery people bring our packages up to the house in the summer months, but this summer they haven’t been, which means when I get an alert, I quickly go down the driveway to retrieve our packages. I don’t like to leave them in The Magic Box too long because I don’t want them to get stolen or anything.
When I received the text notification that my package was in The Magic Box, I hurried down the hill to get it. I contemplated taking Hannah with me, but decided it might be too awkward to carry the dehydrator and handle her. I contemplated driving the Xterra down to transport the dehydrator back up the driveway, but I thought, “How heavy can it be?” Our previous dehydrators, which died last year, were quite light. They were just cheap ones that we found at thrift shops. So I just walked down the driveway without Hannah or the Xterra.
The box the dehydrator was in was so large that the lid of The Magic Box couldn’t close. The box was so heavy that I had difficulty pulling it out, especially since it was wedged tightly in The Magic Box. I finally had to get inside The Magic Box myself in order to lift the dehydrator box straight up and out and onto the ground. I climbed out of The Magic Box and put a second small package on top of the dehydrator box. Stage 1 completed.
Next I had to get the dehydrator up the hill. I took a deep breath and lifted the box by its packing straps. It was heavy. I walked forward a couple steps and then had to put the box down. Another deep breath and I lifted the box again and moved forward a couple steps. At this rate, it would take me until winter to get it up the hill and into the house. I suppose then I could always slide it on the slippery snow…but I didn’t want to wait that long. I finally left the box partially hidden in the long grass at the side of the driveway and walked up the hill to the Xterra. I drove the Xterra down, turned around in our Vacation Neighbor’s driveway, and pulled up by the box. With great effort I lifted the box, heaved it (gently) into the back of the Xterra, and drove back up the hill. Stage 2 completed.
I huffed and puffed and heaved the box into the house. Hannah watched me through the window with great interest and curiosity. She probably thought, “What craziness is Mama doing now?” Do you ever wonder what our pets think of the things we do? I finally got the large box into the kitchen. Then I had to unpack it. Hannah tried to help. I strongly suspect that she believes every package that arrives is a gift for her. Not this time, dear.
I used an old pair of scissors that we use to cut open everything and slit the packing tap and opened the shipping box. I then had to wrestle the box that the dehydrator is packaged in out. I finally got the box out of the box, and then wrestled the dehydrator out and heaved it (again gently) onto the kitchen table. Whoa….it is big. It is almost as large as the table. I wiped down the ten racks as the booklet instructs and slid them into the dehydrator. I am all set to go now!
This is an awesome machine! Since I often refer to our property as our Enchanted Forest, I find it totally appropriate that the name of the dehydrator is “Magic Mill.” I mean, of course an Enchanted Forest would have a magic mill. It really couldn’t have any other kind.
I was tired and sweaty from all the heaving, and pulling, and opening, so I sat in my chair to recover. However, Hannah decided that she wanted to go outside. She doesn’t take “no” for an answer, and she will grumble, growl, put her nose in my face, and nudge my computer aside until I take her out. With a sigh, I got up, put her harness and leash on, and off we went. I took a long my camera so I could take a simple picture of The Magic Box for this blog post. Part way down the hill, however, the Hannah and I and the turkey family surprised each other. The Mama turkey squawked a command and all the babies flew up to the trees for safety while the Mama scolded us from the ground. I had my camera in my hand, but the sight of the babies flying up in formation like the Air Force Thunderbirds was so magical that I just stood there enthralled, camera forgotten. Once in the trees, the babies were very difficult to see–and the Mama was alarmed and Hannah was trying to pull me over to her–but I did manage to get one photo:
I’m actually very glad that the turkey babies can fly to safety. I have been very worried that Madeline, our sweet serial killer cat, would get to them. I’m reassured now that they are not quite as vulnerable as I feared.
I pulled Hannah back up the driveway so the turkey family could get over their fright. I didn’t get a photo of The Magic Box, but I decided to just use the one I took after I wrestled the dehydrator out of it.
JJ stopped by for a few minutes. He works so many hours that we rarely see him but we do talk on the phone occasionally and chat on Facebook. Jared gave me a Richard Castle book based on the TV series “Castle” that he had found at a used book store. He also hunted down Luke, our Sith Lord cat, which is actually JJ’s cat, only he can’t have him in his apartment so he gives him lovings when he visits. JJ couldn’t find Luke at first, but finally located him under the bed in the guest room.
EJ probably would get home super late today because he might help dismantled some kitchen cabinets at his company at the end of his work day–no doubt, from their break room.
Chocolate Mint Tea
During the week, I always get up at 6 a.m. when EJ needs to get up to get ready for work. Often he wakes up before his alarm goes off so he gets up, drinks coffee, and opens all the windows so the morning coolness can cool down the house. This morning when I got up, I walked into the living room and exclaimed, “Brrrr! It’s actually almost cold this morning.” I didn’t realize exactly how cold until I saw this weather map. I wore a thicker hoodie when I went out to do my chores this morning. I tried to keep the windows open–I really did–because the meteorologists predict that temps will reach a high of 79 today and then a cool house will feel refreshing. But as EJ was preparing to leave the house, I began closing some of the windows. EJ laughed. I absolutely love cool temperatures, but the 30s and 40s is just a wee bit too cool in the house.
EJ has said that these cool mornings reminds him of mornings at his grandparents’ house when he was a kid. His grandparents lived in this area, and sometimes EJ’s family would travel north from mid-Michigan during the summer to visit them. He and his eight siblings would “camp out” in sleeping bags in the living room, and EJ says that he always woke slightly cold from the chilly mornings. My family also often came up to this area for summer vacations. We would stay at campgrounds in either a tent (when we were younger) or in the camper (when we were older). Hmmm. I wonder if EJ and I ever unknowingly crossed paths when we were children? My family also woke to cool mornings. My Mom would make coffee on the camp stove before starting breakfast. The smell of coffee brewing on a chilly morning is an aromatic memory.
I ran out of hot coffee too soon this morning so I went out to the garden and picked some mint to make myself a cup of hot mint tea to warm myself. This year I am growing Apple Mint and Chocolate Mint. Both choices were appealing, but I finally snipped off a few leaves of Chocolate Mint. I took the leaves into the house, crushed them, and put them in my tea spoon, which I stirred in a cup of hot water. Then I took a sip. Oh, my goodness! Hot Chocolate Mint tea is heavenly on a chilly summer morning.
Last year my food dehydrators died. I don’t have the knowledge or place to hang herbs so they can dry naturally, so EJ and I decided to get a new food dehydrator from Amazon. I use fresh herbs from the garden in the summer, but a lot of our herbs will go to waste if I can’t dry them for winter’s use. I really would love hot Chocolate or Apple Mint tea in winter. I let EJ choose the dehydrator because there were too many choices and I couldn’t make up my mind about which was best. He chose one with ten steel trays, a timer, and temperature control. It is scheduled to arrive tomorrow! Whoo hoo!
The grass is getting longer so I will need to mow it this week. I’ve been trying to figure out the best day. I like to mow it at the end of the week if possible so it looks nice on the weekend. It is supposed to get scorching hot on Friday, which means I have to mow before then so I don’t die of heat stroke. It is supposed to rain tonight through Wednesday, so those days are out. That leaves Thursday. I will mow as early in the day as possible while it’s still cooler.
When I walked Hannah down the driveway to get the mail earlier today, I spotted a different kind of butterfly on the milkweed. I love milkweed. I think the flowers smell like a spice–almost like cloves. They make a wonderful butterfly garden! I tried to identify the butterfly I saw yesterday with my Butterflies of Michigan book. My closest guess is that it was some kind of Fritillary but I have no idea which one. There were about a dozen types of Fritillary butterflies in the book and all of them closely resembled the one I saw. But I’m sure that this butterfly that I saw today is an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail.
Hannah has a few bad habits. One is chasing cats. She gets along fine with Little Bear, Kee-Kee, and Josette because they do not run when she approaches. Luke, whom I accuse of turning to the Dark Side and becoming a Sith Lord, hisses, growls, and swats Hannah whenever she is near, so Hannah retaliates by lunging at him and snarling. She doesn’t hurt Luke, but she looks and sounds fierce. Timmy is sweet but he is a runner and Hannah chases him whenever she sees him. Timmy spends a lot of time on the beds or in the master bathroom in an attempt to escape Hannah’s notice. We scold Hannah when she chases the cats because we don’t ever want her to think it’s acceptable behavior. Our scolding doesn’t stop her because Hannah is very stubborn and doesn’t give up her vices easily.
Hannah also loves to eat paper, especially paper towels. She knows it’s wrong. She won’t touch a paper towel if she knows I’m watching her. She waits until no one is around and then grabs it if has fallen to the floor or is in reach on a table. Sometimes I have caught Hannah beginning to eat a paper towel, and I have scolded her and tried to pull it out of her mouth. But Hannah stubbornly clenches her teeth and won’t let go so at best I am able to salvage a portion of the paper towel. Often, Hannah poops out paper towels…but I won’t go into that.
I have been finding our toilet paper unrolled a little from the holder in the bathroom, and torn at the ends. Since Timmy spends so much time in the bathroom, he was my prime suspect–even though we have never had a cat who unrolled toilet paper until recently. I need to apologize to Timmy. Last night I walked into the bathroom and found Hannah on the floor in front of the toilet paper holder slurping down toilet paper as if it were noodles. She must have thought she had died and gone to Heaven when she discovered the endless rolls of toilet paper! I should have suspected her all along. It will be a battle to break this bad habit of hers. So far, she is winning. I don’t know if we have been able to help her overcome any of her vices. Hannah is such a stubborn girl, but she is also funny, playful, loving, protective, and a complete joy to have around.
Speaking of bad behavior…I became aware of a situation in which a guy accused officers of racism and of religious persecution when they were called in when a store wanted him escorted off their property and banned from returning. Later, the guy tried to get the officers fired for misconduct. (I later learned they were cleared.) This guy claimed in a video that he was “only trying to tell the store clerk about his Jesus.” He was “Jesus this” and “Jesus that” and “No weapon formed against me will prosper,” and all sorts of religious-speak. He never mentioned that he had shouted obscenities at the clerk for almost a half hour after she asked him to stop. I watched the video and the officers were calm and polite. They were being neither racist nor persecuting him for his faith. Here’s a hint: No one likes to be abused–verbally or any other type–and you aren’t suffering discrimination or religious persecution if you are receiving consequences for your horribly bad behavior. Does the guy really think he was a “witness for Christ” when he shouted obscenities at the clerk or insulted the officers and tried to get them fired? It’s more probable that he drove them away from ever being receptive to the true Jesus. And if a person cries “racism” whenever someone disagrees with him or resists their abuse behavior, they cause people to become deaf to accounts of true racism.
I will try to calm down and breathe. But this sort of abusive fake religious person really upsets me. I think they are the worst sort of people because they misrepresent the true Messiah and turn people from Him. Here’s an idea: If you want to be a “true witness for Christ,” maybe you ought to treat other people with respect, consideration, and kindness. Don’t be deceitful. Don’t be abusive. Don’t swear at people. Don’t falsely accuse them. Don’t try to get them fired for politely doing their jobs. Grrrr. And please, people, be careful who you support on social media. Everyone on his FB page were supporting his “stand for Christ.” Not everyone is honest and you don’t always know the whole story.
Bumblebees, Butterflies, and Old Straw
Once again, it’s the beginning of a new week. The days and weeks just seem to fly by!
EJ and I had an enjoyable weekend. Saturday the weather ranged from misty to a very light rain. It was a good day to stay indoors and do quiet things. EJ, Hannah, Josette, and I did take an afternoon walk down the driveway in the rain. At the bottom, EJ and I discussed where we would put up our wildlife habitat sign, and what sort of post we would hang it on. I told EJ that I don’t know why having the sign is so meaningful to me. He said that it’s just as meaningful to him.
It rained more during the night, which was good for the plants. Sunday was beautiful. We’ve been enjoying delightfully cool mornings lately–so cool that we wear jackets. In the afternoon, the temperature heats up to the high 70s. It was rather humid Sunday afternoon. However, it’s still not bad. This next weekend temperatures in the 90s are expected. Ugh.
After a peaceful morning drinking coffee, Facebooking, and chatting, we finally stirred ourselves to get something done. We first hung up our wildlife sign. I pulled up a t-post from along the driveway, and EJ pulled up the wooden post holding part of the fencing around the garden. We replaced the wooden post with the t-post. (I have a habit of stealing a post from one place to use in another). We carried the wooden post to the front porch. EJ hammered a nail in with a couple whacks to provide holes to start screwing in screws to hold the sign. The wooden post has a birdless bird house on top. Every time EJ pounded a nail, I heard a loud buzzing from the bird house. I leaned over to look inside the bird house. “There are bees in there!” I warned. I wasn’t sure what kind or how many. I just saw one. To make sure no angry bees swarmed out to sting us, I found a short board and put it over the bird house entrance.
EJ finished attaching the sign, and then we discussed how to get the post with the bird house with bees inside down the hill. At first we lay it on the wheelbarrow so we could run if we got swarmed. But the post was unwieldy so I finally said that I would carry it down. We think EJ is allergic to bees, but I am not. I figured it the bees didn’t come swarming out when EJ hammered, they probably wouldn’t come out when I carefully carried it. EJ carried the tools down.
Josette accompanied us down the hill, and watched us as EJ dug a hole, inserted the post, and pounded the dirt with a sledge-hammer to make it firm. I think it looks splendid.
After we got our sign up, I went into the garden to weed the raised beds while EJ went into the crawl space under the house to clean the filter. Then he joined me in the garden to weed and thin turnips and radishes. A big bumblebee kept circling the area where the wooden post had been. “Do you think he is confused because his bird house has suddenly disappeared?” I wondered. Poor thing.It must be a shock to find your home gone–if the bird house was his home. We worked with one eye on the bumblebee so we could keep out of his way. Losing his house might have made him angry.
Later, EJ helped me find the pedestal birdbath in the garage. He then went to work on the suburban while I constructed a butterfly puddling station. I didn’t even know there was such a thing until one of my blog readers told me about them a few days ago. I learned that butterflies drink by “puddling”. They sip at shallow puddles of water in mud or sand instead of landing in large open water areas. I made a butterfly puddler by setting up the pedestal birdbath near the big rocks where the butterfly bush blooms later in the summer. I located it where I could see it from the house so I can shoo away Madeline if she gets too interested in it.
Our area is mostly sand and we have an especially good place to get sand at the bottom of our hill. I got our a shovel and an empty kitty litter bucket and walked down the driveway to get that sand. But as I drew closer, I saw a Mama Turkey with her adorable babies nearby. I could just barely see some of the babies in the long grass. I quietly retreated back up the hill. I used the slightly inferior sand at the top of the hill for my puddler instead.
I put some sand in the birdbath and found some flatish rocks to put in there too for the butterflies to rest on. Then I dampened the sand. I haven’t seen any butterflies on it yet, but I suspect it will take them a while to find it, just as it takes birds a while to find birdhouses and feeders that we set out. I can’t wait!
This morning was another delightfully cool morning. After I finished my morning chores, I sat down in my chair with a cup of coffee. Little Bear came to sit on my lap, then Kee-Kee joined him, and then Hannah climbed up on my recliner footstool. I had three animals sitting on me. It was very comfy. Life doesn’t get much better than this.
Throughout the day, I did various chores–none of them too strenuously. I washed a load of towels and hung them on the clothesline. I washed a few windows, which had gotten very dusty–either from the dust stirred up from my mowing or the dust from the heavy machinery cutting down the trees across the road a couple weeks ago. In the afternoon, I shoveled a wheelbarrow load of the old straw I had raked out of the duck coop at the beginning of Spring. It’s in front of the coop and when it gets wet from the rain or from my sprinklers, it squishes when I walk on it which is rather unpleasant. I dumped the load onto the compost pile. EJ says it makes really good compost. I alternate the old straw with the weeds I pull up from the garden and table scraps.
This afternoon when I walked Hannah down the driveway, I saw several butterflies among the milkweed. One was black and blue, and the others were orange and black. I took a photo of one. It wasn’t a Monarch, but it was beautiful. I like butterflies. I will have to do some research to identify what kind it is. I like learning about the things I see.
I have found many empty stalks on the lilies where the deer have been snacking. I noticed that they have also been enjoying the sunflower plants next to the deck. Several leaves are missing. Our property appears to be a critter cafeteria. I don’t mind sharing with the wildlife.
Well…it’s time to go get the now-dried towels from the clotheslines. After I fold them and put them away, I have to gather eggs and then start preparing our supper.
Bona Fide
One of EJ’s favorite movies is O, Brother, Where Art Thou? It’s about a guy (George Clooney) who escapes from a chain gang when he hears that his ex-wife is planning to get remarried. He finds his children singing at a political fundraiser and they tell him that their Mom’s new suitor is “bona fide,” which means authentic, genuine, real, true, actual. It’s a cute movie with some great singing in it.
Well, I am feeling bona fide today because our property has been certified by the National Wildlife Federation as a wildlife habitat. It’s easy to get certified. You just go to their website, fill out a questionnaire about your property, and pay a small fee. It’s not like they come and do an intense home study or anything. Still, I feel very proud of our certification. I figure we have earned it because EJ and I really do make an effort to provide good habitat for the wildlife on our property. We aren’t extreme like some environmentalists are, but we do believe that God gave us stewardship over the planet and it is our responsibility to care for the earth (Genesis 1:26-28).
I received a certificate a few weeks ago (pictured at the top of this post), and today my sign arrived in the mail. I will put the sign up on our property this weekend as soon as I decide where I want it. It will let visitors know that we make a conscious effort to provide habitat for wildlife.
I think it’s rather funny that when EJ first visited this property with our realtor, the realtor didn’t think it would be suitable because most of it is forested hills and gullies. It isn’t a property that can be easily cultivated. However, our property really is everything we longed for: We have just enough land for a small garden for our needs, it is quiet and peaceful, it is beautiful, and it has wildness that provides good habitat for wildlife–and we work to keep it that way.
Yesterday at Facebook, I came across a meme on my timeline that said that in Japan, doctors would prescribe “Forest therapy” to treat depression and anxiety. The scent of the trees increases activity of the natural killer cells that enhances your immune system which boosts resistance against stress.” We have always consider our beautiful enchanted forest to be “Forest therapy.” As introverts, EJ and I need quiet, nature, and animals to refresh us. Without these things, our spirits wither. The forest is therapeutic for us.
I like this quote by Albert Einstein:
There are two ways to live:
you can live as if nothing is a miracle;
you can live as if everything is a miracle.
EJ and I choose to live as if everything is a miracle. We enjoy the beauty of wildflowers, we appreciate the artistry in a spiderweb (in spite of the fact that I hate spiders), we pause to watch geese fly overhead, and so on. One of my favorite poems is by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. She sums up our view of nature:
We totally love our beautiful Enchanted Forest.
And now we are bona fide.
The Secret World of Crows
When we talked to the Flooring Department salesman at Lowes on Sunday, he told us to expect a call in the next day or two to set up an appointment to get our living room floor measured. We specifically asked him to give the installation people my phone number because EJ doesn’t take personal calls at work. But EJ texted me late Monday morning to tell me that the installation people had called and left a voice message on his phone. This brought back frustrated memories of previous installation guys who kept calling EJ instead of me which delayed our projects. I quickly called the Flooring Department and asked the guy who answered the phone to have the installation people please call me instead of EJ. The guy said he would pass it on but I heard nothing all Monday. However, when EJ got home that evening, he gave me the callback number given to him in the voice message. I called first thing the next morning and the woman who answered said she was working in our area that day and would be by later. She arrived even earlier than she estimated and quickly took the measurements she needed. Yay! As she prepared to leave, she said that she would turn in her measurements that afternoon and Lowes would get back to me with the estimate in 3-5 days. I’m really looking forward to getting the new flooring.
The weather today has been perfectly beautiful. The morning was so cool (in the 50’s) that I had to wear a jacket. I loved it. The temperature warmed up to 76 degrees by mid-afternoon, but the breeze kept it relatively comfortable-ish.
I hadn’t watered the gardens or trees all week because of the rain we had last weekend, but after several days of sunshine, I felt it was time to water everything this morning. I also did laundry and as I hung the clothes on the clothesline, I enjoyed the peaceful beauty around me. The Orcs have stopped cutting down the forest across the road; they only return now and then to carry off another load of murdered Ents. So I no longer hear the constant roar of their machines and I can once again enjoy peaceful nature sounds.
I heard crows cawing overhead as I hung the wet clothes on the line this morning. I think that crows are fascinating. They are amazingly intelligent birds as described in this interesting article: 6 Terrifying Ways Crows Are Smarter Than You Think. There is also a very interesting documentary about crows at Youtube that EJ and I watched together this evening. Crows are one of the most intelligent critters on the planet. Among other things, crows can make and use tools and solve complex problems. They also can recognize individual faces. If someone messes with them, they not only remember them, but they also tell other crows and teach their babies to dislike them. You don’t want to make an enemy of a crow because you will make enemies of all the crows in the area. They also chase away aerial predators like hawks that would harm my ducks and chickens, so they are quite handy to have in the neighborhood. I told EJ tonight that if the crows are intelligent and observing us, I would like to make friends with them. He said that he had been thinking the same thing. “We could make a treaty with them,” he said. I laughed, “Yeah, we could make a treaty with the Crow Nation.” I don’t know how to make friends with crows but they are one of my favorite kind of birds. I can see why Native Americans thought they were special.
I saw turkey vultures soaring overhead this morning. I like watching them soar. I can never remember the differences between vultures and buzzards or which we have in Michigan. I keeping looking it up to try to learn the differences and keep forgetting. But this morning I finally found an article that said that Michigan only has turkey vultures–so that’s helpful and will be easy to remember. Vultures mostly eat dead things so they aren’t a real threat to the poultry, but the ducks and chickens are always alarmed when one flies overhead because they are alert to large birds that could be predators flying in the sky. I’ve even seen the ducks watch airplanes in the sky. Whenever EJ and I see vultures circling in the sky, we comment that there must be a dead cowboy somewhere nearby–because in all the old western movies vultures always circled around a cowboy dying in the desert. If we see numerous vultures circling, we comment that there must be a dead cowboy AND his dead horse.
Yesterday I saw a male Rose-breasted Grosbeak visit my hanging bird bath. My camera was across the room and by the time I retrieved it, the bird had flown away. This is the second time this summer that I have seen one. Rose-breasted Grosbeaks are beautiful. I saw them for the first time a couple of years before we moved to Northern Michigan. I also spotted a hummingbird drinking nectar from the red flowers of the hanging plant. He also flew away before I could get a photo. I also was not quick enough to snap a photo of the Monarch Butterfly visiting the milkweed growing in my flower garden near the house. Sometimes I am able to take photos of cool things I see, and sometimes not.
When I walked Hannah today, I noticed that the lilies along the driveway are beginning to bud. It won’t be too much longer before they bloom. Last year I watched with anticipation as the buds got larger and larger day by day. I couldn’t wait to see them bloom. Then one day I eagerly walked down the driveway to see if the lilies had bloomed and found only empty stalks. I didn’t know that the deer love eating lilies. Apparently they consider them a treat. Oh, well. I think that eventually the lilies will multiply so that even the deer can’t eat them all. And I don’t mind that the deer get to enjoy a treat, even though I really would like to see a lily-lined driveway.
Even if I don’t get to enjoy the lilies, I do enjoy the wildflowers as I walk down the driveway with Hannah. Hannah also seems to enjoy them. The other day she went up to the large seed head of the “Johnny Go To Bed At Noon” flowers. She sniffed it…and then tried to bite it and sending the seeds flying. It was really cute. Hannah also enjoys the wild strawberries that grow all over our property. She has learned where they are growing along the driveway and pauses to eat a few each time we go for a walk.
The last time I mowed the lawn, I found a couple of places where a few hawkweed were growing. I mowed around those places and I check every now and then to see if they have gone to seed yet. When they do, I will plant the seeds along the driveway. I just read that in some places, hawkweed is considered a “noxious weed.” Whatever. I think hawkweed are very pretty. Seriously, I think my favorite type of flowers are wildflowers–also known as “weeds.” In my opinion, a weed is just a flower growing where you don’t want it. Although I think orderly gardens are beautiful, I prefer a field full of wildflowers.
Whenever I go outside, our cat Josette suddenly appears and follows me around. She follows Hannah and me on our walks down and up the driveway and she joins me when I garden, care for the ducks, or hang the clothes on the line. I now look for her to see if I can anticipate where she will appear–sort of a Josette version of “Where’s Waldo.” Josette is as affectionate as Madeline is timid–and she is gentle rather than a serial killer.
I’ve been looking for shallow dishes to fill with water for the critters to drink on hot summer days. I finally realized that there was a perfect saucer under the pot that the dead rosemary plant is in. I took it, filled it with water, and put it on one of the large rocks. I also filled an upside-down frisbee with water and put it on the ground.
Well, EJ and Hannah have gone to bed already and it’s about time to put my ducks and chickens to bed in their coop so I’ll chat with you all another day.
“Hidden Pictures”
Every time I go outside, I look around to see what I can see–I enjoy looking at the wildflowers along the driveway, and try to see if I can spot any new ones in bloom. I also look and listen for birds, insects, or other critters. It’s sort of like my a living “Hidden Pictures” game. There’s always something beautiful or interesting to see.
Hannah also is watchful, although I think she’s actually looking for things to eat. Sunday morning when I took her outside, she lunged for something to the left of the porch step. I quickly pulled her away because I didn’t want her to eat something she shouldn’t. I looked for what she was interested in, and I saw a huge toad. I kept Hannah away from it and when I came back later, it was gone.
Hannah also spotted the dead baby snake in the driveway when we went for a walk yesterday. It was about as thick as a pencil and maybe twice as long. I took a photo of it and sent it to EJ at work. He wanted to see it, so I used a long thin wooden board from the garage to pick it up and put it in an empty kitty litter bucket. I was brave because it was dead. I looked it up on Google and I think it’s a milksnake. It is nonvenomous, as most Michigan snakes are. I read at the Live Science website that there are 24 different subspecies of milksnake. They are powerful constrictors that eat rodents and eggs, they sometimes pretend to be rattlesnakes to scare off predators, and they like to live in forests. The snake was quite beautiful. I do not mind snakes because I usually don’t see them, if I do encounter them they slither off, and in Michigan they are usually nonvenomous. EJ says that the only venomous snake we have in Michigan is the Massasauga, which is extremely venomous.
Yesterday afternoon I was looking out the window as I talked to my friend on the phone, and I saw an Indigo Bunting. I was ecstatic. Besides the fact that they are a very beautiful blue color, this is about only the third time I’ve ever seen one. It was difficult to capture it with my camera because it kept hopping around on the berry bushes, but I got a somewhat decent photo. They are so pretty!
When I walked Hannah down to the mailbox today, I saw that some of the “Johnny Go to Bed At Noon” flowers had gone to seed. I grabbed some of the seeds and scattered them along the driveway to help spread them. I often scatter the seeds of plants that I like.
I also noticed that the milkweed is beginning to bloom. I think they have very pretty flowers. Milkweed are the only plant that Monarch Butterflies lay their eggs on. I’m hoping to increase the number of plants on our property to attract more Monarchs. When the Milkweeds go to seed, I also scatter them around our property.
Halfway down the driveway, I noticed something large in the Leafy Spurge plants. I went over for a closer look, and found two unusual caterpillars that I had never seen before. They were very large–about four inches long–and beautifully colored. On the way back up the driveway after getting our mail from the mailbox, I spotted two more in another Leafy Spurge plant a few feet away. When I got back to the house, I googled them and learned that they are Leafy Spurge Hawk Moths.
I read in an on-line article that
Winter is spent in the pupal stage, which occurs in a below ground earthen cell a few inches below the soil surface. Adults emerge in late May or June and may sometimes be seen visiting flowers at dusk where they feed on nectar. The adults are “hawk moths” that hover when feeding, much in the manner of a hummingbird. Females lay between 70-150 eggs, in small batches on the leaves and flower bracts of their host plant.
I look forward to seeing them in their moth stage. They are pretty cool.
I love our Enchanted Forest because it is beautiful and I always discover something new, unusual, and interesting. It’s fun trying to see them. Life is interesting and full of wonder.
Our Father’s Day
I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! Our weekend was quite quiet, mostly because it was so hot and humid that the energy melted out of us. Sunday was especially hot, with temperatures in the 90s. There were heat warnings out. Seriously, I don’t know how people in the South survive. I think it’s much easier to deal with cold weather than hot weather. In cold weather a person can just put on another sweater and blanket, and turn up the thermostat. But there’s only so much a person can do when it’s supper hot. I mean, you can air condition your house or business, but you still have to go outside. Whenever I walked outside this weekend, sweat immediately started running down my body.
EJ and I agreed that if he ever retires and we sell this place, we are moving further North into Michigan’s Upper Peninsula where it’s cooler, with even more beauty and fewer people. When we moved to Northern Michigan from southern Michigan, I told EJ that I would never again go south of Highway US-10, which is where I think Up North begins. Michiganders have different opinions about where Up North begins but everyone considers Up North to be a magical place of beauty, and rest, and fun, and escape from the stresses of life. It is miles of beautiful forests, beautiful huge lakes, camping, campfires, billions of stars, pasties and fudge, water sports, history, hunting, fishing. Up North is paradise. Actually living Up North is an impossible dream come true. I told EJ, “You know, if we ever move to the U.P., I’m not ever again going south of the Mackinac Bridge.” He totally agreed.
I don’t set my alarm on weekends so I tend to sleep a little later, but EJ still finds himself waking as early as he does on a work day. While I slept in on Saturday morning, EJ did most of my morning chores for me. I thought that was very sweet of him. I only had to fill the duck pool and water buckets. He said it had rained really hard while I slept.
We try to have quiet, relaxing days on Saturdays, but this time we had to go to a local feed store called McGoughs. We have several feed stores in our area that have good prices on different products. We go to TSC for our poultry feed, dry dog food, and other items like garden hoses. Unlike the other stores, it’s open on Sundays. One local feed store grows its own grass seeds and we can buy it at bulk for a great price. McGoughs is furthest away but it sells 40 pound bags of dry cat food for a really good price. We bought two. We store our dry pet food in large trash cans in the pantry so we don’t have to buy it often. McGoughs also grows and bags their own wild bird seed for a great price so we tend to buy it there each autumn. I haven’t been able to find any local wildflower seeds at any of the feed/farm/nursery stores, so I’ve been buying nonlocal commercially packaged bags of seeds which has both annual and perennials seeds in it–probably more of the former than the latter. Even garden centers in home improvement or larger grocery stores sell these bags. But on Saturday I found bags of the feed store’s own local perennial wildflower mixes. It’s more expensive but the seeds are local, and it’s all perennials, which is exactly what I’ve been looking for. I like perennials because I don’t have to buy them every year. I bought a bag and a packet of seeds. I plan to buy the wildflower seeds from here each Spring now until I have enough wildflowers. Hmm….is it possible for a person to have enough wildflowers? I’ll find out.
Since this was our only stop and we didn’t plan to be in the store long, we took Hannah along with us. After the feed store, EJ took the long way home along “roads less traveled” on dirt roads lined with beautiful pine forests. Hannah loved it.
Sunday morning I filled the wheelbarrow with organic garden dirt, mixed in the wildflower seeds, and scattered them along the driveway. I hope they will grow this year, but if they don’t, maybe they will grow next Spring, but whether they do or not, I will buy more wildflower seeds from the feed store next Spring. I am not really an expert in gardening. I just sort of do random act of gardening. I figure if I plant enough seeds or plants, something is sure to grow. Although I went out relatively early in the morning to plant my seeds, the day was already heating up.
When I got back inside and cooled off in front of the fan and had a cup or two of coffee, EJ got out his whiteboard and we listed and prioritized the projects we want to get done. We have a lot of things we want done, but limited money. We need to get more gravel for the driveway, we would like to get a tractor with a lawnmower and snowblower, I would like to paint the master bathroom…but we decided that the priority is getting the septic pumped out this summer and EJ has been wanting to get the living room floor out ever since we decided to buy this place. It is threadbare and stained from the previous owner’s dog. Since we have so many pets, we prefer not to have carpet. Carpet is less sanitary and harder to clean than bare floors.
After our “business” meeting, we hopped in the Xterra and drove off to Lowes to look at flooring. Hannah really wanted to go with us, but we felt it would be too hot for her in the vehicle so we left her home.
We almost decided to get a wood-floor looking laminate sheet, but it would require a seam in the middle of the floor because our room is wider than the sheet. The laminate planks look better than the sheet, is more durable, will not have a seam, and is only a little more than the sheet so we decided on the planks. We are getting flooring called “rustic hickory.” At our other house we put in flooring ourselves to save money, but EJ has been struggling so much with his chronic back pain and other health issues that we decided to just have Lowes do it for us. All we will do is tear out the old carpet during the week that EJ has off in early July. I’m not sure when the flooring will be installed. I am waiting for a call to make an appointment for the installment guys to come out and measure our room and give us an estimate of the cost, and then we will go from there.
On the way home, I told EJ that getting the flooring was his Father’s Day gift. I reminded him that I give awesome gifts. Three years ago I gave him the birthday gift of living Up North. For Father’s Day that year, I gave him a new house. These awesome huge things our lives tend to happen around these days so I claim they are my gifts to him. Of course, he gifts me awesome gifts too. Every year for my birthday he gives me Memories–we take a long drive through the beautiful autumn.
When we got home, we did quiet things that required little movement. The heat and humidity were oppressive and sapped our energy. We had a light meal that required no baking so we wouldn’t heat up the house. The only other thing I did was gather eggs in the afternoon and shut up the ducks and chickens in the evening. While I was gathering eggs, I stepped on something in the coop that went “crunch, crunch” under my chore shoots. It felt like egg shells. I looked down and saw that I had stepped on a dead, flattened chipmunk. It obviously had come into the coop and the ducks killed it. The ducks tend to flatten critters that they catch in their bills. It’s gross. I picked the body up with the garden rake that I keep in the coop and threw it into the forest.
I woke in the night to the tapping of rain on the roof and it has been raining all morning. It’s not a stormy rain, but a steady soaking rain. Yay! I am so glad it’s raining! We need it so desperately! Unlike us, southern Michigan has had a very wet Spring/Summer but I feel especially bad for the Yoopers (residents of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula) who have gotten torrential rains in the last few days. EJ said he read they received 7 inches of rain in 7 hours. We’ve seen photos and videos of floods and ruin roads. Here is one photo shared by John James in Houghton, Michigan, at the Facebook page called Michigan Weather Authority. There are many other similar photos/videos of the destruction.
I feel very bad for those poor people up there. I think they are expecting even more rain.
I Spy
Wednesday was a slow, unmotivated day. Thursday was just the opposite–I was busy all day long from morning till evening.
As usually, I got out of bed and took care of all the pets, then watered the gardens and trees we planted. Yesterday was payday so in between moving the sprinklers, I paid bills. When I finished watering and paying bills, I went grocery shopping at our local store, which is just a couple of miles away. When I arrived home, I lugged all the groceries in and put them away.
I knew that there was a chance of rain this weekend, beginning on Friday afternoon, so I figured that I better get the lawn mowed even though I dislike doing it in the afternoon, the hottest part of the day. With the dry weather, I’ve only been mowing every other week. Even though we only mow up around the house, it takes me a couple hours. I usually begin in the front yard, then I stop, refill the mower with gas, and take a break before I mow the back yard. It is exhausting, and I dream of having some sort of tractor with a mower for summer and a snowblower for winter. It’s not in the budget yet. Even though mowing is hot and tiring, I love the look of a freshly mowed yard.
When I finished the lawn, I took a short break before going out to gather eggs and then starting supper. I made steak, coleslaw, and corn-on-the-cob. I love corn-on-the-cob and it was on sale at the store. If we expand our garden next year, we would like to try growing our own corn. I’d also like to try watermelon and cantaloupe.
This morning my body felt tired from yesterday’s labor. I could also feel soreness from my hands and knees from falling off the porch yesterday when I went out to move sprinklers. Fortunately I didn’t break anything this time. The chance of rain is slight this afternoon (20%), but higher this evening and tomorrow (30% to 50%) so I decided I was too tired to bother with sprinklers today.
The mornings lately have been cool–so cool that I wear a jacket when I go out to do my chores. I remembered that as we were buying our house, our loan officer told me that Lake Michigan often acts like an air conditioner. In the afternoons the temperatures heat up, but I revel in the mornings’ coolness.
Since it was sunny this morning. I decided to risk doing laundry and hanging clothes out to dry. When JJ lived at home, I had to do laundry about every other day because he needed clean uniforms for work. But now that he’s moved out, I only have to do laundry once a week. Well, I do wash a load of towels twice a week so we don’t run out. I got all our clothes hung on the line, but as the morning progressed, clouds began to move in so I decided to wash the last load–towels–in the drying. I didn’t think they would have time to dry before the (slight chance of) rain, and my clothes line was mostly full already.
It is always very pleasant hanging the clothes on the line. I always enjoy drinking in the beauty around me as I hang the clothes and enjoying the peaceful nature sounds. Well, usually it’s quiet and peaceful, but this summer has been noisy with Orcs chopping down the forest across the road. This morning in addition to the Orcs, I also heard machine noises from our Vacation Neighbors, who are obviously at their cabin this weekend. I figured the guy was mowing his lawn, but it sounded much louder than normal this morning. I’m so used to our quiet, peaceful Enchanted Forest that the noises seem deafening this summer. I wondered…was Vacation Neighbor mowing his lawn or was he, also, an Orc? Gasp! Was Orc-ness contagious like zombie-ness?? Usually I am totally uninterested in spying on my neighbors, but I was in a playful mood this morning. I left my basket of wet clothes at the clothesline and skulked through the forest to see if the noise I heard was our Vacation Neighbor’s mower or Orc machines. We live on top of a hill and our Vacation Neighbors live beneath us at the bottom with a steep forested slope between us. I stayed at the top and tried to look down, but there were so many trees that I couldn’t see anything. However, after I finished hanging the clothes, Hannah wanted outside so I walked her down the driveway and saw Vacation Guy on his riding mower. He’s not an Orc after all.
I read an article today about a tree found near the tropical waters of the Indian and Pacific oceans that lures birds to themselves and then murders them for no good reason that scientists can discover. That’s interesting and rather scary.
The breeze dried the clothes quickly. As took them off the line, I heard the sound of machinery from the direction of the Vacation Neighbors. It sure sounded like Orc Machinery and the guy should have been done mowing by now. Either the Orcs are cutting down trees on the other side of Vacation Neighbors or they are cutting down trees further down the road so it sounds as if it’s coming from the direction of Vacation Neighbor’s.
In between tasks I sat in my chair, drank, coffee, and worked on this post. I glanced out of the window next to me and spied a beautiful black and blue butterfly in the landscape rocks near the house. I took a photo of it and then tried to identify it. I think it’s a Red-Spotted Purple. It sure is beautiful.
I had sort of planned to make a trip to TSC for poultry supplies today, but I didn’t feel up to it so I just puttered around home.
This afternoon I walked Hannah down the driveway to the Magic Box (where delivery people leave packages for us in the Winter when they can’t make it up the driveway) and back. Hannah spied a patch of wild strawberries and she paused to eat the tiny ripe berries. Hannah eats everything–old straw from the coop, various critter poop, grasshoppers, strawberries, dead rodents. Much of our walk involves me trying to keep her from eating things. But I stop to let her eat the strawberries each day.
Radar showed a huge mass of rain headed right for us–it couldn’t miss!–so I decided maybe I should go out to the coop and gather eggs an hour earlier than usual so I wouldn’t be caught in it. As I got out of my chair I glanced out of the window and spied Madeline, our serial killer cat, trotting by with a chipmunk in her mouth. Suddenly Madeline dropped the rodent and it began to run with her after it. I can’t do anything about dead or mostly dead critters, but I can rescue still alive ones! I ran out in my socks, shouting “No! No! No!” to Madeline. She is really quite timid, but she was in pursuit of her victim so she’d run off a bit as I shouted at her, and then return, circling around. The chipmunk scurried toward the Xterra while Madeline went under it. The chipmunk hid for a short time in the hubcap and then ran under the Xterra where Madeline was waiting. It was like in those movies where the people are walking toward where the viewer knows the serial killer/monster is hiding…Somehow the chipmunk escaped and ran across the grass, up the hill, and into the forest with Madeline chasing it. I tried to keep myself between Madeline and the chipmunk, continuing to shout “No!” to scare Madeline. Hannah heard me shouting and was in the house barking frantically. I lost sight of the chipmunk but saw Madeline looking up into the tree, so I stood my ground for a moment or two to give the chipmunk time to get away. Then I telepathically thought to the chipmunk, “I did my best. You are on your own now. Be more watchful next time….”
I got my chore boots on and went out to the poultry pen. As I filled the drinking buckets with water, I spied Madeline trot past the pen on her way to the garage. She wasn’t carrying any chipmunks so I think it got away.
The rain went south of us and then disappeared. Bummer. Well, there’s always tonight and tomorrow….
Showers of Blessing
Yesterday was another very beautiful day with sunshine and blue skies…and no rain.
Once again, I had to turn on the sprinklers in the morning after taking caring of the various animals. My backyard method is the same every day: I fill up the ducks’ drinking water and pool, then water the garden, then move the hose and water the potatoes at the bottom of the hill. The front is more complicated. My method is that one day I set up the sprinklers at the apple trees at the top of the hill, move over to the cherry trees across the driveway, then move the sprinklers back across the driveway to the evergreen trees at the bottom of the hill. When I finish watering, I leave the hose there. The next morning I start at the evergreen trees, then water the cherry trees, then finish with watering the apple trees. So one day I start at the apple trees, the next day I end at the apple trees. Up and down one day, down and up the next, and do it all over again.
The loggers at my Orc Neighbor’s place start their work at 6 a.m. I took a video yesterday to show how loudly their machines are, which I hear hour after hour, day after day:
For some reason the loggers quit at mid-afternoon yesterday. I wondered if their job was finished? That would be joy! But when I took Hannah for a walk down the driveway, I saw a huge pile of logs stacked up in the field. Today I hear them working again, but the noise is more muted. Maybe they are working further away into the forest? Whatever. The noise is less loud annoying today–a murmur instead of a roar–although I still hate the thought of all the trees being cut down and the wildlife babies at risk.
Yesterday I washed a load of towels and hung them out on the clothesline. I retrieved the wheelbarrow from the garden where I had parked it so the ducks could sleep in its shade. They have other shady places in the pen to find refuge from the sun, but they seem to like the wheelbarrow shade–and it’s as good a place as any to park the wheelbarrow when I’m not using it. I pushed the wheelbarrow to the back of the Xterra and unloaded the bags of garden soil, three at a time. I put three bags in the garage and the other three bags I left in the wheelbarrow which I parked back in the garden.
I did a little weeding yesterday. I notice a few milkweed plants are growing in the flower garden. I’m leaving them there for the Monarch butterflies. My philosophy of gardening is that a plant is not a weed if it is where I want it to be. I think it’s funny that one is a treasured flower in one region is considered a weed in another. I remember that not long after one of my Michigan friends married an Iowan farmer, she bought some morning-glory plants for her garden. When her husband discovered this, he was horrified because he killed morning glories as an invasive weed on his farm. LOL.
Whenever I walk Hannah down the driveway, which is several times a day, I enjoy watching for wildflowers blooming. I noticed that there are a lot of dandelion-type flowers growing among the milkweed on the hill. Their yellow was very cheerful among the green. I know a lot of people dislike dandelions and spend a lot of money on chemicals to eradicate them from their lawns. I’m not sure why it’s so important to have a dandelion-less lawn. I’ve always loved dandelions. They are the first flowers that children pick to bring to their Mommy. They also are a nutritious food (if they aren’t covered with chemicals). And they are a good source of nectar for bees, which are struggling to survive. I found this informative cartoon from a website called “Mother Nature News”:
I’ve noticed when I shut the chickens in their coop every evening that all the hens are gathered around Sassy, our alpha rooster. Well, all except one. One hen always sits at the far end of the roost next to Captain AmeROOca, our other rooster. I thought, well, that’s nice of Sassy to allow Captain one of the hens in his harem instead of keeping them all to himself. Sassy is a very thoughtful leader who brings balance and harmony to the coop.
We woke to dark cloudy skies and a chance of rain this morning. The forecasts for our area has been up and down all summer, with slight promises of rain that evaporate to nothing. However, shortly after EJ left for work this morning, we actually got some rain! Yay! I quickly closed the windows EJ had opened and then went back to work because I had another night of little sleep and was very tired. I was dimly aware of a little thunder, but not loud enough, or long enough to wake me from my sleep.
Because I slept, I’m not sure how long or hard it rained, but I know it was enough that I didn’t have to worry about watering the gardens or trees. There were dark cloudy skies when I woke, and it was wonderfully cool and breezy today. The temperatures did not reach 70. About mid-afternoon a few large puffy clouds sailed slowly across the blue sky and disappeared into the distance.
This morning when I took Hannah Joy outside, she quickly pounced on something in the grass and ate it. I think it was a dead mouse or something, probably killed by Madeline. I could hear a crunch, crunching (bones?) as she ate it, and it looked like a tail was hanging from her mouth until she slurped it down. Hannah eats everything, probably because she was starved by her previous owner. Usually when Hannah grabs something she shouldn’t I try to pry it from her, with resistance from Hannah. However, there was no way I was going to try to retrieve a dead, crunched critter from her jaws. I felt sick. Yuck!
Today has been a very sleepy day. Tomorrow will be busier. It is grocery day.
Damaging My Calm
Today was another beautiful sunny day. Because of the lack of rain, we have “Extreme Fire Danger” warnings in our area. I hope we start getting rain soon–mostly because of the thirsty plants, of course, but also because we can’t risk having weekend campfires with it so dry. We really love sitting around the fire but the last thing we want is to start a forest fire.
I didn’t sleep well last night. I actually haven’t slept consistently well since JJ had cancer. I sleep ok for a few days and then have a night of poor sleep. It kind of sucks. But it is what it is.
I think I finally fell asleep sometime after 1 a.m.–or was it 2 a.m.? During the week, my alarm goes off at 6 a.m., which is the time EJ needs to get up for work, although often he wakes up earlier. This morning I stumbled out of bed and took care of all the animals, each according to their needs.
After letting the ducks and chickens out of their coop, I turned on the backyard garden hose, then turned on the front yard hose, and took Hannah outside. Since we have extended our front yard hose by 50 feet, the sprinkler was able to reach the evergreen trees we planted. I had to do a bit of adjusting to get it just right. I snaked the hose down the hill, being careful not to crush any of the milkweed plants which are the only plant that Monarch Butterflies lay their eggs on. When the eggs hatch, the caterpillars eat the milkweed. Milkweed plants are diminishing so we try to encourage their growth. I didn’t crushed any milkweed, but it was difficult so I think tomorrow I will try pulling the hose along the side of the driveway instead.
Once the sprinklers were going, I came inside and relaxed. Then as soon as EJ left for work, I moved the backyard sprinkler from the garden to the potatoes, and I moved the front yard sprinklers to water some of the fruit trees. I came in, ate breakfast, then went out and turned off the backyard sprinkler and moved the front yard sprinkler to another section of fruit trees. I have to move the long hose three times to water all the trees, then I move the lever from the long hose to the short hose to water the flower garden near the house. It takes me at least 2 hours, or maybe a little more, to get everything watered. It’s time consuming, but more thorough and less work than before we got the new hoses.
Later in the morning, I drove to Meijers and bought six more bags of organic garden soil. I wasn’t sure we needed that many, but I was told by the clerk last time I bought dirt that when they’ve sold the various times of soil, the store won’t order more until next year. The bags are very heavy–much heavier than the 50 lb bags of poultry feed we buy, but I manage to get them loaded in the shopping cart and then transferred to the Xterra. I didn’t take unload them when I got home. I was too tired. I will unload it tomorrow.
It was lunchtime so I fixed myself a quick meal and then went out to work in the garden. EJ is going to put garden boxes on top of the dog house so I built a fence around the dog house to try to keep deer from whatever is planted in the boxes. Because of the way the dog house it built, and because I only had flimsy chicken wire to work with, it was very difficult to fashion the fence and it did not turn out as well as I wanted. I sort of corn-cobbled it together. Next year we want to extend the garden so we can grow things like corn. We will buy taller fencing to put around the perimeter of the garden to keep the deer out so my fencing just has to last through this summer.
After I finished the fencing, I got a short piece of wooden post and used it to level the box on the dog house.
I have given my neighbors descriptive nicknames. There is the “neighbor who lives on the hill on the other side of the road.” They go to Florida in the Winter. There is the “Orc Neighbors” where the forest is being cut down. They also live on the other side of the road. And then there is the “Vacationing Neighbors.” Their property borders ours and we share part of our driveway. Our 5 acre properties used to be one 10 acre property before it was split. We live on the top of the hill; their property is at the bottom. Our Vacationing Neighbor’s property is their vacation place. They live downstate and come up here only during the summer. They frequently are up here for the weekend and infrequently for a whole week. Usually when they are here on the weekends, they mow the lawn or cut down trees that have fallen during winter storms.
Anyway, early this morning the roar and beep of forest killing machines began at the Orc Neighbor’s place for another week of slaughter. They work all day long, from early morning until their work day is over at 5 p.m. I really hope they will not be working across the road all summer long. The hours and hours of noise is getting to me. I am refreshed by quiet nature sounds. If I wanted to listen to machines all day, I’d move to New York City. To quote a character from “Firefly,” one of my favorite TV series, the constant noise is “…Starting to damage my calm.”
At least the Orcs don’t work on the weekend. Except Saturday our Vacation Neighbor was in residence and I heard several hours of chain-sawing. Sigh. Sunday was quiet though.
For supper tonight, I made homemade pizza. It took me a long time of searching and trying out various pizza crust recipes until–a few years ago–I finally found an amazing recipe. I used canned tomato sauce and paste to make my pizza sauce, but I put fresh herbs from my garden in it. Yum.
I usually eat at 5:30 p.m. if EJ isn’t home from work by then. He often has to work late. Poor guy. He is late tonight so after I ate, I fed Hannah. She waits until I tell her it’s ok to start eating and then she gobbles down her food. After she ate, she wanted to go out, so I walked her down the driveway in the now quiet forest. Hannah found a couple grasshoppers and ate them. I guess they were dessert? Yuck. Hannah eats just about everything she can find–although she’s not eating the June bugs that are dying on the porch.
This and That and Thingmajigs
EJ and I had a quiet weekend together. We got a few tasks done, but we didn’t overwork.
Saturday morning after I took care of all the animals, I turned on the sprinklers to water the garden and the evergreens and fruit trees we had planted. I always turn on the sprinklers in the garden first after I fill the ducks pool and drinking water. Then I headed to the front yard to water the trees. I had just turned on the front yard sprinklers when it began to rain. The rain surprised me because I had checked the weather report Friday night and we were not supposed to get any rain for several days. I turned off all the sprinklers and then headed back into the house. It didn’t rain hard or for very long, but it was enough to water everything.
This morning I again turned on the sprinklers. This time they stayed on because the day was rainless. In the back yard I have to water the garden and then move the hose over to water the potatoes at the bottom of the hill. In the front yard I have to move the hose a couple times to get all the apple trees watered. Since the hose/sprinkler doesn’t reach all the evergreens or the cherry trees on the other side of the driveway, I fill emptied milk jugs with water and lug them over to give each tree a drink. After all the trees have been watered, I really need to drag the hose to water the flower garden next to the house, but I haven’t done it the last few times because it requires dragging the hose back between two of the large rocks and then, after the flower garden is water, dragging them back to the trees for the next morning’s watering. It’s a hassle.
It takes me a while to get everything watered. If we got more rain, I wouldn’t have to water at all. It’s been a very dry Spring for us this year.
After I finally got all my morning chores done, and EJ and I had eaten breakfast, and I had taken my shower, we drove to TSC. I had told EJ that I would like to buy a thingmajig to attached to the front outside faucet so that we could hook two hoses up to them so I didn’t have to drag the hose back and forth between the flower garden and the trees. He said, “You mean a ‘manifold’?” Oh, yes, I didn’t know that’s what it was called. There are little levers on the manifold so I can shut off the water to one hose or another if I don’t want them both on.
We bought a manifold at TSC as well as two more 50 foot hoses, both of which we connected to the manifold. We attached one of the new hoses to the 100 foot hose so it reaches all the trees so I don’t have to lug gallon jugs. We will keep the other 50 foot hose near the house to water the flower garden.
We took Hannah with us to TSC. Hannah loves to be as close as she can to us, which is possibly dangerous if Hannah distracts the driver, but we can hook a seatbelt up to her harness to keep her in the back seat. Even so, she stretches herself as far forward as the seatbelt allows her. Many of you may remember that we had adopted Hannah from the local animal shelter two days before Christmas 2017. She and two other dogs had been rescued from an abusive home where they had been kept outside and starved. When we brought Hannah home, she was extremely thin–we could count her bones. She has blossomed in our home and loves being close to us.
When Hannah wasn’t trying to get close to us, she looked out the window. She also tried to get in the very back of the Xterra. She’s not an easy dog to take on a drive, but I’m confident she will learn to settle down eventually.
After lunch, EJ and I went out to work in the garden. We had bought a few packets of seeds. It’s probably a bit late to plant them, but we couldn’t resist and, hey, they weren’t that much and it’s worth a try. EJ planted his seeds–parsnips, turnips, radishes, and a few others–while I planted mine. I bought borage, which has pretty purple flowers that are edible. I think they taste like cucumbers. They are pretty in salads. I had grown borage in my garden downstate, but I hadn’t found any here in Northern Michigan until now. I also planted some cat mint outside the garden fence. I figure the cats might enjoy it and I think that deer hate it because of its strong scent. I had taken Hannah out with us and looped the handle over a t-post so she could roam outside the garden but not get inside where the ducks are. After I planted the cat mint Hannah began digging in one of the places I had planted it. Dirt went flying until I stopped her. I have no idea now where the cat mint will begin to grow, if it grows at all.
EJ had more seeds to plant than I did so after I finished planting my borage and catmint, I weeded some of the raised garden beds.
We found another wooden box and EJ says that he has another one at work that he can bring home. We are running out of space inside the fence–maybe next year we will expand the garden–but meanwhile EJ suggested putting garden boxes on top of the wooden dog house in the garden. The ducks like to lay their eggs in there sometimes. I asked him where we were going to get dirt. “Do you want me to buy some more dirt?” I asked, trying not to laugh. “You are such a city girl,” he sigh. But he agreed that I could buy some dirt. I will probably do it tomorrow.
After our gardening, we came into the house to take a break. EJ fell asleep in his chair. I wasn’t planning to nap, but seeing EJ sleeping in his chair and Hannah sleeping in my lap made me feel sleepy too, so I went into our bedroom to nap on the bed. Hannah joined me, curling up close to me with her head next to mine.
In the late afternoon, I took Hannah for a walk down the driveway. I noticed a few more wildflowers blooming so after I took Hannah back into the house, EJ and I walked down to look at them. I took my camera with me and our cat Josette walked with us. Josette usually follows us around when we are outside. The flowers sure are beautiful.
When we got back up to the house, we sat on our deck for a while. It was cool and breezy–just right. Later, I went out and shut the chickens and ducks in their coop. I have to wait until twilight when the chickens have voluntarily entered the coop and settled themselves on their roosts. It’s impossible to herd them inside against their will. However, I can easily herd the ducks inside. I just tell them “Go to bed” and they march inside.
Well…EJ and Hannah have gone to bed, and now it’s time for me to go to bed as well!
