a table fable

It's hot - really hot.  We've gone from blissful 70 degree days to 95 degrees daily, with zero rain.  Thankfully, my garden tasks are petering out.  I've up-potted the last of the seedlings in good soil.  After a week or two of growth, I can pop them in the ground.  Otherwise, sporadic weeding, and just enjoying the things that are already up.  Hot pink bee balm...

...and hydrangeas in the shade!

I've had to replant MORE morning glory seeds this week.  Earlier in the spring, the "backyard" chogs ate my thriving seedlings...

he looks so innocent!

...so I planted more, and moved the buckets adjacent to the front yard - where our "woods" chogs indulged.

I've got a woods chog (or last year's babies, who relocated to the woods next to our property) visiting my annual garden - a first.

If he starts to do a lot of damage, our only choice will be to put up ANOTHER fence on that edge of the garden, which would be a huge pain.  I'm hoping that other deterrents will work.  I'm always watching while I'm working at my desk upstairs.

From that same vantage point, I saw that we have a deer and her baby in the side field.  Todd has been getting his daily exercise by mowing it...

...so I can easily see any activity there.  I was able to get close to her last week...

...but she keeps the baby carefully hidden away.  I've only been able to get a quick glimpse through the upstairs window before they melt into the brush.

We've caught her on the trail cam, though, and...ugh.  Ticks.  TICKS!  It's the deer that are bringing to many ticks to our yard.  Check our her ears.  Those are TICKS!

These ticks are getting a juicy blood meal from the deer.  They mate, eat, engorge, drop off, and overwinter in the grass and underbrush.  In the spring, they lay THOUSANDS and THOUSANDS of eggs, and the cycle starts all over again.  Deer also bring fleas...I wish we could completely fence them out, but they can jump up to 12 feet.  It's just not feasible to try to fully fence them out.  

On to more pleasant creatures, like this giant leopard moth.  A real beauty!

A green heron is fishing in the front pond...

...and we're getting the usual group of fliers on our front porch.

I finally finished the side table project! The "before" on these Ethan Allen tables:

...and now:

It took a lot of sanding, and then a couple coats of Minwax finish in "Natural."  I bought some baskets to put in the bottom, for Todd's CPAP machine and other miscellaneous.  The style doesn't quite match our bed and armoire and I *still* haven't gotten around to replacing our 20+ year old lamps, but I don't care.  Baby steps!  

Another fun find for me:  I found a couple of Americana-style canvas prints at a sale this weekend.  I'm not a huge fan of that style, but I was instantly drawn to them, especially the larger one.

It reminded me so much of the big white church next to my great grandma Grace's home.  I pulled an image.  They aren't quite the same, but same basic shape...close enough for my mind to make the leap.  When I see this print, I see the church of my childhood.  

The print even has a white house on the left, just like Grace's house (although they don't look similar).  I look at this print and remember all the times I played "Ghost in the Graveyard" behind the church, and all the nights I watched bats swarm in and out of the belfry.  

I actually have some old photos of Grace's house.  Here it is, before they bought it...this must've been the late teens or early 1920s.

Move in day!

I don't have many photos from my childhood so I'm so thrilled to have these photos, and to have found that canvas print of the church that is so, so similar to the one I loved so much as a child.  

A little walk down memory lane...now back to reclining in the heat.

Have a great week!  

chlorophyll thrill

I realized this week that we've been in our new house for about a year.  Phew!  Our final house and porch renovations are on hold until after the current coronavirus crisis is over, but I'm really pleased with what we've completed so far.  I'm most pleased, I think, with the garden. 

It's no secret that I love flowers.  I dug up nearly the entire back yard of our old place in Indianapolis and filled it with them.  I didn't do too much in South Carolina, though.  The combination of clay/rocky soil, fire ants, and hot, dry climate with lots of shade presented some unique challenges.  It was landscaped beautifully when we bought it - I maintained it, but didn't plant very much there. 

Cue our first year back in Indiana. 

When we moved here a year ago, a wide bed had been dug along the front walkway and porch. There were a few established features (2 juniper bushes, a mystery bush, some daffodils, 2 hostas, and a bleeding heart), but it was mostly overgrown and weedy.

I dug out the weeds and went to work.  Through the generosity of a few local gardeners, the Lowe's clearance section, and some nice greenhouses, I've got hundreds of new plants coming up.  Here this same space is a year later:

I can hardly believe the difference!  Here is the old front part of the bed (those green things coming up?  Weeds.):

And after:

Another before:

And now:

The old garden bed stopped several yards short of the porch edge, for some reason.  I extended it all the way to the end.  The old front:

And now:

There are many plants that are only an inch high right now.  This garden is going to be stuffed and lush in about a month!  I'm so pleased.  I also added this side garden last year:

You can't tell from this angle, but it's quite large.  I've only got about six things there now, but it will be full soon enough.  A wind storm destroyed several of my little growing greenhouses (argh!), but I managed to save several things.  I transplanted 48 - yes, 48! - deluxe tall snapdragons this week.

I also managed to save some hollyhocks.

Our apple tree will be blossoming in about a week, and the lilac is about ready to pop:

Late spring flowers are opening, too, like this Jacob's Ladder:

It's a daily delight to me, going out early in the morning before anyone is stirring and poking around in the garden.  It is a happy family link (and one of the few that I have): my great-grandma, who was a prolific gardener, could frequently be found amongst her flowers with her cats and little dog. 

I've got the cat part down!

I've got some interesting things happening there, for sure.  One thing I'm monitoring is this:

They're coming up all across the front bed - hundreds of them.  It reminds me of obedient plant...and I *do* have obedient plant (but just two) in that area.  If I'm right, then I'll have a glorious display like this: 

(photo credit:  The Spruce)

Or, I'm going to have a ton of weeds to pull up.  I guess I'll just have to be patient!

For Easter this year, I dropped the ball a bit.  No big meal, no special flowers, no Easter basket.  I've been distracted, and I'm also severely limiting my trips to town - so no greenhouses, no spontaneous grocery store run.  I decided to make miniature carrot cakes (carrots, spring, rabbits eat carrots, Easter Bunny = rabbit...get it?).  I found a great recipe at Desserts for Two and used my Easter egg sprinkles and special (Easter) bunny plates.

So delicious and it added just the right festive touch.  Bosewichte was impressed, for sure!

Have a great week!

this old house

We've had some odd weather here.  First in the 80s, then in the 40s, then rain.  Random warmer days pop up, and in those days, we've been outside working.

Even the cats have been getting in on the action.  Who cares if it's a one-story fall from the deck?  I want green grass!

The azaleas are just budding out...

...and the redbuds look amazing!

I have been so busy with house projects and work that my quilt pieces have sat, forlorn and ignored, on my sewing table.  At night, I've been knitting to relax.  First, a simple striped cowl that has been desperately needed on cold hikes.  So often cowls are wide enough to be looped twice or just hang open at the neck.  That seems to negate the purpose, so I made this cowl fairly narrow.

I've also been knitting a sweater.  It's been a real learning experience for me.  The sweater is meant to have zero "ease," which means that it's meant to be snug against the skin.  To get the correct size, the pattern says that I need to have 18 knitted stitches per 4 inches of fabric.  I managed that number with size 8 needles on my practice piece, and cast on for the sweater.

The arms were knitted first, and then the body, from the bottom up.  I "got gauge" (or had 18 stitches per 4 inches) in the first few inches, but I didn't measure again for 7 inches of knitting.  Then I discovered that instead of 18 stitches, I had around 16.  So each 4 inches of fabric was off by 2 stitches.  No big deal, right?  But when I measured the waist, I discovered that I had an extra THREE INCHES of fabric.  I thought about ripping it all out and starting over, but decided to keep moving forward.  Three inches will (hopefully) just give it a bit of room, but not cause bagginess.  I'll soon see.  I'm getting ready to start the yoke of the sweater, which will be a stranded star design in shades of purple and white, similar to the cuffs.  I still struggle with stiffness and pain when I knit, and I have not discovered an easy or pain-free method of knitting, so ripping out enough half of a sweater to switch to a slightly smaller needle sounds horrible.  But if I'm wrong, the entire sweater will have to be remade.  Fingers crossed!

Todd and I have been doing a lot of future-planning this spring, thinking about where we want to live, how we want to live, and the meaningful activities in which we want to engage.  I've been thinking a lot about my great grandmother, who lived close by when I was growing up.  She had a lovely white house with gingerbread accents and a front porch full of rocking chairs.  A big weeping willow tree, rose and grape arbors, and a special long bed for her 50+ varieties of irises.  The back yard was almost completely converted to garden space.  On one side, row after row of flowers, and on the other, vegetables. 

Incidentally, my grandfather sold the property and it fell into disrepair.  A flood in 2006 destroyed the whole neighborhood, which was converted into a public park.  Someone took a photo of the house before it was demolished.  Porch torn off, trees uprooted, walls sagging...such a shame.  Thankfully my great-aunt Ruth, now 101 (!), is going to send me some photos of the home in its heyday!

My great-grandmother, Grace, founded the first animal shelter in Anderson (Indiana), and continued to be involved in animal charities.  She was always surrounded by her cats and dogs.  She was very poor, but gave everything she could to the needy, from cutting old sheets into strips for leper colonies (apparently more prevalent in 1920!) to taking her famous vegetables and flower bouquets around to sick neighbors.  Her daughter, my great aunt Ruth, was a clever seamstress and regularly made over thrift store clothing to improve it and then donate to homeless shelters.  She and her family also brought their instruments to shelters and had singing time.  They were really inspiring women.  This is how I remember them both:

Todd and I have talked about wanting to have a similar life:  in a community of family and friends, downsizing, simplifying, beautifying our space with large gardens, surrounded by our pets, and engaged in social justice causes that are important to us.  I think the next year or so will bring some major changes for us...stay tuned!