I'll Miss the Iris

With all work on the back yard, projects, and, well, work, I almost missed the blooming of our irises this year. 

I always forget about our late-spring flowers.  We've got our 'fireworks' bushes all putting out spiky pink blooms...

...and our 'white cascades' bushes all have beautiful flowers now.

We've even got flowers that I don't remember planting, like coneflowers and amaryllis.

The magnolias are opening up...

...and our gardenia bushes are putting out their waxy green buds. 

Two clematis vines are done blooming, but this big one on our sun room is going to be bursting with flowers very soon!

Most of the ferns and hostas in the side garden have come up.

When I look out my office window, all I see is green, green, green!  It's very restful.

I managed to catch two of my favorite birds in the yard recently, albeit through a screen, which affects photo clarity.  Here is a female towhee.  She has red eyes and an orange/white abdomen like the male, but has a light brown back instead of a black one.

And the bossy blue jay, gathering debris for a nest.  What beautiful color!

Of course, we have our goslings.

I've been very alert to mosquito activity around here because of the dangers of the Zika virus.  Here is a male resting on a leaf (females don't have the fuzzy antennae):

Males eat nectar and are not blood drinkers, but females need the nutrition from blood to produce eggs.  I've got a few bites so far, so it's time to pull out the DEET spray!  I hate using chemicals but it's the only thing that works for me.

Bees are busy in the flowers now.  Check out the pollen packets on this one!

Tabitha and Bosewichte are anxiously awaiting the completion of the fence, so they'll be able to go outside into an enclosed space.  Right now they have to content themselves with getting a little sun wherever they can.

Have a great week!

Duck, Duck, GOSLINGS!!!

I've been peering across the pond, trying to keep an eye on our nesting goose...

...and I've finally been rewarded.  It's GOSLING TIME!!!!!  I've yet to get close enough for a good photo because the parents are very protective.  Here they are, across the pond...

...and I managed to get a quick shot this morning as they glided past our deck.

This group has a lucky number of seven goslings.  I just love watching them.  They grow so quickly!  I noticed that they're a little early.  Last year we didn't have goslings until the week of May 22nd. 

Speaking of birds, a really lovely red-tailed hawk landed in a tree outside my office window.  I fumbled for the camera and got two quick shots, one as he was turning to leave and one as he was taking off.  Still, his bright rust-colored tail feathers were on full display!

When we first moved to South Carolina, I quickly learned that many of the plants I had in our Indiana yard (columbines, lilacs, hydrangeas) didn't seem to do well here.  I just couldn't do without my peonies, though, and planted several.  Many were destroyed when our front trees came down, but four plants remained.  And, three years after planting,  ONE BUSH BLOOMED!  The flowers became very "blowsy" (as I call it) very quickly, not maintaining their original shape and drooping open after just a day or so.  Still, I really loved seeing them, even just for a few days.

Normally I take tons of photos over a typical weekend, but Todd and I have just been too busy.  The weather is perfect - no humidity, cool and in the 70s most of the day before climbing into the low 80s in the mid afternoon.  This is the time of year where we throw ourselves into yard work and last-minute house projects.  Todd is excavating our crawl space and building a concrete-walled room to create extra storage, and I've been doing the weeding/planting/pruning/staking yard maintenance work.  Our fence is up but not quite done yet, but Todd took some time out to make a second walkway.  The first was mainly for aesthetics, since our little tree right beside the path necessitated a pretty stooped walk to get past it.

I've mainly kept the camera next to me outside because I keep looking around and thinking, "Oh, it's so green!"  I don't know if it's the extra sun exposure that we have since cutting down those trees, but everything - the ferns, the liriope, the helleborus - is positively spreading and filling in everywhere.  I also hope that won't backfire on us in the heat of the summer, but I'm just going to enjoy it while I can.

I've got a few obligatory red geraniums on the porch, but haven't had time to do much else.

By June the yard will be in maintenance mode, the fence and spare room will be completed, and all the other little projects too.  We'll be able to spend evenings by the water, grilling out and playing board games.  I can't wait!

Have a great week!

Going Bananas for Birthdays

The weather has been absolutely beautiful lately, so we decided to go hiking this weekend.  I brought the junky camera instead of my nice one, but at least I captured the mood of the day!

The ferns are in full swing.

So many wildflowers have already bloomed!

I love seeing fungus growing on downed trees.

I did see an eastern tent caterpillar, a real pest.  Hopefully this year they won't be too much of a problem.

 

Borga was dying to go for a long hike.  We used to do a minimum of 8 miles a week.  Now, we rarely go, since there isn't a good place that's close to us.  But we really enjoyed this hike.

 

Look at that smile!

 

She crashed hard on the way home.

It was Todd's birthday, so I made a 3-layer banana cake with toasted coconut cream cheese frosting (recipe here).  I'm not a fan of banana, but this cake was amazing.  Let's just say there was very little left for Todd to take to work on Monday.

I bought him several practical gifts, but I always try to do something handmade if possible.  This year I decided to embroider him an image of our pets.  I found some cartoon images online and traced them.  I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out!

Meanwhile, around here we've been loving the wildlife.  The anoles are everywhere, including, somehow, inside our house!

A pair of house finches hang out in the gardenia bushes outside my office window.  So pretty.

We've got our hands full with our "other" wildlife, too.

Have a great week!