A Nighttime Visitor..

It’s not often, at least for me, that I get a really good chance to take a picture of a rare visitor.  For the most part, they usually disappear faster than I can either get my camera or get outside.  The other night though, I got lucky!

This beautiful Screech Owl was sitting in the Rhododendron outside my living room window.  How close is that, well that glow you see to the left is the welcome candle in my window.  I’ve long loved this tree like Rhodo, it stands right next to my front porch and despite the fact that it was butchered badly by a so called professional landscaper this past spring, it has continued to attract wildlife to it.  Randy wants to cut it down, but after this, it’s one more example of why I don’t!  I was able to go out through the garage and walk very close up to this beauty and take it’s picture.  It sat watching me with those big eyes and I was just over the moon to get such a great picture.  I’ve heard them for years screeching in the night but I’d never seen one this close up.  It stayed there for a little while even after I went back inside and then flew off into the night.
What a wonderful gift!

Calling On My Compassionate Caring Friends!

My sister in law is trying to raise money to get medical treatments for some feral cats that live around her house.  For years now she’s been paying for it out of her pocket but anyone with a pet knows those fees can add up!

She’s working with a vet that gives her a break but still when facing major surgery she needs help, so please take a look here and if you can help please do!  Also, it’d be great if you could share the link the more people that know, the better chance there is that she can at least raise some funds to help with the cost. 

Her ultimate goal is to get all the cats fixed so that she can put an end to the vicious cycle of breeding that has been going unchecked in her neighborhood. 

Thanks, I know how wonderful the crafting community is and I know how much many of you love animals!

Legs Broken Needs Help!

Blessings..

Life is amazing and special and just all around wonderful.  There are days when frustration can get the best of me, when things aren’t going quite like I want them to.  Then, there are days like this, when the tears of happiness fall freely because a blessing is answered, a wish comes true and I feel my heart might burst with joy..

Happiness times two!

Mid-July Update

It’s mid July and while there are a lot of bees, there isn’t much in the form of food for them to gather.  A quick inspection of the hive validated my concern for them, the third box that was put on many, many weeks ago remains undrawn.  The second box has something drawn on all eight frames with one comb being less than a quarter of the frame.  It’s all very frustrating.  The constant rain has kept things from blooming the way they are supposed to, which I’m sure hasn’t helped the bees. 
I started feeding several weeks ago, with the large hive top feeder.  What happened a day later was it was full of large black ants. We removed that and put the jar feeder on in hopes of getting food to the bees and figuring out a way to stop the ants.  The ants have repeatedly filled the tray on the bottom board and the cover it’s enough to drive a person crazy.  We’ve put tangle foot on the hive stand legs again and again, I don’t know how they get through it.  I’ve now taken to dusting the cover and inner cover with cinnamon in hopes that this will repel them, because we’ve got to put the hive top feeder back on, they are going through a jar of sugar syrup a day, this does not bode well for the fall and winter.
Today when we did our inspection of the hive they were not pleased, these are some seriously grumpy girls.  We saw two small hive beetles in the tray and one in the second box.  It’s time to fill the tray with water and a smidge of oil, perhaps I’ll use some cinnamon oil too, the smell might aid in the ants repulsion.  I hate the Langstroth, I mean I absolutely loath it!  It is impossible not to crush bees when restacking those stupid boxes or even attempting to move frames.  It doesn’t matter how slow and methodical we move or how much smoke or sugar water we use, bees get crushed and it’s a horrid noise.  I can’t wait to get my Top Bar Hive going again next year, that is so much easier to work with and observe.
Lesson learned, I had a suspicion I’d hate those things and I was right.  If I get it my way I’ll have a yard full of my hybrid TBH in the future!  Send some sunshine and positive vibes to my bees please, they are going to need all the help they can get!

Dreams to reality…

All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.
Walt Disney
I’ve had a vision for a long time of how I wanted the pond area to look, getting it from in my mind to reality isn’t an easy task, I’m only one girl trying to create a gardener’s paradise.  I’ve still got a long way to go, but it’s getting closer and with each plant I place, each weed I pull, each change I make I can see my dream coming to fruition..


Now the area behind the pond where the deer fence is going, is starting to take shape AND I even started planting in there! 



Now to get that fence ordered installed and the rest of the bittersweet pulled out…I can see it, I really can!

Woodland Wonder

Compromise - something intermediate between different things..
So I have a dream of what things are supposed to look like in my gardens, I can see it in my head.  If you are a gardener, or creative, or maybe just have a vivid imagination you know what I mean.
For me though, reality is a big brown mammal with a voracious appetite for a lot of the plants I want to grow.  While I don’t mind sharing my home with all of the animals that live here with me (ok I could totally do without ticks, mosquitos, gnats and stinkbugs) I do find it very frustrating trying to bring my vision to life when someone keeps eating it.  So if I can’t turn my entire property into that dream woodland escape, I’ll have to settle for a portion of it being done that way!

So you are looking at this going, what the heck does the pond have to do with a woodland.  Well nothing and everything!  See the pond makes for a nice break on this side of the yard, almost like a moat and behind that is a nice area of woods, with rich loamy soil, some native wildflowers like mayapples and jack-in-the-pulpits and some lovely native shrubs like maple leaf viburnum and redbuds. 

I had intended all along on landscaping the area behind the pond heavily to make it a cool place on a hot summer day, but then it occurred to me that since it wasn’t practical to fence in the majority of the yard (and oh how I would LOVE to!) it would be practical to fence in a small section!  So I walked off an area (and have done that three times now) that we are going to install deer fence around.  There is an old cedar tree in the middle of this area, it needs some limbs pruned and there is a pine that needs to come down as it’s leaning into that cedar, but besides that, nothing major needs to be done.  Well major as in something I can’t do, there is a MAJOR amount of bittersweet and wineberry that must be removed by hand.

I started that process last weekend.  It’s tedious work for sure, but it comes up pretty easily, I just have to be careful so as not to rip out a wild trillium or any other natives.  Sadly (and I am sad as I thought it was native at first) the evergreen shrubs that I was planning to leave are invasives from Japan so they must go.  I’m keeping all the old logs that are in place and will use them as focal spots for ferns. 

I love brush piles because they provide needed space and habitat for sooo many animals but this one is going to have to go or at least part of it is.  We are going to chip it up and I’ll use those wood chips for the path in my woodland sanctuary.  The problem is it got unruly and it’s more long and flat and spreads into the small space I want to utilize.   Not to worry though we started another one around back and there are evergreens in the queue!
The list of plants that I’m transplanting to this area isn’t that big, the problem is that the plants are spread all over the yard.  One step at a time though, pull out weeds, chip up brush, mulch up leaves, then plant, plant, plant.  Wonder how long it’s going to take me???

Dreams and Reality Mixed…

Conversion – change in character, form or function..
I want need my own gardening space.  Ideally it would be something like this,

It would be nestled back near the apiary, clean and tidy and all mine!
Reality check, it isn’t going to happen, so a girl has to settle for something a little less, but I couldn’t bring myself to spend money on a plastic shed that just wasn’t even close to what I liked.  So, what to do, what to do???
Convert the space under the sunroom to something functional for me!  When I first suggested this to Randy, he looked at me like I had just landed from another planet.  Typically most of my bright ideas are met with that look!   After some thought he said he thought that was a good idea and he suggested some additional upgrades.
We started by cleaning out all the junk that was under there, he’s been storing all the scraps and bits of wood and what not from the basement cleanout.  Then we went to work!

We put up that white lattice to act as a break between the two sides and we are going to put some trim along the bottom as well.  We moved the plastic shed (we’ve had that since we got married lol) to the pad the hot tub stuff was once on.  That shed is used to house the pond supplies (pots, gloves, filters, etc.)
We are going to paint the block wall and the ‘ceiling’ white to brighten it up even more plus some more hooks and shelves.

The trash can is full of potting soil.  I used to hooks on the post for my plant hoops.  I used my tomato cages temporarily to sort all my garden stakes in.  I either want flue tiles or some pvc pipe sections those things are like wire hangers when stored together!

This stuff still needs to be organized, it’s my flower pots and containers and right now they are on my old mini green house frame.  My carts, need a parking space too and I need a couple of hooks to hang my trugs from.  All in all it’s not too bad of a space and even though it’s not my dream shed, at least it’s a space of my own..  Now where can I put a work table….