Grow, Little Green Things, Grow!

I went up to Mom's on Thursday to help her with some housework she can't do by herself any more. When we were done, I asked her if she had an extra hose she wasn't using; she said she had several, and I should help myself. So I grabbed what I thought was a very long hose but which turned out to be two hoses, so I don't have to keep switching my long hose from the back yard to the front. I also mentioned that I thought maybe I'd remove the soaker hose from the flower/shrub bed north of the driveway over to the vegetable garden, and mom said "gee, there's a brand new soaker hose in the garage that I'm never going to use - take it!" Don't have to ask me twice, so that hose went into my car too. I also did a little more "shopping" in the garage, and took the sledge hammer (which Mom can't even lift, much less use) so I could use it to pound in fence posts (I had to return my borrowed post-driver), a big tubular ring to hold firewood (when I get it put together, I'll put it out on the patio to hold the logs that are just stacked out there), and a 5-foot step-ladder (I left the 8-footer there) so I can hang a wire-fence canopy over the well-house to keep kitties from reaching the roof, and I can also get up high enough to clean the leaves and debris off the patio roof and make sure the gutters are clean.

I put the soaker hose in the vegetable garden. It had been coiled up so long it wouldn't lay flat, so instead of putting it on the ground I've temporarily draped it over the top of the fencing, back and forth so it would cover the entire area. I may just leave it there - it's not pretty, but it reaches every corner of the garden and I'm not sure it would if I laid it on the ground on the paths. We'll see. In any case, it's been a life-saver and a life-giver to the garden, everything's really starting to take off.


Carrots (needing to be thinned out) in the front, lettuces in the back


Tomatoes in front, peppers in back


Zucchini


Cukes


The lone watermelon vine

There are beans - both string beans and limas - along the back fence, and there are a couple of tomato plants on the left side of the pepper bed. There are also moonflowers coming up along the left fence, and Cosmos coming up along the front fence. On my way home from Mom's on Thursday I stopped at the garden center again; they had all their vegetable plants on sale, a 4-cell tray for a quarter. I picked up 4 more varieties of tomatoes. I haven't had a chance to transplant them yet, but later this afternoon I'll put one plant of each variety in the garden (there's room in the pepper bed) and one plant of each variety in pots, maybe one or two more plants out back, and I'll give the rest of the plants to my neighbor if they want them. I also picked up two trays of begonias (white, I think) and two trays of petunias (two shades of purple, one a single flower, the other a double) and I'll put those into the pots where I'd transplanted my butterfly impatiens which didn't make it. Total expenditure for tomatoes, begonias, and petunias - $3.95. Good deal. The geraniums I got from this place are in full bloom, and are absolutely gorgeous:



And my Stella D'Oro lilies are blooming:



Mama kingbird is still sitting on her nest, so the eggs haven't hatched yet. They should hatch any day now, as far as I can figure it's been about 13 days since she started over. So far, the long-range weather forecast isn't calling for nestling-killing temps, so I have high hopes for this clutch of babies. Mama's not quite as spooky as she used to be, as long as I don't stand around under the nest she'll stay there and not fly off when I come out. When she does fly off, she'll usually come back pretty quickly; she'll sit on the fence and give me the eye for a few seconds, then fly back to her nest. I think she's finally figured out I'm not going to mess with her or her nest.

The Youngster and I had a great time at the dog show on Friday. It was nice to see the gorgeous dogs who were competing, meet their owners, renew the acquaintance of a breeder/handler I really like, and I got the opportunity to meet someone who's been a cyberfriend for about 4 years. They even fed me lunch! The breeder/handler did all the cooking, and he makes the best darn potato salad I've ever had. His grape-and-walnut salad wasn't too bad, either. This attractive, gentle, funny man is single and unless my instincts are impaired - and they might be, I'm seriously out of practice - he was flirting with me. He only lives about a 4-5 hour drive away....... I'm hoping to see him more frequently in the future. A couple of pics from the show:


The beautiful Posey, with her breeder/handler. Posey took "Best Opposite Sex".


The girl who took Reserve


The handsome Best in Breed winner
(Very nice dog, not only gorgeous but very sweet, bred by Posey's breeder/handler)

The little whiskered packages arrived Friday. They're very sweet, and I'm having so much fun with them!