Friday, May 30, 2014

Getting bigger!

The ducklings are growing so fast. I am absolutely floored when I can actually see changes in them daily...

 
Unfortunately it looks like all drakes so I seem to be destined to repeat growing up ducklings to take to Alabama. After all 4 males does not a duckling population make. It only makes for 4 frustrated guys. LOL.

Monday, May 12, 2014

Harvest Monday 5.12.14

Good Morning! It's Harvest Monday again ~ Make sure you stop by Daphne's Dandelions to get the scoop on harvests from all over!

This weeks harvests consisted of strawberries, blue berries and a ton of rosemary.

I'm getting ready to remove my 3 year old rosemary bush as the placement is just all wrong. It keeps the sprinklers from working correctly. I'll have to be more careful about the placement this time. I know the perfect place - but the kiwi are there and I haven't given up totally on them yet. I may just keep the new plant in a pot for a while until I figure it out. Perhaps a place int he front yard would be better for it...or at least for me! ;-)

I did do some work out in the garden. The place I normally reserve for my sprawling watermelons/pumpkins has gotten rather shady as my pomegranate bushes have filled in over the last year or two. That meant it was time to re-purpose the area. The flat of itty bitty blueberry plants I got a few weeks ago have now gone form this...
To this... They are stretching their little roots out and seem rather happy now.

The long 2 rows on the left are Jewel and the 30 plants on the right are the new princess variety. Those berries were a bit smaller but so much sweeter. I just can't wait for fruit!!!

For Mother's Day we went to a local park that offers a ton of amenities. We did some target practice.

We had a picnic and played on the green-space as well as at the lake on the playground. We managed to do all of this by 12:30 and as we were leaving the park the line to get in was down the street. I'm glad I got everyone up and out the door when I did! We were able to finish off a wonderful day with a dip int he pool and dinner with my Mom.

I'm looking forward to doing some more work in the garden this coming weekend. The kids are excited as the green beans are now producing and the tomatoes are setting. It gets hopping for a few more weeks until the summer storms start. The blueberries are almost done for the year here. I'm sad about not having the fruit readily available and fresh any more but I'm very glad that I have quite a few more plants that will be in production in just a year or two.

See you soon!
Barbie~

Friday, May 9, 2014

Interesting

More than one thing that is interesting, at least to me anyway.

First off - this:


 This is my Mother's Day gift. Because it's custom (Cheap custom, but still custom) it couldn't have been a surprise because i had to pick out each piece for my bow. I <3 my new bow. I like shooting with it, too. ;-) We are going on Sunday to Lake Park to slice up some targets and I can't wait!



 Secondly I'm having issues typing and posting pics at the moment. I think all the pics are here but getting them in order and getting the words in the right place is proving difficult. Sorry.

Third, Those cute little critters over there? Just 2 weeks ago they were just yellow puff balls. I'm excited to take them to Alabama in a few weeks. Memorial day is closing in fast! Just look at those shiny new feathers.

 OK- I'm going to stop counting because it's going to be redundant if I don't. So, I'm down to the last couple sweet potatoes that I've grown from last year and I decided to make some baked sweet potato fries. They are my favoirte things, ever...ok well maybe not I do like them mashed, casseroled, with cinamon with salt or any other way you cook them but I do enjoy them as fires just as much... So I sliced up my wonderful potatoes and was taken aback and just how cool these purple ones are.

Just look at the marbling in that sucker! You may also notice that it is a bog around as my hand and oogle at the thought that I used HALF of it to make fries and I had enough left over to make a large bowl of mashed potatoes as well... see! I also enjoy the fact that it is one of the few truly purple vegetables that does not loose it's color when you cook it. 


 So, here are the blueberries for the week 3.5 pounds worth. These are getting ready to hit the freezer. I realized that the few bushes i have just aren't enough so....


I bought 50 more. 30 of a new variety that does not have a patent yet (princess uh...something or another) and 20 Jewel plants. I was highly impressed with the fruit quality of this new variety and I'm pleased that i"ll be one of only a few handfuls of people that get to trial it. It grows very tall and lanky just like my Primadonna plants do but the fruit is much sweeter and smaller as well.

 Oh joy! So these babies are hitting getting potted up this weekend and I'm praying they start sprouting up quick. Momma needs more plants!!! :-)

On a side note a NOT so interesting thing? The ducks don't mess in my garden much - but the chickens managed to destroy my corn plantingin about 30 seconds this week. Now I'll have to replant the corn and I'm having trouble remembering which variety is in there already. Oh well. Such is life.

Have a WONDERFUL Mother's Day y'all!

See you soon!

Barbie~