My Garden

I have been busy with the yard this last week. I trimmed all the trees in both yards, with my new loppers (I can't believe I have lived without them for so long). I spent 6 to 8 hours lopping the branches into burnable sizes and burning it. It made a nice hot fire so I greased down (seasoned) the fit pit, I love cast Iron, it is no longer rusty but a beautiful black. I left the burning for an evening chore, so I could sit and enjoy a productive days work with a glass of wine and quietness.
While mowing the lawn Saturday the, the mower (the beast) was giving me fits mowing what little grass/clover growing in the front lawn, so I spent Sunday ripping it apart. I took apart the carborator and cleaned it, flushed the gas tank, changed the oil, replaced the air filter (I guess it hasn't had one for years) and replaced the blade. The mower now turns over with just a few pulls, the sputtering and dieing has ceased, and it now turns off when I release the automatic shut off handle. Next chore is to rip apart the transmission, cleaning the dog hair out of the wheels wasn't enough.
I poisoned the weeds in the yard again, and weeded the garden. I am pleased with just how well the plants are doing. I also moved some plants in to the newly built hot house... I had to share.

I bought one Hot Pepper Plant this spring, most of the summer is was outside, since it has moved into the hot house it has developed a flower that just won't bloom.

My tomatoes were stunted from the lack of sunshine and heat, a few day after I moved them into the hot house John was all excited to show me one of the tomato plants. It was three times the size of the others and had 20 flowers ready to bloom. He told me he fertilized the plants with his "Secret Military Growing Liquid Fertilizer" (that he bought at the local plant store), he had me going for a while. As it turns out the neighbor Joe is in Australia for the month and gave us one of his plants. The flowers are plentiful and hopefully the season will be long enough to get something out of this plant.

The red lettuce likes it new home, but is still a little bitter. Maybe I can bribe into a sweeter mood with many of doses of little amounts of water?

The begonias are doing wonderfully now that they are inside, now if I can figure out how to winter them.

My yard plants are surviving the cold cloudy summer. Early this year I was feeling like a loser because my Bleeding Hearts did not return. They tend to be very hardy and hard to kill off, perfect for me. I am almost positive the plant cam from John's mom and I was bummed I killed it. BUT.... Dicentra Spectabilis -

AKA- Bleeding Hearts - Dutchman's Trousers

I am pleased to announce I did not loose my Bleeding Hearts, the came up again, the were just REALLY late and REALLY small. There are a couple more shoots appearing about a foot away from the main plant , so to keep myself from getting over zelious with the weed whacker I planted some Mother-In-Law Tongues around it.Next year it should look nice. (I looked it up and now I don't think that is what they are, I think they may be Hosta Bressingham Blue).

John's Apple Tree may produce some smaller fruit this year, unless we get some sun.
The Raspberries are coming in nicely it should be a good crop this year. I have the garden blocked nicely so Barely cannot comb his hair with the bushes anymore. There is nothing like dog hair in the fresh Raspberry jam. This fall I will most likely dig the majority of the plants up and try to get some nice rows going, instead of the forest we have going now.

I have expanded the strawberry beds, Hopefully they will make lots of runners so next year I can add a Strawberry Tower (maybe a little simpler maybe one to two pipes) to the green house.

This isn't really my rose bush but I have been working for years pulling the branches through the fence from the neighbors yard, trying to make it look like I have some luck with roses.

This is another plant we took from the neighbors, after many hours of research I found out it is a Centaurea Montana or a mountain corn flower. I LOVE the way it photographs.