National Park Service Founders Day

 As stated occasionally in a previous post, I don't like coming up with titles.  However, in looking for an idea today I came across National Park Service Founders Day.  After reading this article about the holiday and the parks, I am reminded why visiting them all is not a goal, there are just too many.  Too many for me to visit time and money-wise.  I'd love if even more parks and protected areas existed.  This date is now added to my Google Calendar to repeat forever to remind me.  Other happy things for today:

• I remembered to water plants.  I have been very bad about this since getting a job.  I'm happy to write that the geraniums that are still in the cellar are still alive.  They seem to be doing better with the artificial light than the ones outside.  Still no flowers, maybe next year.

• The jewelweed is blooming and the bees are busy visiting it as well as the Japanese knotweed that is threatening to push out the jewelweed.  

Jewelweed flower close-up.

Bee on the Japanese knotweed.

• Yesterday I got a reasonable amount of sleep which made my time at work so much better!  Here is hoping I get to sleep today too.

☮

Currently reading: The Backyard Homestead Seasonal Planner, by Ann Larkin Hansen.

Thank you for being part of my happy things. Stay safe.

Planters

 On my way out of work today a coworker made conversation with me.  I keep to myself, mostly.  I can't do small talk and work.  Breaks are spent in the car.  It was nice.  Other happy things for today:

• For lunch at work this week, I have salads.  Yay for a healthy choice.
• Since making the decision to embrace the groundhogs I haven't been out to the garden much.  It has also been raining a bunch.  All the plants I have inside still needed attention though.  I got some of them into pots and put them outside of the apartment at the back of the house.  Hopefully this is far enough away from the groundhogs.  There is still a possibility that the chipmunks are sharing in the garden destruction, but I hope not.

I planted a couple small tomato plants
that I started from seed.
There are more, for another day.

Three of the zinnia plants.

Some geranium, I may keep these potted regardless.

• There are blueberries ready to harvest.  I'm waiting until tomorrow to be sure.

Just a few ripe blueberries, so far.

☮

Currently reading: The Backyard Homestead, by Carleen Madigan.

    Yogurt recipes!

Thank you for being part of my happy things. Stay safe.

No Geranium

 Either the geraniums I planted yesterday were too small to smell, or they are an unscented variety, or woodchucks/groundhogs aren't deterred by them.  Of course another possibility is that the chipmunks or some other critter is eating them.  I stuck a stick into the hole, I know it will be out tomorrow.  It was a half-hearted attempt to deter them.  The worst part is that I haven't even finished securing the fence and the little buggers are coming in through a hole and chewing through the netting. Thank you for reading my vent.  Now to concentrate on happy things for today:

• People at work are learning my name.  I think that is a good thing... I wish I could say that I am remembering all the names as well.  Most of the people seem friendly too, and that is good.  
• I haven't posted anything from the wildlife camera lately.  I just took a look at the footage from the last week or so.  There wasn't a lot this time, but there was a crow.  It flew very near to the camera.  I thought it might be a raven rather than a crow, the more sites I look at though, the more I lean towards crow.  I will continue to second guess myself so let's just say it is a big black bird.  I just want it to be a raven.

It is a large bird.  😁
Then I thought, what does Lens think it is?
Lens' first hit is a common raven,
second is a forest raven,
third the American crow.

• The plants in the front of the house that were identified as wild sweet William early in the spring have finally blossomed and do seem to be that.  They are pretty, I am glad I didn't pull them as weeds.

Wild sweet William.

☮

Currently reading: The Backyard Homestead, by Carleen Madigan.

Thank you for reading, stay safe.

Geranium

 This year one of the goals I had was to grow geraniums to plant at the family graves for Memorial Day.  There were many obstacles that got in my way and that didn't happen.  Many of the geraniums are now much closer to planting in the ground.  I took three of the smaller ones and planted them near where the zinnia were eaten by the woodchucks/groundhogs.  

These three geraniums are much smaller
than most of the others.

According to this site, scented geraniums are resistant to being eaten by deer and groundhogs.  I am hopeful.  Happy things for today:

• I am still employed.  (Yes, I'm tired and weary already.)  
• The blackberries are starting to ripen.  I had one today and it was pretty good.

Amid the black-eyed Susan and grasses
are the blackberries.

• Many thanks to Reader --K who noticed that what I thought was a yellow jacket yesterday is most likely a sweat bee.  I seem to remember seeing some last year, too.  

☮

Currently reading: The Backyard Homestead, by Carleen Madigan.

Thank you for reading, stay safe.

Happy Sunday!

 There were two super things about the rain today.  The first is that when it rained, it didn't last long so there was still plenty of time to do things outside.  The second is that the temperature dropped to something that I would call comfortable.  Other things that I am happy about today:

• It is May.  Every year some of the family get together to plant flowers on family graves at cemeteries before Memorial Day.  This year I tried to grow the geraniums myself so we wouldn't need to spend so much money buying them.  If you read my blog, you know that the seeds were delayed and I didn't get them planted as early as I had hoped.  Eventually I got the seeds and planted them and they sprouted.  They are larger now, but they aren't big enough and have no buds at this point.  So I have an AWESOME headstart on the geraniums for next year (if I am able to keep them alive).  This morning Keziah and I went out and bought the geraniums to plant in the cemeteries for this year.  Wednesday we will meet with some family and make a day of planting the geraniums.

Pretty colors!

• Third day in a row... but rhododendrons!

• Keziah did more shopping today and brought home the El Gato Fish Tacos truck.  Nanni started exploring it before it was completely assembled.

'Hey, what's this?'

Winston heard something happening and had to investigate.
Winston: 'Can I fit too?'

Nanni seems to be the driver.

• A few weeks ago I planted some pumpkin seeds.  I had six left over from last year and they were old then, but I planted them any way.  One came up and I already repotted it into a larger pot.

Pumpkin plant.

Today I noticed that two more of the seeds are starting to sprout!

Breaking through!

• We built Zed's not permanent shed thing today.  With four of us standing and assembling it a bird came down, landed, got the food they wanted and left.  I was only able to get a quick picture.

Where's the bird?

I cropped it.
I think it might be a grey catbird?

• The shed thing got built!  Team work!

Wind blew!  Time to batten down the hatches.

☮

Currently reading: The Burgess Book of Nature Lore, by Thornton W. Burgess.

Stay safe.

Tap

 It was eleven in the evening, I was sitting down trying to put together my thoughts to write this.  Suddenly I realized that I hadn't reached my step goal yet for the day.  It was midnight, my step goal reached, I had a beginning.  Tuesday, if I can continue to reach my step goal, will mark eight months of reaching the 10,000 step goal every day.  Other things that I am happy about from Sunday:

• Zed and I went shopping today and picked up mulch and replacement light bulbs for the cellar seedlings.  Most of them are doing well, the bulb going out was a surprise.  I'm thankful that I remembered to go into the cellar when I did or they may have been without the light for much longer.  

I planted more geraniums on the sixth
and they are already sprouting!

• On the porch this morning I noticed that the petunias are starting to bloom.

• The roses have been pruned and I spread some mulch around them.  

This is what they looked like a few days ago.

Today they are a bit neater looking.  
I think the green coming up by the forsythia might be hyacinth.

• Late this afternoon we all went for a long drive.  I don't remember the last time I was in Massachusetts, but we went there today.  A friend rented out a movie theatre and about twelve or thirteen-ish of her friends went, socially distanced, and watched her DVD of Singing in the Rain on the big screen.  The movie was fun, I don't remember the last time I saw that movie... it might have been when we still had a black and white TV.  It was Gideon's introduction to tap dancing.  He seemed to enjoy the movie too.  This was another small step at getting used to being social again.  I'm fine with just one or two people, but more and it is hard.  Being in a theatre with only a few people was good.  I should have taken tap dancing when I was a kid, oh, well.

From the ride... a lake.

A solar farm.

☮

Currently reading: The Backyard Homestead, by Carleen Madigan.

Stay safe.

It is after one in the morning... maybe I should sleep...

Happy National Tartan Day

 Last year, once we decided to garden, I feel like I was out in the mornings or after work doing things that needed to be done there.  This year, so far, I am having a hard time pulling myself out of bed.  When I start doing things in the garden, I want to keep going.  Today that was right before dinner.  It was just Gideon and I home for dinner.  We walked around the yard and garden, then he helped me transplant some of the geraniums.  

The geraniums are on the right.

It was really great to have a helper.  He did a great job following my directions on how to transplant and water.  I doubt gardening will win out for him over anything on the computer, but maybe he'll like it just a little.  Other happy things for today:

• Did I mention that the garlic is coming up?  It looks like something is already sampling it.  I decided to cut the two milk jugs I had in half and cover some of the garlic in hopes that it will be a deterrent.  

See that hole?
I wonder if whatever lives there likes garlic!

• Speaking of milk jugs, there is now growth in at least five of the milk jug greenhouses I planted in.  I didn't look into all of them.  Lettuce and Johnny jump-ups are coming up.
• This afternoon my friend, Amy, and I walked at Livingston Park.  We walked just over three miles.  There are budding trees and ducks on the pond.  Best of all was the great company!

Straight up.

• During dinner I remembered that I had tried putting some seeds into wet paper towels and bags to see if they would germanate.  Oops.  Three of the marigolds did and they are in the pots to the left of the geraniums above.  That fourth pot has some other geranium seeds that I don't expect to grow.

☮

Finished listening to: Goodbye, Things, by Fumio Sasaki.

Stay safe.

Geraniums

The downsizing for Lent challenge that Zed and I have been doing is over.  Well, the recording part, there is still a bunch of editing.  Zed and I had a long talk about what the next steps should be.  I still have a bunch of boxes.  It has been 46 days of going through boxes and finding places to put things and get rid of at least one thing from that box.  When I wanted to keep everything, I worked on another box.  I think that only happened once.  It has been challenging and fun, but this week -at least the end of it- has been overwhelming.  Tomorrow, Easter, there is no plan to go through a box.  Zed and I are planning to continue on some level until my boxes are sorted and I have less stuff.  This coming week though will be a regrouping.  I don't want to lose the momentum, but I also don't want to completely burn out.  When we started this I feel that I was mostly on top of the things I normally do.  The last week or two things have started to slide.  The pile of boxes in my bedroom has grown because I have put trash or recycling in boxes and then left them in my room instead of taking care of them.  After a week of playing catch up and cleaning I will get back to the boxes.  I am so thankful for the friends who suggested getting rid of things for Lent.    Other things I am happy for today:

• Today was National Find a Rainbow Day.  It is all about finding beauty, hope, or wellness.  My kind of day.  Here is more information on the holiday.
• For the month of April I joined with a group of people to do a pilgrimage.  We each log how much we walk and see how many miles we can do.  I went on a short walk around the property today, only three fourths of a mile.  I decided to cut through places that have no path again.  The little brook was babbling so I stopped for a moment to listen.
• Standing still I can listen.  The sounds of cars and children playing fade toward the back and what comes forward are the bird song and dried leaves rustling as the breeze carries them to somewhere new.  

• The cats are getting along today and they are super cute.

• The geraniums are starting to look like geraniums and not just leaves popping through soil.

I know it is hard to see, but some leaves
are getting the right shape to grow into a geranium.

☮

Currently reading: The Backyard Homestead Seasonal Planner, by Ann Larkin Hansen.

Stay safe.