This Place Is For The Birds

Spring 2017 Flowers

Our walks with the dogs twice a day have been greatly enhanced this spring by the arrival of many flowers.
In mid-April, our daffidils were blooming out in the woods, and there were beautiful little blue stars in the grass around the pond.

Then, in May the bleeding hearts showed thick in one section between paths..

And the wild geraniums are thick everywhere in the woods.

And along the west trail, we have wild columbines.

And here are several other flowers and flowering shrubs that I don't know yet.

Love how the flowers just pop up in the woods without any gardening required.

The COLD and the Beautiful 01-04-2017

Made a banana cream pie today from scratch

Prairie Progress

My prairie project (15,740 sq/ft,1/3 of an acre) started back in May when I sprayed part of the front yard with Round-Up. I did a second spraying in July and a third in September. On September 17th a tree guy came and dug 4 - 30' Maple trees for transplanting to our church in Wautoma. During the first week of October and on October 13th I dragged the plot. On October 14, with the help of my brother Phil, Uncle Rick & Neighbor Harold; using about 20 bushels of sawdust as a carrier we seeded the plot with Short Prairie Mix for dry soil from Prairie Nursery of Westfield. The seed mix has (2) grasses, Prairie Dropseed and (21) flowers. After the seeding I rolled the area, the seed will lay dormant over winter and hopefully next year we will begin to see results. It takes up to three years for the prairie to mature.

A little Corny

Canned 22 pints of corn relish today

It's for the Beans

Although today is nice 70's the early part of the week was for the Beans 90's and humid.  I would much rather have 60's - 70's.

Yesterday was for the beans also, I stopped at the farm and picked 2+ ice cream buckets of Green Beans that my brother Phil planted in one of his many gardens.  I nipped, washed and cut them up last night and canned them this morning.  My goal was to get 16 pints and that's exactly what I got. Since we are usually in Alaska this time of year we don't get to can as much as we would like to. Thanks Bro!

A definite rain mark where the last storm passed across the front yard.  No, really this is the area that has been sprayed twice now with Round-Up with one more spraying (if needed) in preparation of planting a prairie flower/grass mixture sometime late October/early November.