1: serving to preserve remembrance : COMMEMORATIVE
2: of or relating to memory
Monday is a national holiday here in the U.S.A.. It is Memorial Day – the day dedicated to remembrance of those who have died fighting in our nation’s wars. This link offers a history of how this holiday came to be. In recent years memorial day celebrations have encompassed the weekend prior to as well as the last Monday of May, making it a three day weekend. It has become know as the unofficial start of summer and many celebrations include recreational activities such as picnics, boating and camping. However you choose to celebrate I do think it’s important to at least pause and reflect on why we are able to enjoy such activities.
“Those who have long enjoyed such privileges as we enjoy forget in time that men have died to win them.”
– Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Note: My sister sent me the photos she took this Memorial Day morning. She tagged them “Beautiful morning. Grateful hearts.” They were a perfect addition to this post. Thanks! J.B.
We got some light rain yesterday and there is more in the forecast for tomorrow. Boy is that a good thing. Our garden is planted but we haven’t had much rain so we’ve been watering plants to keep them alive.
On Saturday, May 15 my husband put the pump in the pond so we could begin filling the tanks that we use for irrigation.
It may or may not have been my turn to put the pump in the pond but here’s how that works each year.
My Husband: “It’s your turn to put the pump in the pond.”
Me: “Ok as soon as we have a couple of consecutive days of 80 degree F (26.6 C) weather for the water to warm up I’ll do it.”
My Husband: Puts the pump in the pond when temperatures are still in the 60’s or 70’s F.
OR some Years it goes like this
My Husband: “It’s your turn to put the pump in the pond.”
Me: No honey. Last year was my turn. I know you did it but it’s still your turn this year.
My Husband: Puts the pump in the pond.
I didn’t get any pictures of the planting or the garden as of yet but I’ll tell you what we have planted. Potatoes, onions and cabbage were plated first and are all doing well at this point. Tomatoes, hot peppers, sweet peppers, eggplant, melon, cucumbers and basil were planted as seedlings or young plants. Beets, carrots, Swiss chard, green beans, three types of squash, dill, sweet corn, pumpkins, sunflowers, and broom corn were planted as seed. ** My husband brought home a package of okra seed yesterday and we are going to plant some. We have never grown okra before and I have only eaten it a few times but we decided to give it a try.
While it feels good to have the garden planted we realize the work has only just begun.
Now for other farm happenings:
Puppy Playground
This spring we doubled the area that we have fenced in the back field. It’s an area where we have apple trees, our blueberry patch and our strawberry patch. It is now known as the puppy playground. It’s over 52,000 square feet where Ranger can safely run off-leash and sniff ’til his heart’s content.
Prayer Garden
As always the prayer garden is a work in progress.
We decided this year to add mulch to dress it up and for weed control. I started by weeding then edging.
Then we began adding the mulch.
It’s nearly done and I hope to have it finished by this weekend.
Salvia and Thyme
Mean while we have watched the transition from mostly yellow blossoms to lots of purple and some pink blossoms.
IrisesDianthus
Chives
Lilac
Chicken Coop Construction
We are in the process of building a new home for the chickens. It’s a slow process because it gets worked on in between other things that need to be done. I don’t have any photos yet but as we get further along I’ll share some of the process. Hopefully by the end of June our chickens will be in their new home.
Bees
Our bees arrived as scheduled on May 13. It was a lovely day for hiving bees and my husband had the two new hives set up before noon.
My husband and I agree – it’s nice to have bees on the farm again.
Mowing
It seems like I’ve spent a lot of time mowing grass this spring. According to the mower it’s been over 18 hours. The task has been made easier by this new mower we purchased last month.
Outdoor Décor
When the local greenhouses opened in the beginning of May we stopped by a new one just down the road to purchase flowers for our hanging baskets and porch pots. Their prices were a little higher than the one we usually shop at but we wanted to support this new local business.
They did have a nice selection.
Thanks to my husband’s diligence in taking them inside on the frosty nights and making sure they have enough water each day they are all thriving.
The one above has a volunteer sunflower growing in it. Not sure how it got there but I see it as a gift.
Play Time
It’s not been all work though.
We’ve been blessed to have a couple visits from the grandkids (and their parents).
And we’re looking forward to many more of these.
Thanks for visiting. Do you have a garden planted?
Our word of the week was inspired by a quote that my sister K.C. shared with me.
The word is saunter and it is defined by Merriam Webster as:
to walk about in an idle or leisurely manner : STROLL
and here is the quote that inspired this post
While I agree wholeheartedly with Mr. Muir’s premise I would like to amend it slightly by stating that we don’t need to be in the mountains to reap benefits from sauntering. I often saunter around our farm and allow the natural environment to fill my senses. I see various flowers in bloom, seeds sprouting up through the soil, a bird’s nest in a tree or a hawk flying high over head. I might hear the rustling leaves, frogs singing, bees buzzing, or the call of a male pheasant somewhere in the field. I might smell fresh cut grass, lilacs or autumn olives in bloom, or mulch that is being added to the prayer garden. I often smile as I feel the sun on my face, the wind in my hair, or the grass under my bare feet. Perhaps I even enjoy the savory taste of a chive that I’ve pull from the bunch, the sweetness of a ripe strawberry, or the freshness of a mint leaf I’ve plucked off the stem. All these things I would have missed if I’d been in a hurry.
You see sauntering allows us the time to enjoy some of life’s most simple pleasures.
After publishing my Rockin’ Robin post I did some searching on the internet to try to find a solution for our knockin’ robin problem. I was pretty excited when I can across an article, that I believe was put out by the Texas Department of Natural Resources, (I forgot to save the link) that had a simple solution that they claimed not only worked but worked immediately. What I needed to do was take a highlighter (marker) and draw grid lines on the inside of the window. The horizontal lines should be no more than 4 inches apart while the vertical lines should be no more than 2 inches apart. EASY!
Hopefully this will be the last time we see this.
After following the procedure I waited, hopeful that this worked to ward off the bird and I would be able to promote this simple method to others who experienced similar problems. Instead I have to be honest and tell you that this did not work. It was about an hour later that the bird was back on the attack – flying into the same window – same place, and he continued to do so throughout the rest of the day. Whether this is a case of don’t believe everything you read on the internet or if birds in Michigan are different than birds in Texas I am not certain. I can’t say that this method would never work just that it did not for me.
After that failure I got off the internet and turned my attention to what I was really witnessing. As mentioned above the bird was consistently flying into the same window at the same spot. Let me explain. There are two windows that are set only a few inches apart giving the appearance of one large window. Each of the two windows also has two panes of glass the lower pane slides upward to open while the upper pane is stationary. The lower panes have screens on the outside to keep bugs out when they are open. The window on the left-hand side has a vinyl mini-blind hanging on it that for the most part remains closed. It also has a curtain. The window on the right-hand side is where the dogs like to look out so the mini-blind was removed quite a while back. (Dogs and mini-blinds do not mix.) That window does have a curtain though. The upper right-hand pane was the only place that the robin was attacking, not the panes covered by screen or mini-blind.
The next thing I did was to take the mini-blind from the left window and move it to the window on the right. Thankfully the brackets were still in place so this was easily accomplished. I raised the blind so that it was only covering the upper pane, this way the dogs can still see out without bothering the blind. It was a real AHA! moment as I observed the bird begin attacking the window on the left and for the most part leaving the window that was covered with the blind alone.
It took a couple of days before we got a new mini-blind hung on the left-hand window. We had to mount new brackets because the new blind would not fit in the old brackets. During those days I was able to observe that the bird was consistently attacking the pane that was not covered by either screen or mini-blind so I was pretty well convinced that hanging a new blind would be an effective way to stop this birds behavior.
It’s only been a couple of days since we hung the second mini blind but I will share what we have observed so far. For what remained of the first day after hanging the blind I did observe the robin at the window a couple of times but he did not hit the window as hard as he had previously been doing. It seemed more like he was just looking, not fighting. My husband noticed that the robin was spending a lot of the day perched on the top of my car which was parked in the driveway right next to the tree. This was a BIG problem because he was pooping all over my car. My husband chased him off when he saw him but neither of us had all day to stand guard.
The second day and now well into the third day he was/is gone. He was not sitting on the car, nor have I witnessed him flying into or up to the window at all. YAY! Peace has been restored to our home and neighborhood. 🙂
continued effort to do or achieve something despite difficulties, failure, or opposition : the action or condition or an instance of persevering: STEADFASTNESS
I have to admit, despite being annoyed by it, I kind of admired the robin’s perseverance assuming that his mission was to fend off what he believed was another male bird threatening his territory and perhaps his family – even if he was mistaken.
I have also considered the adage “insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” This seems to prove my husbands theory, “That bird is crazy!”
I am happy to say that my perseverance in finding a solution for the robin’s problems seems to have paid off. I will share what I’ve done in my next post.
Romans 5:3-4
3 Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; 4 perseverance, character; and character, hope.
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