life lately

I've been slow to post on my blog, but that doesn't mean that life is slow for us.  On the contrary, we've been so busy, but with mundane stuff.  Here are a few things keeping us busy, but not enough to blog about individually.  If you follow me on Instagram, you've probably already seen these.  Some are from my phone, some are from my camera.

1.  If you follow Keith on facebook, you'll know he got a freeze dryer this summer.  Not to be confused with a food dehydrator.  Totally different.  Think of foods like the strawberries in Special K with red berries, NOT things like raisins, dried apricots, etc.  Anyway, so far, he has freeze dried bananas, blackberries, blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, nectarines, peaches, pears, green beans, zucchini (chips), corn, roma tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, apples, and tater tots.  Yes, tater tots.  Currently he's preparing some winter squash (hubbard) to freeze dry.  We store them in mylar bags we seal ourselves.  Actually, its all very cool.  Our favorites so far are the raspberries, and peaches.

So these cherry tomatoes are the finished product . . . the fruit or vegetables keep their shapes and all the liquid is taken out of them.  The white stuff you see on some of the red tomatoes is sugar that has extracted out.  They're feather light and crunchy.  You can eat them as is, or rehydrate and use in recipes.  We've preserved more of our garden by freeze drying than any other way before.





2. The property border between us and the neighbors we share our driveway with is lined with leyland cypress trees.  We did not plant them, our former neighbor did.  They are the worst.  The roots are huge and invasive and our driveway is buckled from them, not to mention they are sooooo messy. I don't know if you call the things they drop "needles" (by the billions, literally), but as soon as you sweep or blow them off, a breeze or wind will come along and dump new ones all over again.  We'd love to cut them all down, but for now, we cut down the ones towards the back.  Keith took out four trees himself, and the remaining ones we hired someone to take them out.

The first picture is before---but not truly "before", since Keith had already cut down four trees and limbed up the rest.  It opened it up to so much sunshine.  Its kind of hard to tell from the pictures, but it has made a huge difference.



And after the rest of the cypresses were taken out.  The other trees are on the neighbor's property.



See just a fraction of the needles that drop?



3. Gutter cleaning and repairing.  I am SO glad our roof pitch isn't so steep, because it makes me nervous when Keith is up there working.  I should add that he's got the shop vac up there with him, vacuuming out stuff from the gutters (don't laugh, it works great!)





4. Here are some pics from after Abby's soccer game from a few weeks ago.  I got Keith and all the grandkids together on the trampoline.















5. We LOVE going to see the grandkids when they have their Primary program.  This was Summer's very last program, since she was turning 12 the next day.  I can't believe she is 12 now, and in Young Womens!





After church, a little reading time with Lee.









So nice to get a picture with everyone looking at the camera!



On halloween night, I began putting away all my pumpkins and fall decor.  That's right, I can't even wait till after Thanksgiving to get my Christmas things out.  Don't worry, its not going to be "instant Christmas" over here.  Just slowly, little by little.  And holiday music in my car?  Of course.  52 days till Christmas.

stalled

Well.  Its been over two weeks since I last posted, with promises of sharing more of our Yellowstone fall trip.  Since then I got a new computer, only to find out that Apple changed its entire photo program.  Now I can't rename or resize my photos, or share them, at least the way that I'm familiar with.

So right now I'm on my old computer (on the left) to use the old program.  I've been using my new computer (on the right) and I've been spoiled at how fast it is.  I quickly forgot how S L O W the old one was.



I'm going to catch up on my Yellowstone posts on the old computer, since my pictures are still on there.  First I'll share a photo shoot I did of Abby from this summer, of her in her baptism dress.  She's getting baptized the day after Thanksgiving.

After the busyness of Thanksgiving week, I'm going to get serious about finding a new way to share to share my pictures with the new program.  I am so frustrated!  Anyway, hope everyone has a happy Thanksgiving!

picking blackberries on an early august evening

We had Summer, Abby, and Claire with us this weekend . . . Friday and Saturday.  We thought a blackberry cobbler would be perfect Friday night dessert, so off we went to pick some blackberries.  What a beautiful evening.  Long shadows, golden light . . . just look at how the sun is glistening on the deer netting around the orchard.  Just kidding.  One day we'll end up doing something more interesting with our lower field, but for now, it holds one heck of a blackberry patch.



Summer and Abby both just kool-aid dyed their hair.  Of course it shows up much better on Summer's blonde hair, but if you look close at Abby's you'll see it too.







She honestly didn't know she had blackberry juice on the end of her nose.  We had her go wash it off in the sprinkler.



































Summer disappeared back up to the house after only a few minutes.  I ended up going back inside to check and make sure she was okay . . . I found her curled up in a chair reading her book.  Claire kept insisting they pick some blueberries too.  Keith said she was one amazing blueberry picker.  All together they picked 9 cups of berries, more than enough to make a big cobbler.  We spent the rest of the night snuggled up in blankets watching the opening ceremonies of the Olympics and Jurassic World.  Probably not the best choice before bedtime, I realize.  But those good girls slept soundly all night long.  We love having them over!

hummingbirds

When I was growing up, we had an ornate outdoor wrought iron light fixture on a post, where our front steps had a landing.  One year a hummingbird made a nest in a little round opening, right at eye level.  The nest was the size of a half walnut shell.  We had the most perfect view of everything.  The mama bird was very tame, and we could quietly watch her sitting on her single egg, and she didn't seem to mind.  We watched the tiny baby after it hatched.  These little birds never seemed to be bothered by having people so close by (unlike the birds who build nests in the flower pots by our front door and dive bomb us every time we go in or out).

I've always wanted to have a hummingbird feeder, with an easy view of it from inside the house.  Everyone has them, don't they?  I have no good reason why we never had one before now, other than I would over-research everything.  I wanted a beautiful blown glass globe, but the more I researched, the more I realized that wasn't the best choice for the birds.  We even bought a pretty glass one, but never hung it up.  We talked to our friends who had them and got so many conflicting opinions.

One bird loving friend (who has two feeders) told us the best one they had was the cheapest model you can buy at Lowes.  The birds avoided their "pretty" feeder, but loved the cheap version.  Off to Lowes we went and got their cheapest feeder and a shepherd's hook to hang it on.  We made some sugar water, filled it, and hung it up.  Instantly, hummingbirds came out of nowhere and began feeding out of it.  Instantly!  From before sunrise till after sunset, they literally swarmed around it.  We loved it!  Friends who came over even commented on how many hummingbirds we had, pretty much nonstop.

But they weren't very colorful.  We figured they were all females or juveniles.  And so territorial!  There would be a few who would fight off any other hummingbirds who came to drink.  It was constant activity.  There were a few who would sit on Keith's tomato cages inbetween drinks.  Sometimes standing guard.  Since the shepherd's hook had two hooks, about a week later I added another feeder.  Even more activity!





This was before we added the second feeder (and those spots are rain drops).  This bird definitely looks greenish, but not the iridescent kind of feathers.







When we went on vacation, we had some friends water our garden, and also left out a jar of sugar water I had made for them to fill up the hummingbird feeders when they got empty.  After all, they had feeders of their own.  They use the red liquid hummingbird food you can buy at Walmart, etc, and kept trying to get us to use it too.  We had so much success with our sugar water mix and our birds loved it so much, I didn't want to jinx a good thing.  I've read that they can be very temperamental and if you put in some food they don't like, they'll never return.  Or even if you wash out the feeder with soapy water, it will drive them away.

We came home from our trip only to find that our jar of sugar water was still sitting full on the patio, and both feeders were filled to the top with the red liquid (like we had insisted they not use).  I just felt sick.  Not one single hummingbird came near it.  It was like that red liquid was repelling them.  After a while I was so upset, I took down the feeders, and washed them in the hottest water I could stand, and refilled them with my regular sugar water mix.  It took a few hours, but the birds finally returned.  Not in such great numbers as we originally had though.

As the weeks have gone by since we got home, more birds started to come again.  And then, the BEES!!!  Our feeders are supposed to be designed to not allow bees in, but they will sit there and drink out of the holes just like the birds do.  The yellow jackets are the worst.  They're aggressive and will chase the birds away.  I think the birds sit and watch for the bees to move away.  Then there are the bumblebees, who are gentle, but really hog the ports.  The hummingbirds and bumblebees seem to coexist , but those darn bees just sit there.  Look at the picture below, they're hogs!  What about my flowers?  They're supposed to be buzzing around the flowers instead.



I got a wasp/yellow jacket trap to hopefully lure the yellow jackets away.  I don't think I can get the bumblebees away from there.  I'll just have to wait till winter to see less of them.  We're also considering regular bird feeders too.  Our only drawback is that our next door neighbor had a bear on her back porch feasting on her bird feeder, and another neighbor behind us also had a bear with its paws on her sliding glass door (bird feeder drew it there too).  Sheesh, are we turning into crazy bird people?  Anyway, we really do get a lot of enjoyment out of seeing them up close and personal.

friday pretties

Just sharing some pretty things that caught my eye today.

Fuchsias by the front door.



I think this is the stella d'oro daylilly that I planted nearly 3 years ago and have practically given up on.  But all of the sudden this year, there was this big, healthy green clump.  It was too "nice" to be grass, so I'm thinking this just might be the year these flowers take off.



Keith brought these eggs home yesterday.  One of his assistants brought them for him, from her chickens.  Aren't they beautiful?  Kinda wish I would have known in advance, because I just got 2 dozen eggs earlier that same day.



The fuchsias are color coordinated with the flower pots.



These Martha Washington geraniums are on our front porch.



That's all for now.  Sunday is May Day.  Can you believe it??  My friend Jackie faithfully will deliver May baskets to hang on friends front doors.  Somehow she is very stealthy and hasn't gotten caught yet.