Popping in To Say Hi and Landscape Project Update

   Hi everyone, Wow it's Thursday already. 

       So grateful for cooler weather so far this week-although the hot is returning. I have been sticking with my garden project everyday. Splitting up working in the mornings early and then going back out around 4 pm. Once it gets back up in the 90's again it will mostly likely be too hot for me after 4.

    Today I can really see progress, my goal was to finish  going through all the soil-seperating out the larger rocks, and debris by this week's end. We'll see how that goes.

   I just took a couple photos.

      Towards the left front-near where the water is draining from the rocked wall-is the finished soil. I had more than this but spread some of it out already. In the back to the right is what I have left-thinking at least 3 days more of work.

and this is the pile of small rocks that I seperated out of the soil already-that's allot of rocks haha. In the back is the piles of concrete chunks

             I did leave some of the gravel size stone in for drainage. I have only found about 4 worms in this soil, so this definitely needs some compost type nutrients added. Thinking of getting a big bag of peat moss if still available, and some miracle grow garden soil to mix in.  In the spring I will also buy some garden worms to put in here too.

  Speaking of Miracle Grow-I did an online search for small compost tumblers. I found one from Miracle Grow that I really like. So that is on the wish list for next spring. Here is a video I found-looks perfect and will keep the critters out of it if I try to make a homemade one. We have a woodchuck and racoons that get into mischief here smiles

  Do any of you have one of these? the reviews are all over the place, some love it some say it doesn't compost well which may be the fault of the buyer not knowing what to put in the compost.

This morning we had another pretty sunrise. The first photo is the blue heron fishing off of our dock.

    My digital camera is very old, thinking at least 15 years old now at least, so it is not taking sharp photos any more. This sun was a bright red and that does not show up well here.  We don't use smart phones so I don't have a camera that way-may need to look into a new one, hoping still available.

  Happy Thursday 

Garden Project Update & Wishing You a Happy New Week

   Hi everyone,

      With the extreme heat here I needed to take a day off from this project yesterday. This morning I didn't feel strong enough to move rock and concrete chunks, so decided to dig up the now dead grass-that I had sprayed a couple weeks ago. 

     Wasn't an easy job and the soil was super hard here-nice black looking soil but acted like a hard clay. So easier, to just grab the pillow I sit on and my short shovel and work that way-easier on my back too.

    I got allot done, just a little bit more to dig up, but after 6 hours of working this morning (Sunday) decided to get back to it tomorrow. If you enlarge the photo you can see better what is left to dig up-where the big bag and shovel is down to the big tree stump.

   The black railing in front is actually a gate that opens up from the railing down the stairs-really nice that this is here-as to the left front is where I want the outdoor cooking area to be in.

    This new week, since the temps will be in the 80's f opposed to 99 f degrees I am hoping to get allot of this rock and concrete moved, and to get that pile of soil moved around too-Looking like progress-loving that.

    I no longer have a way to compost easily I gave away a compost tumbler that I didn't think I would use-and it would have been perfect here at the lake house. So I have a huge bag and a small bag so far of the dead grass, may try to burn that. I did try to "sneak" some into the garbage can-they don't like garden waste materials mixed in with the garbage. and I do feel guilty not composting it-I have always had a compost pile for garden cleanups and egg shells-food scraps etc. Sooo good for the soil once composted down.

  The lake was super busy this weekend-boats everywhere with three rows of them going up and down the lake. Not sure what activity was happening this weekend, but it was quite loud. August will be very busy with lots of activities including Missouri's Birthday celebration into the Union.  

   "On August 10, 1821, Missouri entered the Union as the twenty-fourth state. Named after the Native American people who originally inhabited the land, Missouri was acquired by the U.S. as part of the 1803 Louisiana Purchase"

  We did enjoy a pretty sunrise early this morning-and the lake is usually very peaceful early mornings-love that.

Have an awesome new week and new month as well as we usher in August.

T Stands for Tuesday and Landscape Project Continues

   Wow can you believe it? Our last Tuesday and T for the month of July. I had a feeling when May for me just zoomed on by that the summer would go fast too-and it has so far.

   We are still into some projects, the dock is not finished due to workers not showing up-sigh, we so need to sort things out at the woods house so it can get on the market to be sold-but too hot this summer, I think we will wait til things cool down.  Speaking of hot we are in for another very hot week-closing in on 100 degree f a few days. So thankful we have air conditioning here, I never grew up with it-the price was a luxury back then. and I know many countries do not have air conditioning so I am always so grateful to have it.

   If you enjoy camping recipes or using cast iron-you may enjoy my recipe share for Cast Iron Saturdays. (previous post)  I am making this a weekly post as long as there is an interest. 

    And just for fun and since it's T Day,  I love to follow John Townsend-18th century cooking and baking so wanted to share his recent post-roasting and brewing coffee in the 18th century.

  A couple posts back I shared a couple videos of our landscape project. In the front, I am working on changing all the grass over to flower beds for the hummingbirds and butterflies especially.  Since that post I have worked around 3 hours every day, except Sunday, very early before it gets hot and before the sun reaches this area. I am sorting through rock and concrete. The concrete chunks (from the brick sidewalk project) will go into two areas to help catch rain water and to eliminate weeds in those areas. The rocks will go on top of the concrete. I also want to cut down on grass. I will need to find someone new to cut lawn next year as we are not happy with who we have now. Which is always difficult to find someone.

  A couple photos 

      As you can see I am working on a hill, the last couple days I have been sitting down and using a short handled shovel to dig through the piles. Much better for my back and more comfortable-not trying to balance myself on the hill. It slopes quite a bit beyond the front of this photo.

  I love this old tree stump for character Will set up something for water for the butterflies here.

I use my cleaning bucket for the small pieces. These two piles are rocks, interesting an hour south where our woods house is we had mostly really pretty and textured rocks. These rocks are not very interesting at all-but will cover the concrete chunks.

I wasn't sure what to expect from the plants I bought online. I knew they would be small but they are a little bit smaller than I expected. Very healthy and professionally packed though-netting on the roots-in the first photo.

   These plants-bee balm and lavender were suppose to arrive on Monday but surprise they came in on Saturday. I had called the post office if I could come and pick them up when they came in-otherwise the carrier doesn't come til after 2pm. So I was happy when the post office called me early Saturday morning.  These came from New York which I hadn't realized when I purchased them-a long time in the mail for plants. I ordered one of each color of bee balm and she sent me two plants each which was a nice surprise. The bee balm colors are red, purple and blue.

This is the medicinal echinacea which came from Missouri-they were packed very well too. I just ordered another set of three plants. Thought I would plant this clump all together and then the next plants same way

Here are the bee balm plants and lavender. I am excited to grow more lavender plants too.

  I have them in a spot outdoors where they are in the shade all day til late in the afternoon-I needed to bring them indoors once the very hot sun hit them as the leaves were drooping. Don't want anything to happen to these plants. (smiles) Update: I looked for a shady spot in the late afternoon today and found one-now can keep these outdoors.

  I also found goldenseal plants on Ebay-I was amazed at all the plant choices there-I had checked out a few online nurseries but I got twice as many plants for the same money from these Ebay sellers.  I have a shady spot that will be perfect for the goldenseal I want to eventually get. I love goldenrod (no this has no allergens like ragweed) so may look for a spot for that too-great dye plant for yellows, and makes a nice tea as well. I am mixing in useful herb plants with the perennials that will attract butterflies, hummingbirds, bees. Once things are set up to plant I would like to order ground cover thyme-it is so pretty and I can harvest the thyme as well-and should keep weeds down. I may wait til next spring for that or see if I can plant it in the fall. Zinnias really bring in the butterflies too-so will scatter these seeds around-and then in the fall collect the seeds for the following year-and there are sooo many kinds of zinnias too.

  Over the weekend I wanted to make a zucchini bread-I found a keto recipe that I changed up a bit. It baked up really well-I had used half gluten free flour blend and half almond flour-I don't care for the taste or the bake using only almond flour. I used a keto sweetener but I took notes that it needed much more. My husband doesn't care for breads like this at all, and he for sure would not like this one-flavor pretty bland even though I added extra cinnamon. I liked it though-now it is getting a bit dry so will toast it in a cast iron skillet to finish it up. Makes a nice break with coffee or good for breakfast.

The recipe was using keto chocolate chips, I changed that to raisins that I soaked first so would be moist

I fixed the not sweet enough-haha-with spreadable honey with cinnamon You can just see my water glass in the back left.

A few lake photos

    Those little tug boats move docks around on the water

A sailboat-the first one we have seen this summer so far

This is a huge dock getting moved and it has a wood roof.

Sunrise

A storm coming in

Another Sunrise-this more was a bit hazy

   Oh and the poison ivy saga is almost over. It took a week for me to stop being super nauseated from the steroids after I stopped taking the last two pills. My worse arm still burns-strange, but I am almost back to normal finally-this has taken a month so far to get over this bad case. I hope I never get into poison ivy again-I am spotting it here at our lake home in several areas.

Happy T for Tuesday and Have an awesome new week everyone

PS here is a photo of the creeping thyme