Busy Bees

Along with working on the garden (see previous post), we've been busy bees in other ways. Here are some of the things we've been up to...

After the snow melted, we got out our rakes and gathered up all of the thatch, pine needles and other ublek (read "deer poop") that had settled on our lawn. For those of you who have graced us with your presence here, you know how big our lawn is. It took us over a week to get it all done. I got eleven piles out of the front lawn, and finished just as it started to hail.

Cody found it refreshing.

Speaking of Cody, he has been living with cancer now for 9 months (the vets gave him 6 months to live at diagnosis). This boy loves life! His symptoms are getting worse, however, so we got the boat out of storage early so he could have at least one more boat ride.

It was a chilly day but the sun was out and he had a blast.

"I'm King of the World!"










He's also wearing Shadow down with his charms. Shadow has been getting closer and closer to Cody lately, ALMOST letting Cody touch noses with him.

Shadow is the one looking at Cody. Isn't he adorable?

Sera, of course, loves Cody and is trying to convince Shadow that he's an OK guy.

He walked up to Cody right before I snapped this photo, but ran away as soon as Cody turned to sniff him.

Bruce finally did witness Shadow rubbing up against Cody's front legs a few hours later, so Cody won him over after all!

We're all going to really miss that boy when he eventually leaves us. But Ginger, his first human mama, will be waiting for him with open arms.

Meanwhile, Bella had three rotten teeth removed at the beginning of this month. We feel terrible that we didn't have it done years ago, but we got bad advice from previous veterinarians. Here she is using her "hands" to hold her bone.

Ahhh, a nice post-recovery chew.












Lastly, I've been busy teaching myself to play the piano again. I bought this piano about 20 years ago and took lessons for about 18 months. Hadn't touched it since, except to dust it and rearrange the photos on top.

Bruce had it tuned for my birthday earlier this year, so I dragged out my old music and started reacquainting myself with the keyboard. I surprised Bruce, and myself, with how quickly I picked it back up. The best part is that I don't have the pressure of lessons or recitals. I play for the fun of it, and I find that I actually enjoy practicing and learning new material. Eventually, I know I'll hit a wall and need to start taking lessons. But for now, it's just me and the piano.

So while I took a month off from blogging, know that we were not idle, cruising the Caribbean or taken by aliens. We were Busy Bees!  

The Garden of Weedin' - Phase I

I apologize for my long absence from the blogging world. We've been a little busy around here (as you'll see from the next few posts).

This year, the garden is our number one priority. We had too much going on last year to work on it, so we had to settle for a few crops in the existing rustic beds and walk over and around the tangle of weeds on the floor. Here's what the garden looked like when we moved in a year and a half ago:

There was no gate, just wire fencing about five feet high. The deer could easily jump over that (if they wanted to). A dirt floor and a few rustic, homemade beds were inside.











We grew some yummy potatoes, beets, onions and herbs last year. We also continued to contribute to the existing compost pile, which supplied us with a surprise crop of various kinds of squash.

But as I wrestled with the rolled up fencing every time I entered the garden, I yearned for a real gate. So Bruce made my garden gate dreams come true.

First, he added about three feet of fencing all around the top of the garden so the deer couldn't get in. Then he built the gate frame...











then he added the posts from our property (see previous post "Our Garden Gate - Part I" on 8/2/13 for details).

As you can see, that was about all we could do last year before winter set in. A few weeks ago, after the last of the snow and ice melted, we started weeding the garden "floor"...

Ahh, my favorite pose.










Meet my new best friend - the Truper!

Here I am with the Truper, moving one of the compost piles from inside the garden to the new compost location outside the back of the garden. You can see the new pile at the upper left. Bruce is going to install a gate at the back of the garden for easy access, and we'll build a nice little three-sided enclosure for the pile so we don't have to stare at (or smell) it while we're gardening.

Nice outfit!













Here's the new compost pile, composed of last year's delicious concoction and this year's still-in-the-works earthly stew.

Cody accompanied me on every trip between the garden and the compost pile. My protector!













The New American Gothic:

Manually removing all of those weeds was back-breaking work, but very satisfying.

Cody hung out with me the whole time. He's slowing down, but he still loves being outside and cleans his food bowl every night, so he's not ready to leave us quite yet.











Finally done! All but one bed was removed. The remaining bed's sides were raised by about a foot to make it taller (old bodies like less bending). Both compost piles were moved out. All weeds were viciously hacked and whacked and moved to the burn pile.

Take a break, Bruce.












Ready for Phase II!

Phase II involves installing the hardware cloth and garden fabric, then filling in the floor and entryway with 2" rainbow gravel (it's going to be so pretty). In Phase III, Bruce will build six 10' x 5' beds and we'll have a huge pile of soil delivered to fill them. Phase IV will be...planting! Stay tuned...