Just Plain Stuffed (Plus a Quilting Update)

A few weeks ago I attended another quilt retreat at Homeplace Bed & Breakfast (SC). As always it was a lot of fun, food, laughter & a good time spent with friends. I made my first 'big girl' quilt.

It's a king size! I used some fabrics that were gifted to me & some I had gotten at garage sales over the years. I finished the top at the retreat then had one of the quilting ladies there, quilt it on her long arm machine. She did a beautiful job! It's 108" x 112" & there was NO WAY I was going to tackle this behemoth! The pattern is called "Broken Star", a variation of a Carpenter's Star.from a booklet published by Debbie Maddy of Calico Carriage Quilt Designs.

Close up of center star.

Once I finished w/this I decided to make a laptop quilt out of some vintage reproduction fabrics I had in my stash. Pic is sideways but you get the idea. It's called a ribbon box quilt, free pattern from Coud9 Fabrics. It is 56" x 62".

Since I got home I've finished up on my Christmas Table toppers that I will be using as a lining for baskets of goodies to give away this year.

While at the retreat my sewing machine wasn't working very well & I had neglected to take my Featherweight. My friend Debbie (the enabler) kindly loaned me one of hers to use. Otherwise, I would have been twiddling my thumbs the whole time.

Now I have to get my mid arm machine (another post entirely) set up so I can get all these projects quilted & bound before Christmas time rolls around.

On another note, I actually planted a few things in my garden beds here in the city. As usual it is proving that only about 3 or 4 hours of sunlight is NOT enough to produce prolific results.

String Beans & carrots in the pot.

Squash Zucchini, Cucumbers, more carrots & marigolds in front.

Onions taken over by weeds.

I had waited way to late to plant the onions & scallions so most just died. I still have a couple at the very back of the bed, we'll see if they hang on. Too darn hot for them.

The squash & zucchini have lots & lots of blooms but never product any fruit. No pollination happening & I'm not doing it by hand. One of our neighbors has gotten bees but their scouts haven't come down to visits. Sooooo, since they aren't making baby squash I decided to stuff some of the blossoms.

Cheese mixture in bag.

Decent sized blossom. Most were smaller than this.

Stuffed with cheese mixture.

All stuffed & ready to fry.

I picked & stuffed yesterday & as the last pic shows, I had a bit of cheese left over so I picked a few more this morning & finished up the cheese. Will fry them up tonight using a tempura type batter. We've had these before & they are delicious!

Well that all that been happening around here ... until next time.

p.s. I have been scrounging the Internet looking for this discontinued fabric.

It's called Anastasia by Robert Kaufman (orange, black & gold colors). If you have some in your stash or see any for sale, please let me know. I'm more than willing to pay for it. 

Gator Feeding

Had some more painting to do at the Country House. Does it ever get finished?

I had crown mold, door frames, baseboards & quarter rounds to paint before they started installing. I also had to get the last coat on in the bedroom. I painted all day on Friday & finished most of it by Sunday.

The carpenters showed up Monday & got to work on the trim in the kitchen & the window sills.

One of the carpenters noticed a 'nice sized' gator in the pond. My Dad just happened to be at his place so I called him to see if he could shoot it. Of course, by the time he got into position the gator went under. My Dad stayed out for about an hour & shot a couple of times but missed. He said that his gun needed to be sighted in or that his aim was really bad. He said that after the 3rd shot, the gator stuck his tongue out at him, & he knew it was time for him to quit.

The carpenter who spotted the gator asked if it would be alright if he tried to trap it. He said & I quote "It's kind of like a hobby of mine". OK. He said he would skin it, save the skin & eat the meat. I said sure, why not? He set out 2 hooks. One off the dock & the other at the shallow end. I left on Wednesday & the gator had gotten the bait a couple of times but didn't 'hook' itself. The guy said he would keep trying.

I talked to my Dad this morning & he said that as far as he knew, the guy hadn't had any luck. I told my Dad that it sounds like he's just feeding the gator & that the gator has probably told his cousins & they are just coming by for a quick meal. If he hasn't caught it by this weekend I will ask him not to set any more traps.

Shallow end after bait was taken. Broke the rod.

2nd baiting. Hook, line & rod were taken the 1st time.

Here are a couple pics of my pathetic garden, Nelly having fun & other weeds:

1 Peach tree blooming. The other only had a couple blooms.

Weeds have once again taken over. The branch looks so close but it's actually about 60 or 70 yards away!

Not sure what this is?

Bitter Weed everywhere!

Nelly running & playing

Sigh

Nelly hiding in the weeds

More weeds but these are kind of pretty.

We're headed back up there this weekend & I'll get some pics of the inside of the barn apartment to post next week.

Pick Up Sticks

Remember that game we played as kids & loved it? Not so much as an adult. Guess I should have had kids so I could get them to do it now. Too late! Actually the picking up doesn't bother me. It's the unloading onto "the pile" that I don't like.

While Greg mowed the weeds (it's green from the road so it's all good) I picked up sticks along the driveway. I know, if you just leave them they rot away, but we like things nice & tidy when we can get it that way. So, picking up those sticks along the driveway was my weekend responsibility.

3 loads just like this.

Here's what he was mowing down:

Bitter weed is what we call this in our neck of the woods. It stays away after a couple of mowings. It's really very pretty but 8 acres of the stuff needs to be cut. Done in about 3 hours.

After I finished that task I took a look at the garden.

Boy, those weeds have grown in a month! Starting that particular task at 2:00p in 80 degree heat probably wasn't the smartest idea but I did get to use the shed roof off the garden shed with a nice breeze & it made a huge difference. I weeded each bed & then took a 5 min. break in the shade & breeze. It took just under 2 hours. No after pics, sorry. Greg string trimmed around the edges & I pulled from the bed itself. Had a whole Mule load full. Put them on "the pile" as well. We'll eventually burn that pile but for now it's just growing.

Anyway, spring has sprung at the Farm. Of the trees installed last year ... 1 maple, 1 willows & 2 peach trees made it. 1 maple & 2 apples didn't. Here's one of the peach trees in full bloom.

Need to prune.

Spring has sprung!

Country Garden Weed Control (or not) Update

Warning .... picture heavy.

March 2013 Mowing Weeds

More Weeds

All pretty & neat - why won't it stay this way?

August 2013 - It was as if we hadn't done anything.

Lots of Weeds

More Weed Whacking

 

Trying black plastic on a few beds

March 2014 - plastic helped somewhat in the beds but in
between was another story so we decided to put down
cardboard & pine bark mulch.

Different angle

Looks all nice & neat again.

Wish it would stay this way.

May 2014 - better but those weeds left are deep! And,
they seem to have taken a liking to cardboard. I think
they think it's some kind of fertilizer instead of a deterrent.

 

Added more cardboard & mulch to the other walkway.

It was all helping but not controlling & since I'm not up there (yet) to be able to tackle the weeds on a regular basis we decided to spray. NOT something that I wanted to do but we've got to get the upper hand at some point. So we did what we did. We'll see if the spray helps kill it back so we can mulch thicker & on a regular basis.

We didn't spray the asparagus beds which are doing much better because I have thicker mulch & some cow poo & more leaves on them & the few weeds that spring up are manageable - no pic. I plan on putting in crowns as soon as I can get some, may be too late for them again this year but if so, I'll put them in next spring.

Regardless, the other beds aren't getting anything planted in them until next fall (2015) at the earliest, so hopefully, the bad stuff will have dissipated. I never planned on being an organic gardener to begin with but hoped to do more natural gardening. We'll see if that pans out after I am able to tend to it regularly.

Anyway, here's a few more pics of the trees & such. Not sure if I mentioned before it but we lost all 3 large oaks that we planted to some strange disease & lost the lemon & lime to freeze. So, I plucked a few oak seedlings & a bay laurel from the City property & planted those in March & so far, knock on wood, they haven't died. Plus we got a few fruit & maple trees in the ground as well.

The 'Orchard' - 2 apple & 2 peach

Lone Surviving Orange
Gets the worst wind & no wind break but
it survived the winter. The other 2 citrus
with wind breaks did not, go figure.

Bay Laurel about 3 ft. tall, dug up from City House.

1 of about 8 tiny oaks seedlings from City House - about 1 ft.

1 of 2 purchased Maples.

The fruit trees & Maples were purchased in early March 2013 from a Greenscape sale in the City. Prices were very good for decent sized trees ($10 - &15 each).

Last but not least, as MIL & FIL were fertilizing the crepe myrtles we planted last year (which are doing great by the way) we noticed this in one of the crepe myrtles. Anybody know what kind of snake it might be?

Snake skin in a crepe myrtle

Close up of skin

Our Garden was Vandalized!

We arrived at the Country House Saturday around noon. Looked out at the garden & said "What the ..?".

From the house it looked like very large Dandelions had sprouted over several of the beds.

Upon closer inspection I realized it was newspaper, wet newspaper.

A few weekends ago I had stuffed newspaper in the concrete block holes in four of the beds. I had hoped the newspaper would help with the weeds. I'm planning on adding leaf compost on top of the paper, eventually. Hopefully before the weeds start to spring free.

But someone had come behind me & pulled up all the newspaper, out . of . all . four . beds. What the ...?

Upon closer inspection I see in the bottom of one of the holes, a cigarette butt. Why would someone pull up all that newspaper I had taken about 3 hours to painstakingly crush and put into each . and . every . blasted hole?

What had I done to anger someone so?

Upon even closer inspection I realized it wasn't a cigarette butt after all ....... It was Goose Poop!

Geese come and go all year long & apparently they thought there Must Be Something Good underneath all that paper.

Geesh, if it isn't the Beavers, it's the Geese. I stuffed it all back in, hoping they realize there isn't anything underneath & leave it alone.

Daggum Geese!