Thankful Sunday, May 26, 2019

I am thankful for Uncle Billy's Garden.

I love gardens. Vegetable, flower, tree, shrub, formal, informal. I like them all. Yesterday, I had a pleasant time visiting one when Ward and I visited Uncle Billy's and Aunt Martha's garden. Aunt Martha invited us to pick some of their bumper strawberry crop, a very lucky thing for us. While Ward picked strawberries, I took a look at other things that are growing in their garden right now. Here are pictures of a few of them.

Uncle Billy has raised beds for many of the things he grows. This is a new location for the strawberries this year and apparently they like it.

The broccoli is doing well and hasn't been besieged by worms yet. Aunt Martha will be freezing some today. The cauliflower (no pictures) is happy, too.

The potatoes are blooming. To the right of them, Uncle Billy has planted corn.
Notice the high deer fence in the background. It seems to be working.

Besides strawberries, we also picked lettuce. Aunt Martha plants a variety pack of seeds each year that makes a very pretty bed. There are onions planted behind the lettuce.

Along the back fence, they grow hops for their sons to use in beer brewing.

The raspberries have just started to get a couple of small green berries. There are also blueberries and figs growing in other beds.

The watermelon and cantaloupe have just sprouted. Uncle Billy has black plastic around them because those crops like heat. 

The tomato plants are looking big for this time of year. 

Red clover was Uncle Billy's cover crop.

Ward and Uncle Billy hard at work. I'm a little embarrassed to say that I may have done more eating of strawberries than just picking them. :)

So for Uncle Billy's garden that he and Aunt Martha shared with us, 

I am thankful.

This and That

In order to post more often, I'm going to be doing more brain dump posts because I'm sure all of you want to know what's going on my busy mind. I really should get into a meditation habit because my thinking needs to slow down every once in a while. Soon, maybe when...

I am not a person who thrives on a lot of activity. I like to be able to focus on a couple of things at a time and master them well. However, I've been trying to push myself out of my comfort zone and I've definitely succeeded. Here are some of things that are keeping me busy.

I decided to go for a new job and yesterday I found out that I actually got an interview.  EEK! It's been decades since I've been to a "real" interview and it's got me flustered. What to wear, what to say, etc. It will all work out, but until it does, my mind is pretty busy with thoughts of it.

Fun stuff. The robin's eggs are hatching.
After this picture was taken the third on hatched.

At the same time I'm thinking about a new job, Ward and I are reevaluating when we can retire. Or more precisely, can Ward retire early? We are in pretty good shape as far as retirement goes, but it's the details we're evaluating again with the help of a financial planner. We have been working extensively preparing materials about every aspect of our finances for the planner to work with. Thoughts of a big change in our lives has my mind pretty busy.

And as we're evaluating all of our finances, we're thinking about what needs to be done to the house and what we can afford or not if we lose Ward's salary. And as part of that we have been working with different contractors and architects to get ideas for both construction ideas and costs. Evaluating to see what might be possible with designs, use, and what we can afford has my mind pretty busy.

On a less serious note, I've invited the staff I work with over for a picnic this weekend. It's always fun and we enjoy doing it. However, details of that are still to be worked out. All doable, but my mind is still pretty busy figuring out weather contingencies, amount of food, etc.

And it's the time of year when a lot of yard work has to be done. I'm also trying to implement a couple of new beds and my mind is pretty busy trying to plan all of the work around the weather and my creaky knees and back.

So, in conclusion, my mind is pretty busy. Until next time...

Thankful Sunday, May 12, 2019

I am thankful for a fun day!

Last weekend, Ward and I went with another couple to the Kinetic Sculpture Race in Baltimore. The Kinetic Sculpture Race is one of those things that you have to experience to really understand, but I'll give it a try. It's a 14 mile race with human-powered vehicles that have to go on road, through water, through sand and through mud. That's the kinetic part of it. The sculpture part is that all of the vehicles are sculpted and decorated usually embracing the theme for the year. There are prizes at the end, the most coveted one being the finisher in dead middle.

Another way to describe the race is a fun, festive, silly way to spend the day with a lot of smiling people.

The day was perfect weather-wise being overcast with temperatures in the 70's. It was the second time for Ward and I to attend the race so we were able to show the ropes to our friends. They were particularly interested in the engineering of the racers since they coach a kids' team that builds and races human-powered submarines.

I've heard that a picture is worth a thousand words and in this case that might be true. Below is a sampling of pictures to give you a taste of the day.

We arrived early so we would be able to see the vehicles up close and talk to the crew members as they put on their final touches. 

Most vehicles were based on bicycles one way or another. However, this one used a pump car like you see on railroad tracks. They individually welded and made each part of their wheels.

On the sides of this one, you can see the flotation devices it will use when it enters the water.

The theme for the race this year was Wheel-ality TV (reality TV). These are two "Real Housewives from Uranus". That's their spaceship behind them.

Each vehicle has to to through a safety check including a brake check where it has to stop on a dime. (The silver cardboard disc on the ground is the 'dime'.)

This was a Hammerhead Shark entry. It was one of several shark themes.

There were teams of all ages from kids to veteran-race adults. The teams came from schools, businesses, and groups of friends who thought it looked like it might be fun to try the race.

You got information for the day from anyone with a chicken. They could be holding a chicken or dressed like one like you see in the background.

This member of security was quite popular in his gold velveteen suit.

The opening ceremonies included the blessing of the feet of the pilots. There was also a drum corp and pom squad from a local high school, an adult chorus that sang the National Anthem and a medley of TV theme songs, the lighting of the Kenetic Torch, and silly speeches. 

After going through local neighborhoods, the race proceeded to the harbor. There contestants entered and exited the water on boat ramps on either side of a pier. This was always a touch and go situation as capsizing and errant steering happen more often than the racers would like. Some entries ended up being pulled by a rope to complete the water portion.

This entry did pretty well. BTW, the wings were done with a 3-D printer.

Always a crowd pleaser is Tic-Toc the Croc. Because of its length (35'), it had to go pretty far beyond the pier to make the turn.

Fifi, the mascot of the race, is an old hand at maneuvering through the different obstacles.

As the day went on, the crowds got larger. Here they're waiting for the next racer to enter the mud pit. After the harbor, the racers go to a park where they go through a sand pit then a mud pit.

The mud was quite a challenge for many of the teams.

We also had a lot of fun watching the kids in the mud pit
when the racers finished.

After the mud pit, we were tired so we headed home with talk of next year's race and the team we might enter one day. So for this day of fun, I am thankful.

More Spring Colors

Here's what I found this week taking a Second Look around the yard.

The azaleas are blooming now.

Beside the white bush is a pink one.

And dark pink ones are around the other side of the house.

In front of the dark pink azalea bushes, the pansies that I planted last fall are starting to bloom. I like pansies because I can get two seasons of blooms out of them.

While weeding in the pansies, I found this young tree curving around the seed pod that was still attached. It's kind of hard to sort out the picture to see it (follow the brown stem), but it was fun to see in person. I love to find remnants of seeds above the ground. You may remember more than one picture here on the blog showing that. :)

When I went behind the bushes to continue weeding, I flushed out a robin that was sitting on this nest. You might say that we flushed out each other because I jumped out of the bushes as the robin flying past startled me. 

And speaking of nests, the bluebird's nest now has six eggs in it.

The first iris has bloomed. I was happy to see this one because it was from a plant I transplanted last fall.

Tucked in a dark corner along the fence, I found lily of the valley blooming. These were from a friend who helped me plant them when I first moved in. I am trying to create more of these surprise, "hidden" treasures here and there like these lily of the valley. While I enjoy the showy beds, I especially enjoy having things tucked here and there to find. I am working on creating more of these finds by planting things in out of the way places. 

And the rhododendron is blooming. I planted this bush last fall in memory of my mother. I picked a rhododendron because it is the state flower of West Virginia and blooms in her favorite color.

Thankful Sunday, May 5, 2019

I am thankful for another morning 
with Sarah.

Today, I spent another morning with my special buddy, Sarah. There was a lot of rain but that did not stop her from bringing her traveling menagerie of stuffed animals. Today she brought birds-3 mallard ducks, 3 Canadian geese, a robin, and way in the bottom of the bag was an ostrich, Stretch. Apparently, Stretch had been misbehaving because when Sarah was putting her birds away before we went for a walk, she said that Stretch had to stay out because he had been biting the other birds. And in the same breath she wanted to make sure I knew that Stretch was an ostrich and not an emu. I asked how she knew and she said that ostriches have two toes and emus have three toes. She showed me Stretch's toes and then showed me with her fingers how each bird walks. Another Live and Learn moment for me because I didn't know that. I always learn something from my time with Sarah and for that I am thankful.