Blue Moon

I took the Gnomeslayer out for a playdate this morning, and when we were done we stopped by Lowe's. We were going to put in the new plants and needed to get some new mulch and some manure. While I was looking around I noticed this beauty, 'Blue Moon' Phlox. Looks like these and it smelled nice too. :) It was sunny and around 50, but the wind was blowing hard. We got all of the plants in, and the first mowing of the season done. Have I said yet that I'm glad spring is here?

Welcome Home

I was very happy to find that my delivery from High Country Gardens made it in today. It is *pouring* outside, so no planting this evening or tomorrow. I had to throw on my raincoat to go take the pictures. I can't say enough about how well they package their plants, they all showed up in good shape. And now they are getting a drink before they get planted. :)

New Beginning

We have been getting beautiful sunny weather. I've been busy doing lots of tidying up and evaluating last years plants. Unfortunately it looks like there are going to be a couple of casualties. Neptune is diseased, and looks like its going to have to go. Also, one of my other roses is dead too. I do love me some roses, but I have decided that I'm not replacing any that I lose. I definately don't need anything high maintenance right now. Maybe when I have more time on my hands I will try some more. I've also made the decision that The Mum That Ate Alabama is going to visit the garden in the sky. It is so huge and sprawling that it looks messy and it takes up way too much room. So with those two plants gone it opens up a very large spot in the front yard garden. Since I'm wanting low maintenance, I had to look through the new High Country Gardens catalog that I got in the mail today. Here's what I've decided to get to fill in the spot.

Purple Ozark Beardtongue
Western Wood Lily
Bluebell of Scotland
Sunset Foxglove
Wildflower Salmon Gladiolus

So I lose two plants, and get five in return. While I'll miss Neptune, I get some neat things to fill the hole. :)

An Acquisition, and a Maintenance Task

The Gnomeslayer and I took a field day trip to Across the Pond a couple of weeks ago. It was a beautiful day and I wanted to get her outside. She likes to see the big fish there. Not to get diverted, more on that in a later post. While we were there I found a really cool pot for my bowl lotus. It has been growing in a plain black tub (see below) for the last few years, and I wanted something a little more decorative.

This is actually the first time that I have ever divided one so I was a little nervous. Lotus tubers are very delicate, and if you break off their growing tip they are worthless.

Lotus roots/tubers have to be planted in round containers because if they are in square containers the growing end can get stuck in a corner and break off, killing the plant.

I was able to get eight divisions from the tub, not a bad return on investment. :)

Fun With Photoshop - Part II

My second Photoshop challenge was my sister's baby picture. My mom is not known for taking care of pictures, and this one had a rough time. It used to be framed, then stuck to the glass. Somewhere along the way the glass got broken, and fell off of the top part that wasn't stuck. Then:

• Algae grew along the crack lines
• The colors bled from humdity
• My mom's dogs chewed on the corner
• There were torn spots missing
• It was dirty
• There were specks and spots of undetermined origin on it
• There were spots of mold growing on it

I finally got her to give me some of the pictures so that I could get them scanned before they got totally destroyed. I'm still working on her for the rest, but I was stumped at how to fix this one. I had to lay it on the scanner, broken glass and all to get it scanned in. I think that it turned out good overall, but the problem is that the cracks ran over her nose, eye and mouth. I patched up the eye and mouth by cloning parts of the opposite side, but I'm still not that happy with how the nose turned out. Since the light was coming in from the side, the shadow was off, but you can only spend so much time on these things. I had to do a lot of cloning and blurring to cover up the many problem areas, so it lost a lot of the original detail. I'll be interested to see if I can fix it better after I have my graphics editing class. Did I say yet that I love my Photoshop now? :)

Fun With Photoshop

I have been busy lately, as you can see since I stopped posting. I have changed degree majors from business to IT, focusing on website development. So I haven't had a whole lot of free time. One of the benefits is that I got to buy the Adobe Creative Suite at student prices. I have lusted after Photoshop for years. It took a couple of weeks before I got to play with it, and here was the first trial. I have a picture of my grandparents (seen on the left), passed on to me to get scanned into the computer. If you magnify it, you can see that it is in pretty bad shape. The big black mark, countless scratches and gouges, and it was really dirty to boot. So I tried to clean it up, which took a couple of hours. Did I say that I love Photoshop? I can't wait to see what I can do when I actually learn to use it. ;)

Snow!

We finally got a decent amount (for here) of snow today. I think it was between one and two inches, depending on where you were. I left work early because they were starting to close some of the roads over the mountains and I didn't want to have to take back roads to get home. The main roads weren't too bad, but the back roads really sucked. So we took the Gnomeslayer out to play in the snow for a while. The snow was too dry and wouldn't stay together, so we gave up on the idea of making a whole snowman - not from a lack of total quantity but because it just wouldn't stay together. So we made a snowman head instead. GS did *not* want to go back inside, but she was starting to look like Rudolph so we all came in and warmed up. Definately a good time to be in the house with a full pantry and a fireplace. :)

Chattanooga

During our long holiday vacation, one of our objectives was to go to the aquarium in Chattanooga. We have meant to go for a long time but never actually followed through. But having a week off and the Gnomeslayer's new fascination with Finding Nemo, we thought it would be a good time to try again. It is an hour and a half drive from here so it is perfect for a daytrip.

The trip went well, and we visited the Seahorse Gallery and the Ocean exhibit. We didn't want to do too much in one day. I got a family membership for the rest of the year, so we'll have plenty of time to go back for the fresh water exhibit. She loved the clownfish and the reef display, and seeing the penguins.

They really do have a very nice range of exhibits there. They have a beautiful butterfly house and tropical garden on the top story, and you work your way down to the bottom. There were sharks and stingrays, and a fascinating jellyfish exhibit. Visiting during a school break probably wasn't the best time to go because older kids were everywhere and it made it harder for GS to get a good view of some of the exhibits.

After we finished with the aquarium it was time to eat. I had picked out a place to eat, the Blue Plate. Unfortunately I didn't notice that they were closed on Mondays, and of course we went on a Monday. So instead we went to one of the restaurants in front of the aquarium, the Big River Grill, for a completely overpriced and forgettable meal. It was worsened by the fact that there was a guy at the table next to us with a kid that sounded like she had the plague. We really should have asked to get reseated, but instead we hurried to finish our food and left.

All in all it was a fun trip and I look forward to going back when it is warmer outside.

Seeds

Back in November I placed an order for seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds. I frequent their i dig my garden forum, and had read about Ozark Razorback cowpeas. I *knew* that I had to grow some in my vegetable garden that I am planning and hurried to get them before they sold out. I got in the order yesterday and it gave me gardening withdrawal. I have been poring through other sites looking for the rest of the seeds that I want, and it really taxes my self-control. I know that it is very important to start with a small and manageable area and crop expectation. I don't even have the garden built yet, so I need to be realistic about what to plan.

My main goal was to have a salsa garden this coming year, but my attention wandered and I got a few other things. I grew some Blaushokker peas (they have blue pods) one year in North Carolina and I found some blue podded peas in their catalog. I also love okra, but it's hard to find it that isn't tough already in the store so I picked out some Alabama Red Okra. Since I'm growing Arkansas Traveler tomatoes and Tennessee Beauty strawberries, I thought it would be fun to have a plant that is named after every state that we have lived in. I think for Virginia I might get some Carwile's Virginia peanuts, and there is Carolina Wonder sweet pepper. That leaves me needing Minnesota...not sure what I'll do about that one. :)

I can tell that I'm going to have to rein myself in on a daily basis!

ETA: When I was trying to think of seeds for Minnesota it occured to me that I could grow some sunflowers. Minnesota is one of the main producers of sunflower seeds, and I remember seeing huge fields of them when I was growing up there. Maybe that's what I'll do. :)

Snow!

We got between 1-2 inches of snow last night. The Gnomeslayer woke up at about 6:30 this morning, much to my protesting. I went ahead and got up and got her ready to go outside. Snow here tends to melt off within a few hours so I wanted to get her out while it was still on the ground. She wasn't too impressed with it. She kicked the grass for a bit and patted it with her mittens, but she didn't like it being cold. We went out to the back yard and I was showing her how to make snowballs. We were scraping snow off of the fire pit blocks, unfortunately there was bird poo under the snow and it got all over our gloves. So I called it quits and we went inside. :)

Cotton

One of the things that I find so interesting about Alabama is seeing the cotton fields when they are ready to harvest. It's almost like seeing drifts of snow. It was especially dramatic seeing the white cotton fields with the fall colors in the trees behind them.

We got our first heavy frost last night. I could hardly get it scraped off of the car this morning. Looks like winter is finally here, booo!

The Last Roses

Today was an absolutely gorgeous day, I am spoiled by being able to say that a lot now. We're actually supposed to get some rain tonight and for part of tomorrow. I had to go and water a few things that were looking peaked from their transfer today, in case the rain doesn't happen. It's the first time that I've had to actually water things in a while.

The Gnomeslayer and I went out and she got some tricycle riding time in. I cut down The Mum That Ate Alabama today, and those are the remains in the wheelbarrow. Yes, that's one mum plant. I did some weeding in the front bed and it was amazing how easy it is to keep it up when you have a good setup.

The picture above is my 'Joseph's Coat' rose, and I honestly think that it is one of the best pictures that I have ever taken. The lighting was perfect and I like the angle. The flowers look like they glow.

'Neptune' has a bloom opening on it and it smells heavenly.

'Elle' also has several buds on it.

Rocks

My Gnomeslayer loves rocks. One of her favorite things to do is to pick up small rocks while we are on walks, and we have quite a collection of them. So last weekend when we went to Across the Pond she was in heaven. They have a stone yard there, and I wanted to get some decorative stones to make the little streambed in the back yard. I have some flat gray/silver ones that were edging on the pond, but I wanted some other interesting ones to have on the sides. So we spent the morning climbing around pallets and digging through them to find *exactly* the right stones. They aren't that different, just some differences in coloration and shape that looked neat. I also got some black river pebbles that GS promptly dumped out of their bag when we got home. The weather is supposed to be nice this weekend so I think I'm going to do some work on it tomorrow.

Battle Scarred

Sigh....another notch in the Gnomeslayer's belt.

He fell victim to her while we were chasing the bullfrog around the garden. I think I can put his foot back together with some superglue, hopefully I won't glue my fingers together!

Froggy Bottoms, Take II

We had a very productive weekend, so much to cover. The main objective was to keep working on the backyard garden area since the front is taken care of. The Gnomeslayer and I went to Across the Pond yesterday, and picked out some accent rocks for the streambed that we are going to put in. Today the objective was to get the current pond cleaned out, get the filter/pump cleaned out and get the fish ready for the winter.

I will go into a flashback sequence here and say that probably two weeks ago, we noticed some very large frog eyes in the pond. Today we plugged a drain hose on the pump and started draining it out. I had a bucket that we were going to keep the fish in while we got the liner cleaned out. Q started fishing around with the net to try to catch them as the pond went down. We have four ornamental goldfish in the pond. He caught the first pretty quick, but then was having problems because some of the edging stones had fallen in the pond. So I got on the pond gloves and started to pull them out. There were a couple of times that I must have brushed against the fish before I got the rest of the rocks out. And then Q said "What the *bleep* is that? I looked down and there was a bullfrog peering up at me. Now our "pond" is 40 gallons. A bullfrog in a 40 gallon pond doesn't leave room for much else. GS took that opportunity to grab a slimy rock from the side of the pond so I took her in to wash her hands. While I was gone Q kept trying to catch the frog. As we were walking back outside, he netted it and brought it over to show me. I grabbed the camera to try to get a picture. The frog hopped out of the net and started hopping around the patio. He doubled back and landed on my foot (which wasn't covered since I was wearing moccasins). I will admit, I shrieked like a little schoolgirl, which must have really made our neighbors wonder about me. He hopped through the garden area and lodged himself between the fencepost and a slat on the fence.

We finished up our work and discovered that three of our fish were missing. To be honest I wouldn't have thought that a bullfrog could have eaten fish that big. When we got finished I went in and looked through my water gardening books and lo and behold, discovered that bullfrogs will eat anything that they can stuff into their mouth. This includes goldfish, mice, small birds and frogs smaller than themselves. I didn't want the bullfrog to get back into our newly cleaned pond, so I went to pull him out of his hiding spot. Unfortunately he wasn't cooperative, and his belly was pretty big, probably full of our goldfish that he was digesting. I ended up having to push out on the slat and keep poking at him to make him move. I finally got him, and went to hold up my prize to show GS and Q. In retrospect I should have had him get the camera and take a picture but it was getting dark and I wanted to get him moved. He took a big (assisted) hop over the back fenceline. Anyway, that was probably the biggest excitement of the weekend. My poor little fishies...RIP.

Monte Sano Visit

We spent the morning up at Monte Sano park, and enjoyed the beautiful fall day. The colors have already peaked but there was still plenty left. The Gnomeslayer got to kick around leaves and pick up sticks and rocks. It was a fantastic day. :)

Fall

I was finally able to get outside and get something done today. I took some pictures but haven't gotten around to downloading them. It was a beautiful fall day - the sky was clear blue and the sun was shining. It was cool outside, especially in the shade. I took the Gnomeslayer outside with me, so that she could get some sunshine and exercise. We started with a wheelbarrow ride to the backyard. I finished digging up all of the plants that were going to be moved to the front yard. I was able to get them all up, with only a few minor interruptions. Mainly when I had to do a highspeed chase across the backyard when I realized I hadn't closed the gate and GS found it open. Running in steel-toed gardening boots isn't that easy. ;)

All of the plants moved to the front got planted, the beds cleaned and the mulch laid down. I still need to go sweep the sidewalk, but ran out of daylight and energy today. The backyard garden is mostly empty now. I need to move the plants that are staying and rearrange the beds. I also need to drain and clean the pond. I was going to move the unwanted plants to the back fenceline, but when I got there to plant everything I decided that I was going to get rid of them and plan out what I want to plant back there when I'm ready. Also, the fence was built right in front of the treeline, and there are roots everywhere. I think I'm going to have to do raised beds along through there. So everything is getting tossed into the compost pile. I've seen the results of putting together plants haphazardly and not planning, and I intend to do better next time. :)

So I hope that everyone else had a productive gardening weekend. I baked some gingersnaps yesterday and think that I need to go sample a few!

Heavy Lifting

After the false hope of an extended forecast that showed sun for all of this weekend, the sun finally came out today. Friday and Saturday were both overcast and chilly, with heavy showers on Friday. To say the least it was depressing, although we did get some work done in the house. Having to wait until Sunday to get outside work done usually means that it won't. Friday and Saturday are our errand and shopping days, and Sundays we usually relax and laundry is about as productive as we get. After taking a long nap this afternoon I finally headed outside to get some work done. This time of year it's almost like a scavenger hunt in the garden, trying to see what is left blooming. Today I found blooms on the honeysuckle (above) and the Veteran's Honor rose (below). Veteran's Honor has been such a workhorse, and the blooms are do dramatic and fragrant. It has a place of honor (no pun intended) in the front flower bed.

My main objective today was to get the boxwood bushes moved from the front flower beds so that I can finish moving the plants from the back garden that I need to move. At least the ground was pretty moist, so it made it easier to pull them up. The soil here is very heavy clay, and digging up the bushes is hard because the root balls are so heavy. I'll be lucky if I'm able to move tomorrow - wrangling big prickly bushes with heavy rootballs can suck the energy out of you. I took the bushes and placed them along the back fenceline. So now that the bed was cleared of the bushes I moved the camellia and azalea in. I moved the Gingersnap rose in front of the garage, and moved Welcome Home to the middle of our bedroom window. I'd wanted two roses there, but Gingersnap ended up being a very short rose so the display was lopsided. I've come up with a tentative plan on what to do with the pond in the back, but I have to get everything moved out of the beds there first. So here's hoping for a sunny weekend next weekend!

Cleaning Up

We had some more rain for the last few days. It ruined my plans for getting a lot more garden rearranging done. We even had the tornado sirens go off and had to visit the closet in our bedroom. :) Today started out overcast and didn't look too promising, but ended up being a beautiful afternoon. So I took out the Gnomeslayer so that she could ride her tricycle and get some sunshine, and then we went for a walk. When we got back in, I left her with Q and then went outside to get some work done. I am trying to get everything done, slowly but surely. Joseph's Coat is putting on a beautiful display to end the year with, and I got a couple of good shots. I had to stand on tip-toe and hold up the camera to get them, so I'm surprised that they turned out at all.

Today my mission was to evict Lady Banks from the garden. I really didn't want to, I love the flowers on it. Unfortunately it only has flowers for a week or so, and then nothing for the rest of the year. It started going crazy and hanging over the fence into our neighbors yard. Aiyana mentioned that the plant gets heavy and needs lots of support, and I agree with her - too much work for me to put up with. So I waded into the corner it was growing in and scalped it. I have a huge pile of vines to get rid of. ;) I did make an interesting discovery. We knew earlier in the year that a bird had made a nest in the corner of the fence. We were never able to see it, but we saw mama flying in with worms in her mouth. Here is the nest.

The butterscotch jessamine is covered with buds that have started to open.

Elle has a couple of saved rounds left.

Birthday Cookies

One of the ladies that I work with makes cakes for everyone's birthday. So when it comes time for her birthday I make her cookies - I am not much of a cake baker. She had surgery not too long ago, and wanted cookies that were soft and chewy, without much sugar or nuts, oats and dried fruit. I originally planned on doing some snickerdoodles, but since they didn't turn out too good last time I made them, I thought about looking for something else. One of the problems is that since she couldn't have a lot of sugar I planned on using baking Splenda. I am not a fan of artificial sweeteners at all and haven't ever used it, but I didn't think that it would be as good in a cookie that depended on the sugar for so much of its flavor. So I was looking through the Baking Bites blog and found this recipe for Pumpkin Spice Fudge Cookies. I thought that having some more complex flavors would help hide the Splenda. Instead of pumpkin I had some babyfood jars of pureed sweet potato that I have been using for making cornbread with. I also had to mix my own Pumpkin Pie Spice since I don't own any.

I ran into a complication as I started baking the cookies. As I mentioned before, I hadn't ever baked with Splenda and thought that it could be treated as sugar. The recipe calls for you to melt the butter and add it in with the sugars and cocoa. When I poured the melted butter on top of the Splenda it caused it to clump together. I used a whisk to help break it apart as much as I could, but there were still some lumps in it. I figured I'd go ahead and bake them and see how they turned out, and if it was a disaster I could bring her some cookies in next week. When I pulled the cookie sheet out of the oven, the Splenda clumps had melted and dripped a bit, but it didn't look too bad. I bit the bullet and tried one of them, and it wasn't too bad (although Splenda lingers around in my mouth for a long time). I want to try to make it again using real sugar to see how it turns out. :) Definately a bit different cookie, more of a grown-up cookie since it isn't too sweet and some kids might not like the spicy flavor.