Flower Photography, and History Repeating

 

I don’t know where time has gone, but I sure wish it would slow down some.  I’ve done the best I can all along, to cherish every moment of watching all of my children grow up, knowing it will all happen too fast. It’s yet another reason I school my kids myself. I don’t want to miss any of their fleeting childhood. Still, it seems like yesterday that my first baby girl, Alexis Grace, was born.  She grew up in the blink of an eye. Next thing I knew, she was in high school, and taller than me!  She’s athletic and strong, and it blows me away.Read More

Garden Peek!> Early Summer 2011

I believe we’ve been both gardening and blogging, for about 3 years.  Our life is filled with so many various passions, there is more than we are actually able to get to blogging.  I sure try to get it all in though!  But one area that is especially hard to keep you all updated with, is the gardening!  Good gosh. Things grow and change SO fast, by the time I photograph what I want, edit the photos, and start putting a post together (while you know, living my life and doing 1,000 other things in the midst of it all), the post report, explaining the photos I took, don’t seem very current by the time I get to typing it out!Read More

Improvised Potting Bench

We’ve been blessed time and time again, with wood to burn in our wood stove through the cold seasons of the year.  Having a cozy fire going in our home, is definitely our preferred source of heat, and we’ve hardly had to invest much in keeping it going.  Oak pallets are dropped and stacked beside our driveway regularly through the winter, by Michael’s supply company, who is always looking to get rid of them.  They burn nice, hot & slow.

This load of tree wood is from the guy a few houses down, who was clearing off his lot behind his home.Read More

Have a Coke, & Some Petunias, & a Smile!

Gardening season is upon us, and we’ve been doing a few creative home-front (literally, in front of our home) projects I am excited to share with you, one after the other, right here in the Homestead section. Our garden beds are all ready for planting next weekend as well, with the soil all screened and fertilized.  (So exciting!) Aside from that, I’ve been getting creative & efficient around the garden beds, and this post is one of the little cute projects I’ve been wanting to share.

The week prior to Mother’s day, {A} and I found ourselves scouting a few antique stores, and I spotted this Coke box among the goods, in the items on the sidewalk outside of the door of one of the stores.Read More

You Have To Know, This Pains Me.

You know, nobody told me, that so much heartache can come with gardening. <sigh>.  Each and every year of gardening, well…..wait, this is only our second year….but we’ve learned a little bit more. I enjoy the learning process.  I really do!  Just as in life, I can handle learning through  little mistakes along the way.  But I prefer NOT to learn, through sheer devastation.  You know?

But this year, we learned a really hard lesson.   We learned about one of a gardener’s worst, ugliest, most destructive enemy:

The squash vine borer.

I was confused about the sudden rapid decline of my beautiful squash plants, in this post, when my friend Maria clued me in about this common squash plant destroyer, in the comments of a previous post.  I researched immediately, and found she had indeed hit the nail on the head, and correctly identified the dasher of all of our squash hopes and dreams.  This year anyway.Read More

Mid-May to End of June 2010/Front Yard Transformation


There is so much to catch you up on, where our front yard transformation goes, that I’m lost in my own thoughts, in trying to figure out where I tell you what we’ve gotten done, and where I tell you about where all of this work in progress is heading.  So, if it all seems a little mixed up at time, that’s pretty much where my head is at.

But to brief you, in case you are new around here;  Our front yard was basically just a big square sandy lot, with no purpose or beauty of it’s own, for all of the years we have owned our home.  We have had a side yard that we have utilized well, but the front yard, beside the (dead end) street we live on, was never safe enough for our then very young kids, nor private enough to relax in.… Read More

I Am Seeing RED!!

It’s Monday evening, at the close of our long Memorial Day weekend. It’s a bit sad the weekend has gone by so fast, but we’ve got to be happy with all we got accomplished outside! I have been taking photos like crazy, and can’t wait to show you all what we got done, and what the drawn out plans are for our front yard transformation, into a garden wonderland!

Pansies, Verbenas & Berries

Yesterday morning, I found myself up wicked early.  And not at the computer, in my bathrobe, with coffee. But up, dressed, and outside with my camera, taking photos around my yard.  (With coffee.)  I had to wonder what in the heck was going on with me lately.  I have never-ever been one to  get up early, unless I absolutely-no-way-out-of-it-have-to.  This morning, I was not only up at the crack of dawn, but after a night where I had laid in bed during the night, for at least 3 hours, wide awake!  I thought for sure I’d be sleeping like a rock, come morning.… Read More