Yay sunshine!

Just been puttering...

Got a few of the knotwork edgers done. They look pretty nice. Still not down pat on the ratio, but I'm settling in around 10 cups mix to 2 cups water or so.
I figure the knotwork ones will be for edible trees.. And I'm going to build a set of plain forms to make edgers for the rest of the trees. I figure it's a handy "secret" signal.. And let's me make more than one stupid edger at a time, lol.
And yay, we do indeed already have irises :) Got some bronze and yellows and yellow throated purples in the border behind the solarium. There is a stunning large sky blue one down in the raspberry area.
So now I got all sorts of fun bulb action to dig out of that area and move to another. It's a shame all those beauties are lost down there now.
And hey, the poppies are blooming. There's only a few of them, the flowers are huge, bright orange, and purple throated. Now I know what to weed, I need to hit that patch and clean it up.
Still don't have the FoH beds fully weeded out. Just been too uninspired to do that kind of weeding, lol.
Most of the fruit trees are now in fruit set. I can tell what the cherries are now. Still not quite sure what else is what yet, the fruit sets look awfully alike. The mulberry in back? Bursting with fruitset! Can hardly wait till they ripen. The raspberries are going from flower to fruit set now, so hopefully I will be able to positive ID those over the next month or so.
Nada on the chestnut trees so far.
My love helped me plug a whole packet of mixed pumpkin/squash seed along the arch drive. We shall see if anything comes up. I didn't see anything popping up on the trouble spot, which bums me out. I figured the fresher seed would have at least sprouted by now.

And no, the truck hole in my front yard is still not fixed. Starting to figure I'll have to do it myself. Sort of pisses me off. But that neighbor did mow the two front sections of my yard for me today, so I'm mollified for the moment.

Met the north neighbors last weekend. Very large family! They seem cool. So I figure I'm ok to proceed with my plans for veggie row. I gotta at least start getting plastic down- less mowing the better, lol.

Yep, they replaced my mower. Went to mow today, damn thing would die every time the brake was released. Figured out through some internet searching that the culprit was.. The safety switch under the seat wasn't plugged in. After I plugged it in, worked great!
Got the path to the firepit mowed in. The neighbors asked if I was gonna mow the whole thing, and I told them nope, growing it out for the birds. I think they think I'm a bit nuts between that and making my own edgers.

Got the seed separated out to start testing hydroponically. There's a couple legumes in the heap that I'm a bit concerned about after killing off a couple batches of tom thumb peas. We are going to try flat out spray first. If we keep running into wet feet problems, we are gonna try the baskets with clay pellets in them style growing. I think it would be tits wiggle if I can bring fresh veggies to the christmas table this year.. I'm hoping it will happen.

The solarium pond is finally starting to dry out. Hopefully soon it will be worth getting out there and doing the next round of cleanup. I'm thinking I might have to get yet some more materials, and do a few of the screenless windows with velcro mounted screens. 3 screens out of 20 on the outside walls just don't cut it. Gets so hot out there condensation forms on the house side windows.
But the lilies are flowering before anything outside. One is tall and rather pretty. I swear if the ones that look like ditch lilies prove to be, they all getting pulled and dumped in the water strip.

The chickens are happy the grass is shorter I think. Been seeing them in the yard more again.. well, when it hasn't been frigging pouring that is. Mr. Tasty was having himself a crowfest the other day, and Ruby just stood by him looking like he was nuts. Apparently it's critter freak out time. The black squirrels have been chasing each other through the trees like mad, and the blackbirds have been flaking out all over each other. The hummingbirds have been zooming each other, and I got to watch a male goldfinch rather closely for a long time yesterday. He latched onto the bottom of the screen of one of the office windows and was watching my ass. lol, maybe they are trying to tell me to come out and play more. And the swans appear to still have two babies, they are getting bigger, and I think whiter too. There's more swans now on the pond to the south too.

On the tec front.. There's all sorts of tinkering around. The cool drip device is now a big ole mounted thing in the great room. Three coke bottles hung on printed out brackets.. feeding into lines that run through the cool printed off valve control. I'm starting to feel like the indoor feed and water upkeep is going to get way easier :)
There's also a cool modular bird feeder coming up. Printed out plates and pegs- snap together for any size feeder one wants. I can hardly wait to try that one out.
The fruit spikes are still working great, and holding up perfectly. I've found oranges work best on them, which is fine since that's the prime feeding fruit anyway.
I have found some squirrel proof bird feeder plans. Gonna build a couple and see just how proof they really are, lol.

On the food front... The quest for one of the top summer foods.. Salads. I found out one of the boys didn't like salads save a couple exceptions. Now I must make all sorts of delicious salads and teach the yumminess that falls under the title salads. I think I'm already starting to grasp what he isn't too keen on, and he is willing to try at least a taste. Ok, I make him at least taste. Lol, I've found myself telling adults the same thing too sometimes- how do you know you don't like it if you've never tried it?