in the garden today...

quote for today:  "Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul..." ~Emily Dickinson

for years and years, i've wanted to have a certain kind of garden.  i've dreamed and i've wished, i've plotted and schemed.

i spent a lot of time following the gardening of the fantastic Vanessa Valencia and wishing i could have gardens like her, not to mention her magical growing skills. 

with all the changes for me over the last year or two, i found myself really wanting to dive into the garden.  last autumn i wasn't able to do much clean up before the cold arrived and i just couldn't get out there.

so as things warmed up, my desire to be in the garden grew and grew.

i finally understand what VeeVala means when she talks about wanting to run to the garden the moment she wakes to see what has grown overnight.  😁

i have cleaned, weeded, moved, swept, moved again, repotted, planted, potted, dug, mulched, over and over for the last two months.  and i'm still not finished setting it up.

on every trip to the garden center, i've searched for the flowers i love the most.  snapdragons, zinnias, hollyhocks, foxglove, larkspur, and more.  i even managed to find a poppy and get it planted.  i hope it will come back and bloom next spring.

i added salvia for the hummingbirds, and i love watching them dip down between the plant and the feeders that i have out.  they are such amazingly beautiful creatures.

 

it's really just a start, getting a few plants in place.  i know they'll grow, self-seed and spread and that makes me very happy.  i'm still having to go in and dig out blackberry vines every couple of weeks.

i planted the hollyhocks along the fence since they grow so tall.  i've planted sunflowers there as well and really hope they'll grow.  i love sunflowers, they are such happy flowers.

and over in the veg bed, i have 8 san marzano tomato plants, rows of basil seeds in (plus a couple of plants from the farmers mkt).  i planted celery again this year, green and red bell pepper plants, a couple rows of carrots and a row of onions and radishes.  

i'm putting cucumbers in a big pot this year and still need to plant my pole beans and more onions.  

tomorrow i'm hoping to head off to the farmers market, as i believe peaches are in mmmmm... and i'm seriously craving fresh peaches.  plus, i need flowers for the planters in the front of the house.

just a little peak in my garden today.  it is a tiny little space, and i still dream of one day having a huge space to grow all kinds of things.  but for now, i will make the best of what i have and love every little bit of it.

are you growing anything?  do you have a garden space?  i'd love to hear/see about it.

until next time...

take care, 

love & kisses & magical wishes...

~*~

november days...

 i don't have much to show for november, despite its demands and chaos.  there was a lot that happened, but not a lot of photos of such things.

lots of time spent in migrainelandia, thanks to road construction and my infusion being on the waning end.  (i get my next infusion in a few days.)

there was a big meal cooked for the not a holiday/holiday but i forgot to take any photos.

this is what i do have...

the first lemon off my tree.  yum...

chocolate pound cake...

my s-i-l and i have expanded our baking game a bit.  in october we made a pound cake recipe that her nanny (grandmother) used to make for her mums' birthday.  this month she came to me with another of her nanny's recipes wanting to try it. so, we did.  the cakes aren't quite what i'm used to as a pound cake.  i'd always associated pound cake as a loaf, not in a tube pan.  but they've turned out pretty well.

and my last photo for today, is...

this month's cheesecake: caramel apple cheesecake 

this, by far, is my favorite cheesecake of the ones we've made so far.  it has a salted caramel sauce in it and brushed on top with a delicious apple filling between the crust and cheesecake layer.  it is soooo delicious!

well, i couldn't let the month end without a quick pop in to say hello, and to see off november.  hopefully i will find my way back here more in december and also to visit everyone blogs.

hope you are all doing as best as you can during these times.

love & kisses & magickal wishes...

~*~

i'm melting...

greetings and salutations, my lovelies...

it is so... freaking... hot.

at 9am it was 85f with a heat index of 96f.  

it is currently 92f with hi of 102f.

i'm staying in the house as much as possible.  in fact, i only go out to walk pup in the am/pm and to water/check on the garden.  since the pup only 'goes' twice a day, it's really not too bad as i can stay in the a/c all day.

as an aside, i can't get over this 'goes' twice a day.  my beastie boy would 'go' 7, 8, 9+ times a day.  of course, he was diabetic and that makes a big difference.  but i'm having trouble getting used to this.

anyhoo, this morning when we came back from our outing, i went out to the garden to water and found green beans!!

i picked the good-sized ones from the bush beans and have a good amount for a dinner or two.  the pole beans are not producing yet, though they are flowering.  and looking through the cucumbers {that have tons of flowers} that i have to train up the trellis every day, i found two nice looking cukes that are almost ready!  yay!!!

i really don't think i'll plant bush beans again.  they aren't like a bush at all and mostly just lie on the ground. i'll definitely plant more to use up the seeds i have, but i'll be using poles from now on.

i was outside for about 15-20 minutes, watering, weeding a bit and picking beans and flowers and i was so hot i drank down two cups of water when i came in. ugh...this, this is why i don't really like summer.  i love the fresh fruit and veggies and all the beautiful flowers and the birds (especially the hummingbirds) but i just do not tolerate the heat very well.

after the beans and watering i picked a few flowers to bring in. 

some for the ancestors...

and some for me...

in migrainelandia news, i really think these vyepti infusions are helping.  i'm on day 9 of not having the pain go over a 7.  after coming in from the garden, i could feel it starting to build a bit so i took out my ice pack and put it on my neck (now on my head) to try to keep the pain level from rising.  i'm really hoping it helps.

well...i'm off to turn off the news and read a book.  the news is just raising my blood pressure and pissing me off.  hope you are having a good day.

love & kisses & magical wishes...

~*~

ps... here's a link to today's mfta post.

pps... does anyone know what the deal is with the different bold of the font?  i didn't use bold at all and i can't figure out why it is so different. any tips appreciated. :-)

little sparkles of happy...

good evening, my lovelies.

i'm just popping in for a little show and tell today.  i'd planned to spend a couple of hours in the garden, but the migraine gods had other plans for me.  i just went out long enough to water and pick these:

after watering i took a few pictures of other things in the garden.

my radishes are coming up but i see the seeds i planted somehow migrated during the rain or watering or something.  so i'll add a few more to fill out the pot tomorrow.  

my neighbor gave me a couple of her orchids that need some help.  i've been watching tons of videos about how to take care or revive lackluster orchids. so, i have these to work on and see if i can get them happy again.  if i do, she's gonna have to give me one since i did all the work. :-)

that's pretty much what i did today other than finish up making my first batch of homemade spaghetti sauce.  oh my word...it's delicious!

this is a recipe that came with my mum's electric skillet a long time ago.  she didn't make it often because she thought it took too long.  i've always loved it though it uses canned mushrooms and tomatoes.  now that i've got it and learned i can cook it in a stock pot/dutch oven, i may try my next batch with fresh tomatoes and mushrooms, just to see how it changes it.  hopefully it will be even better.

well...that's all for now.

thanks for being here, 

love & kisses & magical wishes...

~*~