family reunion

We went to Oklahoma for our annual "goof off"... my parents and i were lucky enough to stay here... isn't it beautiful!!

They have a hummingbird feeder on the back deck

way cool... i've never seen this before!

welcome to oklahoma! =) this was a "shortcut", it actually was part of the directions on the gps!

we went on the boat to look around the lake

had a great time... as always with these folks. see you next year in virginia!

the cardinals try it again

I was glad to see that the cardinals had another baby, and i caught them at a very neat moment! The mom and dad were making a lot of noise, which caused me to have a look. I managed to catch the baby taking what i assume was his first flight! It didn't last long...

weeeeee!

you're going the wrong way!

so he didn't go far, and ended up hopping around the front of the house

mom and dad were never far away

and dad even brought the baby food every little while!

I do not know what became of the baby... but after seeing the fate of the last one, I decided to believe that this one eventually just flew away. Yeah, it's hippie... yeah, it's girlie... yeah, it's my story! I get to write my own ending. =)

nature, garden and stuff

Here's the Green Zebra tomato I posted about earlier. I guess I didn't know when it was ripe - it split open before I figured it out! I've got another one on the vine, so I'm checking it more frequently. It's a pretty tomato, but I wasn't sure what to expect as for taste.

The tomato was soft, like any ripe tomato, and it was green on the inside. It tasted really good! Certainly like a ripe tomato, but a little different from a red one. Can't put my finger on the difference, but it was very good. Alpine wouldn't eat it until I tried it first - he'll usually try anything. Luckily, he was pleasantly surprised!

This is the first bunch of lettuce I got from the garden. I'll use it for as long as possible, but I also want to let some go to seed, so I have seed for next year. This lettuce was grown from last year's seed, so I know it's possible!

Once again, we're overrun with zucchini, and the squash has started coming in, too. The two on the left are our first cucumbers... the skin was a little bitter due to the dry weather, but they were generally very tasty. I'm trying to be creative with the squash and zucchini, but help would be appreciated. I've steamed it with different seasonings, baked it in olive oil with onion and salt and pepper (which is very good, by the way), and put it in soup. I have a squash casserole recipe, and of course have been baking zucchini bread at every opportunity. =)

We had some friends here recently, and while this didn't come out of the garden, it was a a nice compliment to the baked squash and zucchini. If you've never had Beer Can Chicken, you should try it. You don't have to use beer - I've tried wine and perfer it the least, but you can also use pop. I try to stick with Mountain Dew or Sprite, but I think any will work. I do think beer is my favorite, though I'm not sure why. Just has a good flavor. You can find a rub recipe online, or I'll give you mine. Good stuff - probably the best chicken I've ever eaten.

While our buddies were here, we also picked blackberries. We picked about a gallon of them (and I need to go back!), which was enough berries for me to make 4 cobblers. I made one while they were here, along with some homemade ice cream, and I froze the other 3 batches. Put in some sugar, freeze, and they're ready to thaw and make a quick cobbler. Have I mentioned how much I love my chest freezer? I'm not sure how I ever did without it.

Sunset on the farm...

Pretty bird clinging to the storm window!

An awesome lightning storm a few weeks ago... and some lucky shots:

garden and nature

Fields of gold? This was a full rainbow... I was too close to get the entire thing in one picture! It sure was pretty...



This baby cardinal was stuck in the garage behind some plexiglass. I cleared the way for it's escape, and mama was quite concerned about it. I monitored its progress throughout the night, and it made it about halfway across the yard by nightfall. A storm was coming, and it was just out in the grass, so I tried to move it to shelter... however, by morning it was dead. At least I tried!

I love to see the fields dotted with hay bales after mowing time! We didn't get our "rolled up man" out this time, but maybe next time.

And... the garden. I finally got it planted several weeks ago, after it dried up a little... and now we've been a litte too dry! My weeds were under control, but nothing was growing well (even with a few manual waterings)... but some big storms have moved through this week and got everything growing well. Even the weeds. Time to get out there and tend to the garden!

My popcorn is looking pretty good... can't say the same for the sweet corn. It's about time for a second planting, so i'll restart the sweet corn and see if that helps.

This is either squash or zucchini... I can't remember which one I took a picture of. This plant grows like a weed... it gets "true leaves" far more quickly than most plants, and when it starts bearing fruit, you'd better check it twice a day... unless you don't mind baseball bat sized fruit!

I've not had much luck wth growing onions from seed, so my dad gave me some onion sets. Here they are... looking pretty good! I've got red and yellow onions... I'm eager to see how long they keep.

These are my potatoes. The red ones are in back and blooming, and the white ones are catching up to the size of the red ones. The red ones were planted first and had lots of rain. I'm also eager to see how long these keep once harvested. This is our first time growing potatoes (and was James's request), so I hope we're successful. Supposedly they are ready for harvest after the leaves die back.

Ahhh... tomatoes. I planted about 10-12 tomato plants that I grew from seed, and rabbits or some other wild creature ate about half of them. My dad gave me some odd varieties also, and one of those already has fruit! This one is called "Mortgage Lifter" and is an heirloom tomato (which basically means it's not hybrid... and it's been around for a while). Other varieties given to me by my pop are Mr. Stripey, Cherokee Purple and a pink one... I can't remember its name.

I've also planted cucumbers, beans, pumpkins, watermelon, cantaloup, peanuts (which i don't think are coming up), carrots, lettuce, strawberries, sunflowers, dill, oregano, parsley and cilantro. I've got a lot of plants in my small garden... I try to plant an appropriate amount for two people, or enough for me to can/freeze/dry, but I'm afraid I might need a larger garden soon. If I can manage this one well enough...

american chestnut update

Out of 10 seeds, I had 5 sprout... only 4 of those grew into "seedings." Of those 4, we planted the two best ones out in a field... what you see is a tree shelter staked to the ground. The cows trampled them pretty quickly and ate the leaves on one tree, but I think the trees are still ok. We restaked and put wood around them to try and keep the cows away from them. So far, it's working! We'll hope that these two survive.




The last two I will plant in pots this weekend. They aren't very big, so I hope (thanks to the suggestion of HODAR) this will help them grow stronger before we plant them in the ground.

scenes of the season

Hay time... for some reason, a field that has just been mowed and baled is just beautiful to me. See for yourself:

Another beautiful sunset, as seen out my front door:

Alpine got this "kite" from Duluth Trading Co, and it actually flew! I have to say, it's probably the first kite I've even successfully flown. And I never thought that kite-flying was fun!

Now, the next three pictures are nearly identical, just with a different tone. Which one do you like best: color, sepia, or black and white?

Last, but certainly not least, my dogs:

There is no scene to go with this story, but as everyone who hasn't been living under a rock knows, Hurricane Gustav hit the Gulf Coast yesterday. Believe it or not, we must have gotten a little portion of that hurricane here in Kentucky! Before you tell me that I'm crazy, let me explain: Generally speaking, weather comes from the west, right? Sure, sometimes warm storms will come from the southwest, and sometimes the cooler storms come from the north. But how often does weather come from the east? That's contrary to the natural flow of things, right? Well, I witnessed with my own eyes (as did Alpine) a nice storm that blew in directly from the east! We heard thunder, saw sunshine towards the west, went outside and saw the low clouds and rain approaching from the east. There wasn't a whole lot of wind, but there was a decent amount. No hurricane forces, by any means, but that had to be the outtermost edges of Gustav. Whodathunkit?!?

destruction

Friday as I finished up lunch and got ready to head back to work, the sirens came on and this is what I saw (this was the tail end of it... you can hear the siren wind down). It isn't as dramatic as the swirling I first saw when I looked outside, but it's still swirling:

There were 4 confirmed tornadoes in our county that day within about 10 minutes of each other... and not far from our house! This first picture was taken just over the hill from my house, where the video was taken. It was one of the two F-1s... the last two pictures were taken in areas where two F-2s hit.

Did I mention that I'm not real crazy about tornadoes?