The Amazing Bubble Plant!

The Amazing Bubble Plant!

Wouldn't it be nice if it was real? Marvelous photography borrowed

from scottyblue @ Ask.com/gardening

After planting the peony's (9) we then added hay
followed by the chicken wire. We fit in the rose
and the butterfly bush on the opposite end.

We are preparing the beds for winter including the flower beds. As I've mentioned before, the "Dots" have loved feasting on bugs in our flower beds and who knows what damage they have done to the perennial plants and bulbs with all their scratching. We'll find out next spring. We are installing chicken wire over the beds to discourage the scratching which is so destructive. I love my flowers and I love my Dots so I have to find a compromise so I can have both.  Check out our first endeavor in the peony bed - the kitchen window garden. We're keeping our fingers crossed.  I love peony's and want to have a bed full to look out onto from the kitchen and to bring into the house to enjoy up close. We'll be doing this with all the flower beds around the house.

All the Dots are laying - 17 eggs today! We are both amazed because usually there are a few hens that just don't lay eggs. This means ALL our hens are laying, mostly brown eggs but also the 2 blue and 1 green eggs from the Easter Egg Chickens. I have to admit that it is a delight to see those colored eggs in the carton. 

My sister Bonnie found our Mom's pickle recipe which I have made before but couldn't find when I was making my pickles this year.  The pickles that I've tried so far are soft so the texture isn't great  but the flavor is good. Ugh - pickles are supposed to be crisp! How disappointing after all that work. When I opened the first jar and the pickles were soft, I went to the bible for pickling, Ball's Blue Book, and found a notation in the trouble-shooting section that it is recommended to "prick the whole cucumbers" before placing them in the jar. Now, why didn't someone include that in the recipe? My Mom's recipe DOES include the direction to prick the cukes so the brine enters the cucumber and makes it crisp. Well, there is always next year.

The wild birds are beginning to flock together here in preparation for migration. The bluebirds have been making use of the country birdbath regularly. Other birds are coming back to the feeders in preparation for their long journeys. If you follow this blog, you know we have a number of bluebird houses and they were all full last summer so we have alot of bluebirds around here.

Check out the water flying while one of the
bluebirds is taking a bath!

We are lucky to have a teen friend who builds birdhouses. We've already bought 3 from Sydney B.; and she has committed to building more for us by spring.


Project Feeder Watch through Cornell University will be starting up again in November. I'm excited to participate again this year. It was a fun experience, we learned about many birds that were unfamiliar to us and we are helping with a worthwhile North American scientific project. 
http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw/Overview/over_index.html