RIP Chaser

Chaser, the border collie famous for knowing a thousand words, died of natural causes this week. She was 15.  😢

 World Famous Dog

The Summer Garden

 I know flower pictures are boring but it helps to create a record I can look back on to see what was growing and when, so bear with me.

This deep red coneflower was planted several years ago, comes back faithfully every year and is always stunning. Not all the hybrid coneflowers are keepers, growing only one season or just never quite living up to their potential. Unfortunately this one is in the wrong place to be appreciated. It is growing along a path but hidden by taller plants and I don't dare try to move it. They don't like transplanting. Sadly, I haven't seen this variety being offered at the nurseries again so it will stay where it is.

The purple coneflowers are wonderful this year.

This newly planted oriental poppy surprised me with a flower. It looks more salmon than pink but is quite pretty.

How about a white coneflower? It returns but hasn't spread like the purple ones.

Crocosmia are attracting hummingbirds this year.

I'm not sure what to do about this lavender. It is huge. I have to cut off one side to use the walkway. But it is lovely and bees and butterflies find it useful.

It's a bit past it's prime now but this climbing rose was a showstopper a few weeks ago.

We put in a new section of garden where it had been grass (weeds) and awkward to mow. So I've started with rhododendron, burning bush, serviceberry, miscanthus, a hybrid coneflower, a pale yellow daisy, rubeckia and more crosocmia. We'll see how this looks in a year or two.

One of several verbenas I'm trying out. They are doing well in my soil.  A purple verbena grew wild sparsely around Oatman and was always a treat to find.

Love the asters too. They remind me of the Mohave asters that bloomed in the desert.

More purple coneflowers!

This is a gaudy dahlia that I neglect in hopes it will go away. This year it's beginning to grow on me though. There are orange butterfly weeds that work with it and the orange and purple flowers are attractive together.

Here is a bee balm I've mistakenly pulled as a weed for the last few years. Because of its persistence I let it grow to find out what it is. Turns out to be a nice addition to the garden.

A Three Egg Day

 

The duck house had to be moved again. Setting it beside the sheep pen was not a good idea. The girls couldn't stand the prying eyes of the sheep on them in the morning when it was laying time and I was finding who-knows-how-old eggs all over the yard instead of their house. So we hitched the house to the Rhino and pulled it down to a spot out of the wind where they can see the comings and goings at the garage door, and will have the benefit of morning sunlight during winter months. So there they are this morning demanding the door be opened, and I am finding eggs in the nest again.

 

Hattie waits for morning sheep chores to begin and the sheep exit the barn when they see her. That's the power of a border collie.

 

When can we come in? Have you brought hay? 

 

I cleared out all the old stuff from the raised beds and replanted with lettuce, broccoli, beets and carrots for a fall harvest. Now I have to figure out some way to keep the ducks from eating things from the edges. They've been monsters this summer plucking blueberries and leaves from the bushes and eating my oriental poppy bed almost to the ground.

 

Some garlic and oniony things...

 

Growing sunflowers again. I found seeds for a short variety that won't be knocked down in our persistent winds.

 

Delighted that a few Flemish Antique peony poppies survived the duck invasion. I'll save seeds and try again next year, fencing the devious little ones out. These are so beautiful.

Remembering

 From 2006, when we were all so much younger.

Tag and Hooper

Always loved

Never forgotten

At my side forever

The rental house

 

I snapped a few pictures of our latest project, the rental house in Port Angeles. It's a small bungalow. The corner windows feel odd to me, out of balance, but it seems to have been the construction style from the period these were built. There are many like it around town, built for workers in the various mills that no longer operate.

The back door is at the alley side of the house. Bob replaced the broken panel to the area under the house with a door (below) and is putting metal skirting around the house. That unpainted piece of wood above the door is the first of many... we are going to put them up on all the walls in a board and batten look for a coastal style. The roof is scheduled to be replaced next month with wood shakes on the bumped out areas. Will have to update when that happens.

 Here's the kitchen before...

And after painting, new LED light in ceiling. More work to be done in here eventually but for now it's livable. That's our old 'frig, much too big for this house but will do nicely until it dies and I can put a counter depth model in.

This is the living room before. The ceilings had glossy paint that had to go.

We went with gray walls, white ceiling, minus the shine. We kind of like the feel of the room without the window boxes but will get curtains eventually.

A gray blue in the two bedrooms.

We found these chairs for $17 each! They're solid wood but the seats were covered in dirty cotton fabric. I gave Jason a quick lesson on recovering them with upholstery fabric. He finished the job in a few hours and has two beautiful chairs now.

Bringing in some veggies for dinner. I'm also working on my third batch of currant jelly. This time  adding jalapeno peppers for a hot jelly.

The Jungle in My Yard

Work on the rental is consuming my garden time so things are getting pretty wild. Today is dedicated to weeding here (tomorrow I weed at the rental), watering and starting currant jelly. The currant bushes are loaded with ripe berries. More than I need, for sure. So I'm making a hot currant jelly with jalapeno first. Next batch will be regular jelly, sweet and tart.

 

Here's our old gal who is feeling much better with a new pain medication. She has consented to a photo as long as she doesn't have to watch.

 

The greenhouse jungle...

 

The veggie jungle is in here somewhere behind the climbing rose. The strawberry tower to the right of the rose was a success. And raspberries on the far right are beyond control.

 

The ducks have been pruning the blueberries so out came the covers. They've been reaching over the raised beds to eat my veggies and devoured half my Oriental poppies before I could block them off. This is the first time they've been so destructive around the yard. Maybe there is a shortage of insects.

 The boys spend most of their time in the shade of the barn. The overhang we built was a big hit with them.

 

Now that the spring peonies and rhododendrons are done it's time for the summer flower show.