The Long Weekend Is Finally Here!

I have been waiting for this long weekend for what seems like an eternity. Ron and I even tacked yesterday on as an extra day. We are both wiped out from work and running all the time. I needed a chance to catch up inside and out and relax a little. I had big plans to move a bunch of things around in the garden. A few new pass along plants have found there way to me and I have been checking out the sales and of course I've picked up a few things...

Rather than hit the gardens right away, Ron talked me into a walk. He loves to "walk the land." You would think we were land barons or the place was in his family for 100 years. Instead it's just 43 acres and we have only been here five years. We usually head across the road rather than behind the house because there is more excitement down by the creek. Our first discovery was that the little creek, right across the road is pretty dry. It has been low before, but it's never dried up since we've been here. Ron put those rocks across the creek our first summer here. The water usually runs just over them but it makes a little babbling brook sound. This is the first time I've seen the bottom. My positive guy says, hey I bet that's really good dirt if you want some. I don't know if I'm that obsessed. Then again, we pulled out some scraggly pricker bushes from the side of the house recently. There are some indents in the ground that do need dirt....hum...



The sunflower patch Ron planted early this year isn't far from where we cross the little creek. We put the mass planting where we could see it from our front porch looking down across the flats. The reason the photo is from the field and not our front porch is that all the flowers face the field! It is kind of funny actually. The trees must shade it just enough that they look toward the field for sun. It did come out nice, just not what we envisioned.


We literally buy a bag of sunflower seeds that are meant to be bird food so we never know what they will look like. This years have a yellow center. If they were the dark centers, I planned to do some serious seed saving but they are still pretty. I'm sure I'll save some.

Remember that wild lily I posted about earlier in the summer? (if Apple wasn't vacationing, she could link to it for me...I am still learning all the tricks.) (ETA: Even on vacation I can add a link ;) Anyway, this is what it looks like now. Ron is much taller and could reach one of the pods for me. It had a thick white fill inside. I realize this is probably a dumb question but will the pods get seeds later? I would love to add this lily to the gardens by the house but I don't want to risk moving the only flower there. Seeds would be the perfect solution!

When we made to the big creek, we found the water pretty low there as well. I am standing in the middle of the creek bed to get this shot. I have a friend coming up Sunday so her little boy can fish and play in the creek. Looks like we will be wading, not floating on tubes. It probably won't matter to a seven year old. There's always fun to be had in a creek when you're seven! Liz just turned thirteen and doesn't want to float in it anymore since it's "gross!" (That's her exclaimation point.) Poor Ron, his little girl is growing up and we've hit the teen years in full force already! He can't relelate to the creek being "gross", LOL.

At the end of the season, there are beautiful yellow flowers that line the banks. They are six to seven feet tall! A few are starting to bloom. They are beautiful in mass along the water!

After the walk I worked on catching up on weeding but I have decided to wait on moving things around. I am anxious to rearrange a bit but I didn't realize just how dry it was. I'm sure there will still be some hot days and I'm safer to wait a few weeks. I will get my pass-a-longs planted though.

I hope everyone has a wonderful labor day weekend!