More Squirrel Stories

Squirrel on red shed roof torments dogs

Our days are spent listening to the frantic barking of two terriers: Charming and Brooklyn. Charming is the most adamant. She MUST catch that squirrel that sits on the garden shed roof. What matters the small detail that she is inside the big dog pen? The squirrel is not impressed. In fact, I'm pretty sure it sits there, slowly eating a walnut, just to torment the dogs.

Furball and Squirrels

Furball

My oldest cat, LC Furball, is a character. I found her in Grand Prairie, Texas, in 2002 as a six-week-old kitten. She was caught in the plants on the neighbor's porch. I knew she was lost because that neighbor didn't care for cats. She was raised by our German Shepherd, Hagar. No matter that he was a dog, and a male, to Furball he was Mama. She mourned when he died.

When Furball was half grown, she found a way to slip out an upstairs window and lurk on the garage roof watching for squirrels. She was a mini-panther. She was a fierce hunter. She stalked squirrels.  Until the day one caught her.

The neighbor told me about it that evening. She looked out her back door to see a squirrel sitting on the cable TV wire that stretched across her yard and attached to my house. Furball saw the squirrel, too, and slipped across the wire to catch her prey. She caught him! But squirrels have sharp teeth. Once Furball had him, HE didn't let go. The neighbor said she wasn't sure what would have happened if the wire had been larger. It wasn't. They fell off!

Furball dashed one way and the squirrel went another. Each was happy to escape the monster on the wire.

Watching for squirrels

I found Furball and doctored the bite on her chin. She snuggled close to me and told me what a mean creature that squirrel was. From that day on, the mini-panther did her squirrel hunting from behind windows. She had no desire to return to the roof.

Furball was traumatized when we moved to Kansas. This house is surrounded by trees -- FULL OF SQUIRRELS! She rarely goes outside now. She will lurk at the screen door and peer outside. Where are the squirrels? If it is pitch black outside, she will venture as far as the porch. She rolls around and basks in her freedom. Any sudden noise will send her scurrying back to the safety of the house. Most of the time she follows me from room to room, lounging nearby, keeping an eye on me. Perhaps I am her protector, the new Mama now that Hagar is gone.

Jen says she knows Furball's secret: she's nuts, and she is afraid the squirrels will collect her.

New Entry

With all the flowers that needed new homes after I dug up the rootbound plants in the old flower bed, I've been sorely pressed to find homes for them.

This new entry solves several problems. It will give more interest to the front door. It gave me a home for several narcissus and daffodils, and it added an edging to the sidewalk that will make mowing easier. To give summer color, I added impatients to the bed as well. Win-win!  I also got an impressive workout cutting out and moving the sod that used to be where those beds are now located.

Instead of turning two wheelbarrows of sod into compost, I patched it into various bare places around the yard. I hope they take root. We haven't had a good rain since I planted the starts. Watering by hand isn't as effective as a good rain.

Potato Update

Here is the volunteer potato growing in the compost pile. It REALLY likes growing in the compost pile. I will be interested to see if any potatoes make. The green part is going crazy.

2012 -- Year of the Yard

Circle Garden at Top of Raised Beds

I have been having so much fun working in the yard this year. The raised beds and circle garden are coming together. I created a rose garden with lilacs on the west boundary of the property. When Jen thought she was buying a house, she purchased 10 small trees from the National Arbor Day Foundation. By the time they arrived, she had changed her mind, so the trees came to this yard. Squeezing ten more trees onto this property has been interesting, but I found homes for all of them. Some (dogwood and hawthorne) are in the east yard. They will eventually replace the shade we lost when the butternut tree died. Some (redbud) are on the front terrace between the sycamore trees, and some (crabapples) are in the orchard and old garden (golden raintree). The lilacs were added to my circle garden.

Raised Beds -- new on far right is strawberries

The two crabapples are near the 5-in-one apple tree. The 5-in-one is about five years old. It was one of the first trees planted when we moved back to Kansas. I saw my first bloom on it this spring. Aunt Roseanna has a similar tree in her yard. She says hers has never bloomed. We speculated that the trees might want a polinating source, even though the seed companies where we purchased our trees never mentioned such a thing. So-- crabapples cross polinate apple trees very well. By the time my crabapples are big enough to bloom, the 5-in-one will surely be producing more than one bloom! :) I may get apples from it sometime in my lifetime. Speaking of polinators, my second cherry tree died last summer, so replacing it is on my to-do list for this year. 

There were a lot of young plants in my yard that didn't survive the hot weather. I planted two weeping cranberry cotoneasters last spring. They appeared to die, but I gave them one more chance this year. They didn't leaf out in the spring, but the trunks seemed supple. I moved them to a more sunny location (in the circle flower bed). They are coming back! I have new growth from below the graft. Hm... I wonder what I will get? Will it be some sort of non-weeping cotoneaster? Time will tell.

The project for moving all the root bound plants from Mom's old flowerbed is over. I have dug and replanted more lilies, narcissus, daffodils, peonies and Iris than I can count. I gave away plants till the neighbors ran when they saw me coming. After starting rows of foundation plantings around the north side of the house and in areas around the garage and the garden shed; adding Irises and peonies to the circle bed; and lining the front walk with dafodils and narcissus, I closed my eyes and tossed the rest of the plants in the compost. The composter is about half full right now. I wonder how many flowers will try to sprout? They can join the potato that is growing there.

All in all, It's a great time to play in the garden. I hope this summer doesn't get so hot I hide inside and barely stick my head out to water. I'd like to enjoy this till the snow flies.

Overflowing Wastub

I have a Pinterest account. One of the ideas I found there was a photo of a clay urn tipped on its side, spilling blue lobelia onto the lawn like water. I love that picture!

Now, I don't happen to have a clay urn. I DO have two old square washtubs. Last year they held herbs and flowers. This year I planted potatoes in one. They drowned, so I retired the tub. However, the other tub was available. I tipped it on the side, propped it up with bricks, and filled it with blue lobelia. Now, this is spilling wash water, right? Hm... A trip to the store and a six-pack of white alyssum later. Viola! Now there are random soapsuds floating in my spilled water.

I can't wait for the flowers to spread. I want to see the tub filled before half the dirt washes away.

I wonder if I should have had the plants well established before I tipped the tub? Hm... Nah. I'd never have been able to tip it if it were full of wet dirt.

Potatoes, Reprise

I DO have one potato plant that survived. It is growing in the compost bin! When I dumped the compost today, several leafy arms waved at me. I am sure it is one of the potatoes we found going bad the other day. Usually tossing things in the compost does not encourage them to grow. I guess things were just right for this one potato.

Since potatoes like to be buried -- it promotes the growth of more tubers -- I'll leave this one in place and see how it does. In fact, I'm going to make a point to keep burying it under compost so more tubers will form. One thing for sure, it will have good soil.

Mom's Blaze Climber

In 1981, I purchased two Blaze Climber roses from the Jackson and Perkins Company. One I planted where I was living in Texas, the other I gave to my Mother. Thirty-one years later, that rose is still going strong. At the end of 2010 I pruned it back severely. It spent last summer growing new canes, but look at it bloom now! I love this rose.

Potatoes

My effort at planting potatoes in the washtub didn't work. The tub wasn't well enough drained and sitting directly on the ground. The heavy rains we have had this month flooded the tub. There have been INCHES of standing water that just don't go away. I'm going to empty the tub, spread the dirt around the yard and try again another day.

Spring! I love Spring!

          Every March, even if there is a dusting of snow on the ground, I have to plant potatoes by St. Patrick's Day. We made it -- just! -- this year. I wasn't going to plant potatoes, but my daughter found some in the house that had started to sprout. I didn't want to put them in my raised beds, so I tried something different. I planted them in one of the washtubs that are decorative planters in the back yard. Now it is April. I don't see any sprouts yet. I wonder if they have survived?
          Ah! but a lot of things did winter over. Most of my herb garden came through intact. We had a particularly mild winter (only a couple of light snows), so they may never have realized we had winter. I did have to replace the rosemary and lavender. They didn't come through. The tarragon didn't either. I have enough dried tarragon and basil in the cupboard that I won't be planting those herbs this year. Instead I put chamomile in the square where the tarragon was last year. The basil was always planted with the tomatoes. This year I put marigolds with the tomatoes. I don't know if any companion plant thing will go on from it, but the marigolds will be cheerful!
This week I have been outside whenever I could be. I spent all day Easter Sunday working with the herb and flower beds. I installed a new raised bed next to the dog pen, and dug it up. I dug up a small flower bed in front for cut flowers. Then I dug both sides of the circle bed for more flowers. After doing all that digging, I grabbed the trowel and dug some more, making trenches to place the plastic edging that divides my raised beds into squares. Do you know, after all that digging, the things that hurts most are my wrists? They just about scream when I do a turning motion like tossing dirt off a trowel. I expected my back to be tired from all the digging.
Just about everything is planted now. I have two more beds to complete. The strawberries didn't survive the heat last summer. Or was it the drought? Anyway, only 5 plants out of three 4' beds survived.  They are now resting their toes in one of my ornamental wash tubs. I took this opportunity to move the beds.
The painted pine boards that the first beds were made from didn't last past three seasons. I am framing the new beds from landscape timbers. The new beds will be located between my keyhole garden and the asparagus beds. That looks better and will make mowing by the blackberries easier. After the timbers are secured I will dig the beds inside (oh, no! More digging!) and enrich the soil with manure, peat and top soil. When that is done, I'll find more strawberries and get the bed started for next year.

Dog is My Co-Pilot

Charming

One reason I traded my Camaro convertible for a PT Cruiser after we came to Kansas was my furry friend. I had a German Shepherd named Hagar at the time. If you browse the files, you'll find pictures of him. In the fall of 2009 I was claimed by a half Chow/half terrier little girl promptly named Charming. She is my co-pilot any time it is possible for her to go along. She even has her own seat belt! There is a short leash that clips onto her harness. It fits into the backseat seat belt holder.

Lala and laughing Shadow

In September 2011, Joe and Lisa became over-the-road truck drivers. I am taking care of Shadow for them. Shadow doesn't mind. He's the family dog for anyone named Evans. Jen and her children rescued him from the Yates Center Pound when they lived in Iola. After they couldn't keep him, he came to live with me. I felt he was too large, too young and too bouncy for me, so Joe and Lisa took him to the farm. Shadow LOVED running free on 30 acres. However, that didn't last, and he's back home with me. (I don't think it will last long. He and Lala are renewing an old bond. He's all hers. She is as smitten as he is.)

Brooklyn, Shadow and Charming

In October 2011, Jen's heart was stolen by a terrier mix named Brooklyn. Brookie follows Jen everywhere. She sleeps on Jen's bed. She keeps Jen company wherever she is. Our canine home is complete.

So now when we go for a drive -- called Ridies by the initiated -- Lala finds the backseat a bit crowded, but she doesn't complain. Her siblings in fur deserve to go, too.

Family Updates

My silly girls

Just a few lines about my kids. Granddaughter Lala is growing up. She is 13 and her mom is 33, but folks who see this picture wonder if they are sisters. Of course, that hurts Jen's feelings. :)

Joe and Lisa's new home

Joe and Lisa changed jobs last September and became team drivers for a long-haul trucking firm. Here is their new home.  You can see Lisa got to settling in immediately. That's a mini-refrigerator she's moving into the cab. We have a friend who is a full-time RVer. He knows the difficulty of pu

Lisa settles in

shing a high profile vehicle down the road. His first comment when he heard the kids were driving a big rig was, "I want to see Miz Lisa drive that thing!"
So here you go, Jesse. Lisa driving:

Lisa drives

Container Garden

Jen and I have enjoyed this bit of container gardens. We used Mom's old washtubs for the containers. The one on the ground holds basil. The one in the tall tub is the "mystery mint." I took a piece of it to Joanne's one meeting. The consensus was I had licorice mint. Gee! I didn't even know licorice mint existed!  For the winter I moved the mystery mint to the herb bed and mulched it well. I hope it makes it.

What sorts of dishes do you make with Licorice Mint?

The colorful arrangement in Grandma Lala's old wash pan is the find from Home Depot. It was originally priced  over $10.00, but I found it on the reduced rack for $1.99. It was wilting and looking pretty sad. Jen was sad that day as well, so I gave it to her to cheer her up. She nursed the plant, making sure it had adequate water, and look what a treasure we got to enjoy! I moved it to the container garden area after it was healthy. Sigh. I wish this would winter over, but I know the plants are annuals.

The white planter is the miniature rose I bought. I love miniature roses, but I have the worst luck with them. As usual, spider mites killed this one.

Herbal Harvest

Drying herbs above the BarBQ

Herbs drying on the back porch

I had a good harvest today. I pulled up a lot of the herbs I had planted. They will dry outside for a bit, then we will bring them inside. I already have a braid of onions drying in the kitchen. Jen wants me to put some nails up near the kitchen ceiling and hang bunches of herbs there to finish drying. I will probably do that. When they are fully dry, we'll harvest them and put them in jars.

NOW it occurs to me that I could have left some of them in the ground to see if they would winter over. Oh, well. There is always next year.

Joanna has given us plenty of ideas of ways to use these plants besides using them in cooking. I plant to make some Four Thieves Vinegar soon. Its a cleaner and disinfectant made from mint, basil, hyssop and other herbs. We are also talking about making dream pillows. Those a sachets of sweet scented herbs that are pinned inside a pillow to aid sleep.

I'm already thinking about what I want to grow next year.

Putting the Garden to Bed

Raised beds

 It's already fall. I didn't do much with my garden after the heat/drought struck, but I'm pleased with it none the less. It did well for its first year.

The raised beds have been put to bed. I harvested my herbs and have them drying. Two out of three of the beds have been mulched. I didn't mulch the bed where I grew the tomatoes because I am not certain how I will use it next year. This year it was open. Next year I may want to divide it into square-foot sections as well. I really like square-foot gardening. It lets me dabble in several kinds of plants in a small space instead of planting 90' rows of one thing.

Trellis bed

The watermelons on the trellis were a partial success. Two or three melons actually grew, but I didn't realize I had planted an ice-box melon. They were past the door before I had any clue they were ripe. Heck, the melon wasn't much bigger than a soft ball! I thought it needed to keep growing. There is a bright side. The raccoons didn't get my melons either! The last time I had melons I watched the cantaloupe religiously, poised to pick them at their prime. The day I was ready to get them -- all the melons were broken open and eaten. Coon tracks in the mud told me who the bandit was. :(

Herb bed

Jen and I picked all of the cilantro and dried it about a month ago. We have some nicely labeled jars in the cupboard now. I see volunteer cilantro coming up. We may have some fresh herbs for her salsa into the winter if the weather holds. I hope the rosemary winters over. It survived last year, but was in a more protected area. I'm mulching everything heavily. Time will tell.

Now, I wonder when I'll know the leeks are ready?

Sloughing off

I should be posting more. I have been knitting, more off than on. Once the summer heat struck, the knitting bag got hung on a door knob in my bedroom. I doubt I'll pull it off that knob till the weather cools down.

I have made a few Granny's Dishcloths and given them away. There are socks in that lonely knitting bag, and a sweater in another one. I am so slow to work on the sweater that I have to frog it back to the beginning each time I come back to it. I don't know where I left off. Perhaps I should pin a post-it note to it next time. "I am at xxx spot on the pattern."

And what HAVE I been doing? Reading my new colorNook. It is so much fun to have an entire library at my fingertips. Some days I finish one book and move right into the sequel. (I love series books.) After finishing all the Elemental Masters Series by Mercedes Lackey (for the second time), I discovered Juliet Blackwell's Witchcraft Mystery Series. That lead me to her Haunted Home Renovation Mystery Series. Waaaw. She's just starting those series. Three books in one, only one book in the other.

My daughter and I loaded up at the library book sale a few weeks ago. I grabbed all the Dorothy Gilman books I could find. I have always loved her Mrs. Polifax series. (Heavens! I'm old enough to be Mrs. Polifax now. She knits. She gardens. She does a little spying for the CIA... just your average little granny...)

One of Gilman's stand-along books isn't a mystery. It's more a romantic comedy (think Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan). Title Thale's Folly, it is a nice little summer read. Each chapter is started with a quote from a old herbal. I found that delightful because Jen and I and our friend Rosanne have been going to herb classes all summer.

The herb classes are taught by Joanne Bauman of Prairie Magic Herbals. http://prairiemagicherbals.com/ Joanne has taught us how to use wild plants for healing, as well as how to use the things I grow in my garden. I am developing a lot of interest in herbs thanks to her. The last two classes were particularly interesting. They were on Plant Spirit Language. She draws heavily on Cherokee traditions when she teaches us about communing with out plants and learning to listen to what the plants have to offer us. It is fascinating and opens an entirely new way of seeing plants and my garden.

I commune with my garden when I'm watering it. The chives enjoy my company. Some day I will sketch them. So far the only plant that I have sketched is the watermelon that is growing inside the toe of an old nylon. My watermelon plants are trellised to grow upward instead of sprawling all over the yard. Yes, I'm still square-foot gardening.

And yes, again, I did post this word for word from the Iris Knits blog. True confessions of being lazy and doing nothing but reading and watering the garden during one of the hottest summers on record in Kansas. Mea Culpa!

Productive Saturday

I had hopes of finishing the front porch today, but our step ladder doesn't reach the cross beam. Rats!

Instead, I put Lala and the neighbor, Carl, to gathering the walnuts that have been falling from the black walnut tree. They filled two plastic trash cans, but there are still more walnuts.

They were still eager to help, so they painted the trellis for me. It will be cut to fill the space under the porch next time Joe or Skip comes by.

While they were painting, Jen scraped part of the deck and painted it white. She decided to remove one of the support boards that had held the railing in place. Those nails were tighter than she expected. Carl put some muscle into it and got the board off. I couldn't help thinking that last year, Reyes would have been helping do these jobs.

In the mean time, I painted the inside of the cross beams white and added the accent colors to the columns.

The molding around the bottom of the column has become a challenge for me. It's been 40 years since I last cut angles with a miter box. I used most of my stick of trim learning how to get the cuts. I'll have to get more to finish the rest of the project. The first column is looking good, though. It will really stand out when the crossbeam is the same tan as the front door.

There is something about paint that attracts kids. Lala and Carl have two more friends helping them paint now. Jen had to find a job for one of them. The condition for painting is "go home and put on clothes Mom doesn't mind getting painted."

Flagstone Walk - FINISHED

The flagstone walk is done! I rearranged the rocks I had. After my brother, Skip, installed the new screen door Monday, he and I took two loads of brush to the burn pile outside of town. Guess what I found all over the place? Rocks! Lovely rocks! We brought home enough to finish my project.

Putting the existing rocks together with the ones Skip and I retrieved let me make a path from the sidewalk to the back porch. There were even a few extra to make a side path to the front of the garage.

I know the proper way to lay a flagstone path is to dig the path completely, then fill it with sand and seat the rocks in sand. Since my path grew over time, I didn't have the luxury of using that method. I laid the rocks I had when I found them. I knew I would end up rearranging everything at the end to make it all come out the way I wanted. It would have been a waste of time and energy (MINE!) digging the original 4 ft. wide path when I ended up with one two feet wide.

My compromise was to walk the path once it was complete, identify the wobbly rocks, then dig out under them and seat them individually. I promise you, that was all the digging this granny wanted to do today. :) Okay, I know next year I'll pick up all of these rocks and seat them properly, but I'm enjoying what I have so far...

Front porch makeover

You see here the before and after of my front porch. I removed the half-walls earlier this week. They were flimsy and many of the boards were worse for wear, showing all of their 107 years. Taking the walls down was fun. I just leaned on them a bit and wiggled them and they came loose -- pretty much intact. I only had to take a sledge hammer to one section to break it loose. Hee hee. How's that for one mean Granny? Slinging a sledge hammer. (Okay, I was no John Henry rearing back and hammering it down. I used my best croquet techniques, but it worked!)

The new front door went up last year. This spring I was visiting a friend in Topeka who took me across the street to meet his neighbor. I love her house! It is a Victorian house with an oak screen door. That door fit the flavor of the house so much better than any modern storm door could do. Hm... it worked for her. Why not me?

I measured and ordered my door. Unfortunately, I measured the existing door, not the opening. The screen was an inch too wide. My brother to the rescue! He took the screen home and reworked it in his spare time this summer. He brought it back and mounted it this Monday.

The dogs aren't sure they like this idea. Charming, the brown dog, can't pop out the door and run off anymore. Mouse and his brother, Won Ton, were always game to chase after Charming. The screen door is spoiling all their fun.

Next I will finish painting the porch. I want to liven the place up with more color than it has had in the past. A white house with green trim is rather blah. Instead, I'm taking a page from the Victorian Painted Ladies' book and using three colors to accent the house.

Ah! But which three colors? If you look closely at the Before picture, you will see a colored glass accent window over the big picture window. I kept that window when the new picture window was installed. It has a new coat of paint and will be going back in place later this week. It has green, yellow and blue glass in it. Inspiration! There are my colors!

The elephant leg columns will be white. The pedestal at the top will be the same forest green that is around the windows. The house numbers and the crown molding at the base of the columns will be the deep blue-green of the front door, and the support beam under the roof will be the tan of the screen door. I will finish with new forest green lattice work around the foundation of the porch.

The front door will bring all my colors together. The door is blue-green with green, yellow and blue in the stained glass of the window. The decorative bar, called a dental molding, and the screen door have been painted tan. The porch deck will be forest green.

I have painted the back door to match the front door. Now I have to study that porch to see where I can incorporate my three color scheme. It is amazing how a little paint can freshen a place. When both porches have more color on them, this place should take on a whole new character.

Speaking of characters, these paint freckles are giving me a whole new look.

New Flower Bed

Mom made a perennial bed around the front of the house. In the ten years since she passed, the bed had been neglected and gotten root bound. I decided it would be easier to move the entire bed than to try to thin out the existing one.

The old vegetable garden is a rectangle 30'x90'. I put it back to grass this year, but it is a real pain to mow. It is the biggest unbroken section of grass in the entire 1/2 acre yard. Hm... Why not? I could put the perennials there. They would have lots of room to expand, and they would fill a goodly part of that disgustingly large mowing area. So... how should I do this?

I have always loved fish ponds. Perhaps I could make the flowerbed large enough to contain a koi pond. I also love weeping willows. I know their roots seek water, so maybe I could put a willow in the low spot, near the ditch that always floods. Unfortunately, that's awfully near the water main, so I'll need to check with someone before I buy the tree. I don't need willow roots breaking through the PVC pipe.

Oh, I could put lilac and mock orange bushes out there! In the spring, when the bedroom windows are open, we would be greeted in the morning with the fragrance of lilacs and oranges. There would be room for some tall Pampas grass, too. I'm really starting to like this plan! I can see myself pouring over the Gurney Seed Catalog all winter dreaming about things to put in this flower bed. The "legs" of the keyhole can be used for herbs and annuals. Now which herbs?...

A friend told me that you can mark the layout for a fishpond by sprinkling flour on the ground. It works as your "chalk." Okay. I took a five pound bag of flour and roughed in the shape of my keyhole flower bed. To fine tune the layout, I pulled the garden hose to my flour lines and smoothed out the circle. Once the shape pleased me, I started digging the first arc of the circle. This would be the peony bed. About three feet in from the first circle, I dug a second arc for the irises. For an automatic watering system, I pulled the drain hose from the basement sump pump to the top of the circle.

The first arc is roughly 25' in diameter. It is about 30' from Fisher Street. Whether I plant a willow tree or something else, there will be room for a tree to spread and not shade the flowers. There are other trees in the property line on the north. The black walnut will shade my flowers during some of the afternoon, but I don't think it will be a problem.

Next spring I will see about putting the koi pond inside the circle of irises. It will be a little off center so there will be room for a bench beside it. I can see it now, sitting on the bench, a big glass of iced tea nearby and a book in my lap, listening to the breeze in the trees and watching the fish in the pond. Doesn't that sound like a great way to spend a morning?

But I still have to get there. I dug up all but one row of peonies from the front of the house. (I do want some peonies blooming next spring!) After planting 2 dozen bushes in the new spot, I still gave a wheelbarrow load of peonies to the neighbors. Next came the irises, and it was a similar story.

The day lilies that are left will be moved to line the new flagstone walk. Next spring, I will put in some yew or other foundation plantings. I wonder if holly grows in Kansas?