Weekend at the Farm May 30 - 31, 2015

Arrived Friday afternoon.  No rain for the first time in many weeks.

• Saturday morning I picked blackberries for a cobbler.
• Spent most of the morning clearing out paths in the Star Garden.   Plants want to grow toward the light and away from other plants, so it is a constant effort to keep the paths clear.  No one likes to brush up against branches, etc as they stroll.  Trimmed back my Harlequin Glorybower and my Almond Verbena.  Cut back my thyme and Catmint that was growing in the paths.  Transplanted several clumps of thyme to the bed by the AC units.  Staked the Montbretia and White Mist Flower.  Used the hedge trimmers on the anisacanthus.  Cut back Ox Eye Daisies and threw some in the Erhlicheer bed, but mostly just threw them in the compost pile.  I'll probably live to regret that because they reseed like crazy. Weeded, weeded, weeded.  I basically cut anything that was was even slightly growing into a path.  Hauled many wheel barrows of debris to the compost pile.
• Pulled up the last of the Love in a Mist, weeded, and sowed some zinnia seeds.
• Cut lemon balm back in the Kitchen Herb Garden because it was crowding my basil.  
• Made Spanish Bean Soup.
• Read my book for a long while.
• There is a crazy female cardinal that spends hours every day flying into the window in the dining room.  Over and over and over.  This has been happening for the last three weekends.  I feel really sorry for her.  It has to hurt!  She bangs into the window  hundreds of times a day - I am not exaggerating.  It's quite distressing.  Bert and I go to the window and wave violently trying to scare her, but seconds later she is back - bang, bang, bang.  She starts about 6:30-ish in the morning and wakes me up.  
• Sunday morning 6:30 dozing on the couch because I couldn't sleep.  The bird woke me up banging on the window.  I stopped counting at 200.  It's still going on as I write this.  My husband just walked in and declared he's going to shoot her.
• Worked on my climbing roses tying up the long canes to their supports.  American Beauty, Peggy Martin, and Climbing Pinky.  Still need to work on Fortune's Double, it's in the Rose Garden going nuts from neglect.  And it has the most vicious thorns of all of them.  It might as well be a blackberry vine.
• Had to drive in to town first thing to buy a new herbicide sprayer.  Mine stopped working, and the top priority for me this weekend was to spray herbicide in every path and drive.  With all the rain it's a mess.  Also bought 3 bags of mulch and a pack of purple zinnia seeds.
• Spent several hours in the Long Border and Star Garden weeding and laying down bags of mulch.  Hauled many wheel barrows of debris to the compost pile.
• Sowed some Moonflower seeds that I saved from last year, some by the front trellis on both sides, some by the trellis at the entrance to the Long Border, and some on a chicken wire trellis in the Star Garden.
• I'm happy to see that my Cypress vine is starting to climb nicely in the Long Border and on two arbors in the Star Garden.  And the Hops vine in the Star Garden at the entrance to Max's Garden has tiny buds on it and looks really healthy.  I love vines, but I don't always have luck with them. I try nearly every year to grow morning glory vines on the arbor at the entrance to the Long Border, but they never seem to take off.  Usually that's a water issue, but this year something seems to have eaten them right at the base of the vines. They had already started to climb up the chicken wire, so it is doubly disappointing.  Usually if I can get them to the point that they are climbing I am home free - rabbits, deer, insects - I have beaten all of them.  Last year I had beautiful blue morning glories on the front arbor. Love them!
• Tied up my BeeBalm and Pringle Aster in the Star Garden to keep them from flopping all over. Pringle Aster gets pretty heavy, we'll see how successful I am.
• Rested for a couple of hours and read.
• Sprayed herbicide on the driveway, in the Rose Garden, in the Star Garden, in the Vegetable Garden, and the Orchard.  Hot work!
• Walked around Sunday evening and enjoyed the fruits of my labors.  The Long Border looks good, parts of the Star Garden look good.  The Rose Garden looks really bad, needs a lot of work.  The Orchard is chock full of ripe blackberries.  I should pick them, but don't have the energy.
• The cannas are particularly pretty and showy this weekend.  Also, the BeeBalm is really pretty.  Gorgeous weather this weekend.  I was glad to be in it.