Arrived Wednesday night. Saturday we had a barbecue for Bert's golfing buddies.
- Thursday: gorgeous fall day. Cool and sunny. Made myself a farmer's breakfast and hit the ground running.
- I never did find one of my work boots. Hank the dog carried them both off. I found one on the trail between our house and the neighbors' house. The other one has not turned up. But it's rained so many times since it went missing that I don't expect it's any good now.
- I raked leaves near the big arbor, loaded them in the back of the cub and dumped them in the Daffodil Border.
- I had the great idea during that activity to make another daffodil garden in the area we have sectioned off with logs near the Rose Garden. I will dump leaves in that area (which I have named Rose Edge Garden). That will discourage anything from growing except my bulbs, and it will also enrich the soil which I have not amended in any way. The Daffodil Border and the Rose Edge Garden will only be pretty once a year, but during their four weeks of bloom time it will be a sight to behold. I tried to make wild gardens in both those spots - wild flowers and native grasses, but that will take a lot of work which I do not want to expend, at least not right now! Anyway, I just happen to have 150 daffodils coming in the mail as we speak, so I need a place to plant them. That may sound like a lot, but it's not.
- Did some mulching in the Orchard. I put some mulch around two of the fruit trees and began the process of mulching around the edges of all the flower beds. It was a bit like spitting in the ocean, though. Most of the space in the beds has been seeded with wild flower seed, so those areas remain un-mulched which makes them all susceptible to weed growth.
- Napped through most of the day! Must have been pretty tired.
- Got up about 3:00 and started raking and cleaning paths in the Star Garden. They didn't need too much work because I had raked them recently. The big leaf-fall has not happened yet.
- I raked in places where Bert had blown piles of leaves together with the blower and dumped them in the unfinished parts of the Star Garden. (I mulch those areas out with un-shredded leaves to keep the weeds down.)
- I cut away plants that were growing into paths - again, not a big job because I did that over the last couple of weekends as well.
- I noticed that something had eaten every single leaf off my Moonflower vine. Upon close inspection I saw massive worms all over it. Four to five inches long, as big around as my middle finger. Talk about creepy! They are moth larva. Moths are drawn to Moonflower because it blooms during the evening. Then, the moths lay their eggs on the plants, and the larva munch the vine into oblivion. Well, all God's creatures got to eat.
- After the little stretch of work I did, I walked around my gardens for about two hours, finally sitting on a bench and watching the sky darken through the trees. Bert was hunting, so I was alone and in a pensive state of mind.
- Friday morning, up early. Walked around with coffee in hand. Tried to get Cosmos to come down out of a tree, but with Grey Kitty and Hank hanging around she wouldn't have any of it.
- Spent all of Friday raking. I spread pine needles over several beds including the big daffodil bed in the Star Garden. I raked leaves wherever they had accumulated and loaded them in the cub cadet. I dumped them in the Daffodil Border.
- Did some more raking in the Star Garden. Cut away more plants that were leaning into paths.
- Mulched here and there with the last of the mulch we bought last weekend.
- Friday was a hard day's work of raking, lifting, and hauling. But the place looks good.
- I vacuumed, mopped, and put down floor shine.
- Friday night we drove out to the cul de sac with sleeping bags and pillows. Laid in the back of the cub cadet and watched the stars.
- Saturday morning, up before day light. My back was so sore from all the work I did yesterday that I couldn't lay still any longer. I was fine after I started moving around.
- I vacuumed the bedroom, cleaned the guest bathroom, and made some macaroni and cheese for the party.
- The weather looked pretty threatening, but the rain never came. It got really sunny but cold and windy. Too windy to eat outside unfortunately. We had about 25 folks come out. Nice people, nice day.
- Sunday - I can't believe 4 days have past already. Time flies when I'm here. Bert was up before light and went hunting. I got up shortly after and began raking. I'm making great progress on filling my Rose Edge and Daffodil Borders with leaves. They are very, very large areas, and I am almost finished. Only about half the leaves have fallen, and I have only raked where they have accumulated or where Bert has blown them into drifts. I'll wait until the rest of them fall and finish up. I want to heap a lot of them in my compost pile as well.
- I decided to dig up all my sweet potatoes - I had vines growing in four places in the Vegetable Garden - so I can spread the rest of my Elbon Rye in there.
- I dug up about 30 sweet potatoes of varying size. I dug up about 10 last weekend that were really big.
- Loosened up the soil, smoothed it out, and seeded the remainder of the beds with rye grass.
- I spent about an hour seeding various places in the Rose Garden, the Star Garden, and the front beds with the remainder of my wildflower seeds. I have been resisting seeding the front beds because I imagine that won't look very neat once they start growing, but I couldn't resist. I seeded the front beds with tickseed and corn poppies.
- Spent some time on the ladder tying back my climbing roses - Climbing American Beauty and Veilcehblau.
- Brought the ladder inside and Bert held it while I cleaned all the light fixtures in the kitchen.
- Made a final walk around the place and headed for home.
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