Some Visitors (Or Maybe I Should Say, Some Residents)

A hummingbird moth on the phlox.

A fun frog

A bird enjoying her bath 

The Park has grown!

On Thursday we bought Lot 4 (we sit on lots 2&3 now).  We are bigger!  More trees! More to discover!

 

Sunday at the Park

One of several tulip (yellow popular) trees.  They are beautiful trees!

Sweet Joe Pye - butterflies are going to be very happy when they are bigger!

I wish I could make this picture appear as it does in my eyes - the greens just pop!  And it's green upon green upon green.  Spring is my favorite green.

We close on Lot #4, the lot to our South, on Thursday.  Perhaps that enboldened us and we walked up the wagon trail to the majestic sycamores!  One reason I wanted this lot is so that no one ever cuts those beautiful trees!  They just tower over the lot, ruling in majesty.  (Of course another reason I wanted the lot is I don't want neighbors breathing down my neck!)

The view looking back toward the house - we love the knobs.  It's like being in the mountains, and living in a valley.

We have more than five of this tree, and today as a group project of Jason, Sandi, and I we figured it out!  It's a Black Cherry tree.

It has the loveliest flowers  (this picture is from the Morton Arborteum - thank you)

I love the shape of the sassafras leaf :)

I found another grape fern.  This brings us up to two!  The majority of our ferns are Christmas ferns.

My ladies are getting bigger.  I was afraid I had very unsmart birds.  They would ONLY eat their baby chick feed, nothing else.  Nothing from the kitchen, no treats, nada.  I thought maybe if I left them some special chicken grubs/worm things they would eat them when I was gone. Nope.  So I tried their itty bitty baby chick feeder (red in the middle). I filled it with tasty snacks.  They wouldn't go near it.  I left and when I returned it was empty.  Wahoo.  My birds can be taught!

Fun times are coming our way!

 

Saturday around the Park

Worked really hard on the mulch today.  So much weeding, and then covering the bare dirt with mulch.  Almost finished, just a small section left now.  Hard to stop because this is HARD work for an old lady!

I've had this project sitting around waiting to be done.  I got 3/4 of the way done staining the railing on the front porch (front and back on the right section, back on the left section) - and ran out of wood stain.  More has been ordered.  Staining wood instead of painting it, like I had originally intended to, felt so fun - like being on a design show.  haha

Look at that beautiful cattle panel trellis!  I have waited and wanted this for so long!  Jason was able to go get two today (and some dirt for the other side of the trellis) !!  Peas on this side, cucumbers and beans on that side (these two will be planted as it warms up).  I so hope it works as well as I hope it does!

Columbine is about to open!

And the ants have found the peonies- which means that they are about to bloom!

I have two different trees that the phone keeps telling me are elm, but their branches are different.  I have to figure that out.

Update on the wildflower field: We have our same two, wallflower and flax, but I'm starting to see some others :)

and buds!

Last night Jason and I cut out an autumn olive that was growing under the cedars in the front.  We had tons of branches just laying there by the street.  Today while Joseph and I did mulch, Jason moved the branches to the back near the firepit.  It took four trips in a loaded down truck to get them back there.  We still have so much to do up front, but I love it!  Pulling down vines. Cutting out invasives.  Opening up the area for native trees.  It's almost like I can hear them sigh in relief when they are freed from everything.

Look at all of that open area!  I love and hate it!  I love that that horrible autumn olive is gone. I hate the privacy and shade are gone.  BUT - I am having faith in the process that by removing invasive species, natives will be able to thrive and they will fill the area.

I am so impressed with the gray dogwoods we got from the Kentucky Department of Forestry.  They already have little leaves!

I am trying to identify this tree.  (I know it's a terrible picture!). In the winter, the bark intrigued me.  Now Spring is here and it's leafing out, but it's so tall and the leaves are only at the ends of the branches.  It's not like anything I've seen here.  I will figure it out.

And this lovely tree. As much as I am a fan of natives, this guy is going!  Poison sumac is not wanted here.  Sorry.  Although from a purely artistic view, I LOVE the symmetry of this image!

Our beautiful creek.  Bella and I were down here for an hour today.  She loves to throw rocks and climb on her tree.  I keep thinking that this would have been a magical place to grow up.  I feel a little sadness that the girls didn't get the chance.  And sometimes I think we need more little people to have the opportunity.  Today as I watched Bell, I realized SHE is growing up here, and she never has to leave.  She'll be an adult here as well.  That was a good thought.

 

New Trees

 Today I planted:

two arrowwood viburnums

a bur oak

a Colorado blue spruce

a gray dogwood

a red oak

a river birch

a sergeant crabapple

a tulip tree

a Washington hawthorn

I know they are itty bitty baby trees, but they are trees and they are mine, and on my land!

Wildflower Field

 The wildflower field is waking up.  

Today's Morning Meanderings

This is the view from the back porch.  It is a place I often pray.  I am so thankful for the peace I feel here at our home.

The baby chicks aren't little anymore.  They have been outside for a couple of weeks now and doing well.  It's fun to think how much they resemble dinosaurs!  :)

I have consciously decided to only use native plants in our landscaping with one exception. I have a flower garden. I have flowers that I just love there, peonies, dahlias, columbines, bleeding hearts.  When we moved in, there was so much going on and I just needed to put them in the ground. I wasn't sure if they would make it through the winter - but they did!  I have learned that bleeding hearts like shade, not full sun like they get, but they are happy and blooming.  :) The peonies are getting ready to bloom!  :) Wahoo!

Near the flower garden is the vegetable garden.  It's still so early, but for the first time I have planted cool weather crops.  It's fun to go out there and check on them knowing it's too cold for my normal crops and they are still doing so well.

Mama gave me a whole bunch of seeds and it's fun to watch them start to grow - these will grow up to be beets. Isn't that fun?

Trying potatoes this year.  Never grown these before either.  Trying them in buckets so I will have an easier time come harvest.

Swiss chard, never grown this before            

Peas, growing well :). I can't wait to see these grow.  We are going to try growing them up on cattle panels.  Excited to see how that goes.

I am so excited to be growing asparagus!  It takes years for the asparagus to get established and to produce asparagus.  The first two years I have to leave the asparagus there in the bed and not pick it.  It's amazing to watch these little sprouts pop up and then the fronds that come.  The point is to get the roots firmly established - and then, we will have years and years of asparagus.  What a small sacrifice for years of blessings.

 

I wish I could photograph all of the birds flying around. It's Spring so they are busy building nests and starting families.  While I can't seem to capture all of the birds, I did make this short video to capture some of their songs. 

 

Our beautiful creek - truly this is the best sound ever.

The autumn olive bushes - grrr.  Autumn olives are an invasive species.  They are the first and the last to get and loose their leaves.  They have a plethora of sugar laden and non nutritious blooms.  (This video shows how much the bees love this sugar) We are working so hard to get rid of all of autumn olives from the property.  It's hard work!  These plants are huge!  They grow quickly and love to spread.  So we work and work.  I do get discouraged sometimes, but then I'll watch another video from state ag extension about how terrible invasive plants are for the environment and it gives me strength to keep at it.  

Autumn olive isn’t necessarily the most nutritious food source for wildlife. The abundance of fruit autumn olive produces can cause birds to fill up on empty calories. The berries contain low amounts of protein and fat, but are high in carbs, which led my friend to aptly nicknaming the plant “Autumn Olive Garden.”

On top of that, the plant can outcompete and displace native plants by shading them out or altering soil chemistry. This reduced biodiversity can be detrimental to water quality, soil health, and of course, wildlife health

This is the orange maple in our front landscaping. I find it interesting that this one branch is fully leafed out, but the main trunk isn't. It reminds me of Jacob 5.  My hope is the whole tree will be strong.