I’ve been catching up on reading some of my favorite blogs and it seems the theme has been how fast this Summer has gone. They have catchy blog titles having to do with the speed of Summer, but all I could come up with is this one you see above. Yes, Summer has passed so quickly. Here in the states we are heading into our Labor Day weekend which has nothing to do with labor, but picnics and family outings and last swims in the pools across the country. David will be at work. He’s worked every Labor Day that I can remember. He always tells me it’s time and a half, money wise. So we aren’t doing anything special again, but next week we have some fun things planned.

We worked all morning on the little flower garden right in front of our back porch. I love Hibiscus. Years and years ago a neighbor gave me a start of one and I was so glad to get it. Over the years it has sent out its seeds all over the yard and other gardens and now I have too many Hibiscuses and they were taking over this particular little garden bed so I decided we needed to remove them all. Now this is not a very large flower bed, but we filled a wheel barrow to overflowing with Hibiscuses of every size. I could have sold them. I just saw a bunch for sale at a local store recently They had taken over and you could not see the other flowers like primroses, salvia, Rudbeckia and hostas. Now you can see them again and I am sure they were glad to get some sunlight. I never knew Hibiscus was such an invasive plant. Another plant that was gifted to us by one of our contractor’s workers was a Passion flower. I was sooo happy to get it and planted it by our front porch and for a couple of years I didn’t think it would grow and then one year it grew and grew and had beautiful flowers on it and we loved it, but then,,,,all of a sudden we noticed Passion flowers all over our front yard and in all the flowers, up trees and strangling bushes so we have had to eradicate it, or so we thought. Just a day or so ago we noticed another huge one climbing up our porch post. Where did that come from?? So it will be pulled. If there was a place I could plant one that I would not care if it took over, I would, but I have too many other flowers fighting for space and sunlight so the Passion plant has to go.

I do enjoy working outdoors in the flower beds. Our meadow is growing and I look forward to planting a lot of new meadow flowers. I’ve been saving seeds from Milkweeds, zinnias, cosmos, poppies and other flowers. David finally had to cut some of the grass we were letting grow. I was playing ball with Lucy the other day and the grass was so tall she had trouble finding it. It’s seeded itself well and we have nice thick grass now where once it was just a muddy mess where the dogs played. Try letting your lawn grow sometime and let it reseed itself instead of buying seed and let your lawn rest from constant mowing. I do think it made our lawn much nicer although we will let it grow again. It’s been easier on David not having to mow the back yard all the time. Nobody sees it but us and even if anyone sees it, I don’t think it looks that bad not mowed with all the flowers blooming. I actually think the flowers stand out more with the taller grass. We now have grass where once there were bare patches, so I’m happy with it.

I’ve been knitting for Christmas, but I have another project that I am so excited about, but I can’t show it here because it will be a gift, but I have become obsessed with it and have already ordered another to do for Christmas. I really wish I could show you because it is really coming together nicely, but alas, Christmas will be here before we know it, and then I can show it here on my blog with the, I hope, happy recipients.

I will leave you with another silly story about David’s and my escapades. Remember the soap piece I thought was a loose tile from our bathroom and David carefully kept it until he got the adhesive to replace it only finding out it was soap when he tried to fit it on the floor? Well, I got a better one for you.

I was watering and feeding the chickens the other day. We only have four chickens left and when they are gone we are going out of the chicken business which I will miss so much. Anyway,I hadn’t checked inside the house for a while and noticed they needed some fresh bedding so I took a shovel to stir up the old bedding and I noticed this big, black thing in the corner. My first thought was that an animal had crawled into the henhouse and died or, I thought, it was a big bird the chickens had murdered. They have murdered other birds that got into their house. I tried picking it up with the shovel, but it was too heavy for me. It was big and wobbly and I didn’t want to get too close to it. So I went into the house and made a note for David for when he got home from work that there was a dead bird or animal in the henhouse. So he gets home and after Supper he goes out to the henhouse to remove the dead thing and he comes back later and his exact words were, “Do you remember the piece of soap you had me believing was a tile in the bathroom?” I said, “Yes, so?” “Well, that animal was a big pile of chicken poop,” he told me. I just knew that was an animal out there. After all, the dogs killed a skunk just a few weeks ago. That’s another story that left a bad smell with us for a time. So I was once again wrong about what I saw. I know I don’t need glasses. I practically live at the eye doctor right now as I am getting shots in my right eye for Histoplasmosis and they check every time how well I can see, so I am beginning to think I have an overactive imagination. Seeing things that aren’t there. It was good for a laugh, anyway.

Hope you all have had a great Summer. I am looking forward to cooler weather and all the glorious Fall foliage that is coming. Happy Labor Day to all who celebrate it. Bye.

Well, I had the surgery at the hospital with anesthesia and all went well and I am pretty much back to normal. No pain and really glad of that. I feel like this whole month has past me by in a fog, but now I am making up for it.

During all this, David and I managed to freeze twenty-eight quarts of sweet corn. Between trips to the doctor and the hospital. It’s been so long since we have had sweet corn we have binged on it for the last couple of weeks and we finally have some frozen ready for dinners this Winter.

David has been such a good nurse, cleaning my wound and bandaging me. The nurse at the doctor’s said he did a better job than the nurses at the hospital and I told her I could hire him out to come in and bandage people for them!

Before this all happened David and I were working on some more projects or as I have to say, my ideas, his sweat equity.

Here is David, up on a ladder, working on one of them.

I saw this message written on painted boards on Facebook. I don’t know who thought of it so I cannot give them the credit they deserve, but I copied their idea for my meadow garden and David added the birdhouse on top.

I think this is a good message for everyone. What we think about is what we are. Are we growing flowers or weeds in our minds? I’d like to think my mind is a huge meadow of flowers. With a few little weeds!

I’ve wanted on of these for years and we finally got one. A cotton candy machine. I’m in heaven!

Here I am, just like the lady at the fair, twirling cotton candy on a stick. It’s really easy to do and fun.

Then you get to eat it. We have only made cotton candy one time. Trying to pace ourselves. But it tastes just like what you get at the county fair. The grandkids are going to have to come over and test it out.

We have several birdhouses that we have bought over the years that have not gotten put up. I have asked David several times and he finally got them all up, except for one, this month.

He hung this bird town earlier this Spring. I love all our birdhouses and the birds have been checking out the newer ones. I hope by next year every one of them will be full of little baby birds sticking their heads out and begging for food. Someone had a video of some birds feeding their babies in the nest. Mama bird was trying to cram a whole tomato worm in their mouths. If you have ever seen a tomato worm they are the giants of the garden worm variety and the little birds’ mouths are so small.

We were supposed to go to a family reunion this month, but my surgery was the day before so we missed it. Family members I hardly ever see were there and I was disappointed, but nothing we could do.

Glad the weather is breaking from the super hot days. I look forward to Autumn and the beautiful colors and the cooler weather. We are going on another Country Friends tour where ladies and a few men, sell antiques and homemade things in their homes or little shops all out in the country in southern Indiana. They always have a contest where when you buy something you get so many tickets and you put your name and phone number in their boxes and they draw out the winner’s name on the final day and guess whose name they drew this year??? Mine!! I was so surprised. I get a fifteen dollar gift certificate to every shop which means I will be spending more money! They know what they are doing, but it was a really nice surprise especially since when the lady called I thought I was only getting one gift certificate to one store, but no, it was for all of them. What will I buy? Christmas is coming.

Hope your Summer has been better than mine although I really can’t complain knowing there are people worse off than I will ever be. Glad to be back in blogland. Bye.

So my ear pain came back with a vengeance, so bad I could not sleep and that brought tears to my eyes. Today I went to the ear doctor who cleaned out my ear and then proceeded to lance the lump behind my ear without anesthesia. Talk about painful! I said it was worse than childbirth. There was a pregnant nurse in the room with us and I apologized to her for saying that, but then I told her it was true! Never have I ever felt such excruciating pain and hope to never again. This afternoon I feel no pain for the first time in almost two weeks, but I have to go back tomorrow to see if further surgery is needed. This time with anesthesia, my doctor promised.

I will let you know how things went on the other side. Once again. Please pray for me if you are a praying person. Bye.

So I finally am here again. I’ve been away on a pain filled journey that I wish never to return to. This past week I had the most excruciatingly painful earache of my life. Well, really the only earache I have ever had. It started a week ago when my ear had been bothering me. Itching and tingling. So I asked David to put some peroxide in it to maybe stop it. I have used peroxide in my children’s ears to help with the pain. Not long after he did that, I got a huge, painful swelling behind my ear. David said it looked red and painful. I tried for a couple of days to medicate myself, but it was not getting better, but worse and I was in tears with the pain so I went to my GP who gave me some antibiotics and drops for the ears. They were actually drops for the eyes, but he told me to use them in my ears. So, I did. And two days later, my ear was even more swollen and painful so David called an ear doctor, but they could not get me in until the next week, so he said, “I’m taking you to the ER.” I have a real fear of hospitals and dread going. I have not had good experiences in most cases when I have been in one so I really did not want to go, but I had no choice. I was pleasantly surprised that day. Our hospital has upped its game with the ER. It is large and bright and the people working there were very nice. Soon I was having my vitals taken and before too long I was in a room waiting for a doctor. The doctor who saw me was very kind and told me I should have never been put on antibiotics because I had a fungus in my ear, due partially from wearing hearing aids. He said the drops I had been using had citric acid in them and were burning my ear instead of helping it. Boy, does my doctor have some explaining to do! Anyway, with a prescription for the pain and different drops I went home and here I am a few days later feeling much better. There is still some swelling, but the doctor told me it would take about eleven days for it to go down with the drops. The only thing about the drops is I have to lay down and stay still for an hour every time I get them so it’s been a real disruption in my activities.

So onward to more pleasant things. The garden is bursting with bloom this year. It’s been a very good year for zinnias, geraniums, hibiscus and hydrangeas. Here is a show of some of the blooms in my garden.

Because we are not mowing our back yard, these hollyhocks came up in a place I know I didn’t plant them. They have been so beautiful.

These hollyhocks I did plant in my little kitchen garden. They have been lovely. I hope they reseed themselves.

These lilies are all over our garden.

We got these at New Creation lily farm a few years back. They never disappoint.

Rudbeckia or Black Eyed Susans. I can never have too many of these.

The hydrangea beside our front door has exploded into bloom. So full of flowers. I hope to dry a few for Fall decorations.

I did not plant one sunflower seed this year and yet, there are sunflowers coming up everywhere. The birds did the seeding this year I suppose.

This is the same garden as is in my header, but it has also exploded. My flamingo has almost disappeared. I water this every day or it would not look like this, I’m sure.

This is the geranium I got at an antique store’s garage sale! The best geraniums I have ever had.

The story behind these flowers is a mystery. A few years back, I planted some of these seeds in my little kitchen garden, no where near where these are growing. This year flowers began coming up all over our driveway that is gravel. We have had coreopsis, these flowers I call Queen Anne’s Lace, but are called Daria in the seed catalog, and Chinese forget me nots. And not just a few flowers have come up, but like someone threw hands full of seeds in our driveway and they all have come up. I truly love these flowers so much and hope they return next year. Years ago our son and his then wife gave us several figures of children for our garden. I have painted them all verdigris this year and placed them around. Each has a name. This is Jason, after our oldest son.

Those big, tall, ferny plants are coreopsis. No, I did not plant those that are growing in the gravel and they are huge. And more sunflowers. It’s been so wonderful to watch all these flowers come up that I had nothing to do with. Not to say I didn’t plant a lot of seeds, but the ones growing outside pots and planters are not of my planting. I also have tomato plants that I have already made fried green tomatoes from and had one red tomato so far.

David repainted this six foot tall flaming I bought years ago. He has been hidden in the garden for too long so he has been brought out where everyone can see him who comes into our drive. He has a place where I could put a pot of flowers if I so choose.

It’s not only flowers that have taken my time, but this year we are trying to freeze some sweet corn for the Winter. We had not had any sweet corn since before Covid. If fact, a lot of the little vegetable stands where we use to get corn closed up shop and never reopened sad to say. We could not find any sweet corn last year, but this year we found a family owned market south of town that has the best sweet corn I have ever tasted. Before I got sick, we got several dozen ears of corn and I froze eleven quarts. Tomorrow, I think I feel like trying to freeze some more.

I love having frozen sweet corn to serve at Thanksgiving and Christmas and I will have plenty this year.

This is what a good Summer supper looks like here in Indiana on a hot Summer’s day. Yum.

We aren’t the only ones with beautiful flowers. Our daughter and son-in-law brought me these gladiolas from their garden. They stayed beautiful for days.

I bought two of these cement head ladies at the antique sale I told you about a few blogs back. They can hold flowers in their heads. I just think they are beautiful. David hung that birdhouse beside her today on another project we did together. I will show you that my next post, hopefully.

David made a new cupboard on our back porch to hold things, but also to insulate that wall where the plumbing for my washer goes. The past couple of Winters, my washer pipes froze up and I had to thaw them out with my hair dryer. David is hoping this extra insulation and this cupboard will do better protecting the pipes so they won’t freeze again. The doors to the cupboard were my idea using old fence boards we have laying around. David did such a good job on this and I really love it. We can keep our back porch less cluttered now.

I’ve come to the conclusion David can do just about anything he sets his mind to. I just have to suggest a project and he’s off to the races and gets it done for me. Glad he can see my vision of things.

We are trying to make a meadow in our back yard for bees, birds and butterflies. I planted some milkweed last year and it came up again and spread and now I have lots and lots of seed that I will spread around in hopes of having more. Monarch butterflies lay their eggs in these plants. When I was growing up, milkweed grew wild along the fence rows and we had lots of butterflies, but they spray the fence rows now and kill a lot of the insects that flourished in them including the butterflies so many people are trying to plant milkweed again to help the butterflies out. These will definitely not get sprayed. On our drives through the country we sometimes see this plant growing wild. We tried getting some to bring home, but their roots were far too deep to pull any.

This is just the start of our meadow. David is having a hard time not mowing the back yard, but I keep telling him there will be more and more flowers and beautiful wild grasses growing as time passes and we will see more and more butterflies. We have already noticed an increase of the lightning bugs. They seem to like the tall grasses very well, indeed.

Not to everyone’s liking, but I have a vision and one day people will want to have my back yard. With all the flowers growing around it now, it’s really quite pretty and makes me feel so calm to sit and look at it.

We have already had some wild flowers bloom in it and I plan to sow many more seeds next Spring. That light green patch is a zinnia garden that hasn’t bloomed yet, but now it is and is so pretty.

The purple candytuft has already reseeded itself. I look forward to an abundance of it next year.

I have rattled along long enough for now, but this is what is happening at our house. We try to stay out of trouble and try to stay healthy, but sometimes things happen we don’t expect. I hope you all are doing well and enjoying your Summer or Winter wherever you are in this big, wonderful world we all live in. I still find it amazing that people read this blog all over the world and I wish I could meet every one of you in person. Just know I am happy you come to my little corner and see my not so exciting life that David and i have managed to create on our little patch of soil. Until next time. Bye.

I almost forgot! August is going to have two Super Moons. One this Tuesday and the other the last of the month. Having two full moons in one month is what the phrase, once in a blue moon comes from. So get outside and look up. The moon is especially beautiful this year.