Category Archives: gardening

2026, animals, gardening, home, News, Uncategorized

Bugs?

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I know. I know. All bugs are insects, but not all insects are bugs. I had biology minor in college, and took an invertebrate zoology class where I learned that Rock County, where I currently live, is one of the very few counties in MN where they have termites that actually swarm. In ND, we had very few insects or bugs or other pests in the garden. We had the occasional flea beetle on the cabbagey plants. (I applied Sevin, but hated using a pesticide. ) No aphids. No slugs. None of those cane borers in the raspberries. Cabbage worms were easily dealt with by applying Bascillus Thuringiensis, a natural cabbage worm killer. We had virtually no mosquitoes due to being in a semi arid part of the country.

It has come to my attention that there are more insect/bug pests in MN than I remembered after being away for 50 years. I have had incredibly large carpenter ants in the house, presumably living in the decaying sections of our deck, and drain flies in my bathroom. We are planning how to replace the deck. Boommate has abandoned hopes of a hummingbird feeder due to ants getting into the sweet nectar she put out now on two occasions.. I have not yet seen a mosquito, but I am sure they are coming.

Our vegetables are planted in raised beds and thus far we have had no pest issues. A couple of weeks ago we had a pleasant guy from a pest control company come to the house to offer us pest eradication services for ants, hornets, and other home invasion pests. In the past I would have sent such a guy packing, since I hate the thought of pesticide use, but I engaged his services after finding out many of our neighbors enlist his company’s services. They may know more about potential pests than I currently know, and I don’t want any unpleasant bug surprises in the house.

What advice do you have for me regarding MN garden or house pests? What bug or insect issues have you successfully or not so successfully dealt with?

2026, animals, gardening, Gatherings, pets, Uncategorized

Peace, Love, Play

37 Comments

It has been Buffalo Days here for the past week, and there has been a car rally, a parade, a 5K run, a quilt show, a craft fair, and many food trucks around town. Yesterday was to be Woofstock, a celebration of dogs. You can see the Facebook page below listing all the activities

https://www.facebook.com/share/1AjJi3XFZN/

Our pastor was scheduled to do the blessing of the Dogs. Our terriers needed blessings as well as forgiveness and penance! Husband and I left home with the dogs at 4:30 to head to the city park, but we hadn’t gone more than a block when the sky darkened and the wind really picked up. I turned the car and headed back home just before the thunderstorm hit. We got .50 of rain in about 20 minutes. Woofstock was officially rained out. I imagined all the wet dogs that were at the park and what a chaotic scene it must have been.

All this brought up memories of the original Woodstock, and what an awful thing the grownups around me viewed the goings on at the festival. I was still in elementary school but was fascinated by the scenes I saw on TV.

I was thankful that our rain and wind weren’t destructive We won’t need to water the garden for at least a couple of days. They were expecting 85-100 mph gusts, hail, and tornadoes back at our old home in ND last night. I can’t imagine a garden making it through something like that!

Been rained out? What are your memories of Woodstock? What Woofstock activity would you have wanted to do?

2026, Family, gardening, home, Uncategorized

Heads And Shoulders, Knees And Toes

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The childhood song has been going through my head. Husband is 72. Boommate and I are 68. Between the three of us, I think we have one functional body (but three functional brains).

Husband has arthritis and carpal tunnel issues in both hands. Boommate has had both knees replaced. She also had a shoulder repair after getting knocked over by a horse. I was doing pretty well until recently when I seem to have developed arthritis in both my shoulders that has greatly reduced my range of motion and caused a lot of pain. The sciatica issues for me are manageable and just intermittent. I have a broken toe that healed crooked and is totally numb.

It has been interesting seeing how we have managed to get gardening and moving chores done cooperatively. I am the only one who can crawl on my hands and knees. That means I can get down really low and weed and plant and plug things in. Boommate and Husband are taller than I am, so they can stretch and reach things that I can’t. Boommate and I have great manual dexterity to counter Husband’s hand problems. Husband is very strong and can carry stuff we can’t. It is all working out!

How are you joints and tendons these days? What chores are you doling out to others? What is the best team you ever worked with?

2026, Family, gardening, home, Nature

Memorial Blooms

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The iris is my favorite flower; I have always loved them.  It’s probably an inherited trait; I’m pretty sure it was one of my mother’s favorites.  To be honest, I don’t know for sure as my mom was never a flower planter.  She did like to do yard maintenance but didn’t add shrubs or flowers in any of the homes we lived in.  She did however take us kids to the Missouri Botanical Gardens every year, always during the time that the iris gardens there were in full bloom.  That can’t be a coincidence. 

Alice Hahn Goodman Iris Garden (photo credit: Heather Osborn)

I have iris planted all over my yard, front and back, and in a wide variety of colors.  The iris in the header photo is the first to bloom this season – I don’t even know the name of it.  It was supposed to be an orange variety but when it came up the following spring it was this startling white.  Gertens actually credited me for them so not only are the gorgeous, but they were free.  Two of my favorite things.

Of course this year these blooms are bringing my mother to mind so today I am remembering her and thanking her for infecting me with the love of iris!

Any blooms you’re remembering today (literal or metaphorical)?

2026, books, gardening, home, Nature, Seasons

Is It Summer Yet?

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In looking for my packing list on my pc last night, I found a Word file titled “From Books I Like”.  It’s only a couple of pages long and I would not have remembered that I have this document if I hadn’t stumbled upon it.  It has a few quotes from books that I’ve read; one of the quotes is that wonderful metaphor about the town from The Egg & I by Betty MacDonald that I’ve written about before.  Then there are two other quotes from Michael Perry’s Off Main Street.  One is another transfixing metaphor….

“Summer is a seducer.  After bundling through another tight-lipped winter, after enduring the mounting frustration of spring’s titillating dance of veils, we gape as summer comes sliding down her blazing ecliptic like a woman down a banister.  She laughs with her head thrown far back; she throws her hands high in the air, releasing fistfuls of butterflies.  She belly dances through the cornfields until the dust rises like a charmed snake, hanging in fat curls, leaving you cotton-mouthed.  She makes the fox pant, she drives the hawk to think air.  Weaker creatures curtain themselves away to complain.”

Fairly appropriate as I’m enjoying the beginning of spring/summer this week.  My major gardening push is done so now I can enjoy my yard without massive effort.  Bird feeders are full, hummingbird feeders are out (although I haven’t seen any hummingbirds yet).  YA and I have new Adirondacks in back as one of our old ones gave up the ghost a couple of weeks back.  Windows open.  No fans down from the attic yet although I have had my overhead fan going a couple of times in my bedroom.  Did my twice-a-year laundering of  my bedding and allergy covers.  Swapped out my spring/summer wardrobe for my winter one.  Aaaaahhhhhh.

Of course, unearthing these quotes on the pc makes me wonder if I have other files like this started and squirrelled away.  Suppose I’ll have to take a look one of these days!

You enjoying anything in particular this week?

 

2026, Family, gardening, Nature, Seasons, Weather

Spring Yard Disaster

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As of yesterday afternoon, the biggest part of my gardening year is over.  Clean-up from the fall, spring weeding, mulching, flower baskets planted and veggies planted in the bales.  Phew!  

It took way longer this year than usual.  Part of this was the weather.  We had spectacular weekends but then I wasn’t following through because Monday – Friday was too cool.  I do not like to garden when I’m cold and I certainly don’t want to wear a coat out there either!  Then the mess from the fall was much bigger than usual.  And all my fault.  A triple whammy, in fact.

My gardening season came to an abrupt end the day after my birthday last August, when I blew out my first knee.  Then right about the time I might have gotten to some fall clean up, the other knee went.  That meant that apart from some watering (most of which YA took care of), I didn’t do ANY fall clean up.  No dead-heading the late summer flowers, no cutting back peony stalks, no raking (although YA is a little bitty bit).

The second problem was last year’s mulch.  For reasons that pass understanding, I chose big chunky wood chips last year.  As we were spreading them about last spring, I was thinking I’d made a mistake, but it didn’t become clear how obnoxious these wood chips were until we were cleaning up this spring.  They didn’t seem to have broken down at all and were a mess to work around/with.

Then there was the Creeping Charlie fail.  Normally I do a great job of weeding the Creeping Charlie menace but last summer, I was busy in July, thinking I would just do a big push in August.  But, then…. well, you know.  My nemesis ground cover didn’t give a fig about my knees so there was way more weeding needed this year on that front before the mulch could go down.

I’m feeling quite relieved… there will, of course, be plenty of gardening going forward, but not the three/four hours a day grind we’ve been going through.  Time to enjoy!

When was the last time you “shot yourself in the foot”?

2026, animals, Food, gardening, Nature, pets

Bird Food Nemeses

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There are many down-sides to not having a dog.  No walking companion, no one to keep the kitchen floor “clean”, no big furry foot warmer on cold nights.

And then there are the squirrels.  They have absolutely figured out that there is no dog patrolling the territory any longer.  And they certainly don’t see me as a threat.  Yesterday I made a trip to get something from the car and the squirrel on the feeder and the squirrel sitting on the swing hardly even looked in my direction, much less fled in terror.

They’re also eating the hot seed cylinder that they’re not supposed to like.  I called Mr. Bird, the company in Texas who makes the cylinders to ask about the problem.  They said at this time of year, when squirrels are having their young, they are particularly ravenous and will deign to eat things that might not taste too good to them.  This phase will probably pass but in the meantime, they also make a hotter cylinder called “Disco Inferno” that I can try.  I looked it up and Gertens carries it.  Guess I’ll add that to the cart when we are there next week!

Hopefully there will be a dog to guard the sanctity of the yard some time this summer; until then we’ll just have to put up with the squirrels laughing at us!

Any critter activity at your place these days?

2026, Family, Food, gardening, home, Uncategorized

Garden Plans

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Yesterday we had 120 bags of organic raised bed soil delivered to our driveway. You can see them in the header photo. A retired guy who was the head of the city solid waste department picked them up from Bomgaars and brought them to the house. He has a forklift for just such loads. He knew my dad. The raised beds will ship this week. We have enlisted the help of a young man to move the bags of soil into the back yard. The gate on our fence is too narrow for a tractor, so he will move the bags with a big wheelbarrow. He is a cement worker for his day job and used to date one of the daughters of the former owner of our house. Everyone seems interconnected here!

Best friend is excited to plant chard, heirloom tomatoes, eggplants, and peppers. The raised beds are 32 inches high and will be good for plants that need deeper roots. I am planting a late crop of spinach and lots of basil for pesto. We will have herbs in separate pots on the deck. We saw two large deer roaming our neighborhood a few nights ago and I am glad our yard is fenced.

I want to get some Canadian roses to plant around the house, as well as some hydrangeas. We thought about putting in a raspberry bed but it would be too complicated due to underground wires and such. We also have a Birch tree badly in need of pruning, but we will leave that for the fall, as well as planting spring bulbs.

How are your garden plans coming along? What are your experiences with raised beds?

2026, dreams, gardening, Nature, Seasons

Is It Time Yet?

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This is a hard time of year for me.  I grew up in a place where spring is already sprung at this point.  Grass is poking up, flowering trees are beginning their glorious bloom and folks are out starting to clean up their yards and gardens.  I’ve been in this part of the world for decades so I know that this current warm weather is just a tease.  But there are no other signs; it’s just too early to be dreaming of the garden just yet.  I know this in my head but my heart is so ready to get out there.

Then yesterday I saw my first SunSetter Retractable Awning commercial on TV.  How is this not one of the first signs of spring???

How do you survive the “not quite winter anymore but not quite spring yet either” time?   

100 Words, 2026, books, gardening, Uncategorized

I’ll Pass, Thank You

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Laugh. Snort. Guffaw. Giggle. Hoot. Chortle. Snigger. Cackle. Titter.  OK, out of synonyms.

I got an email yesterday that says my work has been noticed and inviting me to apply for the 2026 Who’s Who in America.  Now I’m pretty good at some things and I was very good at my job before I retired but nothing that I think merits inclusion on any published list. 

If I were to be remembered for anything it would be for my parties, my Ukrainian eggs, my gardens, my cards.  Pretty sure that Who’s Who doesn’t give a rip about any of that.

If I’m publishing a Baboon Who’s Who – what would you like listed under your name?