Posted on 12/25/2015 9:48:59 AM PST by greeneyes
The Weekly Gardening Thread is a weekly gathering of folks that love soil, seeds and plants of all kinds. From complete newbies that are looking to start that first potted plant, to gardeners with some acreage, to Master Gardener level and beyond, we would love to hear from you. This thread is non-political, although you will find that most here are conservative folks.
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My opinion too. I just can’t get the same overall picture from an on line catalog. I am collecting the ones that come in right now and stacking them all together. Once past the holidays, I’ll begin looking at them while snuggled up with a hot drink and in my recliner.
I’ll be making notes as I go. It is so hard to narrow down the order, I’d love to be able to plant about 10 acres, but I only have a little over 200 sq. feet, and Hubby has a little less than 1/4 acre.
Then there’s the desire vs ability. Hubby could probably handle planting more, but I have trouble getting all the things planted for just my tiny area. Desire outstrips my ability on a regular basis. LOL
Wish I had a sauna. One way to warm the feet. LOL
Oh no! I had not heard. I have been avoiding news and regular programming lately. We just figured out at Thanksgiving how to put Netflix on the big flat screen TV hanging on the wall. So I have been overindulging on Netflix, and next thing I know, I’ve missed the local news.
That’s too bad. I hope your place is safe?
Our main oven has a cool down feature that prevents using this recipe at our house.
We have a rental cabin next door with an older GE oven. We’ll see how this turns out.
No problems here. We built on rock.
Our builder had to jack hammer the back wall where our house is earth sheltered.
We also put 4 inch pvc drains around the back to keep storm water off the hillside of the house. Our gutters are plumbed into more pvc pipe under our driveway, pointed down toward the lake.
KY3 TV has a story on this.
Record breaking 82 yesterday! People out doing summer activities, including surfing. Singing “all I want for Christmas is a bathing suit”! Plants are a little confused but still doing well. Picked a handful of peas, which were so yummy. Two impatience are summer hold-outs and blooming profusely.
We’ve had a lot of rain (1.95 inches on Wednesday & almost another inch on Thursday) with more expected tonight, plus it has been very warm. The “spring peeper” frogs are singing up a storm and the camellia bush is blooming (usually blooms late winter, early spring). Some of the flowering trees around the mall are flowering as well. My winter garden (kale & collards) is looking like a jungle! A wee tad cooler would be nice, but no snow shoveling this winter would be wonderful.
Headed “over the river & through the woods” (i.e. across the pasture & through the pines) for a family light supper & gift exchange at my brother’s .... my youngest brother & his family are driving up (2 hours) to join us & my dad made it to his 93rd Christmas - we are so blessed.
Merry Christmas to all ..... ~Q
I will never have any more pets again. They become part of the family and when they die...my heart breaks.
NO MORE!
Us either. Once the kiddos are gone, no more pets :(
I hear ya.
MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!
((((hugs))))
I grew up in an old country house built in 1850, back before the average person had levels and fancy tools.
It was a four bedroom with a kitchen, large dining room and a living room.
Every room had a wood stove and there was a big wood cook stove in the kitchen.
I shared a bedroom big enough for three beds with my brother and great uncle.
Depending on which way the wind blew during a snow storm either my great uncle or myself would have to fold our blanket up and take it to the back porch to shake the snow off.
Between the wood stove and the 150 pounds of homemade blankets, we would stay warm all night.
On Christmas morning we would stick to our regular schedule.
Feed the cattle, milk our three milk cows, feed the hogs and chickens, THEN we could feed ourselves.
Gifts were socks, underwear and shirts.
One year I got a nice new Fedora for Sunday wear.
I was the cock of the walk with that hat!
This was the first Christmas the wife and I have been alone on Christmas.
She caught a sinus infection on Wednesday night and I woke up this morning with my sinuses and chest burning like fire.
We called everyone and called off our get together.
It has been a little lonely but I have found it restful.
No hustle and bustle.
Merry Christmas everyone!
Here in PA it is very, very warm. We have blossoms on our weeping cherry and quince!! Parsley & thyme practically growing out of the raised bed... it’s crazy!
We’ve had various Christmas traditions through the years; one fades out, another takes it’s place and then the 1st reappears.
The one that seems to have lasted the longest, and that my kids now do with my grand-kids is opening one present on Christmas Eve — Christmas PJ’s that they put on and then they look super-cute for early-morning pics (unlike Mom/Nana, who could use another hour or 2 of sleep)
Thanks for your Christmas Memories GE. Old age has clouded mine. The one I do remember is the year 1946 I got a new 410 shotgun from Wards when I was 14. It was about the same time I got a used bicycle.
We are having a very wet El Nino winter with the rivers at flood stage but dropping and no road closures at this time. I never got the Redwood needle mulch put on the beds and the Chickweed in thriving. I need to pickup 12 dozen Seascape strawberry plants in the next couple while they are still barefoot. Much cheaper that way
Merry Christmas; snowing; well below freezing: raising a great crop of icicles.
but nothing is like my child hood Christmases...
we had a large family, not too many presents but the best thing was always a new transistor radio...usually we'd always get new slippers...maybe a brush and mirror set....
but we had a beautiful tree with a manger scene under it...lots of singing...lots of baking it seemed....WALNUTS were a sure sign of Christmas...we had midnight mass after a very festive Christmas Eve with all the aunts and uncles and all the cousins...every year it seemed my fun Aunt Pat would buy a gift for all the kids....I can still hear the noise in that small house when she bought little plastic machine guns for the boys....lol
but the past is the past....I guess what we strive for it to pass on some tradition to our younger generations....and we hope and pray that they'll have happy Christmases as well...
I sent a text today to Johnny to see if he could answer. I asked him, “How are you?” He answered, “I am alive.” I asked if he was able to open the gifts and cards from Freepers. He said, “Not by myself.” That tells me he has seen the gifts and read the cards or someone read the cards to him as his eyesight is failing. When we were last there, he had made the letters bigger for text on his phone so he could see them.
I asked if he was better than when we last saw him and he texted, “I am not feeling good anywhere.”
I told him many Freepers were praying for him. I also texted that a bad storm was coming this evening and tomorrow and Monday. Then I said I loved him and that was the end of the text.
His voice is very poor which is why we are texting instead of talking by phone. That has been true for some time. He is bed ridden so cannot get information about what is happening outside unless someone tells him. I wanted to be sure he knew this bad storm with very high winds and torrential rain and possible tornados would hit his area starting this evening.
He has a brother and a niece who is helping care for him now so he is not alone now, thank God. Until now, he was always by himself in the house and that is why we went as often as we could so we could get things he needed and he would have us to talk with him and have some laughs.
So you know what would happen when we went to see him when this cancer hit last January, almost a year ago, and he was told he would be dead by March:
That January, he had brain surgery twice, was taking radiation every day and that was knocking his resistance down, so we bought new electric heaters for various areas in his house so he could stay warm anywhere in the house and most every trip, besides food (and taking him to grocery store when he was able to walk), we took another bottle of Johnny Walker No 9 as he said he used it to kill pain rather than take more Morphine - yeah, sure, that is why he drank it. :o) He has not lost his humor and he loved to have conversation with Bob as they are both brilliant so they could talk “shop” whatever that was. Johnny was always building something in the house and would ask for Bob's help making whatever. He also loved ganging up with Bob to verbally attack me because I was just a woman who could not know anything. However, one time they were making something and they could not read the small print on the plans and needed to know what that said. It was the woman, me, who could read the small print so I bashed them over the head with the fact they needed me or they were stuck with that project. :o)
He also was doing art - numerous paintings that were just Johnny's mind, weird as it was/is. The most “original” one was the lady's head with a big screw going from one side of her head and coming out the other side. That was actually appropriate since the surgeons had put staples and a screw in his head.
On his birthday last fall, we took a carrot cake with his name on it, and a huge bottle of Johnnie Walker No. 9. That bottle was so heavy, I had to use both hands to carry it.
One time his Morphine did not come in the mail, so we jumped in the car and took him Hydrocodone pain pills to get pain reliever in him until the Morphine got there.
He had a joyous time every time we went and so did we. He was not giving up. We took him to the VA clinic twice when his brother could not do it. He walked with a tall natural wood round stick to help him keep his balance.
Now, the last time we went and he was so sick:
When we were there a week ago tomorrow, I asked him about Hospice help and he said he did not qualify. How could a person that sick with terminal cancer, not qualify for Hospice? A pox on Hospice. If they cannot help him now, what is Hospice for?
I have now told you how it was with Johnny through this long period of fighting cancer, and he is still alive, so please keep him in your prayers during this time. I have five cards and two packages from you guys to him and we will go there when this bad storm passes, likely the middle of this coming week if he is still with us.
Johnny is in his middle fifties, too young for this to happen to him but we are all in the human condition, and we do not know what will happen to us any day. What we can do is pray for each other to ask for God's help in our lives.
Love to all of you,
Marcella
Just see on Dallas/Fort Worth area TV, the area where Johnny and I are, is under a tornado watch until 8 pm tonight. The storm is beginning here and some other counties in the extended area have a tornado warning at this time.
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