I love rain. Rainy days make me feel like nesting. Maybe that’s because God is taking care of my watering chores, and when I have seeds sown and new plants getting established, I especially appreciate the help that a good soaking rain gives them. Rainy days give this gardener time to catch up on a little …
Now that spring has arrived, I’ve been really busy gardening like a mad woman. In my flower garden I’ve been weeding and pulling up grass, as well as planting and transplanting. One of the corners of the front yard has been neglected, and while working out there I kept thinking about what it needed. I finally …
It was such a beautiful day! All week I had been looking forward to spending time in my flower garden. I hadn’t been able to spend very much time out there recently. It was something I just had to do, for my own well-being as well as for the garden’s. As I was sitting out …
I’m partnered with Home Educators Association of Virginia (HEAV) to help promote their June, 2017, homeschool convention and had the honor of interviewing one of this year’s keynote speakers, J. Michael Smith of Home School Legal Defense Association. He, along with his friend, Michael Farris, founded HSLDA in 1983, when, as an attorney and homeschooling father, he …
Poultry are not paltry on the homeplace. They each serve a purpose and are profitable. Poultry refers to a variety of domesticated birds that are raised for their meat and eggs. It includes chickens, turkeys, ducks, geese, and guineas. Plumage I think of our birds as feathered flowers. They all have different colors and patterns, and …
My gardening chore today was to prune my peach and pear trees. In my mind it was urgent because the peach trees are in full bloom and already starting to leaf out. I really wanted to get them pruned while I could see the limbs and the structure of the tree. We’ve been working on …
I love leaves and even wrote a tongue-in-cheek poem, “In Defense of Leaves,” about them last fall, but it’s time to make way for spring and the flowers I love so much. I don’t clean my gardens up in the fall, I wait until spring to clear away the leaves and other debris left from …
My husband and I are still adjusting to the changes brought on by emptynesthood but I think we’ve made good progress. We don’t seem to be as depressed and worried. Our evenings are usually pretty quiet, and since its just the two of us, every night seems like date night. We recently went on a …
Gardening is full of surprises. Many years ago while spring cleaning, I moved some debris within the chives and suddenly my eyes were focusing on some little pink things. My first thought was rats, but then I realized that I was looking at newborn cottontail rabbits. Carefully, I covered them back up, trying to leave …
I’m excited to be a part of a Baker Creek Heirloom Seed Collection giveaway! For details and to enter, scroll to the end of this article. There’s nothing like a homegrown salad! Picking fresh greens, plus other goodies, straight out of the garden and combining them into a healthy and beautiful dish is a simple …