A long dry Summer

 This year has been an unusual one.  First we have had to deal with Covid-19 and the wearing of masks when in public. In addition we are getting older and have found that we work much slower than we did twenty years ago. Who am I kidding, we work slower than we did five years ago.

In 2017 we planned to lay landscaping cloth and cover it with stones to make a nice area where we have our burn barrel.  We started the job but got sidetracked. This spring we finally finished our drawn out project! Terry even made a little bench where he can sit until the paper has burned.  We are happy with the completed project but never thought that we would have to carry and rake 1200 pounds of stones.

The summer of 2020 did bring some joys.  We hung out our Hummingbird feeders in April and all summer we were entertained by the  many Hummingbirds that visited.  They "squeaked" as they came to the feeders and chased each other away from the feeders.  They haven't learned to share.  Abby would lay on her perch in the sun room and watch the tiny birds. They would hover close to the screen and seemed to be looking at her.

We had a very successful garden this season in spite of the dry weather.  The rain barrels came in handy. This photo shows a few of our vegetables.  We are happy to report that we have a freezer full of vegetables from the garden this summer.

This was the first year we planted the old-fashioned oval watermelons.  We harvested five of these huge beauties.  They were delicious!

In order to be true to our "Trial and Error Gardening", we must have at least one trial. Our cucumber vines always begin to die towards the end of July but we want them to last until autumn.  We planted two cucumber seeds the last week of August and were pleased to be rewarded with four cucumbers.  The last one was picked the first week of October. Some very chilly nights probably decreased our cucumber growing season.  Next year we plan on planting the second round of cucumbers the first week of August.

As much as we enjoy our garden, this year we were more interested in projects to improve the appearance of our property and to also make our future yard work a bit easier for us.  We removed the grass from the east side of the yard.  This area is behind the storage shed and mostly in the shade.  It was difficult to have healthy looking grass so we decided that spreading mulch would look nice and also require less maintenance. We now have a place for the rain barrels, compost drum and firewood rack. Terry even built a heavy duty table that stands behind the shed.  It can be used for a potting table or can hold our electric wood splitter.

Another project that I especially like is the bench that we placed in front of the arborvitae that hides the burn barrel area.  Romeo the gnome stands next to the bench and is always willing to chat with us as we work or stop to rest.  Next to Romeo are some of our rhubarb plants and in the lower right of the photo is a blueberry bush.