Journal - Preparing for Summer

Well summer is very nearly upon us. In fact, we’ve already had one day at or near 100 degrees and a couple of other days that were very warm as well so you might say that summer is already here. With the change of seasons it seems like there are always plenty of projects to do around the house. This week I had Tuesday and Thursday off so those were my days to get some of those projects done.

On Tuesday I did a little more work in the garden. Last week we got tomatoes and peppers and strawberries in. We had already decided not to have a large pumpkin patch like we did last year, but I still wanted at least a few. So I got out the rake and cleared the winter leavings from another section of the garden. Then I got out the shovel and dug the soil in a plot about 6 by 8 feet or so. In there I planted six mounds of pumpkins. Actually I’m not sure if pumpkins are supposed to be in mounds but it seemed like the right thing to do. I put 3 or 4 seeds in each mound, the seeds having come from some of the pumpkins we had last year. We actually still have 3 of our good sized pumpkins from last year sitting around the house. I don’t think they’ll last much longer; they’re all getting soft spots on them now. Anyway, the pumpkins are in and hopefully they’ll come up again.

Thursday I had several items on my to-do list. I took the humidifier apart and cleaned it up and set it aside to dry. Then I gave the kitchen window a thorough cleaning. Our house is moldy and during the winter, where the moisture condenses on the window frames and glass, the mold grows. During the winter we wipe it down from time to time but don’t really give it a thorough cleaning. I had already done one of the kitchen windows a couple of weeks ago so today I got the other one.

After that I went outside to see if the mower would start this year. Last year it was very hard to start every time we used it, and even after it started we would have to nurse it along for a few minutes before it finally decided it was ready to work. I had been thinking about it earlier this week and thought the carb was probably pretty dirty and that’s what was causing it to run so poorly. I wanted to pull the carb off and clean it up but after watching a couple of videos online showing how to do that I decided it was probably not something I should mess with. Instead I just pulled off the cowling and the fuel tank and cleaned as much of the gunk out from under there as I could. There was quite a lot of gunk that has probably been building for years. Also the mice like to nest up under the cowling so I cleaned all of that out. I sprayed some carb cleaner around the carb and the throttle, drained out the last few drips of last year’s gas and put everything back together. After filling up with fresh gas and topping off the oil I gave the rope a few experimental tugs. It didn’t sound like it was trying to fire at all but after 10 or 12 pulls it started up. That was much easier than last year and more importantly it stayed running without having to be nursed. All in all maybe the cleaning did it some good but I guess time will tell.

So while Joni was doing a little mowing I came back in found that the humidifier was dry so I put that back together and took it downstairs for the summer. Then I sat down at the computer to do some typing.

I still have a couple more windows that I would like to clean up today and I also thought I might try making some potato salad today, something I’ve never made before. And that’s everything I had on my to-do list. It’s only noon now so that’s not too bad. I’ll still have to relax this afternoon which is good because I have a full shift at work tomorrow.

Today is Brad and Cindy’s 27’s anniversary! Happy Anniversary guys!

Mark 10:6-9 But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” ESV

Ecclesiastes 3:22 So I saw that there is nothing better than that a man should rejoice in his work, for that is his lot. Who can bring him to see what will be after him? ESV

Pumpkin Chronicles (and more!) Day 151

Well here we are on Day 151 of our Pumpkin Chronicles. Throughout much of July and August I was a little disappointed that the pumpkin patches weren’t producing more pumpkins and also at the small size of the pumpkins. In September, however, we’ve had much better luck. I guess pumpkins truly are cool weather plants. Here’s a picture of our front steps with all of the pumpkins we’ve produced so far, minus two or three that rotted already. The small ones came out in August, and the larger ones came out more recently after the weather cooled down dramatically.

And the two patches are still producing! We have three or four pumpkins coming along nicely in Pumpkin Patch Central, and two more in Pumpkin Patch East including this big guy! This pumpkin is already larger than anything that’s grown so far and it’s still nice and green, which tells me it’s not done yet. I can’t wait to see how big this one gets!

And yes, I finally picked that lone watermelon. We actually grew two watermelons this year; a bit disappointing since we had about ten little ones starting out at one time. I don’t know how to tell when they are ripe so I was reluctant to pick them, fearing that they wouldn’t be done yet. I finally picked the smaller of the two a couple of weeks ago, and as I feared it was not ripe yet. So I let this one go a bit longer but finally got impatient and brought it in yesterday. As you can see, it’s beautiful and ripe! It’s also very juicy and delicious! This is pretty good sized and will probably be more than we can eat, but I wish there had been more so we could have shared with our friends and neighbors.

We also picked a couple of tomatoes off the vine a couple of days ago and are waiting for them to finish ripening. The tomatoes really surprised me since I never really expected them to grow at all. I probably already mentioned that I took the seeds from a Roma or Plum tomato that we got at Walmart and planted them in the garden. Two nice plants came up right beside one another and started producing tomatoes. These were the first ones we picked but there are probably a dozen more still on the vine. I hope they taste as good as they look!

Pumpkin Chronicles (and more!) Day 127

Well our friend from church reminded me yesterday that I haven’t updated my Pumpkin Chronicles for a while. This friend shall remain nameless, but her initials are Miss Carol! Actually she was right, this update is long overdue so here it is.

Up until recently the pumpkins have been very few and very small. This picture shows the only three good pumpkins we have managed to produce so far and as you can see they are very small. Still, they make nice decoration for our flowerbed on the back side of our house, the side that faces the road.

But wait a minute, look at this! This is by far the largest pumpkin we have so far. I put my hand in the pic to show how large the pumpkin is but it still doesn’t really do it justice. This pumpkin is about the size of a bowling ball or volleyball now. I’m not sure if it’s still growing or not, it is showing some signs of ripening. In addition to this one, we have at least five more pumpkins growing that we know of. Apparently pumpkins do not like very hot weather. During July when our temps were at or near 100 degrees almost every day the pumpkins were, as I said, very few and very small. In August our weather has been much cooler and now we have more pumpkins growing and they’re getting bigger. Honestly, I’m learning more about pumpkins this year than I ever wanted to know. J

Hey, this isn’t a pumpkin! We planted some watermelons in the garden up by the house, just to the east of the pumpkins and this is what we’ve got so far. This one doesn’t seem to be growing much anymore so I’m thinking it’s almost time to pick it and eat it. Unfortunately, this is about all we have to show so far. There is one other watermelon that might be edible but that’s it. At one time we counted 9 or 10 little watermelons starting out, but they all shriveled up and died when they were only pickle sized. That’s disappointing but if we get to eat this one then it will have been worth it.

And finally, the tomatoes! The largest of these tomatoes are about golf-ball size now and will probably be ready to pick before long. These are plum tomatoes that I planted from the seeds of a tomato we bought at Walmart and I really didn’t expect them to do anything, but boy was I wrong. In all there are about 10 nice looking tomatoes on what is actually two separate plants growing side by side. I should have taken a pic of the whole plant because they are about 5 feet tall. In addition to the 10 or so tomatoes growing right now, there are several clusters of flowers getting ready to blossom into new tomatoes. I can’t wait to try some of these!

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 83

Surprise! Don’t ask me how I missed this one because I don’t know. I found this pumpkin today in Pumpkin Patch East and, as you can see, it’s quite a bit bigger than the one I found in Pumpkin Patch Central a few days ago. It’s growing off of a vine right on the outer edge of the patch. The vine had grown out into the weeds outside the patch and that’s where this pumpkin was so I guess that’s why I didn’t see it before. Before I took this pic I cleared away the weeds so I could get a good shot of it. This brings our grand total of pumpkins up to 2! And who knows, maybe there are still more in there that I haven’t discovered yet.

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 80

SUCCESS!! It is day 80 in our Pumpkin Chronicles and, as you can see, we have a pumpkin! Today I was wading through pumpkin patch central and thinning out some of the vines that had not yet produced any blossoms. I should have done this weeks ago as the vines are growing all over each other and some of the ones on the bottom are dying. Anyway, as I was doing that, I finally discovered our first pumpkin. I felt a little like a gold miner, sifting through pan after pan of river silt and finally finding that first bit of color. It was a pretty exciting moment. This little guy is about the size of a racquetball right now, or a bit smaller than a tennis ball if you prefer. The surface is very green, smooth, and shiny. I was beginning to worry because we’ve been getting blossoms for a few weeks now but I haven’t really been finding many female flowers, if any at all.

And speaking of female flowers, here’s a good example of one. Once I really got to looking, I found this one in pumpkin patch east, and later found a couple more over in pumpkin patch central. As you can see, the female flower forms right on top of a big bulb on the vine. That’s kind of like a little pumpkin egg just waiting to be fertilized. This flower hasn’t opened yet but it should open tomorrow or next day. Then, as long as a bee brings in some male pollen, this little guy will soon begin to grow into a pumpkin. I’ll be keeping an eye on this one over the next several days. Isn’t this fun!?

Joni and Steven's Adventures In Gardening

Here’s the west edge of the patio. I dug these flower beds and put down the brick border earlier in the summer and now things are finally beginning to grow and bloom! In the lower part of the picture are marigolds and zinnias and a couple of hollyhocks. The marigolds took a long time but they are finally beginning to take off and if you look carefully you can see that a couple of zinnias have finally bloomed as well. Still nothing but leaves on the hollyhocks. The upper part of the picture is where I transplanted some mint. The first time I tried they all died. The second time it was touch and go for a while but they finally took hold and now they are looking pretty good.

Here’s a close up of the marigolds. I didn’t get a very good picture but you can see that we were lucky enough to get a nice variety of colors. We waited a long time for these but it was worth it!



Here’s the north edge of the patio. Last year this was a huge patch of wild marijuana plants. Now it’s more zinnias, hollyhocks, and marigolds. Things don’t seem to grow quite as well here, probably because it doesn’t get as much sun. We are finally getting blossoms though.



Here are our back steps showing the rest of the brick work I did and a different angle of the marigolds and zinnias. There are some pansies in there as well but the heat is getting to them and I caught them on a bad day. Take a look at that hollyhock right beside the milk can. Are those leaves unnaturally large? None of the others have leaves nearly that big. Maybe it’s a mutant!


Here are the back steps again and some grass that I am trying to grow here. This was nothing but a big hole that filled up with water everytime it rains. I cut out some sections of sod from remote areas of the yard and brought them up here. It looks like it’s dying but who knows. I just hope it comes back next year and fills in a bit. Anyway, this looks a lot better than it did before. The red brick tiles are from Mom!

This little fella is growing up on the side of our garden shed. We don’t know where he came from, but we’re sure glad to have him!




Here are some sunflowers I planted out by the country fence. They sure are getting tall! Yes, it’s that windy!






Here’s a wider view of Pumpkin Patch Central showing the tires I planted. Yep, those are the old tires off my truck. I put them there back in April I think but they still haven’t sprouted any new tires yet. And yes, that’s a huge marijuana plant growing there. They grow in huge bunches everywhere out here if you don’t take care of them. The birds really love them and therefore Joni really loves them so I left a couple growing here and there.

Garage Sale Finds

Here’s the monster truck wagon that my sister picked up at a garage sale. I told you this thing was awesome! We have a lot of trees around and a lot of wind so there are always lots of branches to be picked up and this wagon is perfect for the job. It has a nice little hitch that could be hooked up to a riding mower if we had one, but I just pull it around myself. Also, all four sides can be let down to make something like a flatbed.

And here’s the wheelbarrow, also picked up by my sister. I love this old thing much more than I would have liked a brand new one. The wooden handles are kind of weather-beaten and one of them already cracked so I have to be careful not to put too much weight in it. I’m thinking it wouldn’t be too hard to replace those. I use this a lot for picking up the piles of dirt our friendly little voles are always leaving for us. I’ve been carting the dirt over to the south side of our garden shed where the rain leaks in and piling it along the foundation.

Here’s the patio table and chairs Joni and I found. And we got this for $12, can you believe it? We had a little set out here on the side of the house but the table was smaller and there was only one chair left and it had no umbrella. We love our new one!


And here’s Joni’s little garden fence, another garage sale find. She loves junk, um I mean things like this. :) It actually did fit nicely right here in our little flower bed by the back steps. A little nicer than just an ugly concrete backdrop.

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 74

Here’s Joni enjoying a walk through Pumpkin Patch Central on Day 74! It also happens to be Independence Day so happy birthday America! It’s almost mind-boggling how big and full and thick this patch has become! The plants are standing between 2 and 3 feet high I would guess and some of the leaves are bigger than dinner plates. This was taken at about 1 in the afternoon and the flowers have all closed up already. It seems that the hotter it is the sooner the flowers close up. On a cool cloudy day, of which we have had very few lately, the flowers might stay open until 5 or 6 o’clock. Joni and I have both seen bees on the flowers although you have to get out there kind of early in the morning to catch them at work. I haven’t found any pumpkins growing yet although I haven’t really made a thorough inspection. The vines are very prickly so it’s hard to dig around in there and get a good look.

And here’s Pumpkin Patch East out by the country fence. You can hardly even see the fence now! No walking barefoot in this patch, there are stickers around! These fellas have been looking a little droopy the last couple of days even though I’ve been giving them plenty of water. This patch is in full sun from early morning until late in the evening and it’s been very hot lately so I guess that’s why they look a little tired. Shoot, I look a little droopy after only a couple of hours in the sun, forget about all day! Oh, and check out those sunflowers growing along the fence! The tallest ones are about 6 feet high now and seem to be visibly taller every day. I hope they grow some flowers pretty soon!

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 56

It’s day 56 of our Pumpkin Chronicles and just look at all those big beautiful blossoms! Since that first blossom showed up we’ve been getting several of them each day, maybe half a dozen at a time or so. But as you can see, we had even more than that today! The blossoms have been opening up early each morning but by noon they are already beginning to wilt, and by about 2 o’clock or so they are usually closed up. After that the blossoms will wither away and die only to be replaced by a new batch the next day. The pumpkin plants are doing their job; I sure hope the bees are!

And here’s Pumpkin Patch East, flourishing as well. We had some nice gentle rain showers the last two nights and the pumpkins, along with everything else, are responding with a renewed energy. There are fewer plants here and, therefore, fewer blossoms. There were a couple out here today but they were kind of hiding underneath the foliage. If the blossoms are being pollinated then we should have lots of pumpkins this fall.

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 46

It’s day 46 in our Pumpkin Chronicles! This is pumpkin patch central and, as you can see, the pumpkin plants are really flourishing. Yesterday I dug up five of the smaller plants and moved them to other areas to give them a little more room. I put three of them further back in the garden here at pumpkin patch central and the other two I put over in pumpkin patch east, which I extended by a couple of feet. If you look closely at the center of the picture, you’ll probably notice a bright orange blossom!

And here’s a close-up of the blossom. Isn’t it beautiful! This marks a very exciting time in the life of our pumpkin patch! We noticed just a couple of days ago that most of the pumpkin plants were developing buds. Then yesterday I found a blossom although that one was already done and wilted up by the time I found it. You can see it just below the blossom in this picture. Pumpkin blossoms typically open just before dawn and only last one day, then they are gone forever. Joni found this one early this morning and got a couple of pics of it. I took this picture around noon and it was fully opened as you can see. I got the pic just in time though because about an hour later it had already begun to wilt, and by two o’clock it was closed up again.

Pumpkin plants grow male and female blossoms and it’s up to the bees to bring pollen from the male to the female, which will then grow into a pumpkin. You can tell a female blossom by the green fuzzy bulb just below the flower. Males, like this one, have no bulb. You can’t see that part of it in this picture, but this one is a male and they are more numerous than the females. There are lots of buds forming so I expect we’ll be seeing lots of blossoms in the coming days. I hope the bees get their job done quickly because these don’t last long!

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 40

It’s day 40 already and the pumpkin plants are still growing and spreading out! This last week had me worried because we had some pretty intense storms: furious winds, driving rain, pounding hail. The pumpkins got a little beat up but they are already bouncing back and looking healthier than ever. I’m still not sure about the vines though. I’m beginning to think that the stems or stalks that are already here will eventually lay down on the ground and become the vines upon which the pumpkins will grow. This is my first time with pumpkins so I’ll have to wait and see.

Over here at Pumpkin Patch East it is even more apparent how the plants are responding to the rain. During the first 5 weeks after I planted these here we had almost no rain at all. The plants were growing but slowly. During the last week we’ve had lots and lots of rain and even though we also had a lot of wind and hail, these guys have perked right up. Grow little pumpkins, grow!

Journal - Graduation and Glasses and Gardening (oh my!)

Well, I’ve gotten a little behind, haven’t I? Let me see, what happened this last week?

Last Saturday, May 12, was Kylie’s graduation. It was my first time seeing the gymnasium at the new school. It’s pretty nice looking. I’m sorry to say that the band sounded terrible, nothing like the old days. Mr. Kercher would never have tolerated us sounding like that. I thought going to graduation would bring back a lot of memories, but it really didn’t I don’t seem to remember much of my own graduation. I have clearer memories of playing in the band for graduations when I was an underclassmen.

After the ceremony at the school, we all went to Bobbi and Mike’s house for Kylie’s reception. Uncle Butch and Aunt LeeDel were there so it was good to see them and to sit and visit with them for a little while. Mike had spent the whole day Friday smoking some pork for the reception and it turned out great. It was a fun day, as days with family always are.

Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday were spent watering plants, doing a little weeding here and there, and just generally watching everything grow. Of the four types of seeds we tried to start in trays, tomatoes, peppers, green onions, and strawberries, not a single thing sprouted, so I took all four trays and poured out the contents into an area I had prepared in the garden.

On Wednesday, I had my eyeglass appointment with Dr. Vaughan at the Kearney Eye Institute. He ran me through the tests and, just as on the prior week with Dr. Feilmeier, I was hitting close to 20/30. My eye is still very unstable though. Dr. Vaughan had a little trouble getting any good numbers, and he said that we could do that every day for a week and probably get different numbers each time. My eye is clearly healing and improving all the time, but it’s just very unstable. Dr. Vaughan suggested another appointment next month to see how the numbers compare, and recommended that I hold off on the glasses until things settle down a bit, which is what I decided to do. I was disappointed, sure, but not as much as you might think. I am really pretty okay with the vision that I have now, and I think I could live happily for the rest of my life with what I have now. The problem is, I need to find work pretty soon. That will be difficult, and without better vision it will be even more so. I’m not technically disabled anymore so my social security won’t continue for very much longer. I have to keep reminding myself that God will handle this, just as he has handled everything else. I’m pretty sure he didn’t give me my sight back just to have me lost my disability payments and become homeless. Right God? Right?

Thursday and Friday were filled with more gardening excitement. Oh, and I also started working out again! After my surgery last October, I had to stop working out until my eye healed for a few weeks. I never really got back into it after that, only getting on the bike sporadically. Then when I developed that infection at the beginning of March I stopped completely because there were a lot of trips to Omaha and such. On top of that I’ve been taking Prednisone, which makes me want to eat a lot. Well, lately I’ve been noticing I’m getting kind of round around the middle again and was disappointed because I had burned a lot of that away when I was using the bike regularly. So this week I finally got back on. I worked out 4 days, skipping Wednesday because of my eye appointment. They were fairly short workouts since I haven’t done it for a while, but next week I should be able to go longer.

Umm, what else? Oh yes, we have watermelons and cucumbers sprouting. All six of the cucumber mounds I planted have sprouted, and I think three of the five watermelon mounds have started. Boy I hope we get some watermelons this year! And making pickles would be fun too.

We also noticed the other day that there may be something growing where I dumped out those trays. We’re not sure, but Joni thinks it might be a pepper plant. Keep your fingers crossed!

1 Corinthians 3:7 So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. ESV

Joshua 1:9 Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. ESV

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 28

So here we are at day 28! Can you believe it’s been four weeks already? These are the pumpkins in Pumpkin Patch Central, in the garden near the house. As you can see, the pumpkin plants are growing at what is almost an alarming rate. I’ve been keeping an eye out for some vines to start, but none so far. From what I’ve read, it sounds like the vines could start just about any time now. Then there should be some blossoms sometime around week 10. A lot of grass and weedy stuff was beginning grow in here but I went in the other day and dug it all up with the little 3-pronged hand rake thingy. I know the weeds will be back, but for now the patch looks pretty clean.

And here’s Pumpkin Patch East, across the driveway. These look reasonably healthy but I’m a little worried about them. The soil here is much more dry than in the garden, and seems to be sandier and even gravelly. I took these pics yesterday, on day 28, but didn’t get them up until today due to some internet difficulties we were having. Even though the pumpkins looked okay yesterday, today they look kind of limp even though we got a little rain yesterday. Also, it’s hard to tell from these pics, but we lost a few plants recently. We had some pretty high winds for about 3 days and I think the poor things just got whipped to death. Not surprising I suppose since the leaves are getting pretty big and the plants are generally kind of top-heavy. Not to worry though, there are still plenty of healthy plants left!

Journal - Good News From The Doctor

Today I had my appointment with Dr. Feilmeier in Kearney. I had a morning appointment this time instead of afternoon. I was glad of that because by afternoon he’s always really behind schedule and we have a long wait. Today my appointment was at 10am and we were only in the office for about an hour altogether.

The first sign of good news came during my routine reading of the eye chart. I was still at 20/70 unaided, but on the pinhole I got a partial on the 20/30 line, my best reading since surgery. I didn’t get the whole line, and it was tough, but I got two letters so that was good.

The doctor came in and looked at my eye and before he even got to the microscope he remarked that my eye looked very white and healthy today. My eye does sometimes take on a kind of yellowish hue so that was a good sign. At the microscope he had nothing but good reports. He actually used the word “amazed” once or twice, and he also said, “We were aggressive and we won.” He went on to say that I was his “good” patient of the day, the one he would talk about on the way home to Omaha. Doc is pretty good at hiding his feelings, but I think he was pleased with what he saw today. He did find another loose suture, which he removed. I asked if it was normal for those to loosen over time and he said it definitely is.

As far as my meds, he is having me continue the Zymaxid and Natacyn drops for one more week and then stop them completely. He discontinued my Doxycycline pills and cut back my Acyclovir pills from 5 a day to 2 a day. He gave me a schedule to taper off the Prednisone pills over the next few weeks, but I’m already on a pretty light dose so I might just stop those. So after one more week I’ll have 2 Pred-forte drops a day, and 2 Acyclovir pills a day and that’s it.

I already have an appointment to see Dr. Halsted in Grand Island again in two weeks, and we made an appointment to see Dr. Feilmeier the next time he’s in Kearney next month. He said after that we can probably drop back to every month or two. Since I did so well on the eye chart today, I also made an appointment to see Dr. Vaughn at the Kearney Eye Institute for another eyeglass exam. That will be next Wednesday the 16th. The last time he examined me, the best we could do was 20/50 but it should be better than that now.

So then we came home, having had our fill of good news for the day. I went out and did the watering while Joni did some mowing. Yesterday I dug up some more of the garden and planted six mounds of cucumbers so it’s getting to be quite a bit of watering each day. I sure wish we could get some rain. Everything is looking pretty healthy though except for the mint that I transplanted to the west side of the patio. Most of those look like they’re going to die. Mint plants grow pretty well; they spread out a lot and come back each year, but I’m finding out that they don’t transplant very well. It’s a good thing we have lots of it.

Psalms 30:2 O Lord my God, I cried to you for help, and you have healed me. ESV

Isaiah 53:5 But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. ESV

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 18

So here we are at Day 18 and, as you can see, the pumpkins are growing like weeds! This is Pumpkin Patch Central, in the garden on the south side of the house. I have four rows of pumpkins planted and all seem to be doing well, with the possible exception of the last row at the far right of the picture. Those were the most recent and they haven’t quite decided if they’re going to live or not. I have them planted way too close together but we’re bound to get something out of all these!

And here’s Pumpkin Patch East. These guys are doing pretty well too it looks like. The soil here turned out to be very gravelly. I didn’t notice before, but with the daily watering the dirt is washing off the top and I can see a lot of gravel now. I don’t know if that will present any special challenges in the growing of the pumpkins, but so far they’re coming along well. No signs of any vines yet but I’m keeping my eye out. From what I read, they typically put out two main vines, usually growing in opposite directions. From the main vines, smaller ones can shoot off and may need to be pruned. But so far, there’s not much to do but keep them watered.

Journal - More Gardening Exploits

So last week was pretty quiet and uneventful. Each day I go out and water all the plants we have growing.

On Saturday, one of our very hot days, I put in a pretty good day’s work. Across the long west side of our patio area I dug new flower beds. In one section I planted some catnip seeds that we picked up last year and never did anything with. And in the rest I transplanted some mint from the south and east sides of the house. So far the mint looks pretty limp and it hasn’t decided if it wants to live there or not but I hope it makes it.

Everything else is doing pretty well. The pumpkins are looking pretty healthy, we have sunflowers coming up in about six different areas. In fact, all the sunflowers I planted are coming up nicely. We also have hollyhocks, zinnias, marigolds, and day lilies coming up in various places.

The only things we’re not having any luck with are the seeds we tried to start in some little dishes. We have dishes of peppers, tomatoes, green onions, and strawberries, but so far nothing is showing. I suppose I’ll pick up some more seeds and just try them directly into the garden.

Sunday and Monday were quite cool and cloudy. We had some pretty good chances for rain, which I was looking forward to knowing they would be good for the plants, but we never got more than a few drops. It was too cold out to do much outside.

Today, Tuesday, it is warming back up a bit so I went out and dug up another section of the garden and started some watermelon seeds. I made five mounds spaced out pretty good so hopefully I’ll have some watermelons to talk about one of these days. I also have some cucumbers that I’ll probably get started one of these days.

Coming up on Thursday is my next eye appointment in Kearney. Hard to believe I haven’t seen Dr. Feilmeier for a month. I’ll be interested to see what he has to say after that length of time. Then on Saturday is Kylie’s graduation. Little Kylie graduating, can you believe it? So we’ll be gone most of that day.

Song of Solomon 4:16 Awake, O north wind, and come, O south wind! Blow upon my garden, let its spices flow. ESV

Jeremiah 29:5 Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce. ESV

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 10

So here we are at day 10! The little pumpkin seedlings that I’ve moved away from the main cluster are doing reasonably well so today I decided to get the last of them moved and spread out. I did a little reading up on growing pumpkins this morning and hadn’t realized just how much space these things need. They need an awful lot and our garden is only so big. So today I dug up a new plot and dedicated it solely to pumpkins. This is on the east side of our house, across the driveway in the area where we park the truck. You can see Joni’s country fence at the top of the pic. I raked up the leaves and trash, turned the soil with a shovel, and planted pumpkins seedlings in eight different spots. For good measure I threw in a few sunflowers here and there around the edges. I think this will be a good spot because it gets full sun all morning and afternoon. From what I read, pumpkins like lots of sun, at least 6 full hours a day.

So we now have two pumpkin patches, Pumpkin Patch Central, and Pumpkin Patch East. Altogether there are more than 20 little seedlings growing so surely some of them will survive to maturity. Also, these pumpkins came straight from God as we did not plant them ourselves so I’m thinking that will work in their favor. I hope I didn’t jinx it by moving them around. So far, growing pumpkins is exciting!

Pumpkin Chronicles Day 7

I’m pretty stoked about these pumpkins that are coming up in our garden. As I mentioned in an earlier post, last fall we had a couple of pumpkins on our front steps. After they sat there and got soft and mushy, we scooped them up with a shovel and tossed the remains into our garden area. At the time I was thinking it might add some nutrients to the soil. Then this spring when we cleaned up the garden in preparation of the spring planting, we found this! We weren’t sure what it was until we discovered that these little sprouts were coming up amidst a scattering of dried up pumpkin seeds. I think it was about a week ago that we first discovered them so I’m calling this day 7.

This is one little seedling that I separated out from the bunch. I figured they would do a little better if they were spread out a little, so I picked out three and planted them in a new area with plenty of space between them. I did that on April 25. On April 27 we got a good rain. This pic is from April 28 and the little sprouts have nearly doubled in size since being transplanted. I forgot to put something in the pic for a size reference but these little guys are a couple of inches high and a couple of inches across. I mentioned before that the sprouts each had two little rubbery leaves, but as you can see they’ve added a third leaf which is shaped differently than the first two. How interesting! Now that I know they can survive being moved I’ll try transplanting some more. As you can see from the first pic, there are plenty of sprouts here to make a pretty good pumpkin patch. I just know the Great Pumpkin will come this year!

Journal - First Signs of Life

Tuesday and Wednesday turned out very hot. Tuesday was supposed to be in the upper 80’s but it actually topped 90 before it was said and done. As I write this on Wednesday afternoon, it is 86 degrees. The yard work has been fun but I have to admit that these temperatures take some of the enjoyment out of it. Flies and mosquitoes are already becoming a nuisance. We also have ants in the kitchen already and the moths are flapping around the back porch and the fluorescent light in the kitchen. On top of that we saw our first June bug last night. And it’s not even May yet. Somebody pinch me, I think I’m still in Texas.

Well, it was too hot these last two days to spend 3 or 4 hours in the yard as I did on the cooler days, but I still got out and did a few things. I’ve been keeping the various flowerbeds watered each day and we are finally seeing some sprouts. We have hollyhocks coming up in a couple of different places but no Zinnias that we can detect. I can’t remember if I mentioned it but I planted some sunflowers out in the yard toward the road where that old wishing well used to sit but no sprouts yet. Today I planted some more on the opposite side of the house, across the driveway where Joni’s “country fence” is. Some of the wild flowers I transplanted on the north side of the house haven’t decided if they like it there or not yet. The potatoes in the garden were a no-go so I dug up that part of the garden and moved some of the little pumpkin seedlings there. They were all growing in a big cluster right where we threw the pumpkins last fall so I just moved three of the individual seedlings to see if they will take. If they make it I’ll try some more to get them spread out a bit. If they do well we should have an awful lot of pumpkins later on. The trees have been dropping tons of those little helicopter seedpods all over the place so we got some of them cleaned out of the flowerbeds before they start to grow. I just got all those little trees cleaned out of there and I don’t want more growing. Joni also started some of our pepper seeds in a little tray today. Hopefully they’ll take off and we can get them in the garden. We also saw our first snake of the season in one of the garden beds. It was a good sized garter. In one of the flowerbeds I was digging up a couple of weeks ago I found a nice little sprinkler. Just a little round one but it’s made completely of metal so I guessed it might still be good. Today I cleaned it up and put a gasket in it and it works great. It will be good for watering the garden once it’s full of vegetables.

Tomorrow we go to Grand Island for my visit to Dr. Halsted, an associate of Dr. Feilmeier’s, so there probably won’t be any yard work tomorrow.

Matthew 13:3-9 And he told them many things in parables, saying: “A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured them. Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and immediately they sprang up, since they had no depth of soil, but when the sun rose they were scorched. And since they had no root, they withered away. Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. Other seeds fell on good soil and produced grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has ears, let him hear.” ESV

Journal - Yard Work, Possessions, and Music

Let’s see, where was I? Oh yes, last Friday Joni and I traveled to Grand Island for Distric Music Contest at Grand Island’s Central Catholic High School. Adam, who joined the choir this year, was performing with a group, and Kylie was performing as well. We left at about 9am and made the trip to GI, which is just under one hour away from here. We had obtained the physical address of the school and so with our trust TomTom GPS unit, we had no problem finding the place.

As it turned out, Adam’s group and Kylie’s group were performing in the same room, one right after the other so that made it pretty easy to see both. Adam had also been in a group earlier that morning, and Kylie had another group later that afternoon, so we were glad of the opportunity to see both kids perform.

Adam’s group of about seven boys sang an old Billy Joel classic, “For The Longest Time.” Some of the boys in the group had trouble with the tempo and the pitch, but I have to admit that Adam did a good job. I could actually hear him singing, which surprised me. He’s kind of reserved in public sometimes and I didn’t think he would sing out that well. Also, when he sings at home he has a lot of trouble finding the pitch, but with the piano and the other boys he sounded right on tune. Next up was Kylie’s quartet. They sang “Ave Maria”, not the version you traditionally hear around Christmastime, but a different one. It was a really beautiful song and the four girls sang it really well.

And that was all we stayed for. On the way in, I had noticed that we passed a Home Depot store and I asked Joni if we could stop on the way out to look for a fuel line for the weed eater. So we stopped in and found one without too much trouble. After that we headed on home.

Saturday was kind of a cool day, but it was sunny and not too windy so I went on out to see if I could get that fuel line in. This is when I discovered that it wasn’t actually the fuel line I was replacing, but the line that runs from the primer. There are two separate lines running into the fuel tank. Not too worry, the package I had picked up at Home Depot had both lines in it. So after fighting with the trimmer for a little while we finally managed to get the primer line installed. Unfortunately it still wouldn’t start. I pulled and pulled at it but it never even tried to catch. The only other thing I can think of is to try some fresh fuel. The trimmer uses 2-cycle fuel, gas and oil mixture, and what we had on hand has been sitting around for about three years, which is the last time we were able to use the trimmer. So I decided to try some fresh fuel in it as soon as I could get some.

Also on Saturday I kind of piddled around the yard a bit. I didn’t have anything specific that I wanted to work on so I just kind of messed around here and there. I watered the various flower-beds and such.

Sunday we made it to church. I was glad we did since we hadn’t made it the week before. Two weeks in between church services leaves me feeling a bit frazzled more often than not. Pastor Mike’s sermon was about possessions and riches. It was something I really needed to hear as I have struggled with that. Not with riches, I don’t struggle with riches at all since I have none, but I do struggle with possessions. I have many possessions that are very important to me, even though I know I shouldn’t place so much importance on them: things that I’ve had for a long time, or things that once belonged to now-deceased grandparents and such. I would be devastated to lose those things and I know that’s not healthy. Anyway, it was a good sermon that left me feeling kind of thoughtful the rest of the day.

I can’t remember if it was on Saturday or Sunday that we discovered the pumpkins. I was looking for sprouts on the potatoes that I had planted, and thought I found some. I was wrong. The little green sprouts were coming up in the middle of a pile of pumpkin seeds. The seeds came from two pumpkins that Mom had placed on our front steps as a surprise for our return from Omaha after my surgery in October. The pumpkins lasted a good long time, but when they finally got soft and mushy we picked them up with a shovel and tossed them into the garden area. Well, some of them are coming up. In case you ever need to identify pumpkins sprouts, they have thick rubbery leaves, and they all grow with two leaves on each sprout. We had actually picked up some pumpkin seeds at Walmart, but I guess we won’t need them because there are quite a few coming up. As for my potatoes, I dug up a couple to see if anything was happening and they’re not sprouting at all. So that experiment failed. Pumpkins will be fun though.

Then on Monday the choir had their concert at the school in Gibbon where many of the groups that performed at Districts get to show off for the home crowd. We got to see Adam’s group again as well as the other group he was in that we had missed on Friday. We also got to see Kylie again which was nice since she’s a Senior and it was her last choir performance before she graduates. Mom and Bobbi were there too and there were a few tears afterward. This also marked my first visit to the new school in Gibbon since my surgery. It worked out well: we had to drop off Adam early so we had plenty of time to look around before the concert began. My favorite thing was the class pictures. The old school had the senior pictures for each class in large frames going up and down the hallway. The new school has gone digital, with all the class photos displayed on a large touch screen mounted to the wall in the common area. You can choose a class to view and it brings up the pictures for the whole class. If you want to see a larger photo you can touch the student and it brings up a larger image. It was pretty cool.

Matthew 6:19-21 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. ESV

Mark 8:36 For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? ESV