Ramblings-n-Writings

Archive for the ‘down on the farm’ Category

I looked out my living room window earlier today and discovered this …

Mandy, the farm beagle, apparently decided that curling up in the flower pot equaled the perfect nap spot. Good thing the flowers in the pot had already died!

I’m glad for the little unexpected things in life that make me smile.

For more ABC Wednesday photos, click here (today’s letter is “C”). For more Wordful Wednesday, click here.

Why is it that whenever I get around to doing a blog post, something always goes wrong? This post was originally intended for Garden Vines, but little gremlins invaded the site and I couldn’t post. So, I thought I’d share it with you.

If you’ve been around here for any length of time, you’ll know that I love my flowers. I haven’t shared much about my gardens this year, so I thought I’d give you a peek. (Clicking on a photo should make it larger.)

Why is it that whenever I sit down, dream up a bunch of writing projects, plan a blogging schedule, and am content with how things are finally fitting together someone throws a wrench in the wheel???

I was feeling so good about everything last week. Even my body was cooperating – for those that don’t know, I’m cursed blessed with a crazy ride on the hypothyroidism bandwagon.

And then Friday happened. I woke up to a loud crack of thunder just as the skies opened up and the rains came down.

We have a small mountain stream coming out of the hills behind our house. The stream feeds into 18 inch culvert pipe that runs under our yard and out on the other side of the driveway.

After an average rain, the stream looks like this …

That photo was from last November. Notice the high bank, about 4-1/2 to 5 ft, on the left side.

When I first looked outside Friday morning, the stream was barely running. In fact, it looked sorta like this …

That’s actually from 5 days before, but you get the idea. It didn’t even look like that first picture.

About 15-20 minutes after the skies opened up Friday morning, the stream looked like this …

Um, yeah… Quite shocking. Water was roaring out of the hills. And, honestly, I haven’t seen that much water in our stream in the 5 years we’ve lived on this property.

I immediately realized something was blocking the entrance to the culvert pipe. I called for help, ran to get a shovel, and proceeded to almost lose the shovel in the pipe. The suction was so strong against the pipe that there was no way to pry what we later discovered was a log away from the pipe entrance.

Because the log was blocking the bottom portion of the pipe, the dirt and small rocks washing down the stream started to pile up. Before it was all over, we had a 4 foot high island in the middle of the stream and a sandbar in the backyard.

Remember the photo with the daisies? Here’s Spot standing on the island.

Notice he’s almost level with the top of the bank? He’s standing where the bottom pool of water is in the daisy picture. Crazy, huh?

So, that mess is what consumed most of our Friday morning and afternoon. Then, just when things were getting back to normal, our electricity went off. *sigh*

Not only were all my ideas for Friday totally messed up, but it rolled over into Saturday too. No computer work. Almost no housework done. Seems like I did a little bit of nothing since it was incredibly hot Friday night with the humidity level at 90%. If you blinked your eyes too many times, you broke into an immediate sweat. Yuck!

What have I learned these past weeks after periodically losing our DSL, the flooding, and no electricity? Flexibility!!! And not to sweat the small stuff. What day I post a blog post is no big deal even though it stresses me out when I can’t do it like I plan. It’s all about flexibility.

And even with all the ugliness of the water, there’s still beautiful things, such as these …

We rode the 4-wheeler up into the woods last night. Naturally, the puppy pack followed along. And it’s quite the trudge up the mountain especially if you’re of the 4-legged species. Here’s the thanks we got for inviting the dogs …

Can you say MUD? Ack!

Unfortunately, that was the only watering hole with enough water in it for the dogs to drink out of. Why Honey insisted on getting a mud bath I’ll never know. All I knew was she WAS. NOT. coming in my house for the night!

We discovered that the dogs aren’t the only ones appreciative of this watering hole …

Those are deer tracks! Mandy, the farm beagle, was incredibly interested in the smells, but she behaved and followed us. Shocking, I know. Beagles can be soooo stubborn.

While the dogs appreciated the exercise and water, I enjoyed the scenery. Not much to look at except for trees …

But to me, that’s a beautiful site. I grew up in a heavily wooded area and sometimes I simply miss being surrounded by trees. We have woods that border our yard, but there’s nothing like being in the middle of nowhere in the woods.

Peace. Fresh air. Nature sounds. Freedom. Quietness. Praise God!

For more Wordful Wednesday, click here.

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Did you ever go to summer camp as a kid? I did! And today, I’m guest blogging over at Jendi’s Journal about one of my summer camp memories. Make sure you stop by and say hi!

If you’ve been around Ramblings-n-Writings for awhile, you’ll know that I love hummingbirds. I count the days until ours return in the spring, faithfully watching the migration map, and mourn the time when they leave us for winter.

Last year, at the old house, we had feeders hanging from our porch roof so we could watch the hummies come and go. This year, in the new house, we don’t have porch roof and I couldn’t bear the thought of not seeing the little ones buzz around.

I hung a feeder in the garden off of a shepherd’s hook, but I couldn’t see the feeder from the window. Then, while at Wal-Mart a couple of weeks ago, I discovered a neat suction cup thing that lets you hang a feeder (hummingbird or regular bird) from a window.

I came home and promptly attached it to our living room window. Now I can see the hummingbirds every day! And, even with all the storms and wind, the feeder has stayed attached to the window!

Besides watching the little ones, I love taking their photos. It takes some patience, but the more the hummingbirds get used to my presence, the easier it becomes to snap their photo.

Since I’ve spent a lot of time outside the past few weeks, mainly relaxing in the sun while reading a book or working in the garden, the dive bombers are finally getting used to me. They no longer detour away from the feeder when they spot me.

Then this weekend, we got a surprise. We had two, sometimes three, hummingbirds that frequented our two feeders (one on the window, one in the garden) ever since the hummies arrived in April.

Suddenly, I started hearing a lot of hummingbird screeches and tweets. I went outside to watch and immediately came back in for cover. We have 5, possibly 6, hummingbirds! I managed to count 5 in the vicinity of the feeder at one time.

I’m not sure where the others came from, but I’m glad they’re here. We averaged about 8 last year, but that was after the babies started flying about.

Even though it’s now life threatening to walk across our front porch as the hummies zip and zing around, it’s neat to watch 2 or 3 hummies sit together on the feeder and eat. While capturing some of their action today, I discovered that a hummingbird wing is translucent…

You can click on the photo to make it bigger. Notice that you can still see the outline of his head and the flower stems behind him through the wings. How neat is that?

And, here’s a little lady sitting pretty…

Here’s a handy tip: If ants frequent your feeders, smear a little bit of vaseline on the top hook and on the top of the feeder. The ants can’t travel through the vaseline. Also put small quantities of hummingbird food (I use 1/4 cup sugar to 1 cup water, no red dye and no boiling necessary) in the feeder until the ants are deterred (that’s why my feeder looks empty). No sense in feeding the little critters more than necessary!