SUNFLOWERS EVERYWHERE

by Robin

It turns out that I'm a much better sunflower farmer than vegetable farmer. LOL.



Honeybee!!!!


Tomatoes are pretty much covering up everything else that I was growing around them.


Wait, there's a child between the bolting lettuce & sunflowers.


I did my best to count these but kept losing track. So.... I photoshopped all the numbers in to keep it all straight. Can you guess?? (Answer below)




SPOILER PIC BELOW



We counted 46 sunflower blooms open on these 3 plants!!!!

Disclaimer: This has nothing to do with sunflowers.
Below, is simply the sun hitting the oak behind my house. I loved the red sun on the green leaves.

NANA AND PAPA's Visit

by Robin

A couple weeks ago, my parents came to visit me and I never really got a chance to post up their pictures. Many pics still haven't been resized to fit on the blog, but here's what I've got today. We had rapid fire photos taken of food, manatees, kids and more kids, and now Jack is on vacation for a couple weeks and so there are fishing pictures. It will take me some time to go through and put them here.

When Mom and Dad are here, we always eat specialty foods that we don't normally. Here is Mom and Jack eating some seared tuna. Forgive the smudge. Cooking & cameras don't mix well.





On the 2nd day, we took a cruise in the river to eat at a marina luncheon where we had fish tacos. Yummy.





On the day back home, in the manatee zone, I was telling Dad about how all the grass floating on top was manatee food.



Ten minutes later, we're seeing a dozen manatees everywhere eating their lunch!!!











Must run!! Have a great day.

GARDEN REPORT - late May

by Robin

I guess I should probably update everyone quickly on the garden progress.

Bugs 1, Me 0

Some lovely leaf-eater has ravaged every one of my green bean plants. Everything else seems to be ok at the moment.

Herbs - Great
Lettuce - Bolting but eating it regularly
Onions - half-way done, blooming & I'm gathering seeds.
Tomatoes - making fruit but not ready
Sweet Bell Peppers - 2 picked so far
Hot peppers - growing but no color yet or picking
Blue Jays - talking strategy on how to eat my vegetables
Cucumbers - making male blooms. Still waiting for the girls. LOL





Onion bloom. I have a better pick, but this one is up already.


Lettuce blooms.




Serranos


Dill - ALWAYS wash your dill before you use it.


Interrupted my garden photo session.



Sweet Bell Pepper waiting for picking.


Have a great day y'all!! I'm fishing, but will be back next week.

Half-way Asleep

by Robin

I guess I'm not the only one half-way asleep this morning. I'm getting up at 5:30am Friday morning to go fishing.

My sunflowers are just beginning to open up. One if over 7 ft high. Two more at 6 ft. WOW. Hello Bees!!

SUMMER HAS ARRIVED!!

by Robin

And my blog has slowly fallen to the wayside, at the moment. Tuesday school was finished yesterday. We went to Universal Studios & Islands of Adventure as a family. It was AWESOME. Andrew is finally beginning to ride the roller coasters.

Jack is offshore today while I'm tidying up the house & doing chores. I pray that tomorrow, we're able to get offshore ourselves. (That is, if Jack can take any more exhaustion!)

The garden is growing great. I have taken some awesome pictures to share soon. We had a huge pool party on Saturday with 17 children & 9 adults here. What a blast!! Pictures to come!

The week before, my parents came and we had a seafood marathon. That is going to take several blog posts to share all the wonderful seafood that we ate.

Now......... if I could just find some time. ha ha.

God bless and I'm going to make an effort to get all this brought to you soon!
Robin

AGENDAS

by Robin

Something ate all my green beans while Mom and Dad were visiting this week. Pictures forthcoming as I get them all uploaded & downsized for the blog.

Oh boy, did we eat good! Lots of seafood to show you.

It was very sad to see them go, but we are tied together with heartstrings over the miles.

Stay tuned for pictures tonight or tomorrow. THEN, we have a big homeschool party at our house on Saturday. What a fun week!!!

THEN, V-A-C-A-T-I-O-N!!!!
Lots of fishing, themeparks and sunbathing involved!

Be blessed!
Robin

RAISING MUSICAL FISHERMEN

by Robin

Music runs in both Jack and my family, although, a whole lot MORE in my family. Jack's Dad played guitar in a band for many years and worked around town until he got married & had Jack on the way. My Dad & his family are primarily professional musicians. Therefore, many of my aunts, uncles, cousins and both my sisters are musicians (& music educators), as well as marrying men who are musicians & composers. Even the 4th generation of great-grandchildren to an Italian man who played woodwind instruments have turned into highly skilled young musicians, who are winning awards and turning heads.



There is no denying genetics having a strong role in our development of character. Even though neither Jack or I ended up as professional musicians, our appreciation for music still shows through. And hence, it has shown up in natural talent of our boys. We started them originally on recorders last year. Then, in the Fall, we swapped over to guitar for Simon Peter and piano for Andrew. While Simon Peter loved his new instrument, we had to coerce Andrew a bit to stay with piano. All that hard work paid off last night with a recital held at our church. Our church pianist teaches many children, so it was a 2 hr program.



I'm so proud of all the talented kids, but most proud of my two. Not only did they play exceptionally well, challenging pieces, but also had all their music memorized.

GARDEN REPORT - end of April

by Robin

These were taken around the 30th.


Sage blooms


Green bean blooms




Meschun lettuce mix




My first leaves for a salad.


Herbs, lettuce, hot peppers, sweet bell peppers


Beans, lettuce, onions (front), sunflowers (back), spinach rows died in heat.


Tall sunflowers (back), variety of tomatoes. That entire front row wasn't planted. Those are from last year's rotten tomatoes.


They're finally getting blooms on the tomatoes. FINALLY.


Happy Gardening!

Catch-up

by Robin

It's late but I wanted to post some of these up for family to see. (friends too!) Sorry I haven't been here in a while. Allergies have turned into major infections - sigh - temporary deafness from busted ear drums, throat ulcers, too many doctor appointments, etc. BUT, Andrew and I seem to be on the road to recovery finally.

In no apparent order......

I always wanted one of these....... now I have an excuse to buy it as an adult. Simon Peter takes biology next year and Andrew is taking Zoology - Land Animals. I figured we should have an animal we can examine thoroughly and without formaldehyde.


Andrew's Cottage Garden seeds are nearing bloom.


A special delivery for Simon Peter. Belated back-order Christmas gift.


First day of testing 2010. I think this is our 5th year of testing with our group.


Goofy picture. Why must they threaten the poor flowers?


Hopefully I'll get some garden pictures up for you tomorrow or the next day. Lots happening there.