Happy St. Patrick's Day!

A little early... but bulbs are starting to poke through! Tulips, daffodils, hyacinths all seem to be making their way out of their winter slumber. Even the hardy mums I put in the ground last Fall have some new growth, so yay!

Backyard Wildlife

A juvenile sharp-shinned hawk has been visiting our backyard recently:

First snow of the winter

We have probably 15 inches of snow at our house now, as a result of two storms last weekend. Here are some shots:

In just a few months, this area will be filled with tulips, hyacinths and daffodils!



And soon spring crops will be growing here, spinach, lettuce, etc.



This will be home to tomatoes, zucchini, etc.



Next year we'll see daffodils, hyacinths, day lilies, yarrow, creeping phlox and hydrangeas here:





And come summer we'll have pots of basil, rosemary, oregano and thyme here along with hanging baskets overflowing with bright, sun-loving flowers!



Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! See you in 2009!

Pumpkin pie and apple butter

We still have plenty of apples in the downstairs fridge, even after making this, apple butter:





And my first pumpkin pie, from roasted local pumpkin! It was delish, and I hope will be just as good when I make one for Thanksgiving on Wednesday.

Mmm...apples

Today I made my first apple pie completely from scratch. It's not too pretty to look at, but it certainly smelled good while it was baking. We haven't eaten any yet, but I will be eating a slice later tonight!



Heart shaped produce is fun!



I picked red cabbage, lettuce, brussel sprouts and some more carrots from the vegetable garden today. I'm not sure Steve will blog these or not, so I'll put them here, just in case!

Thanksgiving is right around the corner!

It's election day!

I'm putting up two posts today, so there is one new one below this one in case you didn't catch that. :-)

We've had frost, but I don't think we've had a hard freeze yet. This past weekend I finally did some work in the gardens. I cleaned things up, cut things back, and planted mums, asters and bulbs. Hopefully the mums and asters will make it through the winter to next year.



I added bulbs on the west, front side of the house to try and balance things out. Hopefully next Spring I'll have a shot of tulips, grape hyacinths and daffodils here!



Some things on the patio have not been hit by frost - one impatiens, a firecracker fuscia, and the eucalyptus.



The Japanese maple out back looks nice!



And this is that bush that has great little white flowers in the spring.



And the miscanthus looks pretty good, too! I should move these out from behind the Rose of Sharon.



The herbs are still doing okay, and it's going to be in the 60's the next few days, so I haven't done anything with them yet.



The Tabasco peppers were just ripening when it got cold, but we still got a few red ones! When Caleb and Ethan were here, Caleb ate one! He suffered for it, and ate another one two days later, the crazy kid.