What a WIN!

 

The Sacred Heart Field Hockey team was in Cambridge this past Monday for an afternoon game against the Harvard Crimson.

 

And what an exciting game it was!!

 

The game went into double-overtime with the score tied 1-1 and with just 1:17 remaining SHU scored to win the game, awesome!!  SHU is now 3-1 on this young season!!

 

Of course the win was just the icing on the day.  The day was absolutely beautiful; Emilie went with me and, not only got to see her big sister play, but also to watch an official field hockey game.  She has just started playing field hockey herself, so hopefully she picked up one or two tidbits of the game; and we both got to spend a little time with Stephanie after the game and before her 3+ hour bus ride back to Fairfield, CT.

 

WINNING!

Blue As Blue Can Get

 

Look how awesome and blue the sky was the other day!!

 

Just perfect!

Find The Critter

 

Can you find the critters in the above picture?!

 

You're looking for Squash Bugs.  Actually, they're still young, so technically you're looking for Squash Bug Nymphs...

Tomato Canning 2012 - Take II

 

JoAnne completed her second batch of tomato canning of the season yesterday!

I picked another (3) heaping 5-gallon buckets of luscious tomato's, which produced:
 

22 Quarts (44 to-date)

&

24 Pints (47 to-date)
 

I say, Giddy-Up!!

Carrots 2012

 

Picked the first four carrots of the season this afternoon!

 

There are many, many more to be picked too.

 

The rabbits are happy too, as they absolutely love snacking on the carrot tops.

 

It's a win win!

Oh Deer(s)...

 

Finally caught a glimpse of the deers that have been feasting on our perennials and raspberry plants.

 

Spoted them the other morning in the neighbors back yard.  Pictured is the mother deer. She only had one baby in tow this year.  Last year she had twins.  I was unable to get a picture of the baby, as it was bolting and zig-zagging all over the place and not standing still at all.  It was still spotted, so I'm guessing not too old and fun to watch.  However, the mother noticed me immediately, as you can see in the above picture, and quickly turned and ran into the woods with the baby following closely behind.

 

I'm sure we'll see them again and as long as they stay in the neighbors yard and eat their perennials we'll be good.

Eggplant - Violette di Firenze

 

Back in September of 2011 I placed an online seed order from a company called Seven Acre Seeds.

 

At the time I was after a different Garlic to plant and selected their hard-neck German White Garlic and what a winner that turned out to be!

 

Anyway, as a bonus with that order, Seven Acre Seeds, included several free packages of seeds to try.  For the life of me I can not recall what they all were except for this awesome eggplant, which is called "Violette di Firenze".  This is an heirloom variety from Italy and touted as one of the best tasting eggplants.

 

This was our first eggplant ever grown and harvested here at the ole homestead.  Also, and I will toot my own horn here, these plants were started indoor and as you can tell, transplanted successfully!

 

There are more on the way and we'll let you know how tasty these dudes are!

Tomato Canning 2012

 

JoAnne completed the first batch of tomato canning of the season on Friday!

 

So, (3) 5-gallon buckets of luscious tomato's made:

 

21 Quarts

&

24 Pints

 

Giddy-Up!!

Prankster In The Hen House

 

Looks like we have a joke-ster in the hen house!

 

One of the lady's thinks it funny to lay a bantam sized egg instead of the x-large egg they're supposed to be laying.

 

At the price feed I for one do not see the humor in this little prank.  They better shape up of they'll be shipped out!

Yummy Corn 2012

 

Here's our first mess of Silver Queen corn on the cob of 2012!

 

These were picked from already started plants that JoAnne bought at mark down from WalMart.  My to my surprise the plants transplanted and have done quite well.

 

Sadly, these dudes were not as tasty as they look.  They should have been picked a week or so earlier.

 

There's more coming along from seeds we planted so we have more locally grown, tasty corn to look forward to.

What Time Is It?!

I say, WHAT TIME IS IT?!

 

I can't hear you!

 

One more time, WHAT TIME IS IT?!

 

 

That's right, it's tomato canning time!!

 

The wife has her work cut for her for sure.  I just picked (3) heaping 5-gallon buckets full of beautiful, juicy tomatoes, yummy!  With plenty more on their way too.  She has the day off of work (her regular job) tomorrow but will still be working even harder here in the ole kitchen.

 

Of course I'm not doing all the work, at least not on the cooking side rather on the planting side, but I can honestly say it's well worth all the hard work and oh so delicious too!!

Find The Critter

 

Can you find the critter in the above picture?!

 

You're looking for a Green leafhopper...

The Vines Are Taking Over!

In keeping with the theme of seeds I started indoors this Spring, here are our Butternut squash plants.  I don't remember how many seeds I planted but (4) grew, which I transplanted outside when the weather was right.  Today, they're taking over this section of lawn but this was to be expected and fine with me, less grass to cut on a weekly basis.

In this jumble of creeping vines are a couple gourd plants, see first picture above.  I transplanted these plants out of the compost pile. They're last year's Halloween decorations that we composted and they reappeared in the Spring for another run at Halloween 2012.

From what I can tell, it looks like there are oodles and oodles of both butternut squash and gourds.  They're simply too massed together to be able to get in there for an accurate count. But that's fine and adds to the harvesting surprise come fall.

Now if I could just keep the vines from climbing the fence and the nearby shrub that would be nice.

They're Called "Teddy Bear" Sunflowers

What do you think of these little beauties?!  Cool ain't they!

They're called "Teddy Bear" sunflowers.

The plants themselves are short, can't be more than 3' high.  However, I'm not sure if this is to be expected or perhaps a results of, (a) being started in doors and/or (b) the crazy, wacky Spring weather we had.

In any event I love em!  They're unique looking and add some pizazz to the garden.  They also contrast well to the "Mammoth" sunflowers that Emilie and I planted.  Those dudes are well over 7' tall - pictures to follow soon.

It's Hibiscus Blooming Time, 2012

Our lone hibiscus plant is in the midst of blooming!

The flowers are absolutely beautiful, just wish they lasted longer.

Anyway, where there is a hibiscus plant the dreaded hibiscus sawfly isn't too far behind, see top picture above.  It's been that way ever since we first planted ours several years ago.  I visit the plant daily and squish the sawfly worms, which seem endless.  They do a number eating the leaves, see above, and this example of an eaten leaf is not too bad.

Fortunately, the sawfly doesn't seem too bright or fast.  I'm able to catch them with relative ease and squish them.  Now the potatoe beatle is sneaky and fast, they're harder to catch.  But in the end, they all squish the same, which is well worth it as long as the plants can reap the benefits.

Mmmm A Berry Good Time!

YUMMY!

Our thornless black raspberry plants are rewarding us with nice plump, juicy and delicious berries!

We have only (2) plants, which I transplanted several years ago from my folks house, but they've finally taken hold and doing quite well despite the hot humid weather.  These beauties came direct from a famous Tennessean by the name of Faber, Joe Faber.  He's known for his green thumb and rumor has it he's quite the fisherman too!

Hope I can parlay these two plants into about a dozen more.  In the meantime, we'll enjoy the berries we get today.  Bring on the vanilla ice cream!

Miscellaneous Attic Toys

Miscellaneous Vintage toys:

(from left to right)

Playskool Jumbo Beads - pre 1964

Gem Color Company Magic Wood - 1957

Wm Knox Gismo the Construction Set - 1960

Whitman Krazy Ikes - 1964

Haslam 32-Piece Chess Men - pre 1964

Spot The Critter

Can you spot the critter in the above photo?

If not, here's a close up of the dude.

Cluck Cluck Cluck Cluck Cluck Cluck Cluck Cluck

Despite the heat and humidity the ladies are happy and content these days and continue to supply us with 4 to 6 eggs each day.

I do have to say that these girls are some of the noisiest chickens I've ever owned.  They're extremely boisterous and proud when they lay their eggs and carry on something aweful and equally so when it comes to visiting and inquisitive critters, i.e. a local cat that comes around occasionally.

Perhaps, they're competing with the neighbor's dogs to see who can be the most obnoxious and annoying.  Sadly, the dogs win that contest in a landslide.

Flower Managerie 2012

Gotta love when the flowers are flowering!

The bees and butterflies and insects galore are enamored with them too!

Zinnia Sampling 2012

I'm on a flower posting kick...

We have a bunch of planters that we filled with various annuals this past Spring and all are looking great!  Even with the hot and humid weather we've been having, these potted plants get special attention and watered almost daily.

As a thank you they're rewarding us with outstanding blooms!  Here are several of the Zinnias!

Daylily Sampling 2012

Here's a sampling of just a few of the many daylillies we have scattered throughout our yard.

Unfortunately, these beauties don't last too long, but while they're around they impress!

My favorite is the double orange!

Move Over!

Four nest boxes to choose from but these two ladies prefer to share the same one.  Actually, it's strange how most of the eggs, from our six hens, are laid in this same nest box.  Almost never in the bottom two nests, weird.

In the end it doesn't matter to me which nest box the eggs are laid in, so long as the girls continue to lay them.  You just can NOT beat (no pun intended) fresh, just laid eggs, yummy!

World of Family Fun Bingo

1971 vintage World of Family Fun Bingo game by Hasbro

Play Ball!

Just wanted to provide proof that this years garlic is in fact the size of an official baseball!

And it's delicious too!

Our Beautiful Sunset

Check out our stunning sunset from a couple weekends ago!

This was created just for us!

Jealous?

Hosta Haircut and More

The woodchuck war wages on here at the ole homestead.  As you can see above, they're done a number on this hosta.  Fortunately they're not bothering with our vegetable garden, which I believe are simply too far away from their comfort zone.  However, they are doing a number on the perennials along the end of the woods - the hostas, comfrey, cornflower, balloon flower and even the raspberry plants.

I've set the trap several times but with this crazy hot, humid weather the bait just doesn't last, so no luck yet.  I've found two of their holes and in an effort to get them to move I've cleared the over growth around both holes and even dropped shovels full of Trixie's droppings - no luck. 

These dudes are way more allusive then those in the past, as I've only seen them once or twice but clearly, by the defoliation, they're out there.  I'm patient and will eventually eradicate them, mark my words!!

Trixie Dog - Help Me!

Bath time.

I'm pretty sure she's thinking, put down the silly camera, get over here and help me!

She just loves to lay spread eagle on the kitchen floor, especially when it's hot.

We lucked out, she's a really good dog.

The Proverbial Needle in A Haystack

So, we've been struggling with a leak in our pool.

We've been loosing water almost as fast as we've been adding it.  Of course the lack of rain and the hot, humid weather we've been suffering does not help the situation.

Have had the pool company that installed our new liner on-site several times but the crew (rookies) have been unsuccessful in determining room cause or locating.  They did pressure test the lines, which all came back fine, and visually checked the entire liner, with focus on known areas that tend to give way first, and found nothing.

They did, however, mark the water line each time then came out with electrical tape, see above.  All this did was give us a visual at the water loss.  Like watching money go down the drain...

So, last week I ran a series of tests and in the end I determined that in the 48 hour testing period we lost 1" of water.  Now keep in mind our pool measures 20'x40'. so 1" is a lot of water.

Much to our surprise the owner of the company stopped over this past Sunday evening and within 5 minutes identified where the leak was!  He chalked this up to "years of experience".

It ended up being in the one location that was NOT touched with the installation of the new liner.  It was the seal behind the water return jet coming out of the fiberglass stairs. The under side had simply worn away, which you couldn't see unless you were under water looking up.  The good old, pool guy leak test proved out his theory - simply squirt this dye in and around the affected area and watch the dye get sucked into the hole and gone.

Sealed the entire area around this jet with a special underwater sealer and WA-LA, no more leak!

Perfection

1973 vintage Perfection game by Lakeside

Moon Over Echinacea

How's this for a balancing act?!  Pretty cool I thought.

This is a purple cone flower, otherwise known as Echinacea, with the leaf of a peach tree perched half-moon like on top.  This was not staged. This is how I found these two hanging out.

My guess is you could look high and low for years and never find something like this.  Think I'll play the lottery.

Play Ball, Well Sort of...

First garlic of 2012!

I harvested (6) of our garlic this past Sunday and have them hanging on the clothesline to dry!

I was very surprised at the size when I dug the first one out.  It was about the size of a baseball, no kidding!  The picture above doesn't show the size that well.  I will need to take another with a baseball included, so you can see what I am talking about and also to prove that I am not exaggerating. The other five followed suit and are about the same size, they're monsters, yummy!

Without going outside to count at the moment I'm guessing we have about 30 more plants to harvest.  We're going to have garlic coming out of our ears.

Again, I will need to check to see what kind of garlic these are and be sure to plant the same in the same in the future.

First Cucumber of 2012

These are the first two cucs of the summer and boy were they tasty!

Sadly, our cucumber plants are not doing nearly as well as they did last year, not even close.  Although, planted in the same location, this years plants pale in comparison - they're much smaller and have yet to really get climbing up the trellis.  I need to look back to see what I planted last season versus this.  I'm sure the super hot, humid weather isn't helping too much, even though we've been hand watering almost every night.

In any event we'll take what we can get and enjoy each and every bite!

Blue Sky!

Here is a visiting Northern Oriole sitting atop one of the tallest tree on our property.  I'm gonna guess somewhere in the 120' to 150' mark.

Talk about a birds eye view!

These dudes have been around all Spring and often times I'll see them in and around this Boxelder tree.  I'm guessing they have a nest hanging in there somewhere.  I bet come fall, when the tree is bare of leaves, we'll be able to spot it.

First Tomatoes of 2012

Here are our first two tomatoes of the summer, yahoo!

The plants are beautiful and have, once again, taken over the garden.  So much so that it's almost impossible to walk amongst them to water, let alone pick the ripe ones, but we'll git-er-dun!

We're Here to Pump You Up!

So, after running an errand to Patriots Place late Monday morning I decided to stop in and have a quick lunch at Five Guys Burgers and Fries.  I've seen it, I've heard about it, I've walked past it many times.  We even have a new store that opened up in my town but have never been, so I went.

The burger was good and tasty, as were the fries but very greasy.  Certainly not a place I'd eat in too often but not too bad for a change.

Ironically, when I was standing in line waiting to place my order there were two dudes standing behind me talking about the gym.  One proceeded to make this profound statement, "I don't go to the gym.  The gym is my life.  That's all I do is the gym." - deep right.  So, the first thing that comes to mind is, 'if your such a gym rat and into working out, why are you standing in line for food at a Five Guy's joint?  Shouldn't you be at GNC picking up some supplements and bark and stuff?!"

Of course I was curious at what Arnold Schwarzenegger junior was all about and was NOT surprised to some some early twenty year old weenie standing there.  I would NOT have picked him out of a line up of health, gym-rats, nope.  Just your typical everyday weenie...

NILE

1967 vintage Nile-The ancient game of strategy. As old as the pyramids! game by Lowe

We've Updated & Upgraded

Before

After

We pulled the trigger and decided to have our garage doors replaced!  It was time, as they were the original ones installed when the house was built.  They were solid, heavy wooden door but the New England weather had taken it's toll on them.  Many of individual panels were bowing and starting to separate; you could see daylight between some, so it was time.

We went with pretty much the same style but changed it some and had the windows moved to the top.  The new doors are aluminum, so they much lighter, and have much higher rating on their insulation value as compared to the old wooden ones.  It's something like an R-value of 8 with the new versus a 1+ with the wooden.

Hopefully this will keep the garage better insulated, which we're hoping has a positive effect on the family room above where we spend most of our time.

Now, onto the next home improvement project.  Just need to win Megabucks, alas...

First Squash of 2012

Behold, our first Summer and Zucchini squash of the season!

We picked them back on 7/1 and have picked oodles since.

We could use some much needed rain...