Larry, Ron also had a denture put in immediately. I thought it was awful to put it in on raw gums, but he says it protects the sore spots.

H/J, I called several TSCs. Ours didn't have plants at all. The one in Bartlesville had plants but not Brussels Sprouts. They are a nemesis plant for me, so if I don't get them...oh well.

I need to plant carrots, beets, turnips, rutabagas and spinach. I have lettuce plants to put in my planter, but eventually some seeds in the ground. What else? Some fresh kale and chard, I suppose. When the sorghum comes out, that bed gets Elbon rye. I have hairy vetch for next years tomato beds....if I can decide what those will be. I might have to get some winter peas.

Cucumbers, planted late, are flowering, but so far no cukes. Why do they want to cling to the asparagus instead of the trellis? Also trying to smother okra. Some are battling volunteer cowpeas that want to take over. I have a bed (where the sorghum is) that had nematodes. The volunteer cowpeas are unphased. I put Rattlesnake pole beans in there, but something above ground ate them and they couldn't compete with the cowpeas. My husband is bothered by my hodge podge jungle, but if a plant volunteers and it's not in the way, I let it grow. I didn't plant ANY cowpeas this year, but I have plenty out there, lol. If it weren't for diseases, I would just let everything self seed. I sowed lettuce under the tomatoes and it all went to seed. I hope to have volunteers next spring. BTW, Baker Creek no longer has my favorite lettuce! Chadwick's Rodan. I found a couple of other sources, but no one I've purchased from before. I have so many lettuce varieties. I got carried away ordering it this year. But I really like Chadwick's Rodan. There are melons on the volunteer musk melon (from a store bought melon). I have planted melons before with no success, this silly plant is very vigorous. I also have an Asian melon growing, but no flowers yet.

I've got several seed web sites open in my browser, but I haven't pushed the purchase button yet. I need an inventory, I can't remember what I have used up.

Well, I'm rambling. Everyone have a lovely holiday and a great week.

Amy, wish Ron well with his teeth! I hope they got a good fit on the first try! Will he be off work for a few days?

We're both tired of colds, but they were super easy colds, at least. Cept mine ended up in my left eye, so hoping that clears up sooner rather than later. Haha re having several seed web sites open.

Do you all get the "Native American Seed" catalog? What a work of beauty it is! Oh my. I think I'll be too broke to go to Bustani's after I get done with these guys! Amy, they have American beautyberry seeds. I'm going to get some. I was reading the reviews on Dave's Garden page; sounds easy to grow from seed. Can any of you affirm?

Got a kick out of your post, Larry. I am like you. I HATE driving to town. I don't mind being in town, I just don't like spending time driving.

With all our rain the past week--and some of it brutal, apparently, I'll be taking out the rest of the tithonia that got knocked silly. That bed will be empty, but it'll work great because I need to add more soil to it and then turn it into a milkweed/rudbeckia bed. And some beautiful salvia. And yep, Dawn, gotta get that milkweed in this month. And speaking of crab grass! WOW does the crabgrass love my beds. It's quite out of control. On thing good about it is, they clumps are so huge, one can clear five clumps and the weeding's done. :)

Everyone have a super dooper Monday!

Dawn and anyone else planting wildflowers- do you have to work up the ground or can you overseed a plot? I have a huge pasture area of several acres that we cut for hay. It is full of native grass, bluestem, lespedeza, and several clovers as well as a thick stand of Indian paintbrush and a few other wildflowers like coreopsis, blackeye susans, etc. I would like to add more wildflowers without disturbing what is there. When I plant clover - I plant more every year - I scatter it In cow patties. That makes a perfect hotbed where it’s warm, inoculated, stays moist, and the cattle won’t eat as soon as they germinate. Will that work for wildflowers like Indian blanketflowers, bluebonnet, and such as those? Where is the most economical place to buy wildflower seed?

I have so trouble with this tablet,it is easier to post pictures first.

The first picture is my bell peppers and poblano peppers. Both have strange growing habits this year. The bell are very low and bushy. The poblano grow about like a weeping willow. Both produce well, but hard to keep tied up.

The second picture is of my hot peppers. All were very stunted when planted and still are, but producing well.

You can tell from this post that I have more problems with this tablet than I do with my garden. The second picture looks up side down to me, I hope it post correctly

The second picture did not post, just take my word for it, my peppers look very strange, but are producing well.

My hot peppers weren't hot this year. I read your post about why, Dawn. But am grumpy. What a waste hot peppers are if they're not hot! :) Were yours hot, Larry? And, Larry, there wasn't a second picture! I'm curious to hear the answer, farmgardener, though it's not really applicable to me.

Larry, I think your peppers look good.

Nancy, my jalapenos are HOT. I pickled some a couple of weeks ago and we brought them out at lunch because we had tacos. I was expecting them to be mild, but they are extremely hot! The plants are so small this year as are the fruit.

Amy, keep looking! Someone around there must sell brussels sprouts. I planted them, as well as the broccoli and cauliflower tonight. I only bought a 6 pack of each. I hope they do well. It's going to be so hot this week. The bed they are in get some shade in the afternoon.

I also planted parsley plants.

We bought the stuff for the hinged hoop, but need to cut a large branch off a tree before we put it together. Hopefully that will happen tomorrow.

Arugula is growing all over that bed. Can't wait to get it all planted.

I just dozed off while typing this haha! I guess I should go to bed soon.

Oh, I bought 2 crepe myrtles. They are called Red Hot, I think. I was able to get one planted tonight. I'm also very excited about them.

I had a weird situation. On FB Plant Traders a woman was looking for autumn joy. I have some and she was supposed to come get it at 3 yesterday. She rescheduled because she said she was out running errands with her husband. So, I told her I would leave it and some tansy if she wanted it too, near the front porch and she could drop by and get it. It's still sitting there. I'm pretty sure I saw her drive by late yesterday evening. It was a couple who don't live in our neighborhood snyway. We were all outside doing various things. I was pulling Bermuda out of an area I want to make a new flower bed. Ethan was standing on the retaining wall talking to me and Tom was doing something too. Why wouldn't she stop? Maybe she thinks we look too hillbilly or something. I don't know. So odd. We exchanged several private messages, but I haven't heard from her since that final message about leaving them near the porch. Maybe she looked at it the plants and they aren't what she was looking for.

I'm not doing that again, though. I had to dig it up off the back fence and that was not fun. I should just unsubscribe from that group maybe.

Nancy and Dawn, crabgrass is out of control this year. I'm pretty sure our entire property will be crabgrass soon.

Hazel do your pepper plants look like these? Normally this late in the year my peppers would be close to 4 ft.ft.tall. these are less than 18 inches. A lot of the leaves you see are sweet potatoes, they want to take over the garden....Did you. buy bonnie plants? Started some and bought some but I can't remember which ones. You stated small plants and made me think that bonnie sold a small type of plant this year.

I hope you can read this, besaise I can not

Larry, my peppers plants are about the same size as yours...and they also are usually close to 4 ft tall by this time of the year. And we usually have more peppers than we know what to do with. We are still getting them....just not as many and the plants are small.

My peppers were started from seed back in February, I think. A few more were started in May when I thought all of them would drown so I started replacements. None have died, but they just look...stunted, although healthy in a weird. Basically they are much smaller than normal. A few of them were gifts from forum members as well; Bruce and Eileen.

The brassicas were purchased plants. They are Bonnie plants. I just looked at them and they aren't liking the heat much. They seem a little wilted. Probably time to drag out the shade cloth because the next several days are showing to be in the 90s. BOO!

trying to use my phone for pictures. I am not a very good shot, I got more hand than jalapenos.--------------but I will learn.

2019 shall be known as the year of the volunteers. Last year I had a bed that was all volunteers. This year all the beds have volunteers. Mostly cow peas, but I've found tomato plants I've missed. There's a couple of ground cherries in the asparagus and I found long beans in there today. There is of course the cosmos. I think the whole neighborhood will have cosmos next year, because the house sparrows seem to be eating that seed. There is the musk melon volunteer in the pepper bed where we also have basil, cilantro and cowpeas that volunteered. There is wild purslane and domestic purslane and I think a Jewels of Opar. Tulsi. I'm sure there's more. There were probably volunteers in the flower bed, but I have given up on that. We will dig out the four o'clocks, mums, maybe cone flowers if I can find them and Autumn sedum. I will start new tansy from seed. I'll dig up a small comfrey. Verbena if I can get to it. After that we're removing those beds. They're nothing but bermuda, johnson grass and lambsquarters. I can't reach all the way across the beds, so the back was always weedy. There needs to be a new plan.

I've never had a 4' tall pepper plant. Well, maybe the Figitelli Sicilia, Sweet Pepper, which sprawled, but that was an exceptionally good pepper year. I have lots of pimento peppers and that makes me happy.

H/J, don't meet people at your house to trade plants! They may have been looking to rob you. My son did that with a truck he was selling. The people came back and stole the truck. Hard lesson learned.

Ron's going back to work today, but he's still eating soft foods. I think his top lip is still kind of purple, but the bruises under his eyes and the edges of his mustache are lighter. His face is still a little puffy.

My youngest son mowed for us yesterday. We were at the grocery store and came home and Ron said he got more done in an hour than Ron gets done all day.

Hope everyone had a nice holiday.

Oh, I forgot I have baby asparagus all over, too.

Amy, it was on the Plant Traders thing...so I felt okay about meeting them. I can see her profile, etc. But, you're right...maybe it's a fake profile or something. OR maybe we scared her off by our hillbilliness. I don't know.

Do you watch Root and Refuge? She has a recent video about volunteer plants...and wondering what it would be like to let the garden just grow from volunteers. I'll put the video here so you can watch if you like.

She also talks about chickens at the end of the video and wraps it up with a good thought for me... which is remembering to be grateful once something becomes common to you, I can't remember how she worded it, but it was basically how she wanted chickens so badly for so long and she got them...and now they are just commonplace to her. It's good to take a minute and be thankful for the things you've been given even if they are just in your regular life now. I can relate to that so much because I'm always planning the next thing and am never completely satisfied with what we've accomplished, if that makes sense.

ANYWAY, you might be interested in the first part of the video where she looks at her volunteer plants.

Hope Ron heals quickly!

Hazel, I hope Ron heals quickly.

I went out a few minutes ago and picked peppers and okra to give to my neighbor. I will give you a better picture of how small the jalapeños are. My other peppers are a little small, but as much so as the jalapeños. I placed my pocket knife next to them for comparasion .

Well I found my brussel sprouts today along with some brocolli and califlower . I'm a happy guy at the moment. Now, if I can just keep the heat and the bugs and the rabbits from doing it in .

I got a roll of chicken wire while I was at it. The cages should take care of the rabbits at least.

okmulgee boy

I had a surprise harvest yesterday. My first cup of PEPH, one okra pod, tiny peppers, 2 hidden cucumbers, and a handful of cherry tomatoes. Well, there were more tomatoes, but you probably know what happened to them. I went out intending to rip out a bunch of stuff, but most of it is still there. The cooler weather and rain perked up a lot of things. I only yanked out 2 cucumbers and 2 tomatoes. Since I wasn’t yanking out everything I thought I was going to, I kind of shoehorned the cabbage and broccoli in around other things. At least the tomatoes will shade them until it gets cooler.

The cucumbers that got to stay are Tasty Green. They’ve survived well enough that they get another shot next year. Dawn, your beloved County Fair cucumbers were a huge bust for me. Only one golfball sized cuke all season, full of some disease. Might go back to Little Leaf next year. I don’t think Brandy Boy will make an appearance next year. The squirrels got the first few tomatoes, then septoria put it down fast. The Heidi aren’t surviving the septoria nearly as well as they did last year, and Porter (if they really were) was the first ones down. I’m starting my own seeds for those next year. The beefsteaks and two remaining EG are getting a second wind, so for now they stay, as do the Fourth of July and Gardeners Delight. I think Ma Nature is making next years grow list for me. The family wants only red tomatoes next year, any size. So more Sungolds for me.

My now 7 foot tithonia is propped up by my neighbors fence, but is alive and blooming.

I desperately need to make pesto.

This is was a lousy year for flowers. Almost none of my multitudes of cosmos ever bloomed. I didn’t feed them and even started them in old used soil. Is there such thing as sterile or bull cosmos?

I think the invasion of poke weed and cucamelon vine are the squirrels way of getting back at me for the Great Tomato War. Although, I’m not fighting them for the piles of half eaten green pecans all over the yard.

I have another of those weird hybrid morning glory/tomato plants this year too

Amy, There is nothing wrong with rambling. I need to do a seed inventory too before I order seeds for next year. I'm pretty sure I have a lot of the flower seeds I'll need, but I need to write it all down to verify that, and then manage not to lose it.

Nancy, Beautyberries sprout everywhere in our woodland, so I don't think they are hard from seed. There's a new one along our southern property line---right in the middle of the barbed wire fence with half on our side and half on our neighbor's side, so I'm sure a bird planted that one. It came up out of nowhere either this year or maybe it was there last year and I didn't notice. It is about 4' tall already and covered in the lilac-colored berries right now. Birds love them. There's one in the middle of my southern garden fence line that is the same way, and I just cut it back whenever it starts sticking out too far into the driveway. It has been there about a decade, so we couldn't dig it out and move it if we wanted to without really messing up the fence, because it has been there so long. They are not happy in full sun in our droughts, but they are fine the rest of the time.

Farmgardener, Well, the wildflower seed companies tell you to prepare a plot before you sow the seeds, but I don't do it. My reasoning is that the existing wildflowers in the fields and bar ditches self-sow just fine every year, so why shouldn't the purchased, broadcast-sown wildflower seeds also sprout just fine? Before we sow seeds, we cut the pasture down pretty short, wait a week or so for the grass clippings to sort of settle down onto the soil surface and begin to decompose and then overseed the pasture with a wildflower seed blend. We've had really good results when we do this any time between mid-Sept and mid-Nov. We don't sow new seeds every year, just once every few years as needed if we notice in any given year that the flowers in the pasture are sort of thinning out (more common after a drought year when the plants burned up in the heat/drought before they could reseed). We had to reseed for two years in a row after the horrific drought of 2011 in order to get good stands of wildflowers again. You can walk around tossing handfuls of seed by hand, or you can mix your wildflower seeds with sand as a filler to spread them out a bit and sow with a broadcast fertilizer spreader. One year I used one of those handheld Whirlybird spreaders to sow the poppy seed mix, mixed with sand. I used a lot of sand because poppy seeds are tiny and I didn't need for 200 of them to sprout in one square inch. I probably used a ratio of 20 parts of sand to 1 part poppy seeds, and we had nice even coverage when the plants sprouted. I think that was our first or second year here.

I usually order wildflower seeds from Wildseed Farms down in the Fredericksburg, TX, area. They have a great TX-OK blend. I think they have two---one that is strictly natives, and one that is not. I l love their poppy mix, and I also like their Firecracker 234 mix, which is annual flowers for a quick impact since some wildflower seeds, like Bluebonnets, have hard coats that mean they sometimes can germinate slowly over several years instead of all at once. (I do think that Wildseed now acid-scarifies their Texas bluebonnet seeds to help ensure they germinate more quickly.) I don't sow the Firecracker mix until Feb or Mar. You also can buy packets (in various quantities) of individual species of wildflowers, and they now carry a few culinary herb seeds and some simple garden flowers like sunflowers, cosmos and zinnias too. This is where I buy seeds of Laura Bush petunias. I do not know if they are the most economical wildflower seed supplier, but I know their quality is superb and they are my go-to wildflower seed supplier. I spend far too much time in autumn and winter looking through their print catalog, which you can request on their website. For some of the less common, harder-to-find species, you might like Native American Seed. Here's the webpage of Wildseed Farms:

Wildseed Farms

And, here's the webpage of Native American Seed.

Native American Seed Company

I haven't made it very far, but need to take a break to go see why I have hysterically barking dogs. I'll be back later.

Dawn

Larry, Technology is not my thing either. I'm lucky if I can get on the computer and do anything at all without messing it up to the point that it doesn't work at all.

I cannot help but think that whatever is going on in your garden is related to too much rain, at times, and too little sunshine. It has been such a peculiar weather year.

A waterproof phone can come in handy, you know. I had my phone slide out of my pocket and fall straight into a chicken waterer one day when I was filling up the waterer with the water hose. My phone was not waterproof, but was in a waterproof case, so it wasn't ruined.

Jennifer, I really think the stunted plants and/or smaller than usual peppers relates to the weather. I always get smaller peppers when we are in drought, as your garden was for much of the summer and, then, oddly enough you can see smaller peppers when there is too much rain because the rain leaches nutrients out of the soil, or at least away from the root zones of the plants. The solution for shorter plants or smaller peppers is usually to fertilize every couple of weeks with a good water soluble fertilizer (which only works if it isn't raining so much that it washes away the fertilizer before the plants find it).

As long as we are getting peppers, I don't care if they are smaller than usual as long as they have good flavor. I do deliberately choose varieties (Chichimeca, Mucho Nacho, Gigantea and the like) that produce very large peppers though, so even when they are smaller than usual, they are pretty big.When they are normal sized, they are huge. Mine have been a mixed bag this year---some as large as usual and others, produced on the same plants at the exact same time, much smaller than usual. It is what it is, I guess. At least there's peppers to eat.

I've got to agree with Amy on not inviting strangers to your house to swap plants. There are a lot of people out there using social media to find crime victims and it wouldn't surprise me if someone might pretend to want to come get plants when really all they're doing is looking for a home to burglarize. The world we live in now has changed so much from the much more innocent world we grew up in. There's so many evil people out there nowadays that you really don't know who you can trust. Someone who might drive on by and not stop and pick up the plants if the whole family appears to be home also might come back and burglarize your home, or worse, if only one person (or no one) is home. There's too many stories in the media news and on social media nowadays about people being burglarized. One of our neighbors recently had someone pull up into their yard and take a really, really nice riding mower and the trailer it was on. The thieves just hooked up the trailer to their truck and were gone in the blink of an eye. That's one reason I keep our gate closed and locked. You cannot be too careful. And, on the subject of gates, one of our ranching friends had a brand new pipe gate stolen right off his fence one night. Granted, it is pretty quiet here at night and there's not a lot of traffic up and down our road overnight, but it takes a lot of gall for someone to stop and steal your gate right off your fence, not even caring if your livestock get out. Thieves don't care. They'll steal anything they can get their hands on.

I agree about the crabgrass, and I'm not inclined to stay out in the garden in 95 or 97 degree heat the next few days pulling it out, either. I don't worry about it in the pastures or yard, but I thoroughly hate having it in the garden. I"ll clean it out later when the temperatures are so cool that I'm not likely to encounter snakes, because right now we have perfect snake weather, unfortunately.

Amy, It has been a great year for volunteers. One volunteer I really try to keep pulled is the asparagus because it comes up everywhere and is hard to get rid of if you let it get too deeply rooted. Comfrey also has reseeded everywhere, which is normal for it, but there's just so much more of it in the pathways this year. This winter, I may dig up all the comfrey from the front garden and relocated it to just outside the garden fence, where it can slug it out with the four o'clocks for control of the area.

Nancy, Your hot peppers will got hotter if the rain will stay away for awhile. As with tomatoes, excess moisture waters down the flavor...in this case, it is the heat that gets watered down, and who wants hot peppers without the heat?

okmulgeeboy, I'm glad your brussels sprouts showed up! Now, hopefully you can keep the young plants safe from hungry varmints and insects.

Rebecca, At least you are getting some sort of harvest. I do not understand why County Fair didn't produce for you. When I grow them, I end up canning 100+ jars of pickles a year and...well...guess what everyone gets for Christmas along with their Annie's Salsa? I missed making pickles this year, so probably will plant County Fair cucumbers in the back garden so I can spend part of the summer pickling since the whole front garden is going to be flowers.

Some cosmos plants are just really late to bloom because they are photoperiodic and need a really short day-length to bloom. I have had some not bloom until October some years. Mine have bloomed sporadically since I planted them in June/July and I expect better bloom in the fall. Well, technically it is fall now, but our daylength still probably isn't short enough yet, and our temperatures are so hot....I also think all the rainfall has been keeping a lot of plants too vegetative in growth and that is impeding flowering too. I'd like for September to be cool and dry, but I doubt I'll get either wish.

I haven't gardened any this week because I've been working on cleaning house and decorating it for autumn, at least indoors. It still is too hot to put pumpkins and such outdoors for fall decorations because they'll sunscald in this heat and sun. At least I'm getting the indoors decorating done. I have been cooking more too because it is too hot to work outdoors. The garden does look good though and I like that it is basically on autopilot right now and all I have to do is go in there occasionally to harvest and to deadhead the flower. I walk by it twice daily when I walk down to pick up the mail from the mailbox, and that counts as keeping an eye on it while not putting myself too much at snake risk. Tim got part of the yard mowed on Sunday or Monday, which made him a happy camper. If you just focus on looking at the pepper plants and the flowers in the garden, you can pretend you don't see any weeds there. The wildflowers in the front pasture are starting to bloom pretty well again after pretty much going dormant in the July heat and lack of rainfall.

The hummingbirds still have been swarming the feeders and the plants like maniacs. You can tell they are in a big feeding frenzy, fattening up themselves for their fall migration. I'm seeing both ruby-throated hummingbirds and black-chinned, though there's always far more ruby-throated ones. When I refilled the feeders yesterday, the birds could hardly stand the wait, and I take down, clean and refill one feeder at a time, so it isn't like they had to wait long, but they were very impatient. There's still tons of flowers for them, including trumpet creeper vines and chaste tree blossoms, so it isn't like they don't have other options. I love watching the hummingbirds and have to enjoy seeing them now because all too soon they'll be headed south. They never say good-bye, lol, so what usually happens is that one day I'll realize I haven't seen any in a couple of days and that's that. After that, we may get a few migrants coming through, but it isn't the same as having a yard full of them 24/7.

Everything is gloriously green and that's so lovely for this time of the year, but it is insanely hot and humid again. I wish the cold fronts would start rolling through and cooling us down. It is September and I'm ready for falling leaves and cool, crisp mornings, and those still seem to be quite a long ways off.

Despite receiving at least 8" of rain in the last month, we were paged out to a grass fire yesterday. I have no idea how there is any grass at all here that is dry enough to burn. There's certainly not any on our property that is dry like that. We also had a couple of medical calls and, sadly, they were for some of our very elderly neighbors whose heath issues are pretty much age-related, and you know, things for them are not going to improve much if any at all. It makes me sad for them, and it makes me sad to contemplate the fact that we're losing more and more of the old-timers here. There's already not that many of the really old ones left, and the ones that are closer to us in age aren't old enough for me to think of them as old-timers, because if I do that, then we are old-timers too.

Have a lovely day everybody and stay cool and hydrate!

Dawn

Heat index of 100 at the moment. GDW and I decided it was too hot to be working outdoors today. We went to town earlier today to run errands. . . . the church was one of our stops and we did it again--forgot they close during lunch hour. Grrr. So we went to Walmart, but our list was only like six items long. We walked really slow and looked at lots of stuff, but neither of us was in the mood to buy anything. How funny. I was driving, so took us on a tour of the town. It was interesting, actually. We've not done that before--and he'd never done it before I moved down. There are some really nice houses and some really beat up ones and sometimes next door to each other. The town is also a lot bigger than I'd realized it was. I mean, intellectually I KNEW it was 9,000, but I didn't have a good idea of how big 9,000 is. We didn't see more than 4-5 gardens, but 3 were really nice big ones. And one of those had a sign up that said, "Vegetables" for sale.

We got overheated just getting in and out of the car in town, so had to come home to cool off. And NOT going out. I finally did go out a while ago to do a bit of watering, and was noticing how LOVELY the sweet little Angelonias are! I thought I should take a picture of them to share with you, and to thank you, Dawn, for the recommendation of them. They are just now really beginning to shine!

Amy, did your ginger ever bloom?? Mine hasn't, and the tallest sprouts are probably 6' high now. I decided I am going to do ALMOST exclusively native plants this next growing session so will order all from Native American Seed.

I watched the video, HJ. Is she in our area? It was fun, though I'm not usually a you-tube person. I was just telling one of my northern friends that the glorious re-seeders are one of the things I love most about gardening down here.

When Garry and I were out in the veggie beds early today, I told him there was no way at all that I needed three Seminole squash plants or no way I needed to let that kudzu summer squash go, or even no way I need 3 cucumber plants (since all three are producing now). I will have to go into the squash and cucumber delivery business. Which we did with cucumbers the past couple days. Handed them off to neighbors on one side and in the back, to friends down the road, and took more into town today to the church. FUN! And I believe we'll have dozens of Seminole squash to share, too. And one of these days if the peppers ever get hot, will have dozens of those to share. Yes, I'm sure it's all the rain we've had.

AND, thank you, Farmgardener and Dawn for THAT discussion! You have inspired me! I'm going to sow wildflower mix to the far north part of the property. When you were talking about it, Dawn, light bulb went off in my brain!! YES! The flowers grow out in the grassy areas along the roads! Yay!I went over to see what the grassy area is, and the Bermuda hasn't made it over there yet; it's just crabgrass and wild grasses. And I happen to have a huge packet of wildflower seeds for sunlight. I was going to use them at the school, but we don't need them there now. And that area is full sun most of the day.

The Bermuda is headed that way though, so I'm going to solarize it, at least. No possible way to pull it. WAY too rocky. And too big an area for weedkillers, which I loathe, anyway. Any other ideas, anyone?

The enormous Miss Huff lantana that I dug up earlier this year (with great difficulty) and divided in half, then put one of them in the back Bermuda bed and the other in the shop bed. Now one of those is at least as big as the original one was and the other one's not far behind. The one in the back doesn't get much sun, so the flowers aren't as dense on it.

I'm not sure I'm done, but am going to quit for now. Blessings to you all.

Dawn, glad to see you post. I was getting worried.

Nancy, Root and Refuge are in Arkansas...so close.

Dawn, thanks for all the advice and the links on the wildflowers. I think I’ll buy seed and mix it up then plant some on top of the soil in likely looking spots and mix some with my clover and drop into manure piles. Keep in mind some are fresh but some are months old. Then I’ll monitor and find out what works best for us. We gave my daughter and grandson some land that is pasture but in the future will not have cattle grazing so might be perfect opportunity to try different planting techniques. I really appreciate all the suggestions.

Further proof that my squirrels are purposely making my life miserable. Last night I was out tending to the tomatoes (watering, feeding, tying up) and felt something pelting me on the head. I look up and see pieces of green pecans coming down at me from the tree.

You all are enablers! Every time I think I’m showing some restraint you’re here encouraging me to buy more seeds! Dawn, I redid my mason jar soil test for the blog and made a little something for you....

Nancy, I think your heat index was hotter than ours today, but we were plenty hot and miserable. I am just so completely over the heat that I can hardly bear to go outdoors right now. I'm just hibernating indoors other than going out in the mornings to feed the birds and then out in the evenings to lock up the chicken coop. The dogs and cats have no great enthusiasm for the outdoors either when they go out, and quickly come back indoors to sleep in air-conditioned comfort.

Angelonia is one of my favorite summer flowers. It thrives in the heat and always looks happy and perky to me. I hate bermuda. Solarizing it in summer works pretty well. It won't necessarily kill it, but it will set it back so sharply that it is easy to dig out. If I had bermuda invading a pasture full of wildflowers and becoming a threat to the wildflowers, I'd probably break my own 'no herbicide' rule, and buy an over-the-top grass killer and kill it, assuming that the wildflowers present are on the list of plants that the over-the-top herbicide will not kill. I haven't tried it, but the label does list all the plants (hundreds) you can spray with no harm and it will kill the grass and not the listed broadleaf plants if used according to label directions. Ornamec is the over-the-top herbicide I've seen sold in the Wildseed Farms catalog, but I've never had to buy it and use it because our pasture grasses tend to be clumping kinds, not running ones like bermuda, so the wildflower seeds sprout and come up just fine between the clumping types of grasses. Fertilome also has an over-the-top weedkiller called Over-The-Top II, and I know people who use it to kill grassy weeds that invade their flower beds, shrub beds and veggie gardens as needed. I am not sure if it is labeled for use in a pasture of mixed grasses/wildflowers. Again, I don't use it, so cannot speak to its effectiveness. I just overseed the pastures with wildflower seeds and it all works out, but our pastures have the sorts of grasses that co-exist well with forbs.

One thing about bermuda grass in pastures is that as long as you do not mow the pastures or fields, the bermuda grass does not compete well with the pasture grasses and cannot out-compete our native prairie grasses. That is why our pastures looked so good when we bought this place---no one ever mowed it so you couldn't have guessed that somewhere in that mix of lovely prairie grasses and wildflowers, bermuda grass was lurking. Then, when we finally mowed the area where the builder was about to begin construction of our home, all of a sudden bermuda grass that wasn't even visible before just appeared out of nowhere because the prairie grasses had been cut down short. One of our old farmer neighbors gleefully told us 'Look! You have bermuda grass and you didn't even have to plant it. That's great." He did not pick up on the sarcasm in my voice when I said "Great, just great...:" which meant, of course, I didn't think it was great at all. Here we are 20+ years later and I still don't think that having the bermuda grass is great, not in any shape, form or fashion.

I'm trying to figure out how to rid our side yard and back yard ares of bermuda next year when we redo the landscaping and I want to switch the first area we do to no-grass, only raised beds of plantings and hardscaping like pathways. We'll be working around a few existing trees, so those areas would require digging the grass out of dense clay ground (ugh, not my favorite activity), and you probably cannot solarize in winter as well due to lack of heat, shorter daylength and the less intense sunlight, but I might try it anyway. Maybe we'll rent a sod cutter to take out the bermuda. I certainly don't have to decide anything now. In a dream world, we'd be removing bermuda grass now and piling on mulch in order to have the area ready for planting by Spring, but we hardly have time to do anything on the weekends, so none of this sort of thing is likely to happen this fall and winter. I don't want to put down a lot of mulch near the house, either, until snake season has ended because the copperheads and timber rattlers blend in with mulch and autumn leaves so very, very well, unfortunately. This always makes raking autumn leaves really nerve-wracking. For us, snake season sometimes doesn't end until after Thanksgiving, depending on how many warm days we're still having. I suppose some of the grass removal might happen this fall and winter, somehow....it would depend on how busy the winter wildfire season is or isn't because that is what sucks up all our time in the non-gardening/non-mowing season.

Jennifer, I am here, but since I'm not gardening, there's not necessarily much for me to discuss and then I get sidetracked with projects around the house and don't get on the computer as often. I probably will venture into the garden tomorrow morning early to harvest and to water the containers and that's about it, and then I'll flee back indoors before the very abundant mosquitoes can eat me alive and before it gets insanely hot/humid. I dread the whole hot weekend that is staring us in the face. At this time of the year, I always start longing for autumn's weather and foliage changes, which is absurd because, of course, summer hangs on well into September every single year no matter what I'm hoping for. That doesn't stop me from wishing for cooler weather and colorful foliage, which we rarely have here anyway. You know, when flannel shirts, boots and coats appear in the stores, I think it ought to feel like autumn out there, but it doesn't....it still is short sleeve weather and will be for ages and ages yet.

Life in our neighborhood is just so depressing this year. We lost three beloved neighbors this year between April and late July. This week we lost another one---one of the people for whom our VFD was paged out on a medical call earlier in the week---I didn't think she'd miraculously survive, but for the sake of her family, I was hoping she would. Another beloved friend and neighbor in his late 90s is not in good shape and I'm trying to prepare for the inevitable--Tim went on a medical call to his house this week. A friend of ours who was in town visiting his folks this week asked me about a certain place near us where there's a rocking chair under a tree in a pasture and a flag on a pole near the fence, with no house in sight (the house sits very far back from the road and isn't visible from our road)---he thought it looked sort of strange and creepy to see the chair in such an odd spot, until I told him that I believed it had been set up as a sort of tribute to the recently-deceased landowner. I think it has been there ever since his funeral, and I think his kids and grandkids probably like to sit in that chair and watch the flag wave in the wind and think about their dad/grandfather when they are up here for the weekend....and then it made sense to him. I really think they made their own little special place there to mourn for him and to remember him, and I think that is so sweet, but can see how it might look oddly out of place to someone who doesn't know the backstory. We need for some young folks to move in here and start having babies, or bring young children with them, because there's so many older folks here that we're losing, and it feels like our neighborhood lately is being stalked by The Grim Reaper more so than ever before. I just hate it.

Farmgardener, I hope I was able to help, and I hope you'll keep us posted on how your wildflowers do. I have worked so hard over the last two decades to restore wildflowers here because I want for all the wild things that share the land with us to survive and to thrive and to always have the plants they need. When I look at our pasture full of wildflowers and know that at least some of those seeds were sown by us, I am just so happy. Our pastures were old, overgrazed, sad and tired when we bought this place, and my goal just has been to make them better. Sometimes I wonder if there would be an easier way, and here's why: last year someone a few miles from us plowed up a pasture that normally grew a native prairie hay crop. I loved that field---it always was full of golden-yellow daisies when the monarchs were migrating in the autumn and that whole field seemed to me to just gleam like sunlight. So, they plowed it all up and had it sprigged with bermuda grass last fall so it will be a bermuda hay pasture, I guess, in the future. Except......this spring, somewhat miraculously, it seemed like every square inch of that pasture was Indian paintbrush in full and glorious bloom. It was a traffic-stopping sight and was the talk of the county. It makes me wonder....what if we plowed up just a bit of one of our pastures, what would we get? Are there long-buried wildflower seeds that would sprout like that and grow if given the exposure to sunlight while the field was plowed? It would be worth doing it IF we knew we'd get the result they did. And, I have no idea if the property owners were thrilled to see all that Indian paintbrush or if it made them worry about their bermuda sprigs maybe being shaded by the flowers. They left the flowers blooming though, and didn't cut them down, so I think that is a good sign. I don't know if the Indian paintbrush can compete with the bermuda grass next Spring though because it will be so much better established than it was this past Spring.

Rebecca, Our squirrels are doing the same. I don't want to say that squirrels are evil, but they certainly are irritating at best and maybe evil at worst. We have 10 acres of mixed forest with tons and tons of native pecan trees, hickories, and oaks, and you'd think they'd have enough mature nuts available to them eventually this fall that they wouldn't be raiding the trees so early now as they certainly will not be short of food, but there they are, every morning lately, helping rain down green pecans on anything and anyone beneath the trees. I remember them doing the same thing when we lived in Fort Worth. We had a neighbor with 5 pecan trees and the greedy squirrels would pick a pecan, chew into it, apparently find it inedible and drop it on the ground, and then do the same thing repeatedly all day long. That poor man never got a single good pecan off his trees because the squirrels destroyed the crop every year before the pecans could mature. It drove him crazy. Are the squirrels thinking eventually they'll find a mature one worth eating in September? Because at this time of the year, they will not. Do the squirrels even think at all? There's days I feel like they do not. With all the dove hunters running around shooting off guns now, why aren't the squirrels assuming someone is shooting at them and going into hiding? Well, maybe because no one on our place shoots squirrels.

I got the whole downstairs cleaned this week. I'm so happy when the house is really clean, and it is rare that I get the whole upstairs and downstairs done on the same day, or even in the same week, but I think I'll tackle the upstairs tomorrow and see if I can manage to have the whole house spotless going into the weekend. Of course, that is assuming I don't get distracted by deciding to try a new recipe in the kitchen or flipping through gardening catalogs all day, making lists of flower varieties I want to grow next year. I can wake up in the morning with the best of intentions to clean the house top to bottom, and then forget all about that idea before I've finished eating breakfast. I am easily distracted because I always have a lot of projects ongoing at the same time.

Tomorrow is supposed to be another hot one, y'all, so remember to stay cool and stay hydrated.

Dawn

Amy, I saw brussels sprout seedlings at Walmart today. Maybe you could call your local Walmart and see if they have them too.

That's crazy, Rebecca!

What is this blog you speak of, Megan?

HJ, I'm blogging about my gardening attempts now. I was getting really burnt out at work, writing stodgy corporate stuff all day and needed an outlet where I could be creative. I got off to a rocky start but I think I'm getting my groove now and trying to post once a week, either Tuesday or Wednesday. Most of the articles in development are background about my garden, so the next post will be about my soil... which, as you can see from my modeled stick-figure man, is extremely heavy clay.

All that said, you can check out the blog at www.thecollectedseed.com. I have a facebook and instagram under the same name if you want to check out either of those. I tend to share a lot of snap shots on social media that don't make their way to the blog.

Now that the school year is back underway, we're finally starting to get back into a routine, so I hope to not be as much of a stranger around here. I've also set myself down for a few talking-tos (aka reality checks) and given myself perspective on how much it's reasonable for me to expect of myself. For now at least, I seem to not be spreading myself as thin.

I totally cooked all my fall starts - parsley, pansies, chards, kales and all but a few of my lettuce seedlings. A power surge fried my grow lights so I had to move trays outside as soon as sprouts appeared, which hasn't been ideal anyway because they haven't been happy about the heat and development was stunted. Then I forgot to water the trays one night earlier this week. I'll try to get a few kales going again but will focus on peas, spinach and mesclun (which includes some very cold hardy varieties like mache).

This year everything except tomatoes has been a real challenge and those weren't exactly a breeze. I started my jalepenos late so I'm just now getting some the right size to harvest. With everyone's comments, I'm curious how hot mine will be. Also, how hot are poblanos supposed to be? I've only had grocery store poblanos which only had faint heat. Someone on facebook posted that their lips were burning after eating poblanos and I was caught off guard since I didn't expect them to be hot. Warm yes, but not hot.

Megan, Some years are just more challenging than others, and it sounds like you've had one of those years. You're not alone---many people in OK have had severe/extreme gardening issues, largely related to the weather doing what it does here...only this year the rain was extra extreme for many, and then there's poor old SW OK where the drought is even worse in some areas than usual for this time of the year. I feel right in the middle---rain/flooding issues in late winter through late May, but mostly hot and dry since then, so the hot and dry weather kinda helped make up for the wet and flooding weather. We'll forge ahead with plans for next year, expecting it to be a better gardening year because surely the weather will be better, right? Isn't that hope what keeps us going?

Poblanos should not be that hot. On the Scoville Heat Unit scale, they are way down near the bottom of the scale---in roughly the 1,000 to ``1,500 SHU range. For comparison, most jalapenos (except the ones bred to have no heat) are in the 2,500 to 8,000 SHU range, and some of the really hot peppers, like habaneros, etc., are in the 200,000-300,000 and beyond SHU range. If someone has really hot poblanos, I'd have to assume that the seed from which those plants were raised somehow was crossed with some sort of hot pepper, either at the wholesale seed growing level or, if they save their own seed and use it from year to year, then from an accidental cross-pollination in their own garden.

After I taste today's jalapenos, which I have let mature to the red stage in the hopes that the recent hot weather will drive their flavor up into the hotter ranges, I"ll let you know how much the 8+" of rain we received in August affected their flavor. I'm hoping for heat, but not sure that one week of dry, hot, September weather has been able to overcome the negative effect of all that rainfall watering down the heat.

I'm trying to get back into better routine too. The visitation schedule of one grandchild has been adjusted so that both grandkids are together every other weekend again, so we'll have both of them this weekend and that's the best news that might cure what ails me.

What ails me today? I have almost no words to described it but I'll try. Y'all know we've been dealing with the grief of multiple losses this summer of loved ones, both family and friends, who were very advanced in age and for whom, honestly, death would not be unexpected. I've felt sort of lost in grief all summer, but have been dealing with it. The older you get, the more you experience this sort of thing, of course. Today we received a phone call that one of Chris' childhood friends has passed away, unexpectedly, in Ohio, where he was stationed with the Air Force. No cause of death is yet known, but he wasn't known to have any sort of chronic illness. His dad, Tim's best friend from their police academy and early career days, called Tim this morning to tell him. I am about to tell Chris. I've been stalling for a few minutes because it is hard news to break this news to someone in their mid-30s, is it not? I suppose Kyle's unexpected death is just another reminder that this earth is just our temporary home.

Other than the interruption of that phone call, I have been cleaning house and harvesting the garden as planned. (sigh) You know, you just have to get up everyday and carry on with life. I cannot imagine how Kyle's parents and step-parents are going to be able to do that, though. Their lives just flipped upside down. Now, I think I'll go out to the garden and do something---deadhead flowers, pull weeds, whatever. It doesn't really matter what I do once I get out there....the garden is where I go to heal. I'll see how long I last before the heat drives me indoors.

Dawn

I'm so sorry, Dawn. His family will never be the same. But, that is what we (and they) will have to do...get up and carry on. Or not. Some people really never recover from such a loss.

Megan, I've been wanting to blog for awhile. Several people have suggested that I do it. I don't really know how to get started, although, at one time, it was a thing. I think before Facebook and all...so it can't be that hard to figure out. Now that my son is grown and my days of band filled weekends are gone, I have an empty place...a blog just might fill it. I do my Garden Monday and Chicken Fridays...but would love to go into more detail about a few things. A blog just might be the ticket. I can't wait to check out yours! Something to look forward to doing tonight.

So sorry Dawn. Y’all need a break from death.

My AC is dead. Going to attempt a fix tomorrow morning, keep your fingers crossed.

Megan, that was me that posted about the hot poblano, it was next to the Jalapeno and had been knocked of the plant, and, maybe been there on the mulch for a few days. It was red, few I have picked this year have been red, and it was the only hot one I have eaten.

I went to Ft Smith yesterday and bought 12 brussel sprout plants. I have not planted them yet because they did not look that great. I had to dig back on the rack to wet some that had been in the shade, I will try to harden them off a little before I plant them. I had 22 plants this spring and lost all of them. I dont care much for brussel sprouts, but my daughter does. I also picked up a 50# bag of annual rye for the lawn and wildlife garden. I had planned on getting a pound of wild flower seed also, but forgot it, along with a 50# bag of Austrian winter peas. Madge and I are getting to the point that we just cant spend much time on our feet, so we are always in a hurry to get back home.

I have about all my brush hogging done, so I will be installing the small disc on my small tractor and working on food plots and the wildlife garden soon, I will also work on my north garden to make ready for some cole crops, I just dont feel like doing a lot of work on anything. I wish I could get rid of the fescue that I planted a couple of years ago, it seems too aggressive for a wildlife garden.

I will shut up, I am just rambling, but I am so tired and there is so much that needs to be done.

Larry you had me all worried about my poblanos! Glad to know mine shouldn't be that hot. I don't spend much time on social media anymore so I catch little glances and know that they'll be buried and impossible to find later so I wasn't sure who posted that.

Dawn, I knew you were suffering through the losses of so many loved ones and you've been on my mind a lot lately. I'm so sorry that giving Chris this news has been added to the weight on your heart. I've heard these periods, when it seems like we're carrying the weight of the world on our shoulders, as Atlas periods and it really spoke to me. Maybe it was someone in this group I picked that up from? Still, I'm staring at the screen wondering what words to give you but you and I both know I can't magically make you feel better despite my desperate wish to have that power. I'll continue thinking of you and hoping that you and your family's burdens get lighter very soon.

That is such a tragic thing. . . . such a young man. Made my stomach turn somersaults. Our prayers for his family and loved ones, and all of you. I am so sorry, Dawn.

And thanks for your discussion of Bermuda, pasture grasses, and weedkiller. That was helpful.

As I remember, I was whining in my last post about having to kill an hour because the church was closed. Garry and I went to town this morning for his eye appointment and got home about noon. I realized I was missing my cell phone. So I called them and they hadn't found it, but I assured them it had to be there, so I'd come in and retrace my steps. I got there at 1. And was feeling thankful they didn't close during the lunch hour. But NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, they close from 1 pm to 2 pm. AGGGHHHHH. So I went to Walmart and got a magazine, then went to McDonalds and had coffee and a little hamburger until my hour was up. I was AGGRAVATED. At least they did have the phone. lol

We were both SO tired by this afternoon, too, Larry. I took a 90-minute nap. Another hot day, so no gardening this afternoon.

Larry, ramble away. We all enjoy reading it...or at least I do. AND it makes me feel better about my rambling. ;)

Megan, I enjoyed looking at your blog. Thanks for sharing the link.

Rebecca, I sure hope your AC is working. It is HOT today.

We picked up a table I had purchased on FB Marketplace, then came home and trimmed trees. There's an area at the back of our property along the fence line that I want to...beautify. There is a tree of some sort and it's made lots of baby trees. The barbed wire fencing was about to dig into the large tree and I hate it when that happens, so we cut back the fencing. The neighbors behind us never go to the back of their property and there is an old, but cool looking (in a very rustic way) shed back there. It's just on the other side of the tree--so basically on our fence line. Its back (that faces our property) is old metal. I've wanted to paint some type of mural OR maybe a mosaic of some sort. The back garden is just a few feet away. Also, would like to make a sitting area back there. Charlotte is buried under the tree and I purchased a nice outdoor cat statue that I would like to include. Someone before us threw a lot of trash in between the shed and tree, so we dug it out (and disrupted a thriving eco system). There was an old door. I took the hinges and knobs off because they were a bit rusty, but in good shape...and all sorts of other garbage. The door was uniquely made. It's too bad it rotted and fell apart.

We will probably do our grocery shopping this afternoon because I will begin working on Sunday nights starting tomorrow.

Stopped by TSC to pick up some sort of oil for the chainsaw and the brussels sprouts plants from last week are dried and crumbled. They have them sitting right in the sun, facing the west. Why? My own brussels, along with the broccoli and cauliflower have shade cloth over them and they still aren't their happiest. They look okay, though.

I hope we have a fall. I hope it doesn't stay in the 90's and then get cold. Of course, everyone hopes that.

Unfortunately, I'm unable to go to Vegfest this year. Probably for the best as it's so hot out. Last year we--my daughter and I-- wore long sleeves.

We celebrated daughter's BD last night. I am wondering if she will get a ring for her BD. Her boyfriend asked her best friend what style of ring she likes and asked for discretion, but Dallas is not discrete, so Mason knows and now I know and now my Mom knows. LOL. Oh, and my sister knows. And all the girls I work with know. And now you do too! Mason seems to think it will happen closer to the new year, though.

The garden is still thriving. It's rough in some places and the Seminoles are shading out stuff, I'm afraid. Stuff like the peppers. The pole beans are trying to make a comeback. Something ate all the leaves off of my fall bush beans. Oh well. I'll try again next year. I count this year as a success. We were able to eat beans a couple of times a week for about a month. AND I have four jars put back for later. The okra is still producing, but I sense that it's starting to...finish? I am thrilled with it's production this year. Also, I know that 12 plants are enough for our family. We've eaten it a couple of times a week and have put several bags in the freezer. I like learning stuff like this. It's good to know that a dozen plants is what we need. I've also shared a few bags with friends.

Oddly the asparagus ferns aren't as tall this year and they are still shooting up spears that I could cut and eat.

Basically, the garden looks like a big jungle. The pole beans are growing up the trellis, but reaching towards the overgrown tomatoes and their cages. And I did find that some of the old tomatoes are making fruit. Some of the old tomato plants are quite tall now. That particular bed is a hodge podge of pole beans, tomatoes, a hot banana pepper, and carrots that I missed back in the spring. Love it, though. Really love it.

This years biggest disappointment is onions. Second disappointment is tomatoes. I did get some tomatoes and still am, but they haven't been great. I will blame the crappy soil in the back garden.

Are y'all reflecting on your 2019 gardens too?

My phone is acting wonky on this site so I haven't been able to post. Not sure I had much to say anyways, but it's annoying to be forced into silence by technology.

Cosmos have been going gangbusters. I think I'm on my third generation this summer. The early spring ones bloomed so pretty and grew wild so I chopped them back around May, then yanked them in June when they started looking scraggly and the second batch were almost big enough to bloom. Then last month I noticed a new batch had sprouted and were quickly filling up the beds, so last week I pulled them and let the new ones take over. And to think, 2 years ago I grew one plant & now have hundreds.

My tomatoes have been pfft. I think it's the soil; it's still too dense clay & with the dry weather I just couldn't keep them watered well enough. So next year I think I'm going to try getting a bunch of mineral tubs from my brother & just do containers. I'll leave the beds and grow flowers & peppers, since they seem to do fine for me. But if I keep the tomatoes in containers, I can use better soil and hopefully have a decent crop next year.

The pretty & sweet pepper I got from Nancy is going nuts, as is the red hinklehatz and jalapeno. I made a big jar of cowboy candy for our department lunch a few weeks ago & they were a hit. The jar was almost empty when we finished. I need to make up a few more batches, but since I don't have the necessary equipment for canning I have to limit myself to just a couple jars at a time. I really need to find someone local who will teach me how to can; I'd love to make up some salsa and other goodies.

In exciting news, I found a scorpion in the house. INSIDE my HOUSE! I'm usually pretty blase about bugs, but not things that bite, sting, pinch, or give me the heebie-jeebies. And of course the cats were trying to play with it, so I had to scootch them away so I could smash the little monster to kingdom come.

Did I mention I do NOT like scorpions?

I have air!

We wont talk about what it cost.

Dawn, I'm sorry you've had so much grief lately.

Jen, it doesn't take much equipment to can. I have done pickles in a stock pot with a towel in the bottom. A jar lifter can be fashioned by wrapping rubber bands around tongs. However, a real jar lifter is probably the first tool to get. They'll have the kits on clearance soon. Maybe even waterbath canners will go on clearance, though I can't say I remember seeing them on clearance. My favorite jar funnel. Rack for stock pot. Probably the best canning devices I've bought. The large burners on my electric stove are placed so it is hard to put a big canner on them. I even managed to scorch my microwave a little because it was too close to the canner. So I prefer small batches in the stock pot where possible. But they have to be pints or half pints.

Rebecca, I am so sorry about your AC!

The grandsons were here yesterday and did me in. They had fun playing in the kiddie pool which Ron put under a cattle panel arch with shade cloth on it. Worked great.

Nancy, where did you ask me about the ginger? It has not bloomed. Need to look at the description and see how long it takes. I really adore my variegated turmeric (Emperor). I will have to take a pic. Turmeric has broad, canna like leaves, very attractive plant.

If anyone lives in the Tulsa area, there is a store just south of 15th and Sheridan, east side of street that sells succulents, among other things. I wouldn't even look, I don't need more house plants.

My tablet is fighting with me...or Houzz is, have a good week. Shoot, it's Sunday, must be a new thread!

Thank you all for your kind words and, yes, it has been a really tough summer, but we'll get through it. I know that I cannot comprehend what Kyle's parents and other family members are going through. It is so hard still for me to believe it is true that he is dead---my denial cannot last forever though. His dad describes feeling 'heart-broken', and I am not sure how that sort of heartbreak ever heals, but I do know that we all find ways to carry on after losing loved ones. To me, it just seems so much harder when someone loses a child, as several of you have.....perhaps it is because we parents always expect to outlive our children even though we know this often is not the case.

Rebecca, I am so relieved they were able to fix your AC. That is an enormous relief. Ours is 21 years old and we just cross our fingers each summer and hope it makes it through another year. So far, so good...but we all know that at any given time, our AC systems can go out, can be beyond repair and then we receive the dreaded news that it must be replaced. I am glad this was not that time for you. I am about to the point where I wonder if we should just spend the money to replace ours now instead of having to worry about it going out all summer long every summer. I'm married to a thrifty Yankee, though, so if I dared to suggest we go ahead and replace the system now before it completely dies, he'd be horrified because, you know, it might last another year or two or three. My brother did finally replace my mom's HVAC system a few years ago, when it was around 30 years old. I cannot imagine our AC compressor lasting another 9 years, but I guess you never know.

Larry, There's nothing wrong with rambling! I hope you'll just take your time and pace yourself, knowing you'll get everything done sooner or later. I think learning to pace ourselves, not stay on our feet too long and work at a steady, not break-neck, pace is one of the harder things about getting older. I'm getting better and better about it as I go along. I do look back, rather longingly, at the years when I could work in the garden and yard all day every day from sunrise to sunset and go to bed tired, yet wake up raring to go each new morning. I no longer can work all day out in the heat or wake up raring to go again the next day either. More and more, I'm just happy that I wake up. Getting older is not for sissies!

Nancy, I'm glad they had your phone. We have the Find My iphone app on our phones, and it is set up so Tim can use his phone to locate my phone or vice versa if we lose them. It comes in handy when someone (ahem, that would be me) loses their phone someplace stupid and cannot find it....like in the car or in the garden, buried under some tall plants or something. I'm sure it could find the phone if we lost it further from home, but neither one of us ever has, for which I'm grateful. I am really bad about misplacing my phone around the house, but that's just a simple matter of retracing one's steps until you find the last place you set it down.

I think afternoon naps are wonderful! I think the people in Mexico have the best idea with the afternoon siestas. Why not sleep through the worst part of a hot summer/autumn day, and then wake up all revived and refreshed and full of energy for the rest of the day? I take an afternoon nap every now and then (especially if fire/medical calls woke us up during the night, because I never can fall back asleep after that) and I love those afternoon naps. I wish I could make a practice of taking one every day, but there's just not that sort of time.

Jennifer, Your back area that you want to beautify sounds like it has a lot of potential. I am sure you will have a lot of fun beautifying it to suit you.

I am glad Mason has a fella who is a keeper, and I'm sure she'll be thrilled when the ring comes....whether it is now or later. I'm happy for her. Sometimes it can be really hard for someone to meet the right person, and waiting for the right one to come along can be really frustrating.

When okra is running out of time, heat or daylength, it will start dropping leaves and tend not to replace them. In our garden, that usually happens in October. You're further north, so it might happen earlier for you.

Our asparagus has done that too, despite my best efforts to eradicate it so I can use that bed for something else. I'm starting to think I'll never be able to kill it just by relentlessly cutting it back all summer. I think the asparagus sort of perceives prolonged drought as dormancy, and then when rain comes, it breaks out all sorts of new spears. At least that is what ours does and it sounds like yours is behaving in a similar way.

I have been reflecting on my 2019 garden, but you know, it really performed about as I expected with the weather we had. I adapted and changed my plans a lot early in the season, partly because of all the rainy weather and clouds, and partly because of all the issues with sick friends and relatives and with me just knowing in advance it was going to be a really tough summer, so I cannot complain about how it did. It performed better than expected in some ways--the bush beans, which I did plant pretty early to beat the heat, really over-performed, but it is hard to complain about putting up too many beans in the freezer because I know we'll eat them all eventually. Even the tomatoes produced very well, but again, only because I planted super early. I don't think they would have done as well if planted later. The only big surprise might be the roselle plants, which are much broader and bushier than usual, and I think the August rain gets credit for that. The real test will be how well they flower, and that doesn't even start until October so we won't know for a while yet. If they flower a lot, I'll make roselle jam, but even if they don't flower, they are a lovely background plant for other plants in the garden. Onions were a disappointment to some extent, but I had planted late after debating whether it was worth it to plant them at all in such wet conditions. We still got plenty of onions, and we still are using them and have enough to use for several more months, but some of them were a lot smaller than usual although some were the normal size. Usually I'd be making pretty concrete plans now for what veggies to grow next year, but since I am planting the front garden entirely as a cutting flower garden as a method of crop rotation, veggies aren't on my mind as much. Flowers sure are, though!

Jen, The cosmos I planted late are peaking now, and I'm so glad to see them blooming so much. Between them, the zinnias, the Mexican sunflowers and the various celosias, there's lots of annuals in bloom for the butterflies, bees, hummingbirds, etc. Of course, many perennials are in bloom too, but it is the annuals that carry the burden of feeding the wild things at this time of the year.

I think tomatoes will do great for you in mineral tubs. Mine in tubs still are producing from an April planting and, in fact, I have a couple of tomatoes to harvest today---I believe these are JD's Special C-Tex, and they have produced well early in the season, in the middle of the season, and now, late in the season. I think the fruit that are ripe now set during a rainy spell in the midst of the hot summer, and I'm surprised they have ripened as quickly as they have. The tomatoes in the compost pile are doing well and producing usable fruit too, so never discount the importance of tomato volunteers if they're in a place where you can leave them and let them do their thing.

Canning with a water bath canner is so easy and you can make candied jalapenos in no time at all. You don't really need lessons for boiling water bath canning---just follow the instructions in the Ball Blue Book, or on the website of the National Center for Home Food Preservation. Now, for pressure canning, I do think it is best to take classes or learn from an experienced canner because of the higher danger level. You can use boiling water bath canning for jellies, jams, pickles (including pickled and candied peppers), some tomato products (like salsa), etc., and it really is easy. Don't be afraid to give it a try. I did it all backwards by the way, starting with pressure canning and then taking up boiling water bath canning, which seems totally backwards to me now, but I grew up in a home where some food was canned every year, so I knew the basics from helping my dad can long before I actually canned on my own as a young adult. Really, boiling water bath canning and pickling are so simple that once you do it, you'll be amazed at how easy it is.

Dawn