Good Morning Nancy. It barely rained, but maybe we'll get some more. Almost as importantly, it should be cooler today and start being in the 60s at night for a couple of weeks. Maybe this will have broken the heat and drought patterns.

I sowed common black eyed susan (rudbeckia hirta) mid last month and got overly fabulous germination. It's a good thing I did, because something is eating them FAST. I (yesterday) isolated the pots from each other..because it seems like a caterpillar damage/cutworm to me. I hope I have a few left to transplant into garden when the rains really begin, for bloom next summer.

On the melodramatic front, I opened a can of mountain dew about an hour ago. I couldn't taste it, so I thought...well flat can. I went ahead and drank it (don't waste caffeine!) :) Sadly, I opened another product just now..and I can't taste it either. Ok, so I have a COVID test for 3:15 pm today. This will be (if positive) my second go round. I wonder if I'm reinfected or with Delta or Mu? (I think from what I read that the testing won't give me that detail). I feel mostly fine, been a bit fatigued and slightly more than usual sinusey. I had to look online for about 40 minutes to find a testing center that had openings for today. Sadly you have fill out all the 'paperwork' before you know if they have slots open.

Garden wise, everything is hot and dry. I'm doing minimal watering to sustain life and that's about it. I have no gardening zeal, no interest in much of anything just now (will help immensely if heat breaks).

Danny, I hope you are OK, I feel a little uneasy most of the time and try to keep meds. that I think I might need here at home.

We got a little rain, not much, but hopefully we will get more today.

My neighbor and I started getting a place ready yesterday to plant turnips and mustard, and maybe a few other things in the wildlife garden. I will try to go over there and till today after church. I hope to plant a few things here at the house also. It is so much handier to have food growing close to the house. My neighbor does not have and level ground close to his house, so like to use the wildlife garden also. We are sort of " Share Croppers ", he has water, and I have better land and more equipment, he works like a slave, and I dont get around very well.

We have had a pretty good crop in the wildlife garden considering the hot, dry weather and millions of insects, I have never seen so many squash bugs and cucumber beetles. I will keep the squash and pumpkins we need, and let the neighbor sell the rest to off-set the water bill.

George, if you are on here, those volunteer Old Timey Cornfield pumpkins are doing great. I will keep one for seed and let the neighbor sell or use the rest ( near 30 ), his wife like to use them to make pies to give away. I will also give away most of my roselle. My neighbor's wife loves the jam. one of my doctor's loves the roselle tea.

Madge and I will save mostly Seminole, Butternut, and Arabat for winter food, and sweet potatoes if the produce. It looks like we will get some sweet potatoes, but I have moved them to new ground, with very little amendments and very little water.

I pulled my two butternut squash before I left this morning. They were covered with squash bugs. One went in the compost, the other in the fridge. I also had 6/10 of an inch of rain between yesterday and over night.

It's nice here in Missouri. Cool, lovely bug noise.

Any news, Danny? I sure hope you're okay. I don't have any gardening zeal either, since the grasshoppers destroyed most of my beds, and then the weeds. How's your blossoming Jasper?

Larry, haha re you and your neighbor being sharecroppers!

Garry and I have been pre-occupied with medical stuff and upcoming surgeries. I'm not nervous about hip surgery, but a little down/depressed about predicted recovery time. Hope I'm an except and heal really fast. Garry and I are very wary of Covid and don't venture out much. But my surgery is going forward. I asked one of the nurses about the shortage of rooms when we were there last week. This is through OK Surgical Hospital, physician owned, so it may be a little different there. And GDW has surgery scheduled toward the end of Sept. I need to talk to our family doc--maybe we'll switch Garry over to my hospital system.

We did make it into Lincoln. It's not a great time for gardens. . . they should just now be ready to jump out of their devilish hot doldrums. There were lots of Monarch caterpillars on several different milkweed clumps.

How many of you out there have had hip replacement? How long did it take you to be back to normal afterward?

On to more NCIS. Keep us posted on house stuff, Jen.

Hi Everyone. Thanks for starting this week's thread, Nancy.

First. I am so sorry I've been an absent and neglectful friend. Not just here...but everywhere. I am thinking about you all every day.

Nancy, I'm praying for you. I know that surgery is a scary thing. And the disruption to your life is probably making you feel crazy. Please know that I really am praying for you and for a quick recovery.

Jen, I am SO excited about your new house. I want to visit! Please!

Kim, I meant to tell you a few days ago that I really like your fencing. It's going to be so cute in your garden. I can't wait until I can get some cute fencing.

Danny, how are you? Do you have Covid again? And how in the world? You're mostly alone, right? However, I do know quite a few people who have had it twice and have been vaccinated in between. So, it can happen easily. I hope you're okay.

Hey to Moni and Larry!

We got a tiny amount of rain here last night. Not much at all. We are so dry here. It makes me tired. Part of the reason I've been such an absent friend is because I'm spending extra time watering everything including animals. Heat and lack of rain does cause a lot of extra work in my life. Most of the fall seedlings went into the ground on Friday...but they need to be watered too. The other seedlings require watering twice a day. It's all a lot to care for.

My jobs are busy too. I often think people forget that I work outside the home.

And we have pet issues that is causing extra work. Behavior issues and such. I don't feel like going into the details of it all. All of it makes me so upset.

I did enjoy a couple of hours outside today tearing out the old strawberry patches. This is a project that has been put on hold for almost 2 years. The old patches weren't functioning well.

This all has made me reconsider gardening...and especially gardening next year. Last year, when we grew so much food and preserved it, it was a great thing to do. We saw so many food shortages in the stores. BUT, to be able to grow well, things have to be maintained...and that has been lacking, I feel.

Our beans are drying up and dying daily. IF we were maintained and well prepared, we would have already had structures in place for shading. Yea, we can run out and throw something up last minute....but that isn't easy. If you're having to water, preserve food, take care of regular things plus work outside the home, and be a good wife/daughter, mother/human/make food for people in crisis....scraping up things to make shade structures is hard. IF you're prepared ahead of time because you've spent time in the preparedness, it would be much easier.

In my mind...that might mean you take a season or two to actually grow less food to get your structures in place. Because, honestly, that is a thing too. All the food you grow has to be dealt with. That takes a lot of time and space. If no one really enjoys cantaloupe except one person, what and where are you going to do with/put 2 dozen melons. You can eat a melon a day and take a couple of hours to chop them and put them in the freezer, but once again that takes time away from the garden which needs water and shade structures.

That is where I am right now. I want to get structures in place and simplify the food that we grow next year. I don't want to be stressed out about trying to find a place for all the harvests.

AND I SO miss my herbs. I love herbs and have neglected them for a couple of years.

And I'm sad that another summer had nearly passed and the things on my list for 2019 are still unfinished.

But...please know that I'm just tired. I'm very grateful for the gardens we have and all the food that it produces. I love my gardens so much. I love my home so much. I love eating all the food that it produces. I really do. SO much.

I just need a break. I need for fall to come and I need for the earth to "die" and rest so I can too. Then spring comes and we'll start again after a winter's nap.

That's all I need.

What do you need, Friends?

I think puppies reach a stage where they just drive the ever living snot out of you. I went through it with my poodle and our 2 oldest boys. Our girl could push my husband's buttons so quickly, but was incredibly loyal to him. Our youngest now is definitely mama's Shadow (hence the name) and can be a pain in the butt. But eventually they grow out of that stage, it just takes a semi truckload of patience. Some days I succeed , other days not so much.

HJ, of course you can come visit! Tho it'll be a lot longer to get there, so a quick run to drop off extra pots may be difficult. Besides, I'll need some pointers if we decide to get chickens.

Nancy, I think you ask at one time for me to post a picture of each month of our fur boby calendar. I did not post last month. This is pictures of July and Auk. The pumpkins are not mine, although I had of him in my pumpkins, he was trying to eat them. He loved veggies in the garden.

Gonna lick that pumpkin to pieces! Cute, Hercules! Had 3 hr unexpected company this afternoon. That was fun. But now behind on stuff I need to get done. :)

Three hours, you can make that up before bed, right ? :)

I get at least 3 hours behind every day, and that is when I am trying to run at full steam. It is embarrassing how little I can get done. I did how every finish harvesting the winter squash that I will use for us and the family, the rest the neighbor will use and sell.

I also got most of the grass mowed under the electric fence yesterday, I hope to finish today. The electric fence around our food crop in the wildlife garden is over 1/4 mile long. Part of that mowing included the flower bed that had everything in it, including sunflower stalks of 2 inches or more in dia. We have to do something to keep the deer out, but that may not happen, it is so hot and dry here that the wildlife want our food because those are the only plants that are green.

We want to plant our fall crop today, then go to Ft. Smith to pick up fruit that Madge is having shipped in, also pick up some fuel filters. I have three old worn out tractors, and none will run now. It seems as though I spend most of my life trying to repair something.

I am at Lake Superior now. Am amazed at my friends first year garden, and all the home canning she did. Sorry did not take a picture of it. She gets her roses eaten off by deer, but those are outside the garden fence. I'll suggest electric fence.

Moni, also suggest that venison steaks are very tasty and so is venison chili :) It makes something good out of those roses (*lol*) which are not native. The deer, of course, are, but they're also harvestable.

I love seeing the pics of Hercules. Keep sharing them!

Realtor came to pick up our check today. Now to get inspections done. The buyer for our house wants to wait until October for their inspection; not happy with that because I want to know everything is a done deal. But our realtor says everything will work out & be fine. He did a superior job when we moved to OKC, but this time we're not real happy with him. Hopefully he comes through when we need him like last time.

But I'm starting to mentally plan where to put everything. There are two shop buildings. One is smaller with electricity and insulation & I've already claimed for my potting shed; I'll be able to set up my seed shelves properly instead of trying to wedge them in somewhere. It has a lean-to barn off the back, we can use it for either storage or if we wind up with animals we have somewhere for them that's out of sight of the dogs. My garden will be between that building and the fence to the back yard, so i'll be close to the dogs to keep an eye on them but they (hopefully!) won't be able to get into my garden. The other building is a lot bigger but doesn't have electricity and just has a dirt floor. Cliff has an idea to lease it out to a landscaper or truck driver or something, someone needing a secure building to store equipment or machinery. We really don't need something that large so we might as well get some good out of it (until we decide we need it for [fill in your reason] and start using it lol.

The back side of the property is pretty much flat land, looks like they used it for hay in the past. I'm not sure what I want to do with that, but at least the first year my sister in law & I want to plant squash, melons, gourds, and everything else before the squash bugs find us. Just one year without issues! If I remember correctly, the house on the left is pretty close to our property line, so I'm sure we'll tick them off with all the barking dogs. There is a small section of trees so I plan to continue down the rest of the property line to give us some privacy and offer some barrier to excessive noise. Maybe do a bunch of fruit trees and berry bushes. Trees closer to the property line, then bushes to fill in the space until they grow taller.

The dog yard will be across the back, one side, and all in front of the house. It already has 5ft fencing, so we'll just need to extend the fence up another few feet to make it almost dog escape proof. But it'll be large enough to split into sections so we can separate out kids that don't get along.

Now to figure out where to plant my sister in law's morning glories & the other not dog safe plants I like. At least I'll have all teh space I want to plant whatever my little heart desires.

Jen, I have fun with melons, squash, and pumpkins. I think they give you a lot of " bang for the buck ". We cut our last melon about a week ago, and are still harvesting winter squash, and will harvest the pumpkins before frost. I think we have 30+ Old Timey Cornfield pumpkins on volunteer plants. This has been a hard year for me garden wise because of the drought, but I have more pumpkins and squash than I can use off of volunteer plants. I already have 51 stored for my use. Madge and our neighbors wife made pies from the Arabat squash/pumpkins a couple of days ago, they were great.

Jen that sounds amazing.

Hi. Anyone heard from Nancy?

Larry, I love the pictures from your little fur baby calendar. Thanks for sharing. Super cute!

Jen! Your property sounds so amazing! Excited for you! When you're ready for chickens, let me know!

Busy as usual here. Going to leave work soon and put together a new 3 tiered cat habitat. Just got word that it was delivered. Not how I wanted to spend my money, but hopefully will solve an issue or two at my house.

Will also need to water tonight. and cook dinner. The day are getting shorter and that makes it hard to get everything done, right?

Rick came out last night and built a shade tunnel over the cauliflower.

I got the new strawberry beds made and really, really like how they turned out. The change makes such a difference is the aesthetics of the kitchen garden. Did that on Monday and am still a little sore today. I am very happy to get that crossed off my list. I also found a pool insert on marketplace and will pick it up tomorrow. It will be used to make an outdoor habitat for our turtle. Doubtful Neptuna will get to use it this year as it's so late in the year, but at least I'll have the pool and can work on it and have it ready for spring. Another thing crossed off my list.

We're still harvesting okra, tomatoes, peppers, a few melons (they've slowed down).

Most of the brassicas are in the garden now: cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower. Greens are still either in the greenhouse or on my light shelf.

Rick planted other greens in the SG: swiss chard, collards and kale, maybe? It's coming up. I was working on another project when he was doing that. We get more accomplished if we divide the work. He mostly manages the SG and I mostly manage the KG and CG.

Does anyone have suggestions for a native type of shrub that would look good in a front flowerbed of a HOA type of neighborhood? It needs to be tidy somewhat. My daughter is trying to find something easy and tidy for her new house.

She has good places in the backyard that has a greenbelt behind it, so she wants to do things that are more fun and interesting back there.

Just checking in.

Yes, Nancy is doing 'fine' I think. I talked with her on FB about 2:30 am this morning.

Isn't that weird, that we were conversing on FB at 2:30 a.m. I got a kick out your repeating it, Danny! It was nice having a friend up at that time! And thanks for asking, Jennifer. Jen, I am so excited about your place! Please please God, let it be!

I should spend my time now making plants for our place. Perhaps I will be able to do some of that. Sure is nice to have Garry Dean to sit here and keep me company in the daytime.

I had bought "The Afghanistant Papers" hard copy; it came and Garry happened to pick it up. He decided he'd read it, so I got another copy on Kindle so we can read it at about the same time and discuss. I'm glad he's retired so we have time to visit.

I seem to be adjusting easily to being a lazy slug, just sitting. Doc said I HAVE to use walker for a month because the bone was "soft." That didn't sit well with me, but I won't argue. . .J trust him implicitly. And sooooooooo guess I'll spend the time reading. Two days out, long as I'm sitting still, no pain. LOL. I think it's cuz of great pain killers. AND walking to the bathroom and back is quite a walk--about 100 feet round trip. SO--good exercise.

Phones are screwed up. I am so aggravated with Vive, new internet carrier. I couldn't get a hold of Garry yesterday from the hospital to tell him to come get me. I figured there was something like a screwed up phone going on. He doesn't use his cell, but it's always plugged in and next to him, thank God! I was surprised I even had the number, but I did. So I called it several times and he finally answered. Come to find out, why it took him so long was cuz he couldn't figure out how to answer it! I totally got it. At any rate, we got it done and he got me home.

Well, that's about it from here. . . glad I have OKGW and FB to keep me amused, as well as news, papers, books. Although I have a great stockpile of good foods for us, Garry will run down to the maraina for hamburgers for us this evening. Yay!

Stay well, everyone and have a good weekend! Didn't check for typos and too sleepy to now. .

Good to hear from you, Nancy. Glad you're not in pain.

Not much new to report. Rick came out and planted some root veggies and watered the SG. I watered the KG and CG. That's about it. Our property looks pretty bad right now. It needs to be mowed a bit....really just a weedeater would do it. Just the edges of garden beds are bad.

That's it as far as gardening goes.

I'm ready to tuck in a bit for the dark part of the year.

I want to bake and cook and clean my house and have it all cozy. That's where my heart is right now.

That sounds good (warm robe, cozy, baking) and cooler outside.

I like the spring and fall for getting a few things done around the house, and long ago I lived camping in the fall " deer season ", but winter eats my lunch, I just dont like being forced into the house, fut I just cant stand the cold.

I want to plant some fall/winter stuff today. My neighbor late yesterday that we have over 30/40 rows greens of different kinds, but we are short on collards, I think I will plant more of those. I will also harvest butternut and seminole, My neighbor both have more than we can use, if we cant sell them, we will give then away. I had the prettiest winter squash/pumpkin crop I have ever had. I also saw the largest squash bug population I have ever had. I used spray this year, there was no way I could keep up without it.

Madge Is going to Mena, Arkansas this morning. I have ask her to check the seed supply at the farmers co-op and bring me some of the ones I am short on. I still dont trust our economy. I had rather have food to give away, or till in, than having someone go hungry.

Larry, at first I really hate it getting dark so early and being forced indoors too. Then, I find myself accepting it and embracing it. There's normally many indoor projects to work on--things that I've put on hold. Holidays to prepare for. Books to read and I like to find a series or two to watch. I don't have much time in the warmer months to watch TV series. It's a time to plan for the spring garden and order seed. It's also cool enough to bake and I sure enjoy baking. It's too hot to have the oven going in the summer.

I think Rick is similar to you in his growing beliefs. He would rather grow it and not use it than not grow it.

That's fine with me too as long as I'm not brought buckets of produce to deal with. If I were home all day, it would probably be fine....but trying to find a way to use and/or preserve so much food is overwhelming at this point in my life. I do preserve quite a bit but time and space are limited. We stored a lot last year and I'm so glad we did. We went through about half of it this year. Because our beans didn't produce much this year ( I was only able to can 2 jars of shelling beans from the spring), I'm thrilled that we have leftovers from 2020. Hoping for a few more jars from the fall beans, although we've lost most of them. A few are hanging in there.

I've given away quite a few melons, okra and peppers.

Next year, I want to simplify a bit. I don't need 12 jalapeno plants--they are so productive. Maybe 4 plants. I want to grow more heirloom tomatoes---but not too many. Maybe 6 or 8.

I liked how the Jets did for diced tomatoes, so we'll do 25 more of those next year. And 25 paste tomatoes too. 4 cherry tomatoes---and that's it.

Rick will plan the Survivalists Garden for the most part. I do want the canning tomatoes out there, and Beck's Big Buck okra again. And would like to try again for black beans.

My family is coming over tomorrow to celebrate my daughter's BD. So, I better get up and finish cleaning this house. It's dreadfully dirty.

My uncle passed yesterday. He is my Mom's younger brother. Her other brother died a few years ago and she's very sad. Having a little BD party for M will be good for her. I'm sure it's hard--her parents have passed long ago and now both brothers and her husband too many years ago. I've noticed that people often struggle more with sibling deaths than parent deaths. Just something I've noticed over the past couple of years.

Well, this house isn't going to clean itself. (what a dream that would be, right?)

Err, didn't you say that last year (don't need so many plants?) I know almost everyone does ;) Then watch what happens. (no blame...just an observation). I swore to reduce amount of things I'm growing from seeds too, and I will watch myself and see if my mood changes in December and January when it's time to order seeds. :)

Well I have a cottage pie (more like a cake..full cake pan) in the oven to enjoy for a couple of days. I loaded it with extra veggies (corn, green peas, kidney beans and carrots. I did good with the sauce, wanted to just eat spoonfulls of it alone (tomatoey). Cleaned out my 5 lb bag of potatoes though to make the topping.

Danny
That’s funny. Yes we always say next year I am cutting back. Except me this year since I never had a garden. I want a huge garden plenty to eat preserve and give away. I want to plant all the things.
Jennifer I know how it feels to be overwhelmed with produce abundance. It hasn’t happened in years for but I look forward to it.
Jen is your new house in the east or west side of Oklahoma?
Back to work in the garden

That's true, Danny. Actually I started saying it at the end of 2019, I think. I was "tracking" with Dawn on wanting to work on ornamental beds and structures and such. But, 2020 happened. Empty grocery store shelves. Rick started coming out. No cutting back that year. I wanted to cut back some this year, but really MUST do it this coming year. For my mental health.

I'll be ready to grow a lot again at some point....and I will still grow a lot next year too. But, Rick has said he'll take all the produce I don't want so I don't have to feel sad about it going to waste. And he'll care for many of the plants as well.

And when I say "simplify" I mean with the veggies.

There's the herbs and butterfly/pollinator/native plants I want to focus on next year.

And I would love to have 3 fairly tall raised beds in my backyard for a few things. Mostly culinary herbs and a couple of cherry tomatoes--maybe bush varieties and a couple of lunchbox peppers. Flowers. Those would be in between the back patio and chicken area. Having those there would make it especially easy to gather lunch salad ingredients and herbs for dinners, etc. the kitchen garden is just to the east of the house, but when I'm in a hurry in the mornings before work, I could just grab those things really quickly and not have to put on gardening shoes. Quick and easy.

So, really not so simple.

Behind our shop--part of Charlotte's Garden--are the melons, sweet potatoes, roselle and a few leftover tomatoes that no one wanted. Next year, that will be the start of the native bed. It's large so it might can share with a few food plants too. At least next year before it gets filled in. I have seed to put back there this fall after we pull all the vines and plants.

Yeah, not so simple at all.

Just different.

It's so nice having the house to myself. It's been a couple of weeks. Maybe longer.

Ethan went to Dallas for a concert. Tom went with him (not to the concert but just so he didn't have to drive alone.) Tom can visit with his cousin while Ethan attends the concert.

The house is clean other than mopping. I'm about to head to the store to pick up the few ingredients for Mason's BD party. Luckily most of it came from the garden. The good thing about growing lots of veggies...and having chickens. One can do a lot with those things.

But, I do need some lettuce and salmon and cream cheese.

Kim, I'm still praying that finding your perfect place is just around the corner. What's Jessica always say about turning your waiting into a classroom? Maybe I'm combining 2 of her quotes. lol

Kim, we'll be between OKC & Shawnee. It'll actually only be about 30min further east than we are now.

Y'all cut back, I'm hoping to go all out. After 2 years of crappy gardens, I'm ready for bumper crops. I know it'll take a few years to get the gardens producing, and it'll take forever to get the gardens dug out & ready to plant. But knowing we plan to stay for a few decades, I'm keeping retirement gardening in mind. Eventually I want raised beds, so I don't have to bend over as much. It's already awkward to get up off the ground, and I imagine that's just going to get worse.

I'm sorry to hear about your uncle, HJ. I think we struggle more with sibling deaths because they're our age. We wxpect our parents to die, we know it's going to happen. But having a sibling die hits closer to home.

Well, Madge brought me 12# of pea seeds from Mena, that along with what we already have, and the ones we can harvest from our vines should be enough for next year.

The past 2 days we have taken peppers, okra, peas, winter squash, jelly and peaches to friends and family. It seems nice to go take something to loved ones when they, and us seem to shut in so much.

I have a spot ready to plant more winter crops, but need to go to Greenwood Monday to get some collard seeds, I was sure I had some, but cant find them.

I say every year that I am cutting back, I am sure that day is coming, I just dont know when.

Jen
I am planning trip to okc in October. If you are ready I could bring you some Iris or something.
Jennifer thank you. I am hoping planning preparing studying gathering info and stuff. When I get my own piece of ground it will be a non stop planting party. I am getting help getting my business going and I found out about a women’s business grant. I am working on that currently. I worked outside today for the first time in weeks. I told myself I didn’t have to work but I had to stay out in the fresh air. It felt awesome.

Larry 12# of seed should keep you busy

Kim, I want to see you in October if you have time.

Yes ma’am I am coming to see all y’all.