Flowers, Fruit, Fungi and Rain !!

There aren't many new flowers blooming at this time. I thought I would photograph the fruit of past flowers and some fruiting bodies of fungi that have sprung up and a few late bloomers too. It has been raining almost continually the past 3 days and very quickly everything has become lush and green. There is a definite feeling of Fall in the air it is wonderful.

See how much water there is in this wheel barrow!
And just in the nick of time.

Notice the window boxes have filled in nicely.


The nearly invisible three-tiered planter and bountiful impatiens are what greets everyone at the front door.


Autumn Joy sedum and Nicotiana langsdorfii


Northern Sea Oats and a flower I can't name.


Hyssop (I think) and a moth sheltering from the rain under leaves.



Crab Apples and Wild Grapes



Gourd in the compost bin and the Dreaded Buck Thorn!


Blue fruit of Solomon's Seal and red fruit of False Solomon's Seal.



Turkey tails and Shelf fungi.


I've given up trying to identify mushrooms. There are about a trillion of them and they all look alike! So I just enjoy their beauty.

Here are some more fairy sized mushrooms like I posted a few weeks ago. Except these are an acre and a half away from the first ones.

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Some people might say I'm crazy, but I'm looking forward to Fall and Winter. As much as I love to garden, Summer is quite stressful for me and with the drier climate it has sometimes become a real chore. I can't wait for the colored leaves, shorter days, and cool breezes. And, yes, snow.

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Snowy, Flowy, Blowy,

Showery, Flowery, Bowery,

Hoppy, Croppy, Droppy,

Breezy, Sneezy, Freezy.

George Ellis (1795 - 1815)

"The Twelve Months"

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Bye for now,

Alyssa

A Little of This, And A Little of That

This post has a number of different things. I thought everyone would enjoy them.

The above are sad pugs because they only have a few old plush toys left. Garm has torn most of them up and just about all that was left was the "Packer Doughnut". Ugh - he's no fun! Then, Yeah - Mom finally shelled out for some new toys! Garm was trying to decide what to tear up first. Thea is playing it cool.

A view from the living room window. In the fore ground are impatiens in the window boxes and spilling out of the Main Garden are phlox with heavy heads from the rain. Next is Great Blue Lobelia that flowers in the Vegetable Garden. I don't know how it got there. Probably the compost. But it is a welcome late bloomer since most perennials are winding down now.

Here are some more late bloomers that are so welcome. I'd forgotten I'd planted them. I really should put some late August flowers in my perennial garden - it looks pretty dull towards Autumn.

I snapped this at night and the flash lets you see the fish much better than in daylight. They are so lovely and graceful I could watch them for hours. They will come up to the surface and seem to beg for food. It's just too cute!

Now this is weird! I'll bet you can't guess what that ultra bright spot is. I was trying to take a picture of the gazebo when a mosquito flew in front of the camera and got caught in the flash. Doesn't she look like a tiny plane??

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Now the rest of this blog is:

How I Made Jelly From Queen Anne's Lace Flowers!

Deemom on S&DMartin 1971, had a recipe for making this jelly. It was very simple and I was intrigued so I thought I'd make it this weekend.

Get everything ready and go out into the stifling heat to pick..

18 of the large flower heads. (Right now there are only small ones growing, so I had 36 little heads.)

Watch the Swallow Tail for a while and try to get a decent picture of him without sweating onto the lens.

Get back into the air conditioning and steep the heads (after I rinsed the critters out of them!) in boiling water for 30 minutes.

Strain out the liquid to 3 cups ....

Add lemon juice, pectin, and sugar and boil hard for a couple minutes. Add a little yellow food coloring, and ....

pour into jars then ....

put on some Martha Stewartish (I know that isn't grammatically correct) lids. Isn't that lovely?- It's a good thing :-)

Process for 5 whole minutes then place on the garage floor on a plastic cutting board to cool .... Later, when they can be picked up without giving you 2nd degree burns, arrange them artfully, creating a jelly table scape ......

on your counter top after clearing away everything you really keep there. Stand back and admire your handy work!

The color is like honey and the taste is quite good - sort of lemony with a hint of grass or something. (Neither Steve nor I could really pinpoint the other taste.) I'd say it was a complete success.

I forgot to put the following picture towards the top of the blog and it's too much trouble doing that now. It shows the shelves filled with the pickles we canned last week. All of the supplies, spices, instructions, rings and lids are stored there. Steve made the shelves and they are perfect.

Behind them is a room that the previous owner built that is very small but it hides an old furnace that was too big to remove from the house when he replaced it. It would have to dismantled piece by piece and taken up steep steps so it comes with the house. The next owners will inherit it too.

It's super sturdy and I just love how it looks - kind of like something you'd see in Granny's basement. Wouldn't you agree?

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Nothing is particularly hard if you divide it into small jobs.

Henry Ford

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Bye for now,

Alyssa

"How camest thou in this pickle?" - Shakespeare's The Tempest

The above is where the quote "in a pickle" was first introduced. I thought this would be a perfect lead-in to my post about our Pickling Day.

Every year Steve and I put up between 60 and 70 quarts of mainly pickled cucumbers and a smattering of pickled hot peppers and onions. At 7:00 tonight we finished our Pickling Day with a total of 65 quarts. I will set the stage for my pictorial by explaining how we do this without driving each other crazy.

First of all we each have separate tasks and separate work areas (that solves most of the problems right away). Steve is in the basement cleaning cucumbers, dill, peppers, garlic, and onions and getting them all ready for the jars. He has his mustard seed as well. Then he puts whatever he desires in each jar, making sure they are "just right". You couldn't slide a piece of paper between those cucumbers! It is very neat....

I am in the garage and am in charge of brine making, filling all the jars, sealing them and processing them in two canners. I have a timer and keep track of the boiling time until they are ready to be plucked out of the scalding water and put onto a huge piece of plywood set on sawhorses. Usually, during the down times, I read, listen to the radio or CDs and sort of veg. Today I brought my laptop into the garage and typed a 6 page letter to one of my penfriends in England. So it was very productive day. Enjoy the pictures ....

The jars and what goes into them . .. . . . .

Cucumbers, garlic, Habaneros, Jalapenos, and onions

A Dilly of a pug!! (Garm is afraid to come down into the basement.)

And we have lift-off ! ! !

I wish I were that precise at anything!

Pug inspecting the goods ........ Oh, no. Pug in the cucumbers! Anyone for pickles with their dog hair ???

The highly classified documents that I am entrusted with . . . .

This is a very nice setup and I get to look outside all day.

The beautiful finished product and Hey!! What's he doing horning

in on my territory!?

Pickled Jalapenos and cucumbers and . . . .

onions.

An unfortunate fatality. His bottom fell off! (I am sending the Ball people this picture.)

I don't eat any of these pickles because they are way too hot. Steve loves them and eats them every day! We give them as gifts and they are always a hit.

The only people not happy today were the pugs. They had to be in their crates most of the time because there was a lot of "in and out" going on. They will dash out of the house and aren't trained too well. Thea barked herself to sleep and Steve heard Garm howling like coyote. In a few short hours they were back out, taking a walk, pooping and having dinner. We are back in their good graces now.

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"On a hot day in Virginia, I know nothing more comforting than a fine spiced pickle, brought trout-like from the sparkling depths of the aromatic jar below the stairs of Aunt Sally's cellar."

Thomas Jefferson

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Bye for now,

Alyssa