As you know, I have a very wide variety of flowers in my gardens. I really don’t discriminate! I want them all!!!!

But I definitely try to include native plants whenever I find them. I’ve got a nice little collection, spread throughout the gardens.

You’ll recall that I have two typed of milkweed. First is Common Milkweed, which showed up last year as a volunteer. I had three plants at first, and now have seven. The second is Swamp Milkweed. It’s planted in the catio. Last year, it got aphids really bad, and then early this year, it developed a type of mildew. I didn’t think it was going to make it. But it did, and it’s flourished. I think it’s a little prettier than the Common Milkweed, but the monarchs don’t seem to play favourites.

We are up to four caterpillars and at least a dozen more eggs between the two patches. And that’s only the ones I can see. There’s most likely more.

Out front I have Cardinal Flower and Blue Lobelia

They are related, as Cardinal flower is a type of Lobelia. And you can see the similarities. But other than their colours there is one other big difference – the height! Cardinal Flower gets almost as tall as me (I’m 5’7″) and the Blue only gets about 15″ tall. I actually had to move it because it shaded out by the New England Aster (another native, but it’s not in bloom yet).

These are both supposed to attract hummingbirds. I’ve not seen hummingbirds at them yet, but I have seen them at the bee balm

The first is Wild Bergamot (another name for Bee Balm), and Scarlet Bee Balm. I love the Scarlet one because it makes these double decker blooms. I have a non-native pink version in the catio, but I have to find a better spot for it because it’s getting shaded out by the coneflowers.

And speaking of coneflowers. No Ontario garden is complete without Echineacea – or Purple Coneflower.

There are many varieties of Coneflower (and I have several), but the purple coneflower is just so classic. It’s not only a big favourite of butterflies and bees, but also goldfinches, who love the seedheads.

Liatris (also known as Gayfeather or Blazing Star), is another butterfly favourite. It has just started to bloom. I had some in the catio (brought from the townhouse) but I got a few more plants for out front this year. It multiplies quite nicely once established, so it will eventually be spread through all the gardens.

This neat plant is called Prairie Conflower. Eventually that centre will turn dark brown. Is it a coneflower, is it a Rudbeckia (Black-eyed susan). I’m not sure… but it’s wild! The plant is so big and heavy, I have to have supports to prop it up. I definitely need to split it up this fall (and I only planted it last fall)

I have another relative of it, commonly known as Mexican Hat. It’s not quite as tall, and as you can see the flowers are red. The centres also remain green.

And we can’t forget the Common Black-Eyed Susan

It’s one of my faves. I’ve got three clumps throughout the gardens, with several seedlings started in my greenhouse. The ones in the garden are just starting to bloom. And of course, they will bloom right to the frost. Hard not to love a flower like that!

I have a couple types of Helianthus (False Sunflower, Ox Eye Daisy). I need to move those multicoloured ones though. They get very tall and need to be moved to the back of the garden.

And this odd looking flower is Pearly Everylasting. I bought it spring of last year, and planted it in the catio. Sadly, it didn’t do well because it was in Relic’s favourite nap spot and he would not stop sleeping on it! But the roots managed to take hold, and it got going well enough before the weather got warm enough for Relic to spend all day napping outside, that he found somewhere else to sleep! IT’s just started to bloom.

I’ve told you of my love for Coreopsis (Tickseed)

And this Lanceleaf Corepsis just happens to be a native too!

There are several other natives yet to bloom – Annise Hyssop, Boneset, New England Aster, and Smooth Aster! (And of course, the ones that already bloomed – Native flag iris, Harebell, and Foxglove Beardtongue)

Since most of my weekend was spent on storm clean-up (with the exception of the small bit of stitching I showed yesterday), I don’t have any crafting to show you. I’m afraid you in for several garden posts over the next couple days.

Edible Alley is proving an exciting endeavor. I don’t have a huge amount of experience growing food. Mom and Dad had a fairly large veg patch when I was a kid – but the thing I remember most about it was being put on tomato hornworm picking duty (I got 5 cents for dead ones and 25 for live ones).

At the townhouse, the only thing I managed to grow with any success was cherry tomatoes.

So far, the sugar snap peas have been a huge success. Every few days I get a bowlful for Dave to snack on. I’m not a huge vegetable fan, but I admit, I’ve been enjoying a peapod or two (though I prefer to open them up and eat just the peas).

It’s the same with the tender beans. Ever couple of days, I get a nice bowlful. Dave eats them raw, though if I manage to get enough for two, I may cook some up, because I prefer my beans cooked.

I also planted long beans – they aren’t producing yet, but they are making me think if I plant them again, I need to get taller trellising for them. They’ve reached the top of my supports and look like they want to keep going.

The carrots have been…. interesting.

You will recall the first seeding did not go so well. I have a couple from that first seeding that are doing really well

And now the second seeding has started to sprout…

With a vengence!!! I have to get out there and do some thinning soon.

I mentioned before that Mom used to grow pickling cucumbers. I’ve done a little pickling myself (with store bought cukes), and my attempt at dills was not successful. So I decided to plant eating cucumbers instead for Dave. Sadly I don’t remember what kind I planted… but…

The first picture was taken on July 13th. The second on July 21th. The last on July 24th! I can’t believe how fast it grew.

I picked it for Dave because he needed some cucumber for his falafels.

He’s going to have to wait a while longer for the grape tomatoes though…

They’ve still got some ripening to do!

While most of the veg I planted for Dave, the pepper squash I planted for me. Pepper squash (also known as acorn squash) is one of my absolute favourite vegetables. And it can be very, very hard to decent ones in the grocery store. It just doesn’t keep as long as some other squash, and the ones brought up from Mexico are usually flavourless.

I had four plants, but two have died. The two that are remaining seem very robust. They can produce around 8 squash each, so even just two plants should give me a good harvest.

So when I discovered this neat new moth in the garden…

I was quite excited! Until I looked it up. It’s a Squash Vine Borer. As the name implies, that’s not good news for my plants. I dispatched her quickly and checked my plants….

And I found two leaves with these neat arrangement of eggs. A quick google check told me that these are NOT Squash Vine Borer eggs, but Squash Bug eggs! Another pest! I destroyed the eggs, but I’m going to have to remain vigilant.

Just like my flowers, growing edibles has proved to be a great learning experience! And it’s only July!

Obviously, storm clean up took up most of my time on the weekend, but I did fit in a little time to start a new stitching project.

After I started the butterfly and thistle, I kicked myself, because I’d forgotten all about the pot holders and tea towel I’d bought at the antique shop. So when it came time to start something new, I went looking for something I could stitch on the potholders.

Being that it’s going in my kitchen, you know it had to be chicken-themed! Obviously it’s not finished yet, but I think you’re going to love it when it’s done.

Stitching on the potholder is a bit of a challenge, as it’s like stitching on a pocket that’s already attached. But I’ve got a good technique down, and it’s going pretty well. This project won’t take terribly long to complete.

Thank you for all the concern about our trials over the past couple of days. As I said, in the long run, we are far luckier than many of our neighbours. With the exception of Dory, things are pretty much back to normal. Annoyingly, my headache turned into a weekend-long migraine, but on Saturday, there were no more generators running, and by Sunday, the cacophony of chainsaws and wood chippers was significantly lessened.

Dave has also started on rebuilding the side fence.

Orginally, the fence ran from the back corner of the house, at the line where the coneflowers on the right side are. He’s now got the posts (and framing, not pictured) in, and it’s much closer to the front of the house, in front of the maple tree. That brings all the space between the small garden and the tree into the backyard. It will become my shaded “woodland” garden.

Moving the fence was a project we planned to do in the fall. The storm just moved it up for us. Getting the rest of the materials will have to wait until we can get Dory back, because we can’t fit all the wood we need in Dave’s Buick.

While he was building the fence framing, I was doing my best to tidy up the gardens. I love getting on level with the plants. There’s an amazing world in there that we so often overlook.

This little guy is an Eight-Spotted Forester Moth. It’s a new one for my garden. I just love those fuzzy golden legs!

There are several backyard ponds around us, so dragonflies are a common sight. I still delight in seeing them.

And check out this master of disguise…

Can’t see him? How about now…

This little Katydid is almost perfectly invisible. I wouldn’t have seen him if he hadn’t moved! A perfect way to outwit predators.

And last… it seems Ms. Monarch did her job. The common milkweed were almost all completely knocked over in the storm, and when I was staking them back up, I noticed some holes in the leaves. It didn’t take long to discover why.

That’s a monarch caterpillar. And that’s my thumb! Such a wee little thing. And it wasn’t until I opened the pictures on my computer that I noticed the second, even smaller caterpillar. Can you see him by the hole?

I found this third, larger one on the pod on the swamp milkweed. With a little luck, we might get another monarch chrysalis or two.

You bet I’ll be keeping my eye out for these, and all the other little tiny miracles that call my garden home.

Welcome back.

As you read yesterday, we survived the storm (what local science-people are now saying was likely a downburst, not a tornado) relatively unscathed. The drama for us came afterwards.

With no power, and no prospect of it coming back on any time soon, we decided to head to town (Strathroy) to get some dinner and some yard waste bags for the next days expected clean-up.

We got to the store 10 minute before it closed, got our bags, got back in the truck…

And it wouldn’t start.

Help arrived about 40 minutes later.

His name was Benny. While Benny kept me company (and gave me kisses) Benny’s driver (Chris) and Dave mucked about under the hood for a while before finally determining I had broken the shift linkage. Though my shifter was in park, my transmission was still in drive.

I said goodbye to Benny, got in, put my foot on the brake, and they manually put the truck into park so I could start it. Once started, they manually put it into drive! Hooray.

Though of course, that’s only enough to get us home. The linkage is still broken, and we can’t kept doing the manual thing.

We drove it directly to the mechanic shop, which is only a few minutes from home. And being in the same town, they got hit by the same storm…

And they’ve got some clean-up to do before they’ll get to my truck. Yep… that’s a tree on top of the shop, and one of the classic cars they were in the midst of restoring…

So needless to say, my truck is a little lower down on their priority list.

We have Dave’s car still so that’s not the end of the world.

We left the truck in the tree-free part of their lot, walked home and promptly went to bed.

When Dave woke up the next morning, the power was still out so he decided we needed to get our generator on and hooked up to the fridge and freezer. And for some reason, that mean my grumpy butt had to get out of bed and go get gas with him.

That done, we got home, he started the generator, and I started on yard clean-up.

Normally, our neighbourhood is a symphony of birdsong, punctuated by the occasional dog bark interlude. But Friday afternoon – it was a heavy metal concert featuring multiple generators, chainsaws and woodchippers. Everyone was out doing their part to clean up.

I usually handle noise pretty well, but after a morning in the heat, it was really starting to get to me. Around 1 pm, we came in the house for a rest. A short while later, Dave realized our generator wasn’t running anymore.

He went back outside to much with it. A couple hours later, I told him it was time to admit defeat and off we went to buy another one. With the whole town without power, as you can imagine, generators were as little tough to come by at the local stores.

We managed to find one and headed back home. Dave got it set up and running, while I tackled some more of the yard. By the time I was done, my head was absolutely splitting from all the noise.

And then… 28 hours after it went out – those amazing hydro workers got our power restored! (As much as I’m complaining about my drama – I’m really glad I don’t have their job!)

We still have some clean-up to do

Mostly in the catio yard, and garden beds. There are leaves and small branches everywhere.

And despite our trials and drama of the weekend, we are still very lucky. But I’m ready for a little more normal.

Thursday started out like any normal day. I worked in my office, while Dave puttered about the house getting ready to teach (online), later that afternoon. About mid-afternoon, I checked the weather and noted to Dave that were were supposed to get rain later in the evening, and he said the news was saying it was probably going to be an intense storm. I told him I hoped I would have enough time after work to get my lawn cut before the storm hit.

We both went back to our respective offices to do our usual thing. 4:30 rolled around and I was just wrapping up my work, noting that the sky was getting dark. I could hear Dave in his studio, starting his lesson with his student. And then my phone buzzed.

Tornado warning.

Now this isn’t the kind of tornado warning you get in tornado alley… ie – take cover now. It’s a “There’s a storm coming you way – could spawn a tornado… if weather gets bad, take cover”

I went outside to get a better look… the sky was dark, but also glowing a little – a warm, but eerie glow. The air was dead calm. The birds were silent. I came back in the house and started battening down the hatches. I locked the catio door so it wouldn’t bang in the wind (it doesn’t latch). I made sure the cats were all inside, and locked up the cat flap. About five minutes later, the wind stirred up. It was a howler…

The wind roared and whistled around the house. The rain came in sheets so thick you could barely see more than a foot out the window. Thunder and lightning cracked. Then a couple trees up the street fell in the road… and the power went out.

That’s when Dave came out of his studio. We paced the first floor, transfixed, watching – moving from window to window to see what we could see… it was hard to describe the intensity of the wind… I’ve never seen anything like it. All the while it roared and whistled.

And then in about 10 minutes… the wind died, almost as if it had never been. The rain slowed. Thunder still rumbled but we took the chance to step out onto the front porch.

Two houses up from us – at the corner, several trees blocked the road. I could smell natural gas. Then came the fire truck. (Sorry Dee, I didn’t take a picture). We watched them do their thing, assessing the house with the fallen trees.

A little while later, they started to go door to door. One of the trees hit and broke a gas line. They asked us not to start are vehicles and just sit tight until the gas company could get there.

The rain had stopped, so we took a look around the house.

We lost the side fence, which was coming down this year and being rebuilt anyway. But other than that – we escaped damage. I had a lot of small branches and leaves to clean up, and the gardens got beat about a bit. But that was it.

When the thunder finally stopped and the sky cleared, I went for a little walk. We were definitely among the lucky ones.

Trees down everywhere. I’ve personally never witnessed anything like it. On my walk, I saw a few vehicles with minor damage, and amazingly, only a couple of houses with trees on them. Even as I was walking – no more than 30 minutes after the storm, homeowners were out everywhere with chainsaws, working away to get trees out of the road so emergency vehicles and hydro trucks could get through.

There’s more to our tale, and I’ll share it tomorrow. But we are all safe and well, and in awe of mother nature.

In the meantime you can read about the storm and the range of the damage here.

To be continued…

Shhhhh…..

Don’t wake the baby…

I’m happy to report some good news in the butterfly department…

In addition to these two regulars….

The monarchs have arrived! I’ve seen a couple now… possibly the same one a couple times. But I’m hoping this means that the butterfly hoards are just a little delayed due to the cold spring. And yes, that is the milkweed Ms. Monarch is hanging out on… perhaps we will have caterpillars soon!

And now that the rain has backed off a bit, we have more honey bee visitors

And lets not forget the bumblebees

While I didn’t catch the preying mantis’ hatching, I’ve been finding wee baby mantises all over the garden

And if you look closely, you’ll notice he has half a fly for a snack.

And this pretty little lady is about to chow down…

The False Sunflowers really attract aphids, so the Ladybugs are always a welcome visitor!

If you’ve had enough of creepy crawlies, how about a grumpy robin fledgling?

Or a bi-coloured squirrel

As soon as I finished making the blocks for the last Leader/Ender quilt, I started making blocks for a new one!

Nice big 16-patch blocks! Well… 4-patches that I’m sewing together into 16-patches. I’m not 100% decided on which quilt I’m making… but it will be one of these two.

The individual squares I’m using are all 3″ scraps, so each 16-patch finishes at 10″. Nice big blocks to make another wild, scrappy quilt!

Well… you all knew this was coming… so here it is!!!! The completed Butterfly and Thistle project!

I used to hate all the outlining when I did cross-stitch in my younger years, but I don’t really mind it at all now. And of course, I love the way it make a project look finished.

I do need to work on my French Knots… I’ve always had trouble with them . But these ones will suffice for this project.

It was definitely a challenging project. Not because of the size – it’s only about 7 inches tall. No… it was all the crazy colour changes and symbols in the chart. Some of the colours are very close together and this chart definitely could have benefitted from some simplification.

There are LOTS of mistakes in both the stitching and the outlining. At certain points I gave up on trying to follow the pattern and just winged it.

But unless you sit it beside the chart and compare stitch for stitch… well no one is ever going to know where!

This one will get framed eventually (I think it’s going to be a Christmas gift), but that can wait a bit. I’ve got my next project all lined up, and I promise… it’s a lot less complicated than this one. I’m definitely in the mood for something a little lighter!