Joyeuses Fêtes 2017

2017 was a big year. For me, a half century of memories since 1967, the year Canada celebrated the one hundredth anniversary of Confederation and Expo 67, Montreal's World's Fair.  I graduated from high school that year and worked started my first year at McGill University. It was all long ago, so I'm amazed to be in relatively good health and more or less "with the program".

Bob and I were fed up with winter by mid-February so we packed up and headed to Florida a few weeks early. We spent a few days St. Augustine, Florida, our first visit to that historic part of the country. We drove down the coast to Cocoa Beach where we were right on the beach for a week, before crossing Florida to St. Pete Beach. We especially enjoyed seeing other longtime visitors to our "March home", Sunrise Resort on Boca Ciega Bay, as well as meeting up with friends from my hometown of Temiscaming. Florida pics here.

Summer getaways included a family weekend in Wisconsin over Memorial Day, several Corvette trips to the North Shore of Lake Superior and La Crosse, Wisconsin, and a memorable week around Lake Michigan. One great stop was Milwaukee where we stayed on the top floor of the Hilton and enjoyed a fantastic view of the city. The Harley museum was great entertainment one afternoon, full of vintage bikes, photos and artifacts. I spent my usual  long weekend in Stratford with my sister Marilyn. On my way home from Ontario, my brother Steve and his wife June treated me to lunch in Toronto.

On the horizon: Hawaii in January, Florida sometime in February through the end of March, and the wedding of Chris and Melissa in June, when we'll have Melissa's three great kids as bonus grandchildren. 

Merry Christmas to all; Joyeuses Fêtes à tous.

A Time to Mow

Many homeowners in our St. Paul Macalester Groveland neighborhood use lawn services in the summer. Bob has always cut his own grass and I think he was a little reluctant to let me take on some of the work when I retired four years ago.

However, that first summer he was recovering from knee surgery and he could do only limited mowing. Years ago, I used a rotary mower and I made have made a pass or two with a power mower early in our marriage. Mowing an entire lawn was a totally new experience for me.

I was amazed to find that mowing the lawn is a very satisfying activity. It has a beginning and an end, and the process itself is very soothing in its monotony. An added benefit is that no conversation is possible. I put in my ear plugs and just get the job done. I have no interest in listening to music or the radio. Why add a distraction?

I'm half through my fifth summer now, and we divide up the work to get our property done in about an hour, using two mowers. Bob weed whips most weeks and cleans the sidewalk with a power blower. I sweep the deck and wash the tables, and then we enjoy a big glass of water while we admire our work.

It's a good life.

Prairie Garden: Disaster in Year 4?

The promise

Three years ago I surprised myself with an eclectic butterfly and bird friendly display of flowers in what I called my "prairie garden". I thought that I might have something of a green thumb after all, but it's fairly evident that my knowledge and skills are, at best, limited. Still, the results were fine in 2015 and 2016,  and I felt reasonably confident inaugurating another season.

We got off to a rough start with planting after the weather turned cold a few weeks ago, and record May rain wasn't helpful. Bob was happy to postpone most planting until after Memorial Day, but I, never one to procrastinate, was eager to get the soil tilled and ready before our holiday weekend out-of-town junket.

After two seasons of using a spade to loosen the rocky ground, last year Bob rented a gas tiller and prepared the soil for me. This is not something I can do on my own, as the machine is very heavy and somewhat temperamental. I can pull the cord to start it, but it has to be primed and perfect for it to work. Definitely beyond me.

Anyway, yesterday was the day. The machine was even heavier than I remembered and, once started, it tended to run away with the operator. Bob gave himself a break and off I went through the garden. The tiller pulled me forward: I thought I would fall head first into the rocky, churned up earth until I was relieved of my duties and relegated to the sidelines.

The job got done. Time to plant. A few weeks ago, I was seduced by one of those flyers in the weekend newspaper, showing a happy gardener unrolling a carpet of beautiful pollinator friendly summer flowers. I was hooked: I imagined a Jack-in-the-Beanstalk magic transformation into a farmers' market harvest of beauty. Within a few days, my online order arrived:  five large plastic envelopes of seeds embedded in 8 sq. ft. sheets of heavy biodegradable, compostable paper.

My border looks like toilet paper

As promised, it was easy to cut the sheets into the "desired size and shape". I made strips of paper for a sunflower seed border along the east side of the garage. By then, it was mid-afternoon and a wind had come up, so I needed to anchor down the paper, first with some of the rocks still in the soil and then with the "1/8 " of topsoil recommended by the directions. My carpet of flowers looked like old toilet paper.

Then I tackled the bird and butterfly friendly planting. I wanted to leave myself a little path for weeding, so I divided the plot into triangles, and placed half a sheet in each triangle. By the time I finished, the rectangles looked like a random landing of old white towels, covered with black dirt -- not the topsoil layer, since it had settled in clumps at various spots on the paper. Nevertheless, I watered the mess, as directed.

The reality ... for now

"What the hell kind of pattern is that?", asked Bob. Dismayed and discouraged, I scrambled to straighten the rectangles. They were soaking wet and ripped a little under the weight of the topsoil layer. By the time I finished, pressing shredded paper into the earth so it wouldn't blow away, I was sweating. Since coverage is obviously insufficient, I will be supplementing my carpeted mess with the same seed I've used in the past.

My workfree artistic venture has evolved into a secondary salvage project. There will be no miraculous carpet of flowers anytime soon.