B-eautiful

I was worried the B Garden was going to be a bust this year after Blossom and friends basically mowed it to the ground...twice...back in the early spring.  Thankfully it survived and is really beautiful right now.  I did a video tour this morning.  Besides being here, that's really the best way to see everything.  Well, almost everything.  Here are a few pictures of some things that I missed.

I think this same butterfly has been here for almost two weeks.  It's not a monarch, but still quite pretty.  I've wondered if she's laying eggs on the milkweed as I'm pretty sure that's what I'm seeing and I'm even more sure that I haven't seen a monarch yet.

We added a second purple martin house last month.  No one has moved in, but at least they know there is more room to expand.  They have been very busy this summer.

Here is a link to the video tour.  For some reason it won't let me embed it here directly like normal.  It's worth a watch :-).

Monarchs!

Well, one. One monarch. But more are surely coming!  

How could they resist this buffet :-D. 

Last year I planted milkweed seeds in two of the raised beds and my cousin and I transplanted 10 plants from the back field into the lavender garden.  Nine of the 10 plants came back this year with extras on the side and one of the raised beds is so packed with milkweed plants that I haven't even had to weed it all summer.

I also planted plenty of buckwheat and scattered several packets of seed mixes for butterflies, bees and birds.  There are still a few lavender plants left after three years of way too wet winters and a few volunteer sunflowers have popped up as well.  I'm just now seeing some mixed flowers and I can't wait until the whole garden is blooming!

This picture shows how many milkweeds are packed in the raised bed just outside the lavender, now known as the butterflies, birds and bees garden.

This picture maybe better shows how tall they are.

I tried (once again) to plant some vegetables this spring, Victory Garden style, and (once again) in the event of a zombie apocalypse, we're going to be some of the first folks out.  But, hey, we'll have lots of pretty flowers ;-).

Here's a new puzzle that ought to keep you busy for awhile.  Enjoy!

Baby Baaxter

It's fun to go back through the archives. For anyone new who may not know about bottle lamb Baaxter Black, here's one of my favorite pictures.  He's napping under the skirting table on the porch of the Wool House.

He was easiest to take care of...when he was asleep ;-D.

But he was awful fun when he was awake, too. This is a cute video of him playing in the lavender garden with his beloved Auntie Reg :-D.   Looking forward to [Baaxtering] Out A Carbeth! 

A Little More Lavender

I think technically this is not a white, but a very pale pink or purple that fades to white. I need to check my original list though to make sure.  The bees like it regardless of the color :-).

But Tilly tends to gravitate to the purples ;-).

A Picture Of My...Rabbit?

I have pictures of spinning, wool, yarn, 20, flowers in the dye garden, cotton plants, purple martins...and I just can't get them sorted and posted.  Instead of the blog "rule" of posting a picture of your cat, I'm posting an adorable visitor to the lavender garden yesterday morning.

I love yard bunnies :-).

Ten More

Random horse shot as they randomly decided to gallop back to the barn.  Hank loves when they do this ;-).

Early this spring I caught a tiny flash of brown dart out of one of the bigger lavender plants.  I quietly walked over to see and sure enough, a tiny baby bird in a teeny tiny nest.  I quietly told the little bird to always be very quiet, especially when there might be a stupid cat around.  

I'd stroll through every day, never doing anything that might attract a cat's attention and watched.  And worried.  And one day I saw a tiny fledgling in the nearby dye garden and the nest was empty.  A tiny success story!

Well, part of a tiny success story.  There remained an unhatched egg.  It's still there, tiny blue in a tiny horse hair lined nest.  So pretty.  I think it was a chipping sparrow.

I love this honey bee with her face deep in a bloom.  A good place to be :-).

There are actually three new puzzles - two with lavender and one with the horses.  I worked the horse puzzle last night and it was a fun one with lots going on.  Click the puzzle to get to my folder of puzzles.  There may be others you haven't worked yet.

Enjoy!

Take Your Dog To Work Day

Also known as Every Day, so even though it was technically last Friday...

The lavender garden is almost in full bloom.  Once again I am unable to bring myself to cut even a small bouquet, so the "let's plant a huge lavender garden and harvest it for wool sachets" plan is, yep, once again a complete bust.  Luckily Saint Tim is a good sport.

I can't take a picture that really shows what the real garden looks or feels like.  I thought maybe putting something in for perspective would help.  I called in the trusty border collie sitting right outside the garden gate.

Kate took one look and was overwhelmed by the beauty of the garden the piles of little sticks (mulch) that were everywhere, just waiting for her to come play with them!

"This is the best playground ever!"

So I called in the trusty corgi who was only right outside the gate because she thought Kate was getting treats or something since she was so excited ;-).

I took a bunch of pictures and picked out a bunch of that bunch that I liked...and then couldn't narrow them down any further and I need to go feed Biscuit and Muffin so I decided to just post the first 10 pictures and tomorrow post 10 more.

You really can't have too many pictures of lavender.  

And bees.

And another surprise.

Tomorrow!

In the meantime...

Enjoy!

Hardly Working

I've been working Biscuit pretty hard in the lavender garden.  That's a good new lamb project with plenty of room to explore and lots of good napping spots.  These pictures are obviously from the other day. The last couple of days of cold rain have been pretty shocking after the upper 80s :-o. We've taken some good naps...indoors.

Sunday Snippets

One more breakfast shot :-).

A couple lavender puzzles for you to enjoy working while sitting in the AC.  I'm sitting out in the yard under a shade tree with Bullwinkle so he can get his grazing in.  It. Is. Hot.  But the company is good.  And occasionally the breeze is nice.

Sadly, when it gets this hot it usually means a storm is fixing to blow through.  This would be bad because 60% of our hay is on the ground.  How about some NO RAIN dances until it's safely in the barn. This is the first year we are going to get to feed (hopefully!) our own home grown hay and I'm going to be really sad if gets ruined.  

The first 100 bales smell so good in the loft :-).  I sure wish Smell-O-Vision really worked.  Between the lavender and the fresh cut hay...aroma therapy for sure.

Lavender And Bees

Well, I've just wasted 20 minutes trying to sign into my youtube account to post a short video from this evening, but for some reason I can't get in and now it's really late and I'm so tired I can't think of what I would normally write about the lavender and the bees and the big job it was, once again, to get everything cleaned back up, but boy it sure looks nice now, so I hope you enjoy just the pictures...

Comby, hiding in the jungle.

Much better :-).

Night all!