We're having a spiritual experience...

  I am home, with Roxie, singing along to the cd playing in the Bose.  It's a marvelous cd by a woman named Jan Phillips, full of spiritual songs. It's my Sunday morning go-to music. That..and the Staples Singers.  If you aren't familiar with Jan, please check out the link. I have several of her books and the music...she speaks to me...

  Anyway...we had a nice breakfast of spinach, onion, minced garlic and cheese omelets with english muffins. Then the Irishman left for his busy Sunday...meeting at 10 and then District Mtg at 2 and making copies in between. Copies he should have made earlier, but forgot, of meeting agendas, necessary for the GSR's to have. Anyway, I sent him on his way with a healthy breakfast and my part in THAT is done. lol

  So Roxie and I cleaned up the kitchen and made our way to the computer and the music and she is singing her little heart out. lol  She loves to sing with Joan Baez, too. Someone said the music must hurt her ears, but I don't think so...she just likes to sing.  She sings along until she's done and then she stops and doesn't sing any more.

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   Yesterdays long day at MissB's was relatively uneventful, as she slept most of the day because she was up half the night and on a rampage.  They all warned my about the day, and even thought they were maybe going to have to take her to the  hospital, but finally she exhausted herself (I guess) and went to sleep.  She even ate breakfast for me and had some coffee, and then after an hour or so, dozed off. I did all kinds of little cleaning chores and some laundry and even took the kitchen curtains down and washed them. 

   It was great to be off at 3 in the afternoon and come home after stopping at the market for some bread.  OMG. I have got to get back to baking all my bread again. I cannot believe the price of a decent loaf of bread..and the only kind I buy around here is the Brownberry Health Nut, and it's over 4 dollars a loaf.  Highway robbery. 

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  It was beautiful day yesterday, close to 50, and the same is expected for today. I'm going to take Miss Roxie for a walk in the park, as she didn't get one yesterday and the other dogs did. The next few days are supposed to be even warmer, if you can imagine. 

  The bad news is that my peach trees are budding.  I have lilies poking up through the ground, and that's one thing, but if the trees flower too early and then we get a freeze we will lose the whole peach crop. And THAT, my friends, would be tragic. Because we grow some damn fine peaches, if I do say so myself. Tomorrow morning I am going to try to get some seeds started.  Cabbage type stuff, I think. Cruciferous vegetables...which include kale, broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, and cabbages. I'm going to research and see if we can grow Napa Cabbage here--not sure.  And regular cabbage for sure.  I need to go check Beth Marie's blog and see how close we are to spring. The Irishman seems to think it's way too early for doing ANYTHING, but I know better. One thing I know--this time of year time speeds up and if we're not careful, it'll be late May and we won't even have the compost on the beds yet...at the end of every year, we do a lot of layered composting..putting the debris and leftovers directly onto the beds and let it compost all winter long. Then we turn that beautiful stuff over in the early spring and then we start moving the real stuff from the compost bins onto the beds and turn that under too.  After we plant and things start coming up, we start top dressing them with composted leaf material and whatever compost is left from the bins. After that, we don't fertilize much...unless it looks like something really needs an extra boost. Then I use either a fish emulsion or a manure tea.  And I make my own insect spray from onions, garlic, a tiny bit of dish soap and water, and cayenne pepper.

  I feel like I have spring fever....lol.

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 It's going to be interesting to see how my blackberries come back from the horrific rape by the tree cutting hillbillies. Husbandman seems to think they'll be fine and come back with a vengeance. I hope so.  And if they do, at the end of this summer, I'll go around cutting the rest of the ones all around my perimeters out. I want to get some blueberries in this year too. I planted them once, when I first moved in and then accidently mowed them down. And killed them.  oops.  I have raspberries and blackberries (the blackberries are wild and delicious). I want to plant strawberries too, and I think they probably need to be getting in the ground soon. I had strawberries the first 3 years here, but they tired out and I mowed them all down and didn't replant. (Plus--I had about a gazillion jars of strawberry jam in the pantry, so....)  lol  I know Mama Pea plants lots of strawberries..maybe I'll pick her brain about how she maintains them, because I suspect I could keep them longer. 

  A friend laughed when asking me how much more garden I thought I get in on this little piece of dirt of ours. I looked at her seriously and said that we still have way too much lawn that could be used for practical purposes.  Then she stopped and said--are you serious?? I said hell yes I'm serious.  We have a beautiful yard, but I am so not into all that mowing and maintenance when I could be growing food on it. In this country we are crazier about that than anywhere else in the world.  And I have plenty to spare. There's a little less room in the back where the majority of my garden beds are, just because there are a lot of trees back there, and so it's a sunlight issue. We have already used all the good spots for all the gardens back there. I think. lol  We do still have to have some leisure places back there, and my chicken coop is back there and my clothesline and our back decks, with the bbq and all. I have a little quiet spot down by the pond, with a table and chairs and a shepherds hook with a tiny delicate wind chime hanging from it. It's incredibly peaceful there, and I love to have my breakfast down there in the summer and read. There are bird feeders all arouond down there too, and a wren house.  Down by the pond on any given day, you might see our resident Great Blue heron,  tiny little bluebirds, juncos,  sparrows and woodpeckers. We have some small green herons too, every now and again. And always Robins and Cardinals and Bluejays.  It's heaven.

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  Well, the morning is slipping away and I have things to do. So, I bid you adieu and wish you a spiritual experience all your own on this fine day.  Stay grateful for all the little things, and remember to say a small prayer for Linda as she goes through recovery from her surgery yesterday. Step outside and listen to the birds and look for the signs of spring...they're everywhere....

Namaste.