garden stuff

These are pictures of my beautiful ornamental grasses - that for most of the winter lie flat on the ground under snow!! I'll have to cut them back soon. I have to put them on the lakeside of the fence, otherwise Kobie snacks on them constantly and they never grow taller than 5 or 6 inches. He is such a help in the garden! Looking at the holes and skid marks in the garden, I'm amazed that any plants survive - between rabbits, squirrels, and dogs, the flowers have to be pretty tough.

I just went out and looked, and I have quite a few things showing up. The peony on the west side of the house (by the side door) is showing some pretty red shoots. Also have Jacob's ladder, primroses, and coral bells showing green. The dwarf and tall bearded irises have green too. I can't wait to see the first blooms.

My new roses all look like they survived - hope so! Last year at the Arb sale I bought 9 new roses. It took me all summer to find places to put them all, but they were roses I had been hoping to get at some point - and there they were! I planted 2 gallicas - Charles de Mills and Apothecary's Rose. A cabbage rose - Fantin-Latour. A moss rose - Alfred de Dalmas. These are all old garden roses and will only bloom once, but the scent and blooms make it worthwhile. Plus I love the idea of having roses that were discovered or introduced hundreds of years ago. The other roses I put in were all shrub roses - Country Dancer, Hawkeye Belle, J.F. Quadra, Souvenir de Philemon Cochet. And that's only 8 - hmmmm - maybe I just WANTED 9! I guess if you add in the 20 or so that I already had, 8 is quite enough. Of course, there are dozens more I'd love to try. Thinking that big old maple tree might just disappear sometime when Mark's on a business trip - I need more sun!

Spring Fever

I don't know if you can see it or not, but the bottom picture shows tulip or daffodil bulbs coming up!!!! This is by my gazebo down by the lake, and I have cute little red-orange tulips and bright yellow daffodils that are always the first to bloom in the gardens. I think this garden spot just gets warmer faster than the others. They aren't the prettiest spring flowers I have, but they are so welcome after a long winter that they might be my favorites!

The top picture shows dwarf bearded iris coming up. Still way too early to get out and start cleaning up the gardens, but this past week we have had gorgeous temps - right around 60 yesterday and today - and the gardens are responding. I LOVE IT!

(If you click on the pics you can see better - but for some reason when I click on them the pix become gigantic and you have to move the cursors to see different parts - I have a lot to learn about this program yet!)

As you can see, we have lost a lot of our snowcover. There are still piles around the house where the sun isn't as strong. The ground is still frozen, so it's like a lake in the yard in spots. In the background of this pic you can see someone out ice fishing on the lake. We went for a walk Sunday and talked to our neighbor who was out fishing. He said the ice is still 2 feet thick. So guess we won't be putting the dock and boat in this weekend!!! (I have spring fever - can you tell??)

The pooches are enjoying all this warm weather too. These aren't very good pictures - I'm trying to learn how to take pix of black dogs - it's hard!! Tess is really hard because she usually doesn't sit still long enough to let you take the shot. Kobie poses whenever he sees the camera. He evidently has it in his head that he looks better in profile. I only got this head-on shot because he heard something on the road across the lake.

I broke down and got a copy of Cesar's Way. I have never seen him on Oprah or Nat'l Geographic, but his book really is good. We definitely treat our dogs like people. They both have way too much energy - get over excited when we come home or someone comes to visit. We have kind of ignored it because after a minute or two, they become very calm and relaxed. But that first two minutes - phew! His take on it is that they aren't getting enough exercise and that we aren't demanding the behavior that we want from them. I can't argue with that. So we are now taking walks every day and our neighbor has agreed to help us with the greeting problems. Who knows, they might become great dogs yet!!!

New Dishwasher

More pictures from the Netherlands. I think we took over 700 pix last spring - over 4 days. I promise not to put all of them on this blog. Although, they were all fabulous and you would love to see them, of course!

I LOVE my new dishwasher! It holds wine glasses!!! My old one didn't, and I always had to handwash the wine glasses and my Mexican margarita glasses (with the cute little cactus stems) and my new Mexican glass water glasses. So I am VERY happy. I may even start cooking sometime soon so I can run a load through! (Or maybe I'll just drink enough to fill it up.)

Aren't these guys adorable? I mean, they're not poodles, but still... When I was growing up we had 2 goats for awhile. The male was Frankie - and I can't remember the female's name?? But Frankie got into the corn crib one day while we were gone, and literally ate himself to death - GROSS! Great, now I'll be up all night trying to think what the other goat's name was.

Other news - we had a really nice day, and so I went down to the Arb (Univ of Minn Landscape Arboretum) and walked. Everything is covered with a foot of snow, but still good for the soul just to be there.

Kobie had 2 seizures in less than a week and is acting kind of strange. He's very clingy and won't let us out of his sight. My poor baby. Tess and I would both be totally lost without him, so hope this isn't a pattern that continues.

Patti & Ron - hope you're having a fun time in Texas with Mom & Dad!!!! Ryan sent pix of their trip to Hawaii - what a brat! Looked like they had a fabulous time.

parlez-vous francais?

More pictures from the Keukenhof

I am taking French lessons. It is great exercise for my brain, but I need to spend more time on it outside of class. Nadine, my teacher, is from France and now lives here with her American husband and two sons. Susan also takes the class. Today Susan brought biscotti for us (VERY yummy - she made it with craisins), and Nadine sent each of us home with a half loaf of bread that she had made this morning (also yummy - Susan and I think she should show us how she makes her bread during one class). I took French in high school and college,and really found it sort of easy. Now that I am much older, it is HARD! But also fun and I'm enjoying it very much. Maybe sometime I'll attempt to do an entry in French!!

Sears delivered and installed my new dishwasher this afternoon. My old one decided to quit on me last week. The new one is very similar to my old one, but it's always fun to have new stuff!

Last night we watched A Good Year. Russell Crowe stars with a good cast, a fun, light-hearted story, and great scenery. We enjoyed it.

Sun After the Storm

The Keukenhof Gardens

I'm ready for spring, so think I'll post some of the pictures from our trip to the Netherlands last spring while I'm waiting for my own bulbs to appear. This was one of my favorite gardens. I always go for the bright colors when I buy bulbs, but this mostly white garden with just a touch of orange and pink and blue really was gorgeous. I may try and do something similar next fall in an area that HOPEFULLY I'll get planted out this next summer.

We have a beautiful sunny day - low 20's but melting like crazy. Supposed to be in upper 30's by end of next week. Sounds good to me. Kobie & Tess are having fun in the new snow and come in completely covered with little snowballs sticking to their fur. I've been ironing - yargh! I think someone should start a campaign for "tee shirts - the new dress shirt." Oh well.

New book - High Profile by Robert B Parker. Jesse Stone series. I like his Jesse Stone and Sunny Randall characters. Spenser, not so much. Also last week read I Feel Bad About My Neck by Nora Ephron. Fast read and a hoot. Thank goodness for the Hennepin County Library system - the best! I used to buy all these books (!), but the last 3 years or so, I started using the library again. It's wonderful. This summer they're going to put in a bike trail where the Dakota Rail line was and then I'll be able to bike right to the library. Fabulous.

THINK SPRING!!!

We Have Winter

The winter garden.

All this snow is lovely - but not much fun to move around! For now it's stopped snowing, but wind is picking up. So we're not done yet!




The pooches wouldn't leave the patio (which we shovel) because the snow was too deep. So I went out with the snowshoes and made paths for them. Am I a good mom or what?!










Our soup and bread last night tasted good. But, I need to figure out a warm place to let the bread rise. It was better as toast this morning. Also, last weekend Mark used the last of our frozen, roasted tomatoes in chili, so had to use canned tomatoes in the vegetable soup. Not nearly as good. I may have to put in more tomato plants this year!!

GOOD DAY FOR READING

Very snowy in Minneapolis today, so perfect day to make some soup and read a book! Maybe put a log in the fireplace too.

I just made homemade vegetable soup from The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook - the best. It will be perfect for dinner tonight. I also have my first loaf of No Knead bread underway. We cool our house down at night, so it's taking longer to do the first rise than I had planned. However, the loaf should also be done for dinner. Can't wait. Found a ton of good sites with pictures and info on how to make the bread, so that helped.

I am totally into reading. In 2006, I read 118 books, and so far this year I have 20 under my belt. Could this be why my house is a disaster???? Don't really care!

Just finishing the new Vince Flynn - Act of Treason. I am really enjoying his stuff. It reminds me of Tom Clancy - but set in post 9/11 and the characters are MUCH easier to keep track of. I would recommend starting with the first Mitch Rapp so you have background info as the story progresses. Think first book in the series was Transfer of Power.

Another author that I have really enjoyed is John Lescroart. Great stories. Again, you get to know the characters better if you start with the first - I think in this case, Dead Irish.

Also reading A Garden In Lucca - Finding Paradise in Tuscany - by Paul Gervais. A memoir about 2 guys who bought a house in Lucca and the journey of reclaiming the house and garden. Reminds me of the Frances Mayes books a little. Makes me want to buy a house in Italy (or France or England or Spain or Switzerland or...) and garden. The best line so far is an Italian quote "Quello che non amazza, ingrassa!" which he translates as: That which doesn't kill you makes you fat. I LOVE it!