Tulip Time!

This Morning...

Roof Top View

Some terrific nephews of mine cleaned out the gutters today.

Stephen took this shot from above.

Shea Stadium Today and the Future Citi Field

It was a beautiful day for a ball game,
but the Mets looked more like the 1962 team!
Of course we still love them.

Down at the Beach Yesterday!

Springtime Flowers and Lily on the Way!

Spring Time

Springtime

A time of new life,
A time of rebirth,
A time of beauty,
On our Planet, Earth

A time God has made
A time for flowers' bloom
A time for bird's songs
with a cheerful happy tune.

A time for nature's show
With all its colors too
Yellow Purple, Orange
Red, White, and Blue

So take it all in
Don't let it pass you by
Enjoy every thing, each day
Made by God on High

Happy Spring!

Brain Teaser From Kirstin, My Niece

Subject: Here's another number brain teaser

Try this one. You may have seen it before

YOUR AGE BY DINER & RESTAURANT MATH


This is pretty neat.

DON'T CHEAT BY SCROLLING DOWN FIRST!
It takes less than a minute .
Work this out as you read ....
Be sure you don't read the bottom until you've worked it out!
This is not one of those waste of time things, it's fun.

1. First of all, pick the number of times a week that you would like to go out to eat.
(more than once but less than 10)

2. Multiply this number by 2 (just to be bold)

3. Add 5


4. Multiply it by 50

5. If you have already had your birthday this year add 1757 ....
If you haven't, add 1756.

6. Now subtract the four digit year that you were born.


You should have a three digit number


The first digit of this was your original number
(I.e., how! Many times you want to go out to restaurants in a week.)

The next two numbers are

YOUR AGE! (Oh YES, it is!!!!!)

THIS IS THE ONLY YEAR (2007) IT WILL EVER WORK, SO SPREAD IT AROUND WHILE IT LASTS

After the Storm

This Morning's Calm Before the Storm

View From Above This Morning

Come On Rain!

Proverbs 16.15 When a king's face brightens, it means life; his favor is like a rain cloud in spring.

When I was a little kid we had that nursery school song memorized:

Rain, rain go away,
Come back another day.

Now as an adult my perspective has changed 180 degrees! I realize that the rain means life- like a king's favor!

Come on Rain!

I'll be singing in it!

Today's Cleanup

Happy Easter

My girls in 1985 and last year on Easter Sunday...

They are standing in the same spots in both pictures. I am blessed with great kids.

More of the Wonder of Spring

First Daffodil Bloom of 2007 this morning

Completed

Strawberry Pot
13 plants
6 ever bearing 7 June Bearing

Compost, the secret of the Garden

I began composting 34 year ago. Actually it was longer than that. I began dealing with decomposed cow manure when I was about 12 years old. My parents had a little tomato patch on their 40x100 piece of property in Bellmore and one year they made horse manure tea. Horse manure tea is made from horse manure and water. You fill a garbage can full of water with horse manure in the spring and put the lid on it and let it cook in the sun. Open that thing up and you have some of the worse smelling stuff that has ever entered your nostrils! Whew! You also hold in your hand the best fertilizer bar none! It was my job to put this on my folks' tomatoes each week. I used to gag when I did this chore. Little did I know I would look forward to making this brew each year in adulthood. My granddaughter Emma asked me what it was and then what I was going to do with it. When I told her she said, "I'm not eating any of those tomatoes, Poppa!" I am working on convincing her they will be delicious!


23 years ago this month I began a compost pile here in the house I live in. The original site is still in use, however the main production area is on the south side of the house. This is in operation 365 days of the year. Since Lucy is very health conscious we eat more fresh vegetable and fruits than we do canned and frozen stuff. Consequently we have more scraps for the composter than we do trash and recyclables in the trash!

For years now I have not bagged leaves up and put them at the curb. Before I was throwing away the stuff that black gold is made of! Compost enriches the soil, hold in moisture and provides all kinds of nutrients. I am a organic gardener. Egg shells, potato peelings, cumcumber rinds, and all the rest (including peanut shells) go into the bin and turn into beautiful rich compost! Many of the leaves do not make it into the heap. I have now begun mulching them up so fine that I put them in various gardens out back each fall. The following year I hardly pick a weed from such beds and always have beautiful soil in the summer heat. My son-in-law, Mike, a landscaper commented on my tiger liles - how all over Bay Shore he has not seen such full green clumps- the secret is the compost!

Here is an ingredients list for compost:

1. Grass Clippings, mulched leaves (so they don't mat)

2. All garden waste- old plants in the fall, etc.

3. Coffee Grinds, tea bags

4. All peelings: Potato, Cucumber, orange

5. Egg Shells

6. Apple Cores, trimmings off vegetables like lettuce, cabbage

7. Once in a while a little sprinkling of dirt and some wood chips

Do not put in cooked items, any evergreen clippings, anything that won't break down.
(for example you can put in potato peelings but never cooked mashed potatoes)

Turn the pile every few days. You will have rich compost with things you used to throw out!

Back to the Backyard (and Front)

It won't be long until this is a rainbow of colors!
Coming Attractions are Daffodils, Grape Hyacinths and Tulips.

Formosa Andromeda Bush From Taiwan

Spring got into full swing for me today. I planted primroses, pansies and strawberries.

The Primrose Path

Star of Bethlehem Bed
These beauty grow wild all over the yard.
I put in two beds of them a few years ago.
It virtually cost me nothing. Leo and I mulched the leaves.
I used fallen tree limbs for the border and the plants were here already!

Strawberries planted in last year's Father's Day Gift.
I love it! I put in ever bearing as well as June Bearing ones.