It's Blooming! and other discoveries

When I got into the office this morning I was delighted to find my oncidium orchid (Sweet Ears 'Pacific Gold') had started to bloom.

Apparently, I have an accent. Saturday, I went to my niece's house warming party. One of her other guests asked me where I was from, that I didn't have the typical 'Maryland' accent and couldn't place what accent I did have. I was kinda flabbergasted. I don't have an accent. Moi?

A couple of trees in our yard sustained damage from the seven feet of snow we got this past winter. I finally called a tree company to take care of the damage. $1475 to remove two trees and trim some branches! Yikes. Seems high to me so I called another company and they'll be out tonight.

I have nineteen Girl Scout vests in queue to be worked on before school starts. I'm ignoring them and have been. I'm out of glue sticks and have been waiting for the stores to start with their back-to-school sales so I can stock up. I use the glue to hold the badges in place while I sew them down. I've also been procrastinating on the badge work because I want to take July off, and because I need to get other projects worked on, like the baby quilt I posted blocks for the other day.

No way I have an accent.
 

This Just in...

I'm back from taking my kids to the doctor for their 13,900- and 16,700-mile check-ups. The verdict: they are skinny. She's in the 49th percentile for weight, he's in the 7th. For height, she's in the 67th percentile at 5'4", he's in 85th at 6 feet.

You can now return to your regularly scheduled blog reading.


 

More about The Orchid

When I posted the pictures of my orchids the other day I knew I'd get a comment from Greeny.

I feel bad I don't take better care of the two I have left. When I was on top of my game I had about a dozen plants and was getting them to bloom on a regular basis. The nice thing about them is they are relatively low-maintenance, water them only when they are dry. But even still, watering three times a year is not enough. I've practiced ultra-low maintenance over the last several years and have lost all but those two. I put them outside in the summer and I forget to water them if it hasn't rained in a while. I guess last summer was good to them anyway since they are blooming now.

I was thrilled when I saw the three bud spikes on my two plants back before Christmas. The second nice thing about growing orchids is the flowers last a long time, six or more weeks. Here is a picture of what these flowers look like when they first open. I never got around to taking good shots of mine because I was busy getting ready for the cruise. Now my flowers have faded a bit and are not as pretty.

I'll have to remember to repot them after the flowers have gone. I've neglected that aspect, too. The roots have incased the pots, it'll be tough to get the plants free. Maybe I'll take them to a local shop and have it done. Any bets whether I come back with a new plant as well?

Let the Sunshine In

Dan and I ordered new windows for the house on Tuesday. We feel we got a really good price, but still 15 windows adds up quickly. I guess that's what home equity loans are for.

The most impressive part of the sales pitch was the heat lamp demo. A 250 watt heat lamp was set up and sample pieces of run-of-the-mill two-pane windows were put in front of it. You could feel the heat. Then another and another for a total of 6 panes of glass and you could still feel the heat through them all. Then a sample of their double-pane window glass was put in front of the lamp. No heat came through. During the opening and cleaning part of the demo I asked Dan if that meant I had to start cleaning windows.

They'll come out for a pre-manufacturing measuring next week, then in about 4-6 weeks when the windows are made they'll come back to install all of them in one day. I'm looking forward to being able to open and use them all. But not cleaning.
 

Pea Diaries - Day 57

A moment of silence, please. The peas are dead. What plants made it past 2 inches high were nibbled off by Flopsy and her gang. I should have been celebrating a harvest soon, but it just didn't happen. Good thing I didn't plant that second half pound bag of seeds this spring. I'll look for another place to plant them for the fall.

On a happier note, I have two of my four tomato plants in the ground with a dozen smashed egg shells for the calcium. I've been eating a lot of scrambled egg whites for breakfast. But I'm not done yet, two more plants to go. Now I've got to figure out how to support these new babies, cages, stakes, more copper structures? Maybe I could solder a copper pipe cage. Hmm... This calls for a trip to the hardware store!

Pea Diaries Day 24

I'm not thrilled with the germination rate of these pea seeds. These are the sprouts from a half-pound bag of seeds. Look at the Day 1 Diary entry and you can see how many seeds are there and how many sprouts are growing now. I may have some burrowing animal issues going on in that bed, too. Oh well. I'll see how these grow and decide later whether to move the bed for a fall planting.

Two forms of ID

Last Friday I went over to the pea patch to check on the status of my emerald delights. The seedlings were just starting to poke through. Then we loaded the car and headed to OC for the weekend.

Monday on my way to work I reach for my work ID, my credential, as I approach the gate. Nada. Gone. It's not in my usual location in the car, in the cup holder tray. I get my driver's licence and check in at the guards' station to get a temporary pass. I then keep my DL handy because sometimes the guards ask for it too when entering the building with a temp ID. By the time I got to my desk the licence was not in my pocket. Hmm. At lunch time I retrace my steps and cannot find it. No one has turned it in to the guards' stations. All the while I'm racking my brain to remember where my work ID might be. Not in my purse, or tote bag. Not in my coat pockets, not in the car. Where could it be, I didn't go far?

How on earth am I going to get another temporary pass tomorrow if I can't find my licence?

As the day wears on, my panic increases. Then I get a call from some woman who found my licence in the hall. She's in her car on the way out for the day. "Can I bring it to you tomorrow?" Aye yai yai. Well, no. I meet her in the parking lot and get my card. Whew.

Monday evening when I get home from work I walk over to check on my peas—did all that rain on Sunday help any? Any more sprouts? And there is my work ID lying in the wet grass.

Pea Diaries Days 1 & 2

Yesterday in the mail I got my box of seeds. I ordered two half-pound bags of garden pea seeds (Alderman & Eclipse), two packs of bell peppers (rainbow mix), and a pack of tomato seeds (Giant Belgium). It's the first time in years I bought tomato and pepper seeds, I usually just buy the plants at the hardware store in June. If I am successful in growing these seedlings, and you live in my town, (I'm not mailing tomato babies), I'll give you a seedling or two. Just ask. (We'll see who is reading this!)

Today I left work early for an appointment and afterward had time to pick a place in the yard for my peas. This house was a model home for the builder when the neighborhood was being built 20 years ago. It's a corner lot and the house faces the intersection (to the southwest) so the front yard is bigger than the back and has better sun, and I usually plant my veggies in in the front. Today I picked a spot of unused soil next to the garage.

Last summer —or was it two summers ago?—I taught myself how to solder copper pipe together and made copper trellises. I made them so the four units are supposed to fit together in a large X formation, but I've never ended up using them like that. Anyway, I prepared the bed for the peas, soaked one pack in warm water (the other variety wants warmer soil so I'll wait a few weeks), sprinkled them over the soil (dirt), covered them up and stuck the trellises in the ground in the middle of the bed. I'm a fan of the "wide row" method of pea growing, instead of one seed two inches apart for the 16 million feet a pound of seed will create. The vines help support themselves this way, too so you don't need to provide a lot of growing support.