A year in my backyard #2

I've stuck to it for one whole week!  Yay!

We are getting lots of smoke from the Yosemite fire in California.  (and that is over 250 miles away).  It's hurting my eyes and giving me a headache.
Fires all over the west.
Sometimes it's good---natures way of getting rid of the overgrowth---but it makes me very sad to see forests go up in flames.  Not to mention people's homes and fireman's lives.

I don't know if you can even see the smoky haze thru the pictures, but if you can, that's where it's coming from.  

A year in my backyard #1

Remember the old filmstrips or movies we used to watch in science class... where they had the  'time speed' function?  It used to be all chunky and clunky, because they didn't have the technology we do now?
I've always wanted to do that.  To see how my yard changes in a year.

Now....if only I can stick to it.
Once a week.  3 photos.

Here we go:

a transformation 2011--the beginning

When I was a kid, I was always fascinated by those time-lapsed film segments, when it showed something changing over a period of time.
So, I think I'll try,  TRY to do that with photos of my yard this year.  I'll take pictures of my  yard each week, standing in the exact same place and then we'll see how it transforms.

Am I embarrassed by how my  yard looks right now? Well, kind of--yes.  We had all the leaves raked up before the first snowfall,  (and we do get lots of snow and below freezing temps, so our  yards here in Northern Nevada look all brown and dead) but our weather has been unseasonably warm, so the Handyman got out and blew all the dead leaves  --the ones that had fallen after our big pick up of 20 garden bags of leaves.  Did you not notice our big trees?  they drop lots of leaves, so there is always some leftover).   But he blows them out of the rocks and LEAVES them  (no pun intended) on the lawn.

He says he intends to rake them up this afternoon.  I am betting on a big wind storm to blow them right back up against the fence. 
On the other  hand, at least he is getting of his rear-end and doing something, unlike myself who sits on her rear-end during the winter.  ~sigh~

Anyway.....  my big backyard, the end of January 2011.

and my cat, Izzy, who is getting ready to come weave herself between my legs.  She will be the death of me one morning---the big trip and fall and knock myself in my head, from her weaving.

I sometimes fell my pictures in the Big Backyard Blog are redundant.

But...it's my backyard, so, things are pretty much the same as last year.

Who am I trying to impress?

On a sad note, we will probably have to take out another tree this year.

What's been going on?

I am so behind.... I haven't kept up very good with my backyard blog this year. Nor my backyard for that matter. Why?

Because of these cute little guys.....whom I'd much rather spend some time with than stupid old weeds in my rock garden. Or working on a vegetable garden.

I need to weed. I don't care.

 

 

I do have pictures tho, of our project. We had to replace part of our fence. And once we removed it, we took out the old dog house. Because we no longer have a dog. It was sad to see it go

We really need to cut down this Blue Spruce tree. The Handyman keeps wasting water on it, thinking it will "come back", but it's dead.

We live in the desert. Pine trees do not do well. We better accept it.

 

These pics were taken a few weeks ago, my garden is much bigger and more green now.  I even have corn sprouting.

Hopefully I will be more up to date with blog posts by this weekend.

 

What's Outside My Kitchen Window?

Happenings in the big backyard this week.

All my veggies have sprouted and I have apples on the apple tree.

The Handyman had to chop down a cherry tree---but I didnt' get any pictures of that.

I just walked around and took pictures of "stuff"

I couple of years ago, I asked the Handyman to put up a ledge or shelf on our fence so that I could hang watering cans from it.  I had this idea of collecting antique watering cans...

I guess I need to "dead head" some flowers.

Not even a good shot of a cobweb.

But I did get a bee.

I'm a bit concerned about our grapevine this year.  It's not doing so well, as you can tell by all the vine without grape leaves.

And another bee.

A flower pot on my patio table.

I wish there were more time to lay in the hammock and read.

A Bird on the fence.

A red-headed house finch on the fence.

Two birds...waiting for their turn at the drinking fountain.

Sunday

We had a very productive Sunday.

First, we shampooed are carpets..... no more "gray" knees for our grandbabies.

(talk about horrifying....what a way to find out how dirty your carpets are.  LOL )

After that we worked in the yard.

This little flower bed is the only one I can never get "just right".

It's up against the house. We used to have rose bushes and shrubs, but one of our dogs chewed everything to bits. He was our son's dog and we havent' had him for quite some time, but I just can't decide what to do with this bed.  I still blame the dog.

The Handyman....figuring out how to get water to my garden  (so that I dont' have to drag a sprinkler)

I put a couple of Hens and Chicks in this planter on my patio. I have so many hens and chicks I don't know what to do.

The small garden again.  I will use the chain link fence to train my squash to go up.

It says we can do that in the "Square Foot Gardening" book.

Ta Da!!

Somethings growing!

I do have radishes coming up.

I have to get out there with my tweezer to thin them.

The Handyman has installed a "drip" system so that I don't have to hand water all my hanging pots.  But he discovered a leak. It was spraying all over!

We also have a "mister" for when it gets really  hot.

Which is only a few times a year.  We live in "northern" Nevada and we are high...about 4000 feet.

But the mister is really nice those couple of bbq's we have when it is hot.

The Handyman also had to cut down a dead cherry tree -- but I didn't get a picture of that.

This is Ginger.  Our very aggressive Hummingbird. 

She HATES for us to be out on our patio.

And that's where we like to have our supper all summer long.

We are not bothered by bugs much in Nevada, but an angry mama hummingbird?

Watch Out!

My son, the first time he went outside, came back in and said,  "a giant mosquito" was after him.

We have since come to a wary acceptance.... from the hummingbird, not my son.

She'll let us be out there, but we better not make any sudden moves.