STILL HERE!   Yes, hubby and I are still in the desert, after 48 years!   We now have 6 grandkids (2 are here locally).  My garden made it through August and September, even with 2 hurricanes!   The desert right now is covered with beautiful purple verbena.   I have NOT driven up Highway 74 yet to see all the ocotillo blooms and wildflowers.   Hubby and I seem to be suffering from "long COVID" and we both have relapses every now and then...sigh...(no fun).   Will post more photos and news later!

~~Cheryl Ann~~

More sunflower photos from the garden

 I only have sunflowers blooming right now, except for 2 very pathetic looking hollyhocks.   This just has NOT been a good year for them.   We got virtually NO RAIN all fall and winter.   I do go out and hand water, but there's just something about natural water that makes everything sprout and grow and since we haven't had much, NOTHING has sprouted from seed....sigh...it is very frustrating.

However, my sunflowers are doing pretty well:

My sunflowers in February

 I currently have 2 spots of sunflowers that are blooming out back and I have several spots where they have just sprouted.   I planned out and planted a sunflower circle, but those plants haven't even sprouted yet.   I went out in February with my backup camera, my old Nikon D40x and took these photos of the ones I have.

No sweet peas this year!

 I did NOT plant sweet peas this year.   Actually, I didn't plant any last year and I had quite a crop come up on their own!   I'm not expecting that this year and, in fact, I have planted hollyhocks in their place.   I will miss my sweet peas, but they have been so thin and straggly the last few years, I've frankly just given up.   I MAY try to plant some next week...we'll see.

In the meantime, I have plenty of hollyhocks coming up, as well as sunflowers.   The hollyhocks are from the seeds I picked all summer long.   I have a whole bucket full of them!   I have scattered them all around the back yard and there are a few that even survived our summer temperatures.   As long as they have water, they seem to do fine.

Another update soon!

Garden update January 2021

 Still here.   Hubby and I are pretty much just staying at home.

I am, however, working hard on my back yard garden.   Edison came and took out 6 trees under their wires because they were coming out twice a year to trim them.   So, when they asked if they could just take them out, we said yes.   It took them 3 days to do so.

But...

NOW I have about 1/3 of the yard completely bare in which to plant flowers and a vegetable garden!   Since they also took out our huge Chinaberry, all that area is clear to plant.   So, every morning I go out and do a little digging.

I do have sunflowers coming up from the seeds in my bags of bird seed!   And, I see bees out on them.

Until next time.

~Cheryl~

Fountain visitor (Coopers' hawk)

Yesterday I had a visitor stop by our front fountain:   a Coopers' hawk!   YES!   A nice, big FAT ONE, too.  I think this is the momma.   There are 2 young ones additionally in our neighborhood.   In fact, one of our neighbors (next street over) stopped by and chatted and they visit her yard, too.   I sometimes hear them cackling to each other.  I always know when they are around because ALL the birds in the yard have disappeared!   Sometimes when they take flight, they bump into my craft room window...poor things.   And sometimes I find their feathers all over, so I know one has been a meal for one of the hawks.   But, that's nature, right?

I did find a young hawk DEAD in the front yard last week.   I looked at it and couldn't see any cause of death, and since I'm still recovering from week 3 of a TERRIBLE, coughing, NASTY flu, I didn't do anything with it.   It sat out there until one morning I noticed the whole thing WAS GONE!   I believe that one of the neighborhood feral cats made off with it.   Nature's cycle completed.

Anyway, here's the link to the You Tube video that I made about the visitor:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFrsDOy-8gU

Garden, Spring 2019

I'm so sorry I haven't posted on this blog for...2 years!   I can barely keep up with my other two!

Anyway, if you want a little sunshine, here are some photos I took of my garden last Spring.   I had sunflowers and hollyhocks all over the front yard and around the mail box!   The hollyhocks got to be over 6' tall.   I planted black oil sunflower seeds from the bird seed I use in the yard and they weren't quite as tall.   They also weren't as sturdy as the hollyhocks and many of them broke in our March winds.

My sunflower garden this year

Since I am now retired (as of May 1, 2016...), almost 2 years ago, I can no longer to spend outrageous amounts on my garden passion.  Therefore, this year I kept it simple:  I book the sunflower seeds in the birdseed and planted those.  I also have sunflowers coming up from all the dropped and scattered birdseed from the feeders!

YES!

And, you should SEE my gorgeous sunflowers out in the back yard!

Here is one photo and I'll be taking more today!

This one opened up the last week of... FEBRUARY! 

Amazing, eh?
~Cheryl Ann~

I have a vegetable garden this year!!!

For the first time in over 25 years, I have a REAL vegetable garden!  I'm planing my veggies out in the back, in a nice sunny spot.

So far, I have 3 tomatoes, 3 New Mexico chili peppers, 6 red cabbage, 6 green cabbage, 2 lavender, some alyssum, 1 Swiss chard, and 2 pineapple sage (to attract hummingbirds).  I have sage and basil, also.

HOWEVER, SOMETHING is nibbling on my cabbage plants!  I thought it was a rat, so I go out every late afternoon and cover my plants with plastic bins from the 99 cent store.  I even found 3 for $0.99 at Dollar Tree!  What a find!

I wanted to interplant some herbs with the vegetables in the hopes that they WOULD keep some pests away and they do seem to be doing their job!

I'll update this as things move along...

Daisy macros~Macro Monday~October 24, 2016

I had a single daisy plant that made it through our summer, but ALL of my purple salvia did.  I'm starting to go out now and buy plants for the fall garden.

One morning I went out and took these photos of my daisy.  I LOVE my daisies!

Macro Monday for October 24, 2016.   To visit Macro Monday, please go to:   http://macromonday2.blogspot.com/

Photos taken with my old Nikon D40.  It STILL takes the best photos in low light!

Spring in the desert

Our desert here is EXPLODING with color right now.  It's been several years since I've seen this much color!  Fortunately, my allergies ARE NOT bothering me, but other folks are pretty miserable.

 Lots of cacti blossoms

 Pretty yellow flower

 Palo verde tree

desert verbena

Garden center

I drove up to our local garden center Sunday morning, since I hadn't been up there for over a month.  I wanted to buy some cosmos and zinnia seeds.  They didn't have any that I wanted.  Instead, they had some strange looking cosmos and NO zinnia seeds.  But, camera in hand, I wandered around and enjoyed seeing all their plants!  :-)

Why can't I grow roses like these?  I've given up on roses.

Roses

These are not my roses.  I simply cannot grow roses.  I've tried and tried over the last 40 years...sigh...
These are at the Palm Desert civic center park.  They had to pull out their old ones and replant them, so these are only a year old...they look pretty tired right now.

It wasn't all ice at the nursery

Well, it wasn't ALL ice up at our local nursery this week!  I love to find water on flowers...so pretty!

Ice at the local nursery

It was 21 degrees here in our valley two mornings ago.  This morning it was 34 degrees on the front porch here at home.  I'm keeping an eye on my sunflower seedings.  They didn't like the cold and most of them are bent.  I hope they survive.

I went up to our local nursery that morning.  This is what I found at 8:30 that morning...