The Garden Fence

A garden fence is a must have hardscape of the farm yard, especially if you have yard birds running amok. We have over twenty chickens (I'm scared to count because I don't want to know how out of hand I've become) and one pet turkey that would love to scratch out all the seedlings, peck any emerging produce, and feast at the compost bin.

This year, instead of just protecting the crops, we have a sight to behold. A riot of almost white, pink roses. We had roses last year, but not this huge wall of color. We have about 30 feet of pink.

These are old roses that I took from my mother's yard. I clipped five pieces three years ago. Now, I get to enjoy the amazing scent of thousands of roses as I hoe, plant, and harvest. I get to sit in the kitchen and enjoy the bouquets Princess clips, and I get to enjoy the shocking display every time I step out the back door.

Some of life's greatest pleasures cost nothing. Enjoy!

Sugar Snaps

Sugar Snaps grow only during the spring and sporadically during the winter here. We get too hot to have a long growing season with delicate pea plants, lettuces, broccoli, and carrots. We have been in the 80's this week which means my precious peas won't last much longer, but this week we are enjoying this fantastically crisp and sweet treat in abundance.

We like them barely cooked, either steamed or sautéed with some sesame seeds. Last night, I was home alone and I threw a few into my pasta water at the last second, then added some Parmesan. Of course, when I was picking my supper, I popped a few into my mouth right off the vine. I have caught my children, on several occasions, standing suspiciously at the raised beds containing the pea plants and the carrots. Yet, I can't get upset because I can't think of a more healthy snack.

Sugar snaps, or at least these, claim they don't need staking, but I find that everything does better with a little support. These are growing on pieces of cattle panel braced by some triangular tomato cages and have grown to about four feet tall. Since they aren't touching the ground, the heavy rains haven't harmed the blooms or rotted the peas. If I could just control the heat, I could have wonderful peas all through the summer. I bet they wouldn't seem so special if I could have them all summer long.

Springing Spring

Spring needs some serious help lifting itself into full bloom. One month ago, I found the first daffodil. Today, we had snow and I will have to find someway to warm my fruit trees tonight. The projected low temperature of 26 is not a great thing for fruit trees in bloom . We have weeks in the upper 60s and low 70s, tricking the trees and flowers into bloom, then BAM, back to winter.

Isn't it funny how the cold always feels colder once you've been truly warm for a while. I'm hopeful that this is winter's last hurrah. I can't take much more.

For now, I'm out to cover the vegetables.

Daffodils, Accidental Felting, and Winter Excitement

As is my custom, I like to recognize the first daffodil of the year. For some reason, seeing that yellow bloom, even if the weather is stinky, makes me feel like spring is drawing nigh. My spirits soar. I begin piddling in the dirt, ordering seeds, and making plans. The power of that first flower is awesome.

Though my spirits are rising, the temperatures are all over the place. A few weeks ago, I found this pattern and knitted a version for my cold feet that don't like shoes. I made them out of a wool and llama blend. I immediately wanted a happier color, but brown is practical. Anyway, I loved my Moc-A-Socs. I frisked about my house like a sprite with my hardly noticeable foot warmers. Then disaster struck. I accidentally washed and dried them. They were stuck in my pants legs. Now, my wonderful new Moc-A-Socs are smaller, stiffer, and hotter. The biggest disaster was that I had to disassemble my lint ducting and outside vent because of my sloppy washing routine. I didn't have time for dryer repair and maintenance because of my crazy single farming schedule and because we are hosting the Dixie National Trail Ride, again.

The riders will pull in Sunday afternoon. I don't have to cook for the 300 cowboys. The fundraiser was so successful last year that the group asked to borrow the kitchen for another needy family. We aren't riding either. We never do, but a lot of the town seems to be participating this year. I was at the hardware this afternoon and they were doing a steady business in saddle repair, bridle bits, and reins. The Colombian man who lives at the sale barn is so excited for the diversion that he wanted to invite relatives. My attitude must be wrong, because I just don't get it. I do have my battery charged so I can snap a few pictures.

I'll be able to write more after the weekend. I have finished the W-2s, the quarterly reports, Workman's Comp audit, and other stinky end of year chores. I also mailed the last Christmas presents today. I know I should be ashamed. Next week I'll mail my Christmas cards.

Wild Blooms

We're in a honey flow. Meaning, that despite the slow start, spring has sprung and is moving forward quickly despite the cold and rain. My garden looks terrible, but the wild blackberries are blooming prolifically, the honeysuckle and privet are just beginning.

The bees are working hard now. If all goes well, I will get to harvest and make jelly out of this bumper crop of blackberries. Wouldn't it be nice to have so many wild blackberries that you didn't have to ration the jelly??


Love, love, love wild blackberries!!

Plum Blossoms

The plum trees are blooming! I was worried that we wouldn't have a blossoming because we had a freeze and snow (very unusual for us) a couple of weeks ago, but I suppose luck, orchard location, and the garden fence provided a little assistance.

Today was a gorgeous 75° day and the plum trees were a buzz with life. I counted 10 different types of flying insects on one tree. There were red wasps, bumble bees, butterflies, moths(I was forced to smash these), sweat bees, and many others. Of course, the trees were covered in honey bees (Better pictures of them here, here, and here. You may as well look at them all).

Thought you northern dwellers would appreciate a view of spring.

Japanese Privet

Japanese Privet, technically called Ligustrum japonicum is a pest plant here in Mississippi. The plant thoughtfully placed in some one's landscaping has become an invasive species. When we first moved onto the hill, we took a backhoe (yes, it is that stubborn) and ripped privet and fence row to clear the view immediately surrounding the house. We pitted the yard trying to remove every last root. But removal is elusive. We still have a beautiful specimen flowering next to a mature tree.

As you can see we still have fence rows that don't really need fences because of the thick cover of J.Privet. To the locals and the US Forestry Service the plant has become a pest.


Yet, the blooms are beautiful and the sweet fragrance perfumes the entire farm (actually the town and outlying area). Unless someone is burning or spreading chicken fertilizer this is what you smell here in early May. The cows loll in the shade. The brown thrashers love the messy fence rows. And, when you have bees hanging on their hives, the privet is a welcome nectar and pollen plant. Look at the pollen on the leaves in the first picture. In fact, we have been busily assembling honey frames to try to keep up with the bees' production in this privet induced honey flow.


After the flowering, the privet produces a little purple fruit on which the birds feast all winter.

So, I wonder if all invasive species are bad?

Other than trying to take over yard, garden, and pastures, Japanese Privet seems to give much to nature and farm.

More Southern Spring

Competition among flowering shrubs, trees, and plants is steep in the Southern Spring. Another one of my favorites is the iris. White iris blooms, like the daffodils, at all old homesteads and frequently in ditches where people have thinned and didn't know what to do with the spare rhizomes. Yellow iris and purple iris are also fairly common.

This fancy bronze bearded iris is in front of my mother's house. They used to reside in the side yard by the old pear tree and before that at my grandmother's garden fence. My grandmother had a riotous garden of single species, gifts from gardening friends and purchases of beautiful things. Matching color was no object. Yet, it all seemed to work.

She had a garden inside her house and in the windows of the hardware store of gloxinia, violets, cyclamen, cactus, and anything else that could be rooted from a cutting. I remember her joy at coaxing something into blooming or rooting.

She would have been happy to think her special iris is still blooming in profusion each Spring. Mama wants me to take a few to plant at my old house. I will, for memories. The blooms are not the only special iris trait that produces memories.

Did you know that you can take an iris leaf and, with a stick, write messages or your name on it. You can then fashion bracelets and crowns or you could just leave the leaf attached to the ground to claim your bloom. I spent hours, as a child, sitting with the iris scratching my name and secret messages onto the leaves.

Don't you just love the stalky, pride of these wonderful plants?

Struggling with Day Light Savings Time

I doubt that the powers that be gave two seconds thought to the by-products of an earlier Day Light Savings Time. In fact, I never thought of consequences. Being the energy conserving maniac that I am, I was excited! Now, I've changed my mind. Every night I struggle to keep a school schedule for bed-time rituals. Yet, the children play longer; we start supper later; we eat later; we go to sleep later. The children wake up later. Starting school before 8:30 (which is our goal) is impossible for children who don't get to sleep until 10 something.

Knowing the struggle of morning, I concentrate more on an early start. Yet, I am affected by the light. I am weak. I want to play longer outside. I want to leisurely prepare dinner. I don't want to sacrifice our reading time.

Since this is Poetry Friday for many of my online friends, I thought I would share a fitting poem by Robert Louis Stevenson. I hope y'all don't mind me playing along.

Bed in Summer

In winter I get up at night
And dress by yellow candlelight.
In summer, quite the other way,
I have to go to bed by day.

I have to go to bed and see
The birds still hopping on the tree,
Or hear the grown-up people's feet
Still going past me in the street.

And does it not seem hard to you,
When all the sky is clear and blue,
And I should like so much to play,
To have to go to bed by day?

Honestly, I am so happy my children don't have a school bus to catch.

The Southern Spring Queen

I was overcome by the sheer spectacle of the azalea yesterday and had to share. I feel a bit guilty since I have just found out one of my Northern friends is being pelted by blizzard like conditions, but once my camera was raised to my eye the inevitability of these pictures showing up here was cast. Maybe they will bring a smile.

This weekend the show will be over. I think our temperatures will dip to almost freezing and the blooms will fade. Every year we Southerners are lured into thinking the cool weather is over only to be slammed with freezing weather on the weekend when white shoes and light-weight, sleeveless dresses premiere for Summer. Because we are a slave to those clothing rules and what people think, we will wear our white shoes and light clothes anyway and pretend we aren't cold. We are good at pretending. Sometimes when it is over 100 F in the Summer, we pretend we don't sweat.

Let's go back to safer territory, the azaleas. Lest you think I have this flashy show occurring in my garden, let me set the record straight. This is my mother's side show. I was lured into picking up my camera when I was picking up her contribution for the Salvation Army. My foundation plantings are virtually non-existent, because we are still working on hardscapes.

When we plant, I will plant azaleas because I won't be able to resist the month of melodrama each year.

Bluebird Eggs

In the spirit of Easter, here is a picture of naturally colored eggs. I finally found the courage to check my birdhouses. I found out last year that checking the birdhouses is not harmful, that the birds will return to the nest, and that some intervention actually increases success rates. It still scares me. What if? What if? What if?

I don't want to be responsible for a nest of dead babies.

Yet, by checking I got to see this nest of perfectly colored blue eggs. I wish our dyed Easter eggs could look so perfectly blue.

I have been cleaning

Really!! Don't laugh. I really have. What I have done is not enough. No matter what I do, cleaning wise, it is never enough. Dirt and clutter just seem to reappear as soon as I turn my back. I feel like Pigpen. Nonetheless, I have spent the rainy part of the weekend purging.

Purging feels good. I don't want to stop. I want pristine counters, shelves, and desktop. I want a calm place for my eyes to rest. I want simplicity.

Unfortunately, I still want stuff - books, dishes, fabrics, pots, pans, and shoes. There is a separate part of me who wants stark simplicity. Duplicity in the home makes for confusion, disorganization, and a crazed woman. Yet, I can't seem to choose a path. I can't seem to purge deep enough to make a difference.

Yet, things are better than they were.

Wisteria gone wild!

With a blog named Twice Bloomed Wisteria you would expect to find a bit of wisteria draping over many entries. It is - allegorically speaking. But, here is a more substantive entry.

Wisteria goes wild by the roadsides (even with MDOT's aggressive use of herbicide) covering trees, bushes, and buildings with its grape like blossoms and filling the air with its inebriatingly sweet scent. Seeing wisteria like this reminds me of how riotous southern Springs really are.

I got to see plenty of roadside wisteria, dogwood, and redbud this weekend when I drove to the Delta. I'll tell you about my fabulous weekend later.

A Spring Break

I'll be back in a few days. I'll take the camera.

The clover is not the only thing blooming!!!

The plum trees have just started blooming. There are other expectant trees in our yard, but the plum has produced the first real flowers.

After yesterday, we are closer to being ready. Hives have been inspected, repairs made, and new paint applied.

Manure has been applied.

Screen doors have been repaired.

Now, we watch and wait while enjoying our best season.

Spring in the Air

Even though Miss Betty, my consultant for all old timer knowledge, says there will be a frost on April 28 because it thundered on the 28th of February, I feel Spring.

The purple clover is blooming in the orchard. My husband is straining at the bit to crank the lawnmower and shear it. He says it is unsightly, but I say leave it. I do wonder what the neighbors think. If they could hear the hum, the buzz, the throb of the many insects using this section of untidy lawn, could they be swayed to see my point of view?


I caught one (actually hundreds) of my bees collecting pollen and nectar. There were also bumble bees, spiders, gnats. . .


Now, I have to get to work so I can keep up with Spring. There are bee hives to build and repair, aged manure to spread, seeds to plant. The wisdom of the old farmers' wives has spoken, so I know not to get too far ahead of myself, but with the temperatures rising, the birds singing, and trees blooming, and the bees buzzing it is hard to resist.