The Screaming Type

Why have I been missing for 11 years?

2026-08-10T23:49:10.421-04:00

Part of why I haven't blogged for so long is...somewhere along the way, I forgot I had this blog (or my other blog, for that matter...turns out I have two). Also, I had some troubles. My son became disabled. The interior of my house was destroyed by fire. My spouse became handicapped (but they figured out the problem: rare pituitary gland failure, walking much better now!). But, I'm back now. Moved back into my house. Figured out how to carve writing time (and me time!) into my caregiving schedule (helps that the spouse doesn't need caregiving anymore). Way back when, I wrote a book. But, my pile up of troubles meant I was unable to finesse it. The book was pretty good (Kirkus Reviews said good things about it: Quirky, paranormal adventure...inventive first novel...provocative thesis...Knott’s sharp comedic sense permeates her writing...imaginative tale peppered with adventurous escapades...), but the ending was thrown together hastily because of THE TROUBLES (TT) never really promoted it. I didn't think I'd have time to fix the book because of TT. But here it is just 11 years later, and I found the time. Worked on it full time, seven days a week, for three or four months (one loses track at the keyboard). This time around, I am going to attempt to publish traditionally. Probably won't happen (the odds are astronomically low). But, if it doesn't, I will publish it myself some time in 2027. (You may be better off if I publish it as a traditional publisher will probably take until 2030 and who wants to wait that long?) And the good news is, after tearing the book apart, adding a new ending (fully 25% more on the end now), and really refining it, the book is really good. You will love it. It is titled Catching Nothings. The picture on this post is part of my garden. It's an old pic from before TT. That magnificent blue delphinium was my favorite plant. It made a great show in my garden for years. Then one of those yellow flowers behind it strangled it and a couple others. It strangled them over the winter, so I didn't even know it was happening. The yellow flower is gone now...I tore it to shreds. I didn't realize I could be so vindictive. I haven't found another delphinium like the one I had. And I've been looking for years. If you see one, tell me!

My first mosaic project in progress

2015-01-09T02:25:00.000-05:00

This is my first attempt to make an "art" mosaic. It is both easier and more difficult than I thought. I wanted to make an artsy statement, so I chose to do this "Blue Boy." I figured the teen angst/sadness that I wanted to express would be well served by random, shattered, broken mosaic pieces (so I wouldn't have to worry too much about creating any kind of pattern or rhythm to the placement in my first mosaic). It's not looking too bad except I think the lips look more like a moustache (good thing I didn't do a girl).

The piece moved along very swiftly since I was not trying to place the pieces with precision, but rather with a chaotic feel. I used double wheeled cutters to break the glass and that was much faster (and resulted in less blood) than using a regular glass cutter (which I am not very good with even after building a couple stained glass windows and a lamp).

Another "before & after"...this time an underwater watercolor

2014-03-31T22:12:00.000-04:00

I wasn't too pleased with this watercolor (it's my 9th or 10th...something like that). But, I do think it immproved when I tried to fix it some after I thought it was done. All I really did was blue up some of the plants and the fish. My iphone may have changed the colors even more, though I took the two pictures in the exact same spot under the same lighting conditions. That's all I got. Hope it hels someone.

Before and after of watercolor painting #6

2014-03-25T22:13:00.001-04:00

This is the first painting I am almost happy with. Maybe because there isn't as much subject matter to mess up. Maybe because of the lighting. Who knows?

After I finished, I decided that the values were off and I attempted to fix them. I blued up the midrange hills to try to make them look more distant and decided to do the same with the forward hills as well. I also tried to put more shadows on the plants, etc. Finally, I decided that the light green cacti weren't lookign anythign like what they were supposed to, so I turned the ones in the foreground in to prickly pear cacti. Don't know if all the changes helped or hurt, but I decided to quit before I did too much damage.

#5 You can learn so much from me...it's all about mistakes

2014-03-23T22:47:00.002-04:00

This is a portrait of a relative, but no one would know it. My advice: don't do watercolors of children until you are good! The drawing was dead on. (I can say this, because knowing how important it would be to get it right, I traced it from a photo). You have to paint fast when doing youngsters...there is so little detail, everything is smooth. I wasn't up to the task. For painting #6, I'm going back to landscapes.

Watercolor #4 lessons on subject matter

2014-03-21T22:16:00.001-04:00

This is my first landscape and as I imagined, it is a lot easier to loosen up your watercolor painting sytle with a landscape. However, I made some poor choices in selecting this image. I will share them with you in the hopes that it will help you make smarter choices.

First, te lighting is weird. It's a grey sky, so the background is grey, but there is some light in the foreground, but not dramatic light.It is about noon, so the shadows aren't dramtic. And the light in the foreground isn't stunning, so it all looks like the light could be a mistake. In my reference photo, there was a hill in the foreground and the crops in front were greener, while the crops on the next rise were golden. I thought that would look wrong, so I took out the hill and made all the cropts golden. Gets a little tedious. I need to select photos with better composition. No real focal point. And the rows were a challenge to get the right perspective. (Especially since I added some rows where the farmer had taken parts of them out. Bet you'll never guess what crop this is...grapes! It's a vineyard. Oh, well.

Third watercolor painting...way too ambitious

2014-03-13T23:37:00.001-04:00

My watercolor class was cancelled due to the blizzard, so I thought I'd spend the night painting. I chose a picture that was way too complicated for a beginner. I had never tried to paint people before. Painting manufactured stuff is (I think) more difficutl than painting nature. The list goes on. (( am full of excuses.)

The one thing that I did right was run my reference photo through photoshop, applying the "water color" filter to it. I sized it up to actual size (I draw my initial sketch freehand, but it helps immensely if I'm not having to draw larger or smaller than my reference material) and the filter eliminated a lot of the unnecessary details that I would have otherwise found myself trying to paint. As it was, I messed up considerably on the slots at the right. There were blurred arms reaching at them and I could not get those blurred arms to look right. Made quite a mess of it as watercolor is such an unforgiving medium. Fortunately, and X-acto blade helped me edit out the mess (2nd pic above). I forgot to cut out the space between the gambler's chest and arm...I will do that.

My one recommendation to beginners trying people is to choose an old lady for subhect matter. All the horrible blotches and such look perfectly natural on an old woman. In fact, I would have liked to make her look older and saggier. Oh, well.

2nd watercolor painting

2014-03-09T17:55:00.000-04:00

In the first pic *(the first two are the same, I can't get one to go away) you can see that I laid down some blue washes (mixed in a little green or grey here and there) and some black details. In the second pic, I added a grey wash to the chest and put in some purple to create shadows on the feathers. I didn't think the shadows were enough, so I also wet the highlight areas and removed some of the blue with my brush.

The last pic is the completed work (except for erasing my initial sketch lines...I have to go buy a special eraser for that... Magic Rub, I am told). The paper got really bubly from being saturated when I put in the background wash, so once the paper was dry, I wet the back, turned it over and weighted it down, which flattened it out considerable. From now on, I will prestretch the paper. I had to do a lot of blurring around the edges to get the distant branches to look distant, but I think they eventually turned out. In my first painting, I relied on darker shading to make things look distant, but in my photo reference for this, some of the background branches were in light that made them brighter. I suppose I could have ignored that. Should have ignored the fluffy white bottom on the bird, which looks wrong in the painting. LIve and learn. All in all, I think I learned some from this painting #2.

Learning to paint with watercolors.

2014-02-28T21:18:00.002-05:00

If you have been keeping up with me, you may wonder why on earth I am taking on so many new things. I am wondering that myself. I should allow myself to get good at something before I try something new. Trouble is, I am finding weather to be a detriment to the mosaicing that I have taken up. I don't want to be using thinset and grout indoors and it seems like it is never going to warm up. I know grout will really affect they way my projects look, so I don't want to have too many projects waiting to be grouted before I know if I have to change they way I am putting them together to maximize their appeal after grouting...so watercolor painting is something I can do indoors.

I am finding quite a steep learning curve on the painting. The paint behaves in unpredictable ways and there is a lot to learn about layering the colors (glazing)and such. Much more technical than I'd imagined. I am taking a class through our school district's community education program. Have attended two 2-hr. classes so far. I'd like to learn to paint in a loose style, but I'm not sure that will happen as our instructor has a very detailed, realistic style. I've watched youtube instructionals, which have been very helpful, but I think it's going to be tough to learn to paint loose, even with tutorials. The pictures here show all my work so far. The pink flower and trees were done in class, the pink flower in week one, the trees in week two. The purple poppy is something I did on my own the day after class this week. I was pleased with how it turned out for only having 4 hours of painting experience, but it was difficult and frustrating. Hopefully, things will get better as time goes on. So far, my experience has been that wet-on-wet techniques seem to be easier and more likely to give me an effect I am pleased with. I will try to remember to take and post pictures throughout the process for my next painting.

Blue Boy: my first-ever mosaic art project, day one.

2014-02-06T18:53:00.004-05:00

This is my first attempt at a work of mosaic “art.” Previously, I completed one very simple stepping stone. Probably shouldn’t have jumped into such a complicated project so soon. I sort of cheated in that I knew I wanted the mosaic to look very shattered and chaotic to add to the depressive feel of the work, thus saving me from needing any kind of rhythm or pattern to the pieces.

This piece was both easier and more difficult than I’d thought. I created the blueprint for it on my computer, so I thought that pasting the tesserae on the glass over the pattern would be easy. It was not. However, fitting the tesserae together went much faster and easier than I’d imagined. I used some tile, vitreous glass tile and stained glass as tesserae. Most were in the form of fairly regular squares and I cut them into irregular(ish) shapes with double wheeled glass cutters. The cutting went much easier than I’d imagined, though it was difficult to achieve precise shapes with that type of cutter.

The gluing was actually far trickier than I thought. I used Weldbond, which is supposed to dry clear, though I’m worried it will not dry clear enough for the background I planned. (The “blueprint” print out is showing through in the image, but I was planning on using streak and/or patterned clear glass in the background to give the feeling of rain on a window to further the depressive feeling of the piece.) I am also worried that the grout will get under the pieces because there is not a complete glue seal on all of them. I’m hoping that won’t be evident unless the piece is held up to light. I’d originally hoped the piece could be backlit or put in a window, but it turned out that most of the glass doesn’t let much (if any) light through, so it will probably just be hung on a wall.

Right now, everything is done except for the background (I’m going to have to do a test to see how the glue looks between clear glass) and the grouting. I think I am going to do a light grey or blue non-sanded grout if I can find some. I originally pictured this exclusively in shades of blue, black and white, but I ended up mixing some of my blues in spots where I thought I’d use all one color blue, so I ran out of different blues for the t-shirt and resorted to grays. I think mixing the blues a bit adds a lot of interest. I’m still going to call the piece “Blue Boy” even with the inclusion of the grays. I will post a pic of the finished piece to this post or a separate post as soon as I am done. Wonder what my next project will be?

Did you lose your wedding ring (and more) 19-24 years ago?

2014-01-23T15:18:00.001-05:00

When my child was an infant, I found a wedding ring and other jewerly items all bundled togeter on a watch inside a car seat package. I tried to contact the car seat manufacturer, but found that the location had closed down a few years prior. The rings may not have even originated at the manufacturer site as it looked like the box had been opened and resealed. Maybe it was returned. Who knows.

Every few years I remember to do a web search. (Though, the rings were recovered before anyone was really on the world wide web), but nothing has turned up. The rings are not very valuable. They are pretty basic, with tiny stones and not much gold. However, I know they must be meaningful to someone (assuming the marriage is still intact).

So, I'm hoping I find the owner. Maybe through this post. If I don't find the owner, eventually I will give the rings to some needy young couple or an organization who can find them a good home or sell them and use the money for charity. If you think the rings are yours, please comment describing them! I would love most to get them into (or better yet, onto) the hands where they belong.

When clutter=dreams, cleaning ain't easy.

2014-01-22T18:50:00.004-05:00

Here's the deal: Cleaning my home office would be easy if that's all it was. But, it's not. It's admitting I'm never going to go to the weaving class on that brochure. Or learn to paint with that book. Or listen to the offspring's 5th grade music recital on that CD. Or write more poetry using the book on meter. Or restring that broken necklace. Or contact any of those people in that Rolodex (curse of the pre-digital age). It's admitting defeat or limiting my options with every toss.

Clutter isn't a sign of a disorganized mind. Clutter is evidence of a mind filled with hopes, dreams and ambitions. If only I knew which ones to truly let go of.

Review of The Wolf of Wall Street

2014-01-02T22:56:00.002-05:00

Warning: do NOT go to this movie if you are faint of heart. There are enough drugs, sex, nudity and swearing in any given 10-minute segment to burn your grandmother's eyes out of her head. That being said, I don't believe these elements were included to pander to one's baser insticts. Rather, the film is trying to give us a sense of the utter debauchery of the individuals involved. I did not know this was a true story when I went to see it. If I did, I might have had qualms about supporting a venture that is likely putting money into the pocket of Jordan Belcourt. The man seems to have no moral or ethical base and has made his living blatantly swindling individuals. However, it is an interesting and entertaining story and does open one's eyes to what can and does go on in the financial world...sometimes with your money. If you can stand almost 3 hours of nudity and drugs, go see it. You'll enjoy the humor, be entertained, and learn a little something about the sleazy side of Wall Street. (Sometimes I wonder if there is a non-sleazy side.)

Don't take the kids to "Saving Mr. Banks," but do go.

2013-12-25T22:35:00.002-05:00

There were young children in the audience when I saw this film. That was a shame. It is an excellent movie, but it will not be appreciated by most children. A mature teen would enjoy it, perhaps, but not a child. It is not about Mary Poppins so much as Mary Poppin's author. Emma Thompsom does a spectacular job bringing the famously difficult author to life. The viewers are treated to two stories at once: the challenging childhood of the author and the collaboration with Disney of the challenging woman the author turned out to be. The first story is rather tragic. The second is largely humorous, but has its moments of pathos and drama. Anyone of either era will appreciate the nostalgia value of the scenes as well. The screenplay is well written, flawlessly acted and beautifully produced. You will laugh and cry. And you will walk away wanting to know more about Ms. Travers. There seems a lot more to be known. I can't wait to read the biorgraphy I just ordered.

Black Friday shopping revisited

2013-11-23T17:29:00.000-05:00

A few years ago I posted regarding a young employee who was upset about having to work the Target Black Friday Doorbuster Sale that started at midnight on, well, Black Friday. I still have no sympathy for the young man. However, I do find the Thanksgiving Day sales a disturbing trend. There are scant few holidays when retail locations are closed. During these few times, extended families have the chance get together in toto...or as close to that as possible. Having stores open on Thanksgiving Day means some family members are working. It means other family members have to choose between saving money on (or even getting) that perfect present that will surely sell out quickly or spending time with the people they want to buy the present for. (What, did Machiavelli design this system?) Unfortunately, it only takes one or two stores opening to force the rest to participate or lose sales. That is, unless no one comes to the sales. As consumers, we have it in our power to tell the stores what we want simply by choosing when and where we spend our money. I don't attend doorbuster sales as I don't appreciate having to jump through hoops to get a bargain. Making me shop at a certain hour, wait in line outside, fight crowds...sorry, Mr. Retailer, but that's no way to treat a customer. Making your employees work on Thanksgiving between 3 and 10 is no way to treat an employee. If stores want to open at midnight, or even 10 p.m., I have no problem with that. I won't be there if it's a doorbuster, but I often shop during extended hours on the holiday season (weeknights and very late extended hours tend to be less crowded, so that's when I prefer to shop if I must go to a major retailer). So, if you don't agree with Thanksgiving Day shopping, don't go. If we don't go, the stores won't open next time.

How the healthcare coverage of today (2013) will trample your dreams and other fun facts

2013-10-18T01:19:00.000-04:00

This is not a political post. But, it is about how the healthcare coverage system works. And by "works" I mean "does not work." Or, more accurately, I mean "sucks." Unfortunately, no one realizes how bad the system sucks until they either try to follow their dreams or get really, really sick. And since most people cannot imagine themselves getting really, really sick -- but would love to think they might want to someday follow their dream -- we'll start there. Usually following your dream involves saying "neener, neener, neener" to your boss while putting your thumb on your nose and wiggling your fingers. Here lies the problem. It turns out that you can't get decent healthcare coverage at an affordable price without your joyless, soul-crushing employer. Let's look at that word, "affordable." Some of you may think $1,000 a month is not "affordable." Unfortunately, that is the going price for "affordable" family coverage. At least, it is in NY state. As states go, NY requires providers to give its citizens pretty decent healthcare coverage. You can probably get by for less in states where the coverage includes little more than a Bandaid (R), aspirin and a lollipop. (Note: you really don't get that lollipop in NY anymore.) Without an employer or a business generating real income (and your new business likely won't generate income and will be considered a "hobby"), you'll pretty much need to fork over something in the $30,000 (annual) range for family coverage. Can you hear your dream dying? Let's say you'd like to be an author. It will take you a lot of time to write your book. Even more time to make any money from writing. And all those years that you are trying to be an author, you'd be paying those tens of thousands of dollars a year for healthcare coverage. Of course, if your spouse is employed, you can use his/her coverage.(isn't that "his/her" thing annoying? We need sex-neutral singular personal pronouns.) Sure, I know what you're thinking. I'll just use my spouse's "affordable" coverage. But, there's a catch. Once said spouse sees you following your dream, he/she will become envious and want to follow theirs. But, the spouse can't because the spouse is the family's "affordable" healthcare coverage getter. Maybe your dream isn't to be an author. Maybe your dream is to retire early. Who doesn't want to do that? And maybe you've been a good little saver and could actually afford to do that. Well, factor in that $30,000+ annual healthcare coverage cost and your savings will look like chopped liver. (Note: I don't know what chopped liver looks like, but I'm guessing it is not pretty.) I am not going to say Obamacare is or is not the answer. No one knows how close it might be to the answer. And anyone who thinks they know is fooling themself. ("Themself" should be a word. No one wants to write or read "his or her self. It is inefficient.) Anyway, looking into the future to predict how the Affordable Care Act will pan out is simply too complicated. There will be both good and bad unintended consequences. One unintended consequence I'm predicting is a lot of people retiring early. That will be a good thing: job openings for young people. Happy retired people. And healthier people. (I don't know about you, but working is not as good for my health as not working. Working is stressful. Working requires me to sit alot and that is ruining my back. When I'm not working, I go to the gym. I walk. I eat healthier because I have the time to prepare healthy food. Heck, I'd GROW healthy food.) Unfortunately, I don't think any of this early retirement stuff would happen all at once because a lot of people will be skeptical. After all, if the administration changes and the Affordable Care Act is axed or gutted -- and you retired early -- you might be shoot out of luck. There are probably bad unintended consequences, too. I'm just pointing out some of the good stuff that would happen if we fixed the system. And I don't know if Obamacare will fix the system because I cannot predict the future. I just wanted to point out that as the system stands in 2013, you can forget your dreams of quitting your job or retiring early because your need for healthcare coverage will stomp all over those plans like Lucy Ball stomping grapes in the classic "grape stomping" episode of "I Love Lucy" (not to be confused with the classic "candy assembly line" episode.) I could go on and tell you how if you get sick under the current plan (I mean really sick, for a long time: the kind of catastrophic sickness health insurance was designed for), your healthcare coverage (as opposed to old-fashioned health insurance) will leave you high and dry. Because you will eventually lose your job. And if you lose your job, you will eventually lose your employer-sponsored healthcare coverage. And then you will have to pay that $30,000+ annual rate until you are dead broke and go on Medicaid. Ain't that a great system? I won't bother going into details on that because no one ever thinks it will happen to them. (And you can always use your spouse's coverage. And if your spouse doesn't have coverage, you can get divorced and marry someone with coverage. Don't laugh. I'll bet this has happened. I know a guy with a brain tumor who got married for the healthcare coverage.) Anyway, I bet no one is reading anymore, so I should stop talking to myself. If you are still reading, and you have a dream, remember, I am not the one squashing your dream...I am just the one informing you how the current healthcare system will squash it. Maybe the Affordable Care Act will fix it. Maybe it won't. Put your dreams on hold until something is definite (which might not happen for a long, long time.) Have a nice day.

The harvest is really slowing down now that September is ending

2013-09-28T02:04:00.002-04:00

Brussels sprouts are almost the only thing I can look forward to harvesting in any abundance (if you exclude the sunflower seed...I'll have lots of that, but it's going to be for the birds, not for me). I don't know much about sprouts except that they are supposed to taste a bit sweeter if you let them get hit by a mild frost. So, I'm waiting for the frost. I've started pulling the dying bottom leaves off because the bottom sprouts around those leaves are getting a bit moldy. I have twisted off a few sprouts and they are pretty good even without the frost effect. One plant turned completely to mold...can't figure out why. Also, there are a couple people in the Community Garden whose sprouts are much taller and larger than the others. I'm assuming they have a better variety, but then, who knows which will taste better?

I'm still getting some tomatoes, peas and peppers, but they are ripening very slowly. It may be the cold nights. The weather really turned early this year, with nights being cool for weeks now. We've had some cool days, but the majority of days are pretty warm. Next year, I will start everything earlier and try to plant as much as I can earlier (protected by water-filled pop bottles and in ground that has black plastic covering it). I figure the only way I can extend my growing season is on the front. The plants are too big to protect/keep warm now. I'd need a huge greenhouse and a way for the bees to get to the blossoms.

All in all, a pretty good season for a first-time (unofficially organic) farmer. I've harvested 90 pounds of veggies so far (this does not include the sunflower seeds or any of the cosmos I planted as companion plants and have been taking home for cut flowers). I donated 23 pounds to food pantries and still had plenty for both my family and my sister's. I didn't have enough to do any canning, but I figure veggies for canning are pretty cheap when you buy in bulk, so I'd be just as well off to buy 'em as to grow 'em. With what I learned this year, I'm hoping I'll be able to do better next year. (And I'm still hoping to get some lettuce from seeds I planted weeks ago. If it's like the Spring lettuce, it won't start growing until it's good and ready, then it will grow like crazy.) Addendum: my plot is 4 feet by 50 ft.

The seed heads on these sunflowers are amazing.

2013-08-26T23:38:00.001-04:00

The seed heads on my giant sunflowers must weigh around 20 lbs. each. They bend the stalks down, so the flower faces the ground. The bees don't seem to mind working upside down, though. Not sure how long it will take these to mature. I hope the birds at the farm don't get to them before I can harvest 'em. I plan to put them in my backyard so I can watch the birds from my windows.

Forgot to mention my kale

2013-08-23T22:53:00.001-04:00

I put in 4 curly kale plants in the spring. I've been harvesting leaves from them for at least a month. As soon as a rip some off, more grow quickly. Those 4 plants have kept my sister and me in kale continuously. (Of course, we're not huge kale eaters. We use it mostly in soups, though my husband throws some on his salads). It's probably my easiest, most prolific (per sq. ft.) plant in my garden. Next year, I may plant extras and try making kale chips.

Adventures in gardening, end of month 4

2013-08-23T01:41:00.000-04:00

The difference between now and the beginning of month 2 is dramatic, as shown above. You can see the Brussel sprouts in the foreground in both shots, the rest of the plot is almost unrecognizable. The experience has been a good one. I've learned a lot and accomplished a lot.

First, I planted way too much lettuce (and I may not have learned from that experience as I just scattered another seed packet along with all the lettuce that I let go to seed...but, I couldn't think of much else to put in the space at this late date). Next year, I will cut the lettuce space down by half. I will also never plant this variety of sunflower again. These took over more than their fair share because they grew so tall, they shaded everythign adjacent. Plus, I am growing them for birdseed and sunflower birdseed is fairly cheap, so not worth taking valuable space in my expensive garden. I tried to grow things that are $2 per pound or over.

I am finding that planting the tomatoes early with pop-bottle warmers was well worth the effort. Compared to the plants I put in later, the ones with the headstart are about 10X more prolific. Same with the eggplants. I'm not sure I'll even get any eggplants off the plants I put in after May, while my one early plant has given me two eggplants and there are more coming (it was a Japanese eggplant, if anyone is interested).

I had no luck with cukes...only got one. No one in our Community Garden really got much in the way of cukes. Maybe it was just not a good year for them. The squash plants had a lot of trouble from both powdery mildew and squash bugs. I lucked out in that the squash bugs mostly attacked the decorative gourd plants (which were mismarked at the store...they were supposed to be winter squash). I need to be more diligent with spraying a baking soda and water mixture on the mildew...it is difficult when I am so far away from my garden. Also, I have to put something up to keep the deer out of the squash...they ate a few...I think I have the remaining squash (2, plus some blossoms) protected enough with string and posts that the deer will move on to easier pickin's.

Onions were a mixed bag. I planted a bunch mixed in with other stuff to help fend off bugs, etc. The ones that were mixed in with lettuce and crucifers didn't really get enough light. I need to keep those on the south side of those veggies next year. My sweet pepper plants produced, but weren't very prolific, so they ended up not being worth the space devoted to them. Some of the hot peppers did better. In fact, my poblano peppers (think they might also go by the name of "ancho"}, which are just now starting to produce, look like they will be worth the space devoted to them (especially because I love the taste and they for for $3.50 lb. at the store).

Crucifers: the cauliflower was small and not tasty...I think I need to find a different variety (I used seedlings and have no idea what they were). The broccoli was just okay. The Brussel sprouts seem to be doing really well, though I noticed some people have a variety that are much larger and have more sprouts (though, several have some that are much smaller with hardly any sprouts). I am going to have to pay more attention to varieties and seek advice from other gardeners on what to plant. Also, I will label my peas better (couldn't tell the snap from the snow from whatever else I planted) and I will plant more green and wax beans and look for heavier producers on varieties of those. I will also plant them every week to spread out the season (I replanted some, but I really didn't do a good job of planting enough every week.)

I'm glad I did my homework on knowing SOMETHING about veggie gardening before I started. The black plastic mulch saved me a lot of work when it comes to weeding and watering and help made early planting more successful. I will try to reuse the same plastic next year (not sure that will work, but the stuff is expensive and probably doesn't break down well). Throwing some grass clippings over scattered seed seemed to help a lot. And the bottles were a big win.

Adventures in gardening: my sunflowers finally started blooming

2013-08-08T18:47:00.001-04:00

Yay! once these (huge) babies form good seedheads, I can chop them down and give my surrounding plants more light. Interestingly, I thought these would be the Moulin Rouge variety that I planted after my first "generic" sunflower seeds failed to sprout...but it looks like these are the "generic" sunflowers. The Moulin Rouge were supposed to be red. I would have thought the flowers would face the sun, but they face away from the sun (they may catch some morning light...had to say for sure as I'm not a morning person).

The hydrangeas are making up for last year

2013-08-05T12:38:00.000-04:00

Last year was a bad year here for hydrangeas. Early heat followed by late frost added up to NO flowers, not even on my reblooming hydrangeas. This year, they are making up for lost time. I've never had them so floriferous. Only wish I had the chance to lay down pine needles to blue them up. I've sprinkled some commercial acidifier, but I can't seem to keep ahead of the rain and the flowers quickly pink up again.

Harvest is so much smaller than I expected.

2013-08-02T23:59:00.000-04:00

Never having dealt with vegetable plants before, I thought each plant would be more prolific. But, I got one lousy cucumber from the one cuke plant that survived, one very skinny eggplant (though there is now another flower on it, so maybe I may get one more). And each green bean plant is only giving me a few green beans each week...I didn't plant nearly enought to feed the whole family. (Except for lettuce. I had enough lettuce to feed the neighborhood). I did, however, have very successful sunflowers. Look at the stalk on one...I can't even get my hand around it. And the farmer who is leasing me his land planted a small field of sunflowers and got NONE, so I should be proud. (Or, hopefully, I should be proud. They haven't bloomed yet, but look like they are on schedule to do that soon.)

Everything you ever wanted to know about flooring.

2013-07-30T22:00:00.001-04:00

Want to skip hours of reseach? Here's what I discovered in my search for flooring that looks good, yet can stand up to a destructo family: Porcelain tile is the most indestructible. It can chip or break, but is not likely to scratch from normal wear. A through-body porcelain won't even show minor chips very much. (I've found through-body porcelain tends to be more expensivel. I personally don't think it's that important a feature.) Purchase extra tile and you can always chip out and replace a broken tile with a new one. (Note: there is a difference between porcelain and ceramic tile, porcelain being more endurable, though trickier to work with.) The new porcelain planks that look like wood are a pretty durn good substitute for wood. I think wood is the most attractive floor, but kitchen/water/destructo family makes a bad combo for wood in my house. (Be sure to make the grout a color close to dirt so it doesn't look horrible...those are porcelain planks shown above.) Of course, because porcelain floors are hard, they can make your feet tired if you spend a lot of time in the kitchen. But, that's why God invented comfort mats and restaurants, no?

There really seems to be no true environmental benefit to bamboo. The only truly durable bamboo floors are strand bamboo and those involve a lot of resins and processing, not to mention shipping halfway around the world.

The most impervious countertops are quartz. While they are 90% actual quartz, they also involve resins, making them a manmade product. They can chip, but it is said to take a lot of force to cause said chip. They resist staining and do not need to be sealed as granite does. Granite is, in my opinion, more attractive, but then again, I have that destructo family who leaves orange juice spills on the counter, sometimes for hours, for me to clean up whenever I get home.

Being social doesn't pay for squash bugs.

2013-07-29T00:45:00.001-04:00

It appears that squash bugs like to hang out together (as seen here). Makes it pretty easy to get rid of them. I was able to discard them along with a gourd they were hanging around on and haven't seen another squash bug in my patch since. (These are on a plot several parcels away. Interestingly, I was told that this gardener bought zucchini seedlings and these yellow summer squash appeared instead. I guess I'm not the only one falling victim to mislabeled seedlings. I suppose I'll have to start my own next year.)