bee creative

Walking home I often stop here...

As I walk to work....

All victory gardens should include flowers!

I think this captures the weekend the best...glorious yellow sunshine, well, a "Lady Banks" rose. 

So much happening in the garden:

*Planted out most of the tomatoes.
*Planted my sweet potatoes in containers.  They look rather sad.
*Still hilling up the potatoes.
* Assembled one huggelkultur.  Tomorrow I'll plant the winter squash I've started indoors. 
*Weeded my asparagus bed.  I found one teeny-tiny stalk coming up.  It's the first year for this bed so it won't be harvested. 
*Figured out where  to put the lavender and two rosemary plants that need a home.
*Observed a lot of bees working in the garden.   Hoping that there are enough flowers blooming to keep them happy! 

The to-do list is even longer unfortunately.   More weeds to pull, more seeds to plant (cucumbers, beans, and summer squash), and some mulching to do.  I have a stash of cardboard I'm going to put around the blueberries. 

Something else that is making me very happy in the garden:

I've waited four years for my tree peony to bloom.  Here's the first blossom.

Something beautiful in the morning -walking

Yesterday was "Bike to Work day."  I'm still uncomfortable biking so I'm walking most of my commute right now.  The other part I bus.

Walking makes me feel good.  And I get to see beautiful things like this....

It's a dogwood, possibly the variety "Kousa?"  It's planted along one of the trails in my community. 

Plant sale and Peacocks

Spent the day at a local Master Gardener's plant sale.  The park that the sale was held at has peacocks.  They spent most of the day sitting in the trees or on roofs "talking."  They did come down for a little bit to check out the sale though.... 

Interesting comments floating around.  Mostly that people were generally wanting to buy edible plants rather than ornamental.  Victory Garden's in progress? 

Riot for Austerity, 90% report card

I took the picture of the magnolia yesterday while walking through the park.  It was snowing. 

I took the picture of the rhododendron this morning in my garden.  A record snow fall for this area.  Just crazy, whatever the reason.

It’s been about a year since I stumbled across the Riot for Austerity challenge.  I’d already sold my car and started busing/walking, taken the challenge to not buy any newly made clothing at Wardrobe Refashion and had been working towards reducing plastic in my life.   The challenge to reduce my usage or resources to 90% less than the average American seemed like a good way to push farther into being more thoughtful about how I consume. It’s been an interesting and worthwhile direction to go. 

I’m not at 90% for everything.  Roughly I’ve reached the following:

Food:  At target for buying local (70%), about 15% bulk, and I buy a little bit more wet bulk (10%)/non local than I should. 
Water:  50% of average
Gas for heat:  35% of average
Electricity:  36% of average
Transportation:  5% of average
Spending:  6% of average
Garbage:  4% of average for the human contributions, 11% for the cat, and 15% for 2 dogs.

Some good results (calculated here) and some that could be improved.  Over the next couple days I want to look at these areas a little closer and see what I think I've done right and what I could improve upon.   Today I'm going to make a postcard and send it to Bill McKibben and his friends at 350.org.   I hope you will to.   

Happy Earth day to all!

Favorite photo from last week

In the morning I get off the bus at the top of a hill where I can look across a valley and over to part of the Cascade Mountain Range.  There was the most beautiful golden glow just between the top of the foot hills and where the clouds began....

Turning down the heat

I took this picture a couple weeks ago on my way to work.  The frost was so heavy it almost looked like snow....

There have been a lot of cold nights this year, a lot of frost in the morning.  The average temp for February listed on the electricity bill was an average temperature of 35 degrees Fahrenheit.  Which means the gas bill was the highest it's been all year.  And yet, the gas company has decided to take the budget payment (prorated over the year) down 20 dollars a month due to the average gas usage over the year!  Victory dance! 

There haven't been any complaints about the house being too cold (other than from Lola the Chihuahua and her sister Maddie when she comes to visit) or frozen pipes.

I think that most of the savings have come from shutting off the  door to the laundry room, which also has an exterior door.   I've also been careful about turning of the heat before the dogs are let out.  Usually when the door opens it triggers the thermostat on the gas fireplace that heats the house.  I still think that we can get the gas usage down a bit more during the coldest weather.  Luckily it will have to wait for next fall, spring is definitely making an appearance! 

Wet, wet, wet...

Walking in the rain is good for the soul...especially if you are on your way home and can change in to dry clothes and drink something hot! 

Chihuahua meets Frankencritter

This is a metal  critter that my dad made for me one year for Christmas using assorted metal scraps.  I was taking a picture thinking I might do something with it for Inspire Me Thursday when Lola happened to walk by...