Today, I offer a Slice of Life Tuesday post that is two-pronged. In one prong, I ask for you to share your experience with me for a future post. The second prong entails telling what I did yesterday – an old activity, in a new place! Prong One: Currently, I am working a post about Advanced…
The school down the road has a garden that I know well. There, in the butterfly garden, are plants picked by former students and some selected by me, some were donated by parents or staff, and many were purchased. In the center is a large, overgrown, lilac bush. It serves as a shelter for butterflies…
It is that time of year again. Master Gardener Volunteer (MVG) hours are due. Since 2004, I have spent the last couple weeks in September recording my continuing education and volunteer hours to maintain my Master Gardener Volunteer Certification. Collecting enough volunteer hours has never been a problem with my history of running a community…
By 6:50 a.m. this morning, they were gone. My two students were off to the high school for another year. One was excited, and one was reluctant but glad it was the beginning of the end of high school for him. He is ready for something more. On the first of this month, I wrote…
Recently, while reading posts offered by members of a reflective blog writing group to which I belong, there were a couple that caught my eye. The authors, two separate people, wrote on the memories that specific plants evoke for them. I understood completely! Plants are powerful! My grandma always had african violets. They seemed to…
Some areas across the nation have already started back to school! I know this from listening to the news, reading social media, belonging to a teacher blog-writing community, and talking with friends. Here, in the upper mid-west, our summer is not quite over, but it is close. Most districts have two to three more weeks…
This morning, just as I sat down to type up answers to a batch of new garden based math questions I developed for enrichment, I got distracted. As I sat down, with my anniversary roses in front of me, out of the corner of my eye I saw my husband of thirty years outside our…
Our blueberries are coming in! Earlier this month, we had a bountiful cherry harvest. We still have cherries to pick, but the weather has turned hot and the Japanese Beetles have attacked! It is harder to pick under those conditions. Blueberry picking was easy. We only have six bushes. Four of which are established enough…
As a semi-self taught horticulturist, I learned to stay away from orchids. It seemed everything I read warned that these plants were hard to grow, and the person attempting to grow them was doomed to failure. I took these warning seriously and went about my business growing other plants that interested me, but were “easier”….