Mystery No More!

A good weekend in my watergarden! Last year I bought two waterlilys for my pond. My first, a lovely peach colored lily (Georgia Peach), the most expensive one at the water garden store (thanks to Sarah's good tastes) and the second, a much less expensive "mystery lily" (I shall call it Mystere). The mystery lily was purchased late in the season, and never bloomed last year, so until this weekend was still a mystery. Four of my mystery buds opened this weekend, reveal ind white flowers tinged with the palest shade of pink. I do hope Mystere proves to be such a fecundid bloomer for the rest of the summer!

My poor son...

I got to take a couple days off of work this week. Unfortunately, not for a fun reason, but because my poor son had hernia surgery on Thursday, and I got to play "good mother" and take care of him. The surgery went well, he got the first appointment of the day and we were actually home by 10:15. Between the anesthetic they used in the surgical site and the morphine they gave him in recovery, he was actually feeling pretty good. He wasted his favorite salad from Cafe Rio, so I ran out and pot it for him, and he sat at the dining room table and we chatted while he ate his lunch. It was actually really nice to sit and have some one on one discussion time. By mid-afternoon all the "good" meds had worn off, and my poor boy became a hurting puppy... it's hard to watch my active boy lay on the couch for 2 days. He was sure that by Friday night he would out with his friend. Surprise! He was still playing couch potato Friday night. Hopefully he'll be feeling better tomorrow... I'd hate for him to get to used to being waited on. Get me a drink, fix me bagel, bring me some ice cream, help me sit up, rent me some movies... I don't imagine I put on this "good mother" charade for too much longer.

One nice thing about being home when I'm normally at work is that I got to see my first waterlily blossom of the season!

Rain, rain... welcome here!

Another rainy day here in Salt Lake City. Being a high desert, we don't get a lot of rain, so when it comes it is usually welcome. Especially in the spring, when my newly planted blooming babies need regular water. The combination of a couple of hot days and missed waterings can bring quick death to bedding plants. Saturday was my plant shopping day, Sunday my planting day, so I was thrilled to have a rainstorm on Monday. I have yet to have the "make my sprinkler system work day" (that better happen this weekend!) so I'm thrilled to have a rainstorm today. I thought I'd share a few garden pictures... my to be planted annuals, my now planted deck pots and pond, and in honor of the rain a few close up pictures of raindrops on my poppy buds. Weird huh? I just love taking macro shots. There's something about seeing things from a different perspective, and viewing details of pattern and texture so easily missed with the naked eye, that really appeals to me.

Birds Again...

The bird for today is Western Tanager. I looked out my kitchen window at my ponds waterfall and spied one sitting on the wet rocks. He sat and posed for quite some time allowing me to get a great look at his magnificent plumage. I wish I'd had my camera handy, although I know I know he would have flown off as I opened the back door, and it's so hard to get a good bird picture anyway. Watching the birds on my rocks got me thinking about a new project I might like to do... I think I'd like to set up a "bird cam" trained on my waterfall so I can easily check for pretty birds when I'm not standing at the window, and even better, when I'm sitting at my desk at work. I've been told that webcams are easy to set up and hook to instant messenger. If I can figure out what kind to buy I may give it a try. I mentioned this idea to one of my nerdy birdy friends and next thing you know she is at my door dropping off her Cornell Lab of Ornithology newsletter that contained an article on nestcams. Unfortunately there wasn't much set up information, so I'll have to do some research (hmmm.... will that take me all summer?)
Anyone know anything about webcams? Outdoor web cams? I'm thinking this could be a fun little project for a nerdy little girl like me.

Happy Mothers Day

Last summer my big yard project was replacing my kids deteriorating sandbox with a small pond. I have to admit that I feared spring would arrive and I would find myself with a green, slimy, stinky mess. I was pleasantly surprised that four of my six goldfish survived, my water lilies are sending up new growth and the water quality seems as good as in the fall. So far I think my pond experiment was a success. The big treat my pond has brought me this sping is how it has been attracting the birds, who love to play on my slowly flowing waterfall. I don't recall a spring where I have seen such a diversity of birds, and being the nerdy birdy type I've spent time binoculars and field guide in hand trying to identify them. My list (at least what I remember) so far:

Lazuli Bunting
Dark Eyed Junco
Spotted Towhee
Lesser Goldfinch
American Goldfinch
House Finch
Cassins Finch
Yellow Warbler
Yellow Rumped Warbler
Ruby Crowned Kinglet
Northern Flicker
Stellars Jay
And of course the ubiquitous, robins, house sparrows starlings and magpies.
I also suspect there are other sparrows and warblers that I have yet to identify...

I have to admit my favorites are the little flighty song birds that are so hard to get a look at and identify. I love it when they dance in my waterfall long enough for me to get a good look!

Pond Friends

It appears I had a pond visitor last night. My kitty doesn't go outside, so I have no idea who decided to traipse across the ice to check out the water. I'm just glad the ice was thick enough for my visitor; I have a small floating stock tank heater that keeps the middle of my pond from freezing, and I have no idea how sturdy the surrounding ice is. I also hope that my visitor didn't manage to have a goldfish snack.

The birds have really been enjoying my pond as well. It's too bad they all fly off whenever I open the back door to snap a picture, I'd love to get a shot of them frolicking on the waters edge. They seem quite happy have a non-frozen water source and I'm happy to have some nature in my suburban back yard.

My pond again,,,,

Can you tell that I'm totally enamored with my water lily blossoms? I was thrilled when my latest bloom occurred on the weekend when I could enjoy it. I hope the next bud does the same.

My pond building came about because I really needed to do something about the eyesore my kids outgrown sandbox had become. Truth be told I was really, really sad to get rid of it. It was really important to me to build a nice sandbox for kids when they were tots. We had lots of great sand toys and tonka trucks. We added shells and coral that we found on our beach vacations. The kids and their friends had a lot of fun in it. It's funny, I'm not only one who is a little sentimental. I had dinner at my friends house the other night. We talked about my little pond, and upon realizing that the pond replaced the sandbox my friends 17 year old daughter sighed and said "But I played in that sandbox. I had a lot of fun in that sandbox." She was sad that it was gone. Then I told her about my sandbox shrine. In homage to my beloved sandbox and my kids childhood I took a very rusty old tonka trunk filled it with sand and seashells from the sandbox and placed it the garden next to the pond. My friends daughter, and my kids too, were really pleased about that. And I'm glad I decided to replace my kids play place with something beautiful, it takes a bit of my sentimental sadness away.

My new babies...

I bought a water lily and four $0.26 goldfish for my pond last weekend. I have since learned two things about ponds. First, when they advise you not to put your pond pump in the lowest part of your pond they are right. I came home the other night to a half empty pond. One of the water hyacinths I had floating in my filter bucket clogged the waterfall pipe, causing the pump to overflow the filter out onto my lawn! Fortunately, the fish seemed to survive having half a pond full of ice cold tap water added.

The second thing I've learned is that waterlilies, at least the "Georgia Peach" hardy lily I bought, opens mid morning and closes late afternoon. A lousy schedule for this working person! But yesterday I got home early enough to take a couple pretty pictures. I can't decide which shot I like better, so even though they are about the same here they are!

I guess I'll have to investigate "night blooming" water lilies. Hopefully there is a hardy one out there!

Happy Pioneer Day!

What, it's not Pioneer Day where you live? Today is a state holiday here in Utah, celebrating the Mormon Pioneers arrival in Utah. As a non-Mormon living in Utah I feel pretty left out of the pioneer day festivities, but I'll never complain about a day off of work! I'm not sure god is favoring the pioneers today, because, to quote Pooh "Tut tut, it looks like rain". Or maybe he is shining on the pioneers as the bad weather has cooled things off a bit. It's nice to have temperatures of less than 100 degrees! It actually poured rain for a short while last night; I even had use my windshield wipers - I'd almost forgotten how to turn them on. I would welcome more rain! My gardens, which I worked so hard on this spring, are down right crispy!

So on my day off from work I'm trying to get caught up on a few things, including my blogging! I've been a bit distracted lately; I started an outdoor project a week ago or so. I decided to replace my kids decaying sand box with a goldfish pond. It'a not all quite done yet, but done enough that I can show off a little picture. I've been a little obsessed with the project, because I knew if I didn't actually bust my butt to get it done it would become a big dirt hole blighting my back yard and yet another badge of my advanced procrastination syndrome. It still needs some work, but here's the sneak preview:

Fish Pond

Apparently it was 105 degrees here in Salt Lake City yesterday... so what did I do? I ripped out my kids decaying sandbox and dug a huge hole to make a small backyard pond. It certainly semed like a huge hole while digging, but as far as ponds go it's just a small one. After some landscaping I'll post pictures. Meanwhile, check out todays blog at Watch Me Create for a fish story!!