Oh my goodness! Don't tell me this is actually gonna' work this time? There must be gremlins in my computer because sometimes things work and sometimes they don't. I really didn't expect this to work this morning. Ahh, I know. Its only working because my son-the-computer-guru is visiting. As soon as he leaves, I won't be able to blog. ;>)
Things have been very interesting around here of late. I'm hoping to get out of the sale of this property. Much as I want to move back to Oregon, I can't bear the thought of all the 200+ trees and the house our parents built being bulldozed to make way for a rediculously large sub-division. The neighbors are all up in arms as well. They don't fault me for wanting to sell and move but they are certainly not happy with the developer who led me to believe that he "would save as many trees as possible" and now indicates that that number is possibly as many as two. He does not understand how we feel about trees. Trees are just obstacles to him. The fact that these trees are somewhat historical, being one of the few olive orchards left in the area, (there are many other tree varieties also), the fact that they aid in air quality and in halting erosion, the fact that they are homes for several kinds of birds (hummingbirds to titmice, bushtits, housefinch, goldfinch, yellow billed magpies, red tailed hawks, Sharp-shinned hawks, screech owls, scrub jays, mourning doves, robins, yellow-rumped warblers, spotted towhees, California towhees, white-crowned sparrows, gold-crowned sparrows, dark-eyed juncos, white-breasted nuthatches, cedar waxwings, and an assortment of migrants in the spring and summer to name a few) means nothing to him. I haven't even mentioned that there have been a lot of alligator lizards dwelling on the place, though I haven't seen any for a long time. (that doesn't mean that they are no longer here) To tell me "This is a beautiful piece of property! A park!" and then to say that he intends to turn it into solid houses and pavement, is just, well blasphaemous! My tummy has been in knots. Ideally we would like to find a buyer who wanted an "estate" or "estates". Who would build no more than 4 houses, and to have spacious yards, and contain people who actually cared about the earth and who would build "green", earth-friendly houses...
Ok. now let's just see if this will print. errors and all!
Just some random photos of little mini-projects. One of the "e"s from the peace sign was lost for months but surfaced, literally, when I cleaned up the old chasmanthe leaves near the kumquat tree last week. The letters are made of plywood so it is amazing that they haven't fallen into untidy, unrecognizable masses of pulp.
Then I read an article about a Corvallis gardener who turned two old toilets over and made a bench of them. Since I only had one old toilet, it became the base for a birdbath and a concrete stepping-stone thingy for a potted plant to live on.
What is the easiest and most economical way to refinish old lawn furniture?
What to do with a broken glass hummingbird feeder, some bamboo, and a cheap hangydown from Walgreens.
