Can you smell the lavender? The Willamette Valley Lavender Festival was celebrated this weekend all across the Willamette Valley with fields upon fields of blooming lavender. One of the main events was held at the Chehalem Valley Cultural Center so we made sure to stop by on Saturday morning to check it out.
We put in a backyard pond for the honeybees this spring and it’s been a fun project to watch over the summer. I feed the goldfish every day after work and it really is mesmerizing to watch them swim around and come to the surface for food. I’ve also been watching the water lilies.
So this post is half praying mantis and half “Where’s Waldo?” It’s been hot outside the last few weeks, so I’ve been spending lots of time watering the plants…they need it, and the sunshine is good for me too! As I’ve been watering away I keep spotting what I call like to call “teenage” praying mantis. They’re about two inches long and mainly just hop from plant to plant as I’m watering the grasses.
I’m still in awe that we bought a mantis cocoon and that it actually hatched!? This backyard experiment is certainly the best $7 I’ve ever spent at the grocery store…endless entertainment!
Ok, so here it goes…can you spot the praying mantis?
As you know, sometimes “Weekends in Dundee” travels and like everyone else, I’m just catching up from the holiday weekend…they sure do fly by fast!?
The Renaissance Man and I headed to the Oregon Coast to escape the heat and to say our final goodbyes to a wonderful beach house that’s been a part of the family for a very long time. On the 4th of July, we joined Rockaway Beach visitors and residents to celebrate America!
US101 was busy and as we approached the parade route, and cars were being diverted off of the highway to by-pass downtown Rockaway.
Once we installed the paver patio last summer, I just knew we needed some patio lights at the back of the yard in order to utilize that space throughout the summer and into the evenings. The Renaissance Man and I had been keeping our eye out for lights and were happy when we spotted some at Costco that we thought would do the trick.
It’s hard to believe that I started planting our garden over a month ago!? Where has the time gone? Just look at the overall growth that’s taken place in the last three weeks.
Late May…
So this post is a long one…mostly pictures, but I just couldn’t help myself. I am so excited about having a fish pond in our backyard, even if it is just a cattle stock tank! So you may be wondering what goldfish have to do with honeybees, but the truth is, it’s a bit of a symbiotic relationship (ok, that might be an overstatement!?). Honeybees need water, and if you have a pond you need goldfish to keep the mosquito larva away. See there…we just had to buy goldfish for our honeybees!
So it started out with a trip to Wilco where we picked up a six foot cattle stock tank. We then started to prep the area where the tank was going. We raked back the bard dust, tried to level the soil, and ultimately used a bag of sand to get things leveled.
I am super excited to share a new restaurant we found in Carlton. On our adventure out to The Carlton Winemakers Studio we stopped in downtown Carlton to have a quick bite to eat and were super happy to find Farmers’ Plate & Pantry!
This past weekend the heat was on! Temperatures were up in the 90’s and my allergies were causing me all sorts of trouble. So what do you do when it’s hot out, but you can’t be outside? Go wine tasting!
We first learned about The Carlton Winemakers Studio from Eric Hamacher at a special tasting event over Thanksgiving weekend, and we were happy to finally go check it out!
Every time I went my best friend’s house last summer, she had the most beautiful flower arrangements tucked here and there all over her house. Tons of dahlias exploded everywhere from all sorts of beautiful vases. I got to talking to her about her flowers and she let me in on a secret. She had planted a “cut garden” in her backyard so she could have fresh flowers in the house all summer long. Such a fantastic idea!!!
We were super busy last summer doing all sorts of yard projects, but the idea of a “cut garden” stuck with me and I started creating a mental catalog of all the flowers I would love to fill our home with…the list was long!
