Joy of Country Living

Since most of my week is spent in front of the computer – I always look forward to getting outside  and the weekend wasn’t a disappointment. 

I always marvel a the color and size of  hydrangeas.  I have 3 large bushes and considering they’ve  been transplanted several times since we moved here – it’s a wonder they have survived.   I discovered by trial and error that they do not like the west sun.   When they were on the west side of the house – by 3 o’clock in the afternoon all the leaves looked like limp green wash cloths.  I practically had to drown them in water to revive them – only to go through the same exercise the next day.  That was a few years back – all 3 plants are now situated on the east side of the house where they get the ‘not-quite-so-hot’ morning sun with shade in the afternoon and are thriving beautifully.  The  plant  pictured has a mixture of colors in the flowers and while I’ve read that the soil acidity is the defining factor; I really don’t care what color they are – and you can see a couple of the blooms are bi-color.   All the plants in my yard are low maintenance plants.  I don’t want anything I have to ‘baby’.

I spent some time picking blueberries and will post a great recipe for a banana-blueberry pie later on.  Also spent time weeding the garden – not   my favorite thing to do but the promise of fresh tomatoes, squash and cucumbers keep me task focused.  

Did manage to get into some ants while weeding – and will pass along this helpful hint to stop stinging.  Put ammonia on ant bites – in fact you can use ammonia on just about any bite – wasp, yellow jacket, fire ants, etc. – it stops the sting and if you put it on quickly enough the next day you won’t even know you’d been stung.  We keep a small bottle with a sponge top  filled with regular household ammonia – in the kitchen and in the barn.  Anytime we get a bite, we liberally wet the area with the ammonia.  Works like a charm.