Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
Amen!!!
We arose early since our new furniture was arriving today, and we had to make way for the movers to do their thing. By 10:00 am, we had finished breakfast and awaited a warning call from the Lay-Z-Boy movers.
I bought these two couches in about 2003, so they are twenty years old but seldom used. How do I know? This picture is of Kat and Edith in 2003 at my home!
Everything is ready for the movers to do their thing!
Goodbye, old friend!
Presto, the new couches are here! We plugged them in, and everything works, and they even have USB ports for charging our phones while we watch TV.
The salesman at the furniture store told us, “This sofa will seat five people without any problems.” We said, “Where the hell are we going to find five people without any problems?”
In with the new!
We tried them out, and everything was perfect. We just sat and talked, and then I blurted out, “Why did the proctologist go to the furniture store?’ There was a long pause, a “please not another pun” expression on Mary’s face, to which I responded, “For a stool sample.”
A view from our new perch!
The day was terrific, with hardly a cloud in the sky. Yesterday the sky had many clouds, and I walked in on my wife, yelling that she hated low-lying clouds. I hadn’t the foggiest idea what I mist.
The most wonderful day.
Mary worked inside getting things ready while I worked outside. The barrel below is also an oldie; they are fiberglass recreations of the famous half-wine barrels, and they are over twenty years old and still in great shape. I wish I could find some more of these!
We planted Velvet Queen seeds that grow into summer’s most exclusive and rare blooms, exceptional 60 – 72″ tall branching sunflowers with hypnotic 8″ heads of smokey blood-orange mahogany petals around a heavily black-seeded center.
This will undoubtedly be a conversation piece at our birthday/anniversary party!
They look small now. Velvet Queen Sunflowers grow up to 7 feet tall and offer blooms that are 10 inches in diameter. They are drought-tolerant and require a lot of sun. Velvet Queen Sunflowers provide substantial food for birds so that they will flock to them. Sunflowers also make good-cut flowers.
While looking at the baby sunflowers, I recalled some statistics from my past; always a dangerous thing to do! About 1,375 olives are pressed in order to make 1 liter of olive oil, and 8,435 sunflower seeds to make a liter of sunflower oil… Don’t even get me started on baby oil.
Red sunflowers are coming our way.
The new planter is slowly getting filled. I moved the Scarlet Bush Beans from their location by the trellis and separated several beet plants.
The transplants are feeling the move.
We ordered authentic Scarlet Runner Beans from Amazon, which will arrive on Mother’s Day. The Scarlet Runner pole bean gets its name from the groups of attractive red flowers growing from its 10′ vines. The beans are good as snap beans when young or shelled and cooked as a lima bean.
Did You Know? It is the one species in this genus that is grown both as a vegetable food plant for its edible pods (green beans) and seeds (fresh or dried beans) and as an ornamental plant for appreciation of its showy flowers. Flowers (in addition to salads) and young leaves (pot herb) are also edible. Another common name is butter bean, which can also refer to the lima bean, a different species. It is grown both as a food plant and an ornamental plant.
The plant occurs wild from Mexico to Panama and Central America.
Other popular common names of the plant are Runner Bean, Scarlet Runner Bean, Scarlet Conqueror, Fire Bean, Mammoth, Red Giant, Dutch runner bean, Case knife bean, seven-year bean, Scarlet runner, Red flowered runner bean, Red flowered vegetable bean, Perennial bean, Dutch Case-Knife Bean, multiflora bean and butter bean.
Strawberries are coming on strong now; we get a half-dozen every morning, and they are so fresh! I thought, “What’s the best thing to put in a strawberry pie?
Your teeth, duh!!
Tomorrow you are mine!
Mary’s vertical garden for her edible flowers has taken off. I can hardly wait to see what colors she adds to her meals.
Flowers should be fresh and harvested early in the day for the best flavor. Wilted and faded flowers and the unopened buds of most species can be unpleasant and often bitter.
Edible? Yes, and pretty to eat!
The colors are amazing.
Thank you, Mother Nature.
This type of marigold has a pleasant bitter tang, perfect for teas, salads, or as a substitute for tarragon. Remove the bitter white part at the end of the petals before consuming. It’s one of the easiest annuals to grow with few diseases or pests.
On guard against the bugs!
Our work is done; time to play! We aimed the Silver Fox down the 55 and went in a mighty swoosh away! We arrived at 6:00 pm, an hour after happy hour had begun. We were greeted by one of our waiters, and he had two glasses and a bottle of Chardonnay in hand; we accepted it.
The ballroom looked great!
The Lodge was all decorated up this evening.
John, the General Manager, snapped a picture of us as we entered. We looked OK for 148 years old!
We dined and danced.
We dined and danced until about 9:30 pm when our “get up and go” done “sat down and left.” That was OK, we got in several dances, and besides, we wanted to go home and watch a movie using the new couches.
As we departed, we noticed the flowers Mary brought to the front desk ladies were on display. Get dropped them off Thursday moring and Saturday evening. They looked like they were just cut, and the top blossoms had unfolded.
Mary’s flowers from Thursday were still beautiful.
We were home at 9:30 pm and headed for the TV Room, where we planted ourselves for a short episode of something! We didn’t care; we wanted to ensure the chairs were as comfortable as we remembered. They were.
