Garden Journal Excerpts

My garden is in constant revision, as you may notice my web page is, also.
This will be a way to show some of the updates and revisions I make to the garden throughout the years from my garden journal entries. I have several books of written garden journals. In June of 2012 I began to keep sporadic notes of my time in the garden on my computer.

Monthly Excerpts from the Garden Journal of 2022

SYNOPSIS of the year

1. RECAP of the pond and the fish:
The little spillway is working fairly well. I often have to rearrange the stones on the waterfall area as the animals and birds seem to like to bath in this area. The pump ran through our 2 weeks of freezing and snow at the end of December. I have a few herniaria glabra (rupture worte) plants established on the 'mountain'; and a couple of the red sempervivium, with room for more plants. I did some renovation on the cement block sides of the pond and to all the rest of the "rock necklace". I added 2 trays with black plastic linings, covered with a sand/compost mix, tied to stakes, and supported underneath them by cedar boards to the deck side of the pond. These trays are planted with sedums that are spreading over the trays. I have a few rocks in the trays to add to the look of a rocky shore. The wolfenia plants grow up in the spring and help to cover the edges of the trays and fill in the surrounding area. There is a London Pride saxifraga established and a little gold/green grass and some polyanthuses to help cover the cement blocks that surround the pond. There has been constant renovation to the waterfall, the edging plants, and the surrounding moss/Japanese garden room. This will continue on into 2023.
We have not had a visit from the blue heron again, nor any animals to eat the fish. So, again there are little fish to populate the pond. I have removed the tomatoe cages in all the pots and bamboo sticks along the sides and across the top of the pond.

2. I have finished the basic stones surrounding the new little rock garden area in the front. The soil has settled more over this past year. Some of the saxifragias and other plants are beginning to take hold. This settling of the soil should allow more room for top dressing. I have a lewisia tweedy growing and a sopanaria that I think will survive. I moved some of the the veronica from by the plum tree into this little rockery, and some of it into the back rockery. I also have delosperma (ice plants) and globalaria in the back and front little rockeries. I could use a few more gold rocks. The beds are trough size, with 3 levels of a difference of 6 to 8 inches in the levels.
Along with the renovations to the pond and little back rockery, I also did a bit of work on the paths in the cutting garden and the strawberry patch. I put in a new rhubarb behind the old garage and hope I can get it to grow some rhubarb next year.

3. I had Davey Tree people in to do an extensive pruning and removal of trees around my garden, this year. The sweet gum tree in the front had branches removed from the area facing the house, and other shortening of branches done. They did a severe job of pruning back of the cedar hedge and other plants along the Pees side of my property, with a great altercation with baby Pee in trying to get the debris cleaned up. Since then there has been no more heard from him or damage to what's left of the trees and shrubs along that side of the house. I took out the trellis for the Jackamani clematis and cut it back to the ground. And cut the other plants, except for the rose down to the ground, to accomodate the installation of the heat pump. These plants will grow up again. I will put the trellis back, and reattach the clematis to it when it grows again. Davey Tree took out the old firethorn along the back fence. It was old and too much for me to take care of. They also took out sumacs, the old lily of the valley shrub, and the pin oak. They trimmed the yew hedge down a bit, took down the height of the bay laurel and the French lilac. All of these plants should be better for the pruning. I took out the Virginia creeper and the ivy off the pole along between the driveways. There was a big squirrels nest in vines. The guy from Davey Tree removed all the debris for me. I will try to keep the ivy down, but let the creeper grow to a manageable height on the pole. Will also be able to mow the St. John's worte down if it gets out of hand again. The people on the other side of our driveway have totally trashed their side of that cedar hedge. They have a disgraceful mess of metal car parts and other trash piled up along the side of their house over to and on to the hedge. God knows, I will be happy to get out of this place.

4. There were many renovations all around the garden this year. After the Davey Tree people had finished their work, I cleaned up in the Cutting garden room and rebuilt the path and the platform setting for the chair. Earlier in the year I had cleaned up under and around the plum tree in the front boulevard garden and created a tree well for the plum tree. There is now an area around the roots of the plum tree that I can keep mulched and watered. Another area that I worked on was the garden room under and around the Magnolia tree. I weeded the whole area, and established the trilliums within a stone border. I cleaned out the weeds from in the iberis along the driveway and around the cement vase. I weeded the little stone path into the water meter, and made a flat stone border along the grass path from the stone path to the driveway. Added leaf mold to the front area above the water meter and have established a piece of the old Irish heather and a Raspberry Ripple Hebe, with Autumn crocuses and saffron crocuses in this area. I should like to get some more tulips in this area next fall.

5. After some very hot days we were in a great drought in the summer and on into the Fall. We have only started to get more rain after the great freeze and snow in the end of December. I had to spend a lot of time watering last summer and fall. With all the renovations I am hoping that next year will be more maintenance than renovations. These climate change disasters are getting to be too much for me to keep up with, in my garden.

6. I have made some good progress on recreating my albums for my ancient web page hosted by Trevor. I have finished all of the travel pages that had been done, all of the photography albums that had been done, with longer albums for some of them. A couple of new albums on the cars pages, one more poetry page, and some of the albums on the gardening pages. I will never get it all finished, but I do have notes and outlines on an ongoing basis for all of it.

The garden in 2022

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January 2022

January 1, 2022
The pansy orchid (Milt. Breathless 'Beauty'), the Pixie, a cattalaya (tag lost), the hai maria discolor (Ludisia discolor), are in bloom. We are in a cold snap, with about 12 inches of snow. Made Crepes St. Jacques.

January 2, 2022
working of the JE2021 page. Have the Synopsis pictures ready to add to the page. Rained in the afternoon and some of the snow has gone. Still near freezing. Spaghetti for supper.

January 3, 2022
Laundry, more snow melted. Activated my new credit card and changed all the payment places. Bother!

January 5, 2022
We have a weather warning for snow this afternoon. at Storm Remarks: A low pressure system is forecast to approach the B.C. coast later today. Heavy snow will develop this evening. By Thursday morning, snow will change over to rain. During this transition Thursday morning there is a risk of freezing rain for central and east Vancouver Island as well as the Malahat.
Rapidly accumulating snow could make travel difficult over some locations. Surfaces such as highways, roads, walkways and parking lots may become icy and slippery.
Please continue to monitor alerts and forecasts issued by Environment Canada.
I just found that Smith's Insurance have merged with Henderson's. 2 offices.. one in Regina is Smith's address on Dewdney, and one in Moose Jaw. CEO is Reidy. This merger started November 1, 2021 and I believe it is now complete.
I have an email from PlNw to provide them with any screen shots I have, and that I can see the replays on the History. They have forwarded my info to another department for further investigation or whatever they said.
I have finally got a start on the JE2021 page. .jpg files over 1000 or even 900 are not working. So, I hext have to sort that out for the 2019, and 2021 annual garden photo albums.
Making potatoe soup and the shrimp for the salad with crepes tonight.

January 7, 2022
When our first dump of snow was nearly all melted, during the night about another 12 inches fell. It was very icey and Pat was unable to get out to go for coffee yesterday. Over night last night it rained a bit and this made the slush melt a bit but it is still piled up on the roads that are not ploughed. I had swept the humming birds feeder free of snow and filled it. It stayed liquid through the dump of snow night before last night. We were out this afternoon and Pat was out this morning. I have been making a few gardening 'under construction' pages. Cannot get the 2019 page to work and have no idea why. Been catching up on some of my garden reading. Now, I need to get to work on the JE2021 page. I have a good start on it.

January 10, 2022
two days ago I wasted the day on PlNw. Yesterday I was looking at recipes and copying them out. Especially the Greek soup and baklava. We have had cooler weather with near 0 temperatures. Yesterday it got a bit warmer and some of the snow melted. Today it is to get up to 8 degrees and rain, so we should get rid of the ice and snow. There have been power outages, the ferries not running, the buses in town were not able to get on their routes 2 dayes ago, the highways closed due to all the snow and ice, for some periods of time. On top of all that weather this version of the Covid-19 is spreading like crazy all over the world. Our medical personnel are becoming very tired and unable to keep up to the work load. Most hospitals are unable to take all the sick patients or to do previously scheduled surgeries. It is almost impossible to see a doctor at our local clinic and we haven't had a 'family doctor' since Dr. Treice left the clinic. So, we are fortunate, I guess to have had our vacinations (2 each, and the booster shot). We are doing ok. Pat goes out for groceries and most everything we need. He has even started to go down town to Quonly's for the coffee group in the mornings. He zooms with his mom and sister on Sundays. I have gardening zoom meetings monthly, if I remember them. Pat is doing great with his management of our finances, and I seem to be doing ok in meal prep and laundry. The rest of the house keeping is sadly lacking. Today, I watered the house plants, and did the laundry, took out the compost pot, including most of the apples the were left as they are rotting. I have a few left but they are not very attractive and may get thrown out too. Pat has been making some good sour kraut and I am eating some every day. Its very good. Made $9. on plnw.

January 11, 2022
We are in the middle of another atmosphere river. Lots of rain but the temperature is at 10 degrees. It rained most of yesterday and last night. The snow is disappearing. We have had no problems with our power going out, nor do we have any flooding. The robins were at the holly tree this morning. They seem to have become a nasty bunch of birds, chasing each other off the tree. The humming birds survived the cold snap that is just over. I managed to get the 19Garden loaded. Cannot use JPG files. Good grief! Had hours and hours trying to talk to the help people on Plnw. Nothing became of it. They sent me a form to say how David the helper was. Gave 2nd from top stars, and gave them shit about the snow lepard and white rabbit cheating on the payouts on the bonus spins on the .10 tab. I no longer have any high hopes of getting any $$ recovered. Reduced my deposit limit to $20/week. Been playing some games on demo mode to drain them of the money available to play the games. Bah. Waste of time. We managed to get our Life Lab tests done this morning and had lunch at Fonbos. Very few customers. So, now Pat waits to see Dr. Henderson - Marsha? Sarah? is suppose to call him about the appointment time. No call back yet. Looks like Pat will have to call her AGAIN. All use the excuses of the Covid pandemic. Lots of places are unable to get staff. Pat said that one or two of the Life Labs had shut down because they were unable to get people to work in the place. I think that if they are vaccinated and have the booster shot, take sensible precautions they should be ok. Yet there are people out there who still refuse to get vaccinated. Do you suppose they are waiting for the universal income plan, or whatever it is called? Real estate prices have gone way out of sight. Our place is at 1.3M (i think that is what Pat said... will have to look it up. So, we get thinking more and more about Berwick.

January 13, 2022
Was warmer today. Put out the blue box. Went for a drive to see the big container ship/barge in for repairs. Pictures. Looked up Primula Marginata and did email to McMillan re adding the Primula info to the news letter. Have reviewed the April month for the JE2021. The month of the great snafu. Talked to Jason from the Playnow .. they will give me $50 worth of tokens. The vendors say there is nothing wrong with their Rabbit game. He did know about David reporting the Snow Leopard to the Vendor. S000 he is not exactly up front about these games. He seemed to not be mentioning the Snow Leopard until I mentioned David. Says no one else reported this happening. Hi Ho. . . I expect they might fix it ... or not. I won't be playing those cheating games any more. I might play the demo to see if it is still cheating. :)).

January 20, 2022
So, they gave me $20 worth of tokens, when Jason had said $50. I saved $13 of it and sorry to say I am now back at playing. I spent a few of the interveening days reading gardening stuff, and adding to the secret gardening group. Found a good info page on Primulas and added it to the gardening page links. Found that my Sandy plant is, after all the campanula glomerata, and the primula is marginata. It was up to 11 degrees today. We took out the empties and went to Walmart, I got tickets and Pat got some little perogy things with pork in them, or maybe shrimp. I have started the 03Malta recreate. I am just going to use the photos as they are, with a tweek in photoshop. Am finished the first page. There will be 17 pages of 8 each. All the captions are done and I will just copy them. I finished the JE2021 and the construction pages of the garden in 2019, 2020 and 2021. I need to change the coding to add the synopsis photos to the JEpage. Seems to have something to do with the file size. I need to use:< p align="center">< img src="./The Changing Garden_files/2020Snynopsis.jpg" width="1022" height="1528" >< /p> als for the background image and the monarda image. I have this coding copied to a note pad The Changing Garden files for jpegs. There are snowdrops up in the boulevard garden and a little cyclamen in the little gold rockery at the front.

January 23, 2022
It has been warmer in the last few days and some frost over night. There was frost on the water table this morning. Got a lot of stuff done in the Gardening page of my website, yesterday. I now see how to code the JE pages with the new folder to add the jpeg files into. Found the name of the orchid that is in bloom. It is a cattleya and has bloomed before. It is a survivor from the Ant Purge. The pixie and the pansy orchids are still in bloom, and the hai maria discolor (new name don't remember) and the magenta African violet is constantly in bloom. Have been doing some Facebook stuff and catching up on my garden clubs reading. Made 4 dozen chocolate chip cookies.. recipe is on the bakers chocolate semi sweet chips bag. They turned out good. I could use less sugar next time, I think. Chicken cordon bleu casserole for supper with lettuce, etc. salad. I am up to page 3 on my Malta album, in tweeking the photos. This is easy, as I am just going to copy all the page descriptions and picture captions from the old album. Just copying and tweaking the photos in raw. I can see where lots of them could use some levelling of the horizon, but won't bother. Nobody goes there anyway.

January 24, 2022
Was about 7 degrees. Some sun. Did laundry. Made biscuits. Looked around FB. Played PN. Watched the Jamie Ellison bog garden youtube. Was good. Look at all my liked videos on youtube, seems to be where they are saved to. Have it saved to VIRAGS.

January 25, 2022
Was cooler today. Went for a drive after lunch. Am up to Page 6 of the Malta page, in saving the photos.

January 27, 2022
Yesterday made chicken soup and made broccoli salad. Today it is sunny, 6 degrees. Froze last night and there is still ice on the water table at 1:00. Finished Page 8 of the 03Malta album.

January 28, 2022
5 degrees at 1:00. Did the morning chores: made the bed, turned on the plant lights and spritzed them, emptied the dish washer, did the ironing, did a bit of dusting and shook out the table cloth. Did my email. Made lunch. All this took from 9:30 to 12:00 - another 3/4 of an hour to have lunch and do the dishes. While taking out the recycle bin I tore off some of the old perennials in the boulevard garden. There is a great long blackberry and a bamboo out there that should come out. I don't see any crocuses yet. I see where the old demented shithead, from the west side of our property, has cut off some of the camillia bush and thrown it down by the trail on the other side of the street, across from our driveway. Pat got tired of the Syrians and all the other Syrians in town parking across our driveway and was 'so angry' about telling them about it. So, one of the church people that brought them over to Canada was over to introduce the new Syrian that is going to be living there now. That was a couple of days ago. The driveway is cleaned up and there are 2 cars there now. So, this is Canada, eh? After lunch went to Tillicum mall for lottery tickets, then to London drugs to look for wine glasses, they have none, on to Capital Iron for wine glasses, they have none, then to Value Village and got 2 wine glasses that are slightly bigger than the ones we have. $5.46 for the 2 of them. Took until 3:00.

January 29, 2022
7 degrees today, overcast. From 9:00 to 12:00, made up cranberries (3 jars). had cappiccino. Looked at garden photos and did email. 12:00 to 2:15 lunch, more photo viewing, tweaked photos for page 9 of 03Malta album. So, 8 more pages to go.

January 30, 2022
8 degrees, raining. Watered and fed the house plants. Finished photoshoping page 11 of the 03Malta album.

February 2022

February 1, 2022
Yesterday got all the banking, etc done. Added a few dead perennials to the green bin. Quite a bit of time spent reading. Spent this morning doing stuff with lentils. Then doing email until 3:00. It froze last night. It is now 4 degrees. Changed payment to Flickr.

February 2, 2022
Grocery shopped in a.m. went to Flying club for lunch. Did some smith clan stuff on Facebook. had a short nap in the afternoon. Made $1.00 on PN. Good supper of Liver and onions, etc with strawberries and yogurt for desert.

February 3, 2022
Bought another book last night. Is about 6 degrees, rained a bit this morning. Finally got the towels up and put away. Cleaned the stove filters, inside and all. Helped Pat reinstall the light bulb.

February 6, 2022
About 8 degrees. Was out to take pictures. The yellow crocuses are up. The little cyclamen is spreading all over the front, already. Measured the spot on the pond edge. Needs 24 inches to fill it in. One of the black plastic trays is 21 inches long and about a foot wide. So, I will use one tray. Put black plastic in the bottom and poke a few drain holes in it. Put wires and twine on it to tie it back from falling in the water. I need stakes to tie the wire or twine onto. Remove the big plywood board that I have there now and put a higher board along the water edge. Put the tray on the board and slanting backwards, so it does not tip into the pond. I will put silver sedums and the red ones in the gravel and soil in the tray. Hopefully they will grow over the tray edges and hang over the sides. The wulfenie should cover the edge by the cement blocks. Put another one of the turquoise slate pieces in the water fall, with small gold rocks where the water falls from the plastic thing to make the first drop of the water fall. I still have to clean out that thing and level it up again. then I will attempt to put more sedum, some of the Irish thing, and other tough rock plants into the stones around the water fall. I might cut the bottoms out of black pots to make the holes for the plants and soil stay level, before putting the next rock in place. I need more chicken/turkey grit which appears to be limestone grit. It looks white at first, but soon turns grayish. I have to get rid of the arum that is under the rhodo by the back step. It is very invasive and poisonous. There was an article about it in the Times Colonist a few days ago. Finished tweaking the 03Malta album up to page 17. So, 1 page left to do. (8 photos)

February 9, 2022
10 degrees at 11:00. Watered house plants. made a vegetable soup. Made up the 03Malta album yesterday and have started the Index pages coding and captions. Finished page 8 of the Index captions. Attended the zoom for the VIRAGS last nite, and the AGS-BC tonite. Was out gardening from 2 to 4. Got a lot of the perennials cut back, raked off the thyme circle, cleaned up some of the boulevard garden. Dug the rupture worte (umbilicus..) out of the West Coast Planter. Put a couple of them in the waterfall mountain. Have 4 potted up for the VIRAGS sale, maybe. Put leaves in the bottom so the soil does not run out. Added more sand to the potting soil and then top dressing from the bag of pea gravel. Filled the empty spot on the West Coast planter with potting soil/sand mix. Tonite I learned that we do have some very nice penstomenes in our area. So maybe I can dig out one or 2 from my garden for the sale. I have plenty of the cyclamens. I must dig out the arum and get rid of all of it. Very invasive and poisonous.

February 10, 2022
Was overcast, about 9 degrees. Was out in the garden from about 2 to 4. Cleaned up along the driveway strip. Not quite finished, but have the green bin full. Today is thursday, and the next bin day is on Monday. So any more gardening will produce a pile of debris to add to the bin next time. After I got tired of the driveway strip, I went to the waterfall and rearranged the rocks. I think it looks a bit better. I had some arabis to try to establish in the rocks, but lost it. I will need to get more to try and add to the crevices, but I need more soil to put into the rocks. There are 2 turquoise slate in the waterfall and one on top of the spillway. I have one left. No doubt there will be a place for it, somewhere on the little mountain. Am up to page 13 of the index page captions of the Malta album. . . 5 more to go. I watched a Japanese gardening zoom from the Hardy Plants people. They are on an island and have a few acres of forest, and are maintaining the forest, plus adding meadow garden, and other gardens which we did not see. They try to keep it more natural looking. This is a new way to garden in Japan. Hard for me to grasp this idea. The meadow garden looked a lot like the English country or cottage gardens. Where the plants are all mixed up in drifts, sort of.

February 12, 2022
Spent yesterday shopping and then making the lamb shanks in the instant pot. Instant you say???? nonsense. Finished the Index pages for the Malta album and added the menues. Was up to 11 degrees. Was out in the garden from 2:15 to 4:44. I am digging out the arums. It is a invasive, poisonous plant. I am replentishing some of the soil under the front rhodo by the back step where all the arums seem to be growing. Have dug out a few rocks as well. Have about 2/3 of them finished.

February 13, 2022
Finished the menues on the Malta album and have started coding the colspan. Am finished page 9. It froze over night. When I went out to the garden at 1:30 it was 11 degrees. Finished digging out the Arum bulbs, I hope. Added a little pot of compost bin soil to the hole, added some peat moss, and the rest of the fish soil. Put the bits of veronica I had dug out into this soil at the edge of the wall. Hopefully they will re-establish the roots and grow over the edge like the rest of it is. Or, I could add aubretia, maybe. I have a half bag of clay that might contain arum bulbs in a plastic bag back by the compost bin. I might put it into a pot and see if any bulbs come up, and slowly get rid of them all. I had more bulbs and shoots to put into the garbage in another plastic bag. I will have to keep an eye on the clay stuff that is left, to keep ahead of these invasive arums. This took till 4:30. Pat has found me some nice long nails for creating the edging tray for along the pond. First, I need to level the bottom plywood board, so that it is not slanting into the pond. I might need to cut some of the plywood off one edge. Then nail another board along the pond edge, leaving the nails sticking up to hook the tray onto. I will tie the tray to some stakes that I need to pound into the clay at the edge beyond the plywood. I will use twine and double or more strands of the thin wire I have on hand to tie the tray to the stakes. Then I put black plastic in the bottom of the tray and up the edges to the top. Add soil to fill the tray. Put sand on top and add sedums, top dress with pea gravel, or some chicken grit. The chicken grit turns grey after its been out in the weather. I think its granite bits.

February 14, 2022
Did 3 loads of laundry, vaccumed the kitchen and dining room and ran the little vaccume out of charge. Was 11 degrees. Was out from 2:00 to 4:30. Starting to add the trays to the deck edge of the pond. Ooops dropped one of the nails into the pond. Have one tray with the nails in the board, and the pegs pounded in. Have the wires threaded through the bottom and need a pliers to tighten them around the pegs. I see I will have room for another tray, and have it set and hopefully levelled. Need to pound the last 2 nails into the levelling board beneath it. I have great expectations for these trays filled with sandy dirt and topped with sedums and chicken grit. I hope the red ones will hang over the sides. There were 2 dead fish in the pond. Have no idea what happened to them. Elvis still lives on the deck. The Wulfenie is getting trampled in this process. The waterfall looks pretty good now. I think I will just take those tomato cages out of the pond. They look awful, and the fish seem to be dieing anyway. Am up to page 14 of the index pages on the Malta album.

February 16, 2022
Was about 10 degrees today. Sun and bits of cloud. Was out from 1:15 to 3:30. Have 2 trays nailed to boards. Have one of them attached to pegs by wire, with just one wire attached to a peg of the other tray. The wires go around the peg and around the nails inside the trays to hold the trays to the boards beneath them and wires attached to the trays and the pegs to keep them from sliding into the pond. Have one of the trays with twine attached to the trays and to the pegs. I have yet to finish the other tray with twine to hold it to its pegs. Pruned the little rose in one of the beige pots, and cleaned up the pots. There is a big pink pot with blue crocuses in it. I should move that out to where it can be seen. Clipped back the fig tree a bit. Used the little rake to rake some of the leaves of the moss garden stepping stones. Put 2 cardboard trays full into the green bin. Cleaned some of the primulas up. I need more soil under the rhodo and some top dressing on the primulas. I didn't see any more dead fish. Added a bit more clay to the waterfall mountain. Have the salad made for supper and cleaned and cut up the white fish (Pat scaled it). Going to bread it for supper. I have cut the big pieces in half so that they get cooked both sides. Will fry them in canola oil flavoured with butter. Have finished the index pages on the Malta album.

February 17, 2022
11 degrees today. Was out from 1:30 to 3:30. Lined the trays with plastic dirt bags. Dug up clay from under the deck. (3 small pails full and one left in a plastic bag) Put the clay around the edges of the trays to cover the plastic and some along the bottom. I will be adding some compost soil next with sand on top and then sedums into the sand with some chicken grit for drainage. I have one corner of a tray with the little plant that climbs over rocks. I surrounded it with rocks and pushed sand in around it. It was in a pot and did not seem to have long roots at all. So it should be just the thing for these trays. I cleaned up the back side of the pond, taking out the tomatoe cages and clipping back the old iris debris, and the leaves that go into the pond. It looks a lot better. If I have to have the creatures eating my gold fish, I will get new ones.

February 18, 2022
Was out from 2:00 to 5:00. Finished filling the trays. Have added some blue crocuses - about 5 to each tray. The crocuses were in the big pink pot and in bloom. There is clay around the edges of the trays, then a layer of sand, then added a pail of compost to the middle of each tray to fill the trays. Added another thin layer of sand. I have put the blue crocuses in next, with a bit more sand. Then brought sedum from under the smoke bush, added to the edges. This stuff will spread quickly, I hope to cover the trays. I have one little rock plant in one corner with the turquoise slate covering the corners of the two trays, and more rocks to cover the area between the trays. I brought moss from the patio area and put it on the turquoise slate and around the outside of the trays, with clay behind it. I hope this moss and clay application works. Cut back a few more dried perennials at the back garden, moved a yellowish rock to the front gold rock wall bed; and replaced it on the back little rockery. Put some of the compost on the back little rockery plants. I need to add bonemeal to the trays and pea gravel to the back little rockery. At the front the little cyclamen is blooming like crazy, and the blue hepatica is in bloom. Snopdrops and crocuses blooming everywhere in the garden. If these trays work, I will have a few big rocks to add to the waterfall mountain, maybe. I have to rethink this side of that mountain, as well as getting some taller plants for that side of the pond. I haven't seen any fish in the pond. Will probably have to get some new ones. Next week is going to be colder and maybe rain, so probably won't get out. I can't believe it took me 3 hours to get the clay and compost and sand put into the trays.

February 21, 2022
Made cookies on the 19th. More captions on the 20th. Today it was frosty and icey in the morning. It got up to 6 degrees by noon. Rained a bit. Did laundry. Captions finished up to page 9. WAsted far too much time on Facebook.

February 24, 2022
It has been colder, freezing over night. A day with some fairly high winds. Today there has been frost over night and by noon it got up to 4 degrees. The humming birds have been at the feeder. I have finished the coding for the photo pages html. Now just have the col span coding to do. It is very tedius and will take a long time. I have 17 pages with 146 photos to make these changes. Made crepes yesterday and stew today.

February 26, 2022
Yesterday got up to Page 6 on the colspan coding on the photos of the Malta album. Did ironing and whatnot. Today, I piddled the day away on trying to get my apple Id back and working. My music works without that signing on. I seem to be able to get audio books, if I ever get my new password and credit card added. bother! Maybe I really don't need apple stuff right now. Too much to do anyway. Then wasted even more time arguing with Ashly about how the quick deposit works. She didn't seem to get my question, so just gave it up as a bad waste of time, throwing good money after bad. It was quite cold out there today and overcast dreary.
In the news, after 3 days of fighting off the Putin military attack on Ukraine, they are holding off the Russians. There have been women and children leaving to cross borders to Poland, etc. when they are able to. Most of Europe (including Italy and Germany who depend on Russia for much of their gas), Britain, Australia, Japan, Canada and others are putting Sanctions on Putin, and his henchmen, and putting the finances that go through SWIFT to and from Russia on hold, more or less. Putin is being considered as a war criminal. He is threatening nuclear hits. Seems he has done that before. China supports Russia which is really no surprise. Turkey is blocking Russian ships going through the Dardenels, France seem to be patroling the Channel to board any Russian ships from passing through. Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuainia have blocked Russia from their airspace, as have some other countries, of course. US and others are sending billions of dollars worth of war machines to the Ukrainians. (Hopefully, they are sending soldiers along to run the machines.) There are protests all over the world to stop this war, including in Russia, itself. Of course, they go to jail there, by the thousands. I hope they can take back the Crimea, Belarus and all the territory that Russia has grabbed over the past 15 or so years.

February 28, 2022
Yesterday it got up to 12 degrees and was raining most of the day. Finished the Malta album, loaded it and it works. Yippee. Started sorting the Scotland Ireland photos. I should have 15 pages of 10 photos, so will need to condense the Index pages info the 15 pages from 20. Need to resize the photos as they are too big too, so this might take a bit of time.
Today we have had a heavy rain storm warning. We have had quite a lot of rain over night and it is raining lightly now at 11:00 and is 9 degrees. Skimmed off the pond. The trays are okay and the moss has stayed in place. Moved the tomato cages around a bit in the cutting garden. The rhubarb is coming up despite being covered with stove ashes. Maybe that's just what it needs. Some potash. The waterfall is running very well. I think I will need more new fish. Dragged the bins to the back. The saxifrages are looking surprisingly good at the front. They need more rocks to make the crevices smaller. oh well. The crocus field is looking good, but a bit soggy in the rain. Should get some photos of all this stuff. Doing the light laundry. Pat and Jim have decided to go to the Red Deer swap meet although they won't have a table.

March 2022

March 1, 2022
12 degrees and partial sun at noon. It was foggy this morning. News is all bad. Putin carries on with his insane military attack on the Ukraine and threats of nuclear attack. The ruble in Russian has hit an all time low and they might even go into deflation; due to the sanctions imposed on the banks and all Russian goods and services comqanies to anywhere in EU, UK, Au, Canada, etc. The garden is looking pretty good, it just needs to be cleaned up.

Mar 2, 2022
Overcast, 11 degrees at noon. Tweaked page 1 (10 photos) of the 2004 Scotland Ireland trip; and added the Photo Captions to be copied to the album when re-created. Downloaded and saved Jan and Feb camera photos. Outside and took a few photos. Helped Pat make Saur Kraut - took us about 1.5 hours.

March 3, 2022
Up to 12 degrees today. Bit of light rain. Up to page 3 of the 2004 Scotland Ireland album in tweaking photos and recording the photo captions. Watered and fed house plants.

March 4, 2022
There T shirts available for VIRAGS 100th show and sale on April 1 - 2 ? For $25.00 cash or cheque at Paul Sprigs place - 3 - 5:00, on March 6th. He has some plants for sale: hepaticas, primulas, I have a zoom at 11:00 and Pat has one at 4:00. So we cannot shoe-horn this time in. I am not yet sure, if I will get tickets for the Symposium, etc.

March 5, 2022
Lovely day out but I have been on my computer. Finished page 3 of the 04 album. Cyrus is going to make me a new guest book in a few days. Says he is not a developer but a designer and some other thing.. la de da.

March 7, 2022
Nice day out. 11 degrees at noon, a bit over cast. Did all laundry. Emailed the clinic to get my perscription refills. Made big pot of chicken soup; some for lunch and enough left over for tomorrow.

March 8, 2022
Another lovely day wasted trying to find someone to be my family doctor. Tanis told me that Dr. Gibbons is the one to call for renewals and his hours. I did a reply to her telling her where I thought my Margaret records might be. OMG. she must think I am a total pain in the A$$. We went for lunch at Tim's, walked about to try found a Doctor in that Mall, Pat took pictures of the sign for 3 lady doctors. I will look them up and see if they might be my family doctor; and then to shop at London Drugs with coupons. Took in old light bulbs and used printer ink.

March 10, 2022
Finally got Dr. Gibbons to give me refills for my meds, after much stress and bother from the Clinic. Now I need to go through the Drug Store stress and bother. The need to wear masks in public places has been lifted. The Vax card stuff is still in effect until April 8. It was at -2 overnight and now at 2:00 it is up to 8, and feels quite cold. Skimmed off the pond, took out the compost pot and the recycle bin. Put a bit of turkey grit (granite chips) on the West Coast planter and a bit on the gold wall saxifragias. I will need more of that stuff and some fine pumice from Borden Mercantile. Must check for coarse sand at lowes, or some gravel mart places. I don't seem to have any fish left in the pond. Must make a trip to cannor on some warmer day.

March 12, 2022
Yesterday, registered us with Health connect registry to find a family doctor or nurse practioner. Was cooler today. got up to 8 degrees. Finished tweaking the photos of page 6 of the 04 Scotland-Ireland album. My meds will be ready at the Drug Store tomorrow the 13th. Did some shopping.

March 14, 2022
Yesterday I was out in the garden from 3:00 to 4:30. Got the weeds cleaned and the leaves raked off the stepping stones in the moss garden, from the epimediums almost to the stones that go under the deck. Dragged the green bin to the pick up at the boulevard. Made pork chops for supper, a green bean and potato soup for lunch. Picked up meds.
Today did laundry. Got a call back from the Health connect registry to say I would need to register with the "Victoria" registery and to check back to the link to find out when they are on line. Very frustrating. They cannot send my registration stuff to them. I was awake for most of the night with a sore shoulder. Must have been from gardening yesterday. Finally took a tylenol and it was barely noticeable when I woke up in the morning, but I did want to stay in bed.

March 15, 2022
Got the ironing done, and the towels up and folded away. Did one line of the 7th page of the 04 album. Cleaned up the light garden. Threw out 3 more little ugly orchids. They fit onto 3 trays now. Made pork fried rice for supper with extra big shrimp on the side.

March 16, 2022
It was 13 degrees this afternoon. Did shopping for cherry pie filling for the crepes, red cabbage for the colcannon for tomorrow's feast day - St. Patrick's day. Made the crepes. Was awake a lot last night reading Al Jazeera and Guardian on my phone, so am quite tired today. The Russian's invasion is really nasty. At least 3 million people have left the Ukraine - women and children, the men stay to fight. NATO and the EU and everyone else around the world is sending help as they can, but they won't do a no fly zone over the Ukraine which is what the Ukrainians keep asking for, as they are afraid of Putin's veiled threats of nuclear war. They have applied sanctions to Putin's people and the oligarchs, have cut off Russia's banking with many countries. The Russian economy is tanking... down by more than 30%.. shortages of everything already. Companies are leaving Russia as fast as they can. I think they lose money on any interest they had in their Russian branches; except for the franchises... they are more difficult to be gone. BP and other important oil industry companies have left. But most of Europe needs the Russian oil and gas, so they are scrambling to find other sources for their electricity and industrial useage. There are worries about China lending Russia money and support. There investigations in to crytocurrencies making inroads into the monetary system. Oligarchs, politicos, and Putin: Meet the Russians Canada has recently sanctioned https://beta.ctvnews.ca/national/politics/2022/3/8/1_5810889.html Rented the Gladiator movie through Google Play for about $6.00 at 8:00. I have it for 30 hours, so should watch soon as I can.

March 17, 2022
Raining. Made the Dutch Mustard soup. Made the cherry crepes. Made brisket and colcannon.

March 18, 2022
Was a nice looking day out there today. A bit damp after all the rain yesterday. Got up to 11 degrees. I finished up to page 8 and 1/2 of page 9 of the 04 Scotland Ireland album. So, a little better than half way finished tweaking the photos and making photo captions.

March 19, 2022
Its a fine looking day at 10:00, sunshine and 8 degrees. Last night, untill midnight, I worked on getting a playlist made for the web page music, and I believe I have done it, at last. Now keeping it up to date is going to be easier, I hope. I have thousands of music files in another of the playlists. I have to correct that somehow. Have doubles and triples of the songs. All from attempting to make a freakin' playlist, I am sure. O well. I have daffodils in the house since a couple of days ago. I have a picture of them on the living room table taken with my phone (my first pixel photo). Finished tweaking the photos for Page 10 of the Scotland/Ireland album.

March 21, 2022
Got up to about 8 today. Rained a bit and just a few drops coming down at 2:00 when I was out for about half an hour. Skimmed off the pond. Transplanted a little saxifragia to the brick yard. Hope it takes hold. It had no roots to speak off, so it should be good in the brick hole. Picked up newspaper from the front garden and a big piece of cardboard from the ditch up the street. Tore up the cardboard and put it all in the green bin. Transplanted a piece of sedum autumn joy to near the holly tree, in the bed beside the old sidewalk. The daffodils along the driveway are all a'blpom. The ones I brought into the house are almost dry now. Finished tweaking the photos of Page 11 of the 04 album.

March 23, 2022
Yesterday, I was to Borden Mercantile and got 2 bags of #3 grit (50 lbs each), 2 bags of potting soil (28 l) 1 bag of topsoil (30 l) small bag of orchid bark. This stuff is expensive - $89.32. Took them to the back with the hand truck.
Up at about 8:00 to watch curling at 9:00 to 12. Good game. Took the bags of books down to the front deck for the diabetes truck tomorrow morning. Very heavy.

March 24, 2022
Was up to 11 degrees today. Watched the Canadian women curl against the US in the Scotties (World) tournament. Took out the compost and had a bit of a walk around the garden. It is all soggy. More flowers in bloom... some hyacinths, windflowers, primroses, the daffs, cyclamens at the front. Finished page 12 of the album. Out to supper tonight with Art and Marlene, so did not go out in the garden.

March 25, 2022
was up to 15 degrees today. Played on FB and PN. Shopping. Finished tweaking photos of page 13 of the 04 Scotland Ireland album. Watching curling.

March 26, 2022
Was overcast and about 11 degrees. Did not go out to garden as I thought I could watch the curling of the Canada team at 1:00... not.. maybe we will see them tonite at 7:00. Finished tweaking the photos for page 14 of the 04 album.

March 27, 2022
Overcast. was 13 degrees. Made up the album for the 04 Scotland Ireland trip. Coded the Index pages menus and descriptions. Watched curling.. part of Canada last game where they get Bronze, and later the playoff for the Silver and the Gold. Switzerland gets the gold, Korea gets the Silver.

March 29, 2022
Weather has been warmer. The magnolia has big buds that are beginning to open. The daffodils are in bloom across the driveway. Irises etc. coming up in the Driveway strip. The crocuses are finished in the Bouelvard garden and need to harden off. The wind flowers are blooming everywhere in the garden. The moss/Japanese garden needs more cleaning and weeding. The primulas/primroses are in bloom. The flower bed from the fig tree to the holly tree is full of pink and blue hycinths and daffodils in bloom. Tulips to follow ... The woodland needs weeding - there are blue bells. The pond needs algae treatment, although the water looks quite clear. Today I saw a sparrow having a bath in the waterfall on the turquoise slate stone. I don't see any fish and shall have to get some new ones, I guess. The trays are looking pretty good, the red sedum seems to be taking hold. The crocus are finished. The primula marginata is looking good in the west coast planter. I have it filled with soil and have #3 grit for top dressing. The rock from Bryan is the feature rock. I need a few more thin rocks as low crevice garden stuff and then some good plants to put in there. Was watching videos from the English rock gardeners. They stuff their troughs and pots full of plants. Their show plants are incredible. Some of them are going to plastic pots because the frost is hard on the terracotta pots.
I am registered for the symposium - 2 speakers. Starts at 9:00 am on Saturday the 2nd of April. I am bringing a tray of sandwiches from Thrifty's, so I have to be there early to deliver the sandwiches and find my registration for the symposium. They open at 8:00, symposium at 9:00 and they are closed until 1:00. I imagine the people who are in the symposium will have lunch before the doors open at 1:00. I hope to find a T-shirt and some plants. I wonder if there will be any tufa rocks. hmmmm! In our goodie bag there will be information on the open gardens on the following Sunday the 3rd. Pat is unavailable to take me. He has a motorcycle group breakfast the the mother facetime. Oh well, it is to be cooler and maybe rain, so not the best. I am sure I would be able to see Spriggs garden just about anytime he is there, would merely have to arrange it. There is to be some information on the Garden in the Beacon hill park, but i do not participate in that. They are renovating it, apparently. Must get down to see it again sometime, too.
I have my light garden cleaned up and its looking good. The Andean (?) is coming into bloom. Its a lady slipper .. not too great.

March 30, 2022
Nice day. 13 degrees. Did not go out - don't want to get dirty. Finished the menu coding for the Photo pages. Helped Pat take in the recyle cans and bottles. I must pack up my wires, cables for their recycle.

March 31, 2022
There was ice on the water table this morning. Did some coding on the 04 album. Shopped after lunch. Did some changes on some of the pages to correct errors. It got to be a nice day in the afternoon. The grass needs mowing and the garden rooms all need weeding, etc. Maybe next week when the big VIRAGS show is over. It is at the Mary Winspear and starts at 8:00 a.m. when we go get our registrations and get in with VAX card checks. I am taking my thrifty's sandwich tray in on that morning so have to make sure I am there early enough. They close from 9:00 to 1:00, while the symposium is going on. They did not sell all the 100 seats apparently. I hope to get a T shirt yet and maybe a plant or two, if there are any left. There are 4 open gardens on Sunday, from 10 to 2. Only the people who got symposium tickets get to go to them. Pat will take me in the Benz. I hope he can fill it with water tomorrow, so its ready. Maybe we can take something along for lunch. a soup? the imitation KFC bits?

April, 2022

April 1, 2022
Was rather cool at 12 degrees today. Overcast and later bits of rain. I finished the 04 album coding on the photo pages -- have only the captions to do. Picked up the sandwiches (apx. $35) from thrifty's for taking to the Mary Winspear tomorrow at 8:00... way early. Sandwiches look good, and very full of all the stuffings... egg salad, roast beef, ham and cheese, turkey and I don't know what. They say it should serve 10 to 12 people. Get into the symposium before 9:00 and then the doors close until 1:00. Had lamb kabobs for supper and baked potato. Too much wine and chocolat.

April 4, 2022
The speakers at the symposium were very good. I was up way too early, so was tired by 12:00 and called Pat to come get me. Did not buy any plants, nor any lunch there. The show was not great. it was a spriggs and currie show. Very few other entrants to the show. I did not go to the open gardens on Sunday (3rd) as it was cold and rainy.
Today I am much more rested and energetic. Did laundry, made chocolat chip cookies, watched curling. Am finished the photo captions up to page 5. We had big winds and rain today and it was only 8 degrees. Was nice to have the oven on to warm up the kitchen. Made bean salad yesterday. I have 3 orchids in bud and the almost ever blooming African violet.

April 5, 2022
Was rainy and windy in the morning. Finished the laundry. Did a bit on FaceBook. Shopped after lunch. Meat Loaf for supper. Have started the mousaka for tomorrow. Finished the photo captions to the end of page 6. The news about the Russians pulling back in the Ukraine is horrible. Awful war crimes. I expect they will be prosecuted, but it is going to take years before there is any justice and compensation for the Ukrainians, I am sure. Putin is following the Hitler line of propoganda and lies, that I am hoping he continues the Hitler lead and kills himself in his bunker somewhere in Siberia. Reading Kasporov's ebook "Winter is Coming", published in 2015 after the Crimea was ransaked by the Russians. It should be a must read for all the diplomats.

April 8, 2022
Yesterday I spent the day trying to fix a thing on Pat's computer, and ended up messing it up. Called Trevor's office and Sung was able to come over in about half an hour. He was unable to fix it with the desk top thing by remote cause Pat's computer would not download the app. Anyway, $152.88 later and it was all fixed to Pat's satisfaction. Let that be a lesson to me not to mess about with his computer. He can call the guys to fix it next time. Sometime on this day, I did some clean up of the deck pots and plants. More to do yet. Watched curling. Day before yesterday I made moussaka and the lemon bars dessert things to use up the extra egg whites and half a lemon. Took up the whole day. Well, we both had very bad acidic stomachs from all the lemon etc. But the dishes both tasted good. Let that be another lesson to me... too much lemon is really bad for me, and for Pat, too.
Today I played in Facebook and a bit on my blog, as the rock gardening guys use blogger, too according to the guy that did the talk at the VIRAGS show, Panoyoti Keloidis. As his blog showed some of Janice Curries garden and some of Cameron Kidd's garden. Added Panoyoti's blog to my blog side panel stuff. Took off Pat Haugen's blog as she no longer seems to have it on line. After lunch I went out about 1:00. Mowed the grass back and did not quite finish the front before the mower and I ran out of battery. I took a bit off the apple tree as I was getting my face in the branches. Cut back some of the Jasmine back off the old cement sidewalk. Dumped the debris in the green bin and have it half full. Skimmed off the pond and used the skimmer to take out quite a lot of that long stringy algae. Fixed the waterfall a bit. I guess the birds bathing in it move the little rocks around. I should probably add more of that dissolve stuff to the pond to see if it takes out the algae. The marsh marigold is in bloom and so is some of the water hawthorne. The hycinths along the old sidewalk path, daffodils and wind anemones are putting on quite a nice show. The sidewalk is mossy, the patio area is very mossy. The autumn crocuses around the garden have sent up nice bunches of leaves. Maybe I should divide them. The little saxifrages that I added to the brick yard (the red bricks with holes in them between the little rockery at the back and the strawberries, are both doing well. There is a volunteer Chamomile in one of the brick holes. These plants pop up all over my garden and I generally let them grow and go to seed. I think I have the Roman variety that is the perennial. Quote "Chamomile is a unique herb; it is as pretty as it is useful. Unbeknownst to most gardeners, there are two types of common chamomile: German and Roman. Both are native to Europe and both have medicinal qualities, often being incorporated into herbal remedies, beverages, and skincare interchangeably. Both boast fragrant, daisy-like flowers with white petals surrounding a yellow center." The primulas in the moss garden are doing very well. I seem to have got all of the arum out of the area under the rhodo, along with most of that 3 colored leafed plant that is very invasive. The wretched blue bells are not under control yet and need to be dug out of the woodland. And dandilions should be caught before they go to seed, also. Finished page 10 of the photo captions. Ordered pizza for supper and then there will be curling to watch again.

April 09, 2022
Highest was 10 degrees and a bit breezy. It Felt quite cool to me. Caught up on Facebook stuff. PN gave me $5.00 in tokens again. So with a $10 deposit I managed to Put $32 away. I seem to be even up with 21 days to go. Was out in the garden from about 2 to 4. finished cleaning up the deck pots. Dug out blue bells in the woodland. I am up to the buddleia bush. They are miserable to get out from the midst of the fawn lillies. I will have to watch them and get rid of any that go to seed. I have room for maybe one or two more woodland plants next to the buddleia. I might like to get more indigenous plants. Finished page 13 of the photo page captions on the 04 Scotland Ireland album. Watched 2 curling games.

April 10, 2022
Was cold and rainy all day. Finished the 04 Scotland Ireland album and loaded it. It works. Did a correction on the Travel logue page. I must get photos of the garden, soon. So very many spring bulbs, magnolia tree, wall flower, primulas, water plants, woodland when I finish cleaning it up. Watched the Canada team and Sweden playoff for the gold and silver. Very good game, very bad ice. Sweden won the gold, again. I have started to organize the photos and pages for the 05 Danube album. 95 pages with 4 photos on each...this is going to take a long time to recreate. As I look at the old photos I want to add more and more of them to the album...I would never finish if I did that though. Was a very good trip. Also need to do gardening and all the other stuff. I really need a house keeper. It is nice to have the light garden cleaned up. I have 4 orchids in bloom and the ever blooming African violet, of course.

April 16, 2022
The past week has been cold and damp, with some rain. So, I have been inside working on the 05 danube album. I have the photos up 146 sorted and the Captions done, I hope they are ok, but will find out after I get the album done and the time to add the captions. So, if it takes a week to do 146, I should be finished this part of the remake in 2 more weeks... potentially the end of April; I should be making the album and doing all the coding. I did get a tiny bit of gardening done: digging out blue bells in the woodland and have finished up to the Saskatoons area. Have been pulling out the extra fritillaria (onion self seeded) things to thin them out. The deck pots are cleaned up and ready for the annuals and herbs. There will be heliotrope of course. And will need new fish, even though the motion light has been coming on regularly, at night. The day that Manitoba and easterly had a big blizzard, we had colder weather too. Some of the higher areas on the Island had snow. Today was warmer, but still with a wind chill factor. I was out and took the April photos for about an hour. The squirrels have been running along the power lines, at the meal times when I see them. We seem to have 2 eagles ... hope they mate and start another hatch.

April 17, 2022
Happy Easter. It got up to 12 degrees today. I am in the house cooking the duck. I packaged up the 4 plastic containers of beef barley soup that I made yesterday. I am finished sorting and naming the photos up to 192. 191 finishes page 19 which is half way finished the 380 photos. So, I am making pretty good time getting them done, but there has not been much time in the garden.

April 18, 2022
There was a high winds weather warning, and we got some wind early in the morning until about noon. It was only about 10 today and overcast. We did not loose our power, as did a few thousand people. Made up the 8 cups of duck stock and froze them. Made clam and vegetable sauce for the spaghetti for supper, was very good. Did the laundry. Have finished page 22 of the sorting and numbering of the photos for the 05Danube album. 16 more to go. If it keeps on raining I should be able to get finished sorting and the captions done up in another 7 - 10 days.

April 20, 2022
Was another overcast day. Made Mousuaka this morning. Finished up to page 30 of the sorting and numbering of the photos..300 photos. So about 80 more to sort and number, and that equals 8 more pages.

April 22, 2022
Added $55 to the PN account this am. It is a nice sunny day, but I am inside, except going for lottery tickets. I have finished the 38 pages and added another one for 39 pages of photos numbered and captioned. 390 photos to put through photoshop! I don't think I will be in a big hurry to get them done, as it seems to have finally warmed up and there is lots of gardening to get done.

April 23, 2022
Was up to 15 degrees today. Was out from 1:30 to 4:30. Cleaned up a bit in the boulevard rectangle on the Pees side. Dug out clover and lemon balm and weeds along the edge where billy bob is digging a trench with his weed eater. I have set in new little honeysuckle pilea cuttings to make the little hedge go down to past the plum tree. I put stones along the edge and hope he gets his freaken' machine caught in them. Dug out the little yellow leafed veronica that was doing great in the clay. I have two big pieces and a small one. Planted one of the big pieces into the little rockery at the front. It is the last plant before the cedar hedge, next to the feather rock. There were cedar roots in the area I transplanted it to. I raked off the thyme circle and weeded it. Then put dolomite lime on it, as there was lots of moss growing. Hope this kills the moss. I took the compost pot out and mixed it with the leaves on the top of the old compost bin. I thought I had a garden fork in my tools --- couldn't find it, so mixed with my thin spade tool. Digging out blue bells where I find them. There are really lots of them in the boulevard rectangle, despite putting leaves on them in the Fall. I put 3 fruit tree fertilizer spikes around the plum tree. I should add a surrounding mound of dirt around its bottom to help water it, but that garden is on a slant toward the street, so it would take a high barrier to keep its water in. I should water it well by hand and put leaf mould around it. Could get the leaves from under the bench. I need more old boards to build this watering spot around the plum. The pasque flowers are looking good. The lillies are coming up in the little gold rock rockery.

April 24, 2022
My goodness! It was 17 degrees when I got in from the garden at 5:00. I had my toque and 2 sweaters on! Was out from 1:30. Early this morning there was a lovely misty fog. The newpaper guy arrived on his motorcycle. I have chicken cordon bleu casserole for supper so no need to cook tonite. I have 2 nice boards that I will be putting along by the plum tree to keep the weeder eater off its roots, at least some of them close to the trunk of the tree. This will create the tree well so I can water by hand, if necessary. I cleaned up the little rockery at the back. Moved a few rocks around. Transplanted the small piece of the yellow leafted veronica into a spot by the big red rock. I now have the red speckled rocks in the same area. The little globalarias are getting buds and so are the lewisias, and the daphne. Put some topsoil in the red cedar planter. Not sure what I am going to put in it. Cleaned up some of the strawberry patch. The rhubarb is doing poorly, as usual. Pat dumped ashes on it last winter. I don't think it likes them. I really do need to get a new rhubarb root. Transplanted a little globolaria into the brick yard, and another small saxifragia. Moved the hepatica from under the bay tree into the little rockery near the budding daphne. It does not look happy about the move. Added a bit of turkey grit mixed with the gritty pea gravel to the cleaned up bed. And a shovel full of leaft compost to the daphne. Put some of the debris in the back compost bin, but most in the green bin. Its only half full and they take it away tomorrow. I must have this garden weeding under control, as the bin is not over flowing this year, yet. I must get over to cannor and see if they have any plants I might want, as I seem to have lots of empty spaces for alpines. And need new fish, of course. They don't mention their fish on their website. I will want heliotrope, some basil, not sure what else for the pots on the deck or the patio area.

April 25, 2022
It got up to 15 degrees today. Rained a bit over night .. maybe 1/4 of an inch. Enough to water in the few transplants I had done. I was out from 1:30 to 5:30. I finished the tree well around the plum tree. Put in 3 boards and finished just at the edge of the boulevard. Finished with a grey brick. I have tried to put cuttings of the honeysuckle pilea along the edge to the bottom, just inside of the boards which are about 6 inches further to the Pees side, where shithead has been weed eater-ing too close to the plum tree trunk. Hopefully he can stop that stupid practise, but I don't hold out any great hopes. No cure for stupid. Moved clay from under the deck to shore up the boards and packed it along on the inside, with the clods of grass that I dug out for the trench to put in the boards, and some small stones packed on the outside. I got about 1/4 of a bag of compost from the old bin and put it around the bottom of the tree. It still needs more and then a covering of dried leaves for mulch. I should be able to water the tree well by hand and replenish the mulch when necessary. I cut out the old wild hawthorne bush and chopped it up into the green bin, which is about 3/4 full. A very thorny job, but its done and that boulevard rectangle looks a lot better for it. I need to replenish the honeysuckle pilea little hedge and get it looking good again. The crocus leaves are beginning to brown, so I should be able to mow that grass in maybe 3 more weeks. Just as I got out to garden at 1:30, it began to sprinkle lightly. Stayed out and got the tree well almost finished. Put a few gallons of water into the pond. It seemed to be down a bit, even after the rain. I got my tax refund back today... exactly to the penny the way Pat figured it out. Marvelous! We will celebrate tomorrow. Finished tweaking photos for page 2 1/2 the Danube album and did the light laundry today. Seems I have more energy today for gardening, and all. Hope I can keep this up. A day of gardening and a day of rest might be the answer.

April 27, 2022
Made red cabbage and the roasted potato in the am. After lunch went out at 1:45 and was back in at 4:15, so 2.5 hours. Dug lemon balm, blue bells and weeds out of the plum tree root area. Put down about 1/2 bag of compost from the bin. Added dried leaves from under the bench - 2 bags full. The mulch is not very deep. Dug a few weeds out of the woodland up to the old stump. Spread stone chips from the old pea gravel bag on to the thyme circle, and some on the sedum, and a bit around the sea thrifts. Messed about placing a couple of rocks on the waterfall mountain. I must open the spillway and see if I can scoop the black soil out of the place where it has collected. I seem to be losing a bit of water per day. Probably the water fall. It is easy enough to fill the pond, from the tap. I still have a big piece of the veronica to plant -- maybe by the pond. I have finished the page descriptions to the end of page 3. I have finished tweaking photos for Page 4.

April 29, 2022
yesterday slept most of the afternoon. All that gardening took the energy out of me.
Today it got up to 13, and was a bit cloudy in the afternoon. In the morning I loaded 10 plastic bags full of books for Pat to take to the Times Colonist book collection tomorrow morning. This has done quite a bit of space cleared on the shelves. Carried them downstairs. After lunch we loaded them to the car. I went out to the garden for about an hour. Transplanted three of the red sedums, the campanula, and a little piece of the yellow leafed veronica into the weaterfall. Filling in with rocks, clay, sand and compost mix. I put a bigger piece of the veronica into the bed on the other side of the pond. The pond is losing water somewhere. It is also getting algae and needs to be skimmed off. the marsh marigold and the hawthorne are in bloom. Finished page 6 of tweaking the photos of the danube album.

April 30, 2022
Wasted the morning on PN. It is a misty cool day, at 10 degrees. Pat took our books to the Times Colonist book drive this morning. After lunch we went to Gordon Murray's open garden to see his trilliums. I went later cause people were there earlier to get trophies, I think. Anyway there was just one other couple there and they left soon after we got there. As we finished up, Sue arrived and spent a minute chatting. When we got back, I did a bit of tour around my garden. Gordon's garden is so very very clean. He takes very good care of his plants. His whole back garden is little rockeries and bits of grass paths between them. He has horse troughs to grow, mostly his trilliums in. He seems to use field stones for his rockeries, and has other little covered places where the troughs and some other potted up plants grow. He had some little seedlings for sale. Sue thought they might be 3 years old. It can take up to 10 years for them to come into bloom, so I did not get one. I have 5 plants that are all in bloom now. And lo and behold, this master trillium grower says to plant them under a magnolia, as they are compatible. I think he said they grow together in their natural habitat. His rockeries had a top dressing of very clean compost. There may have been some grit top dressing in the odd little space, but cannot remember for sure. He says he gets lots of sun. There is a few tall evergreens, but the lower branches have been trimmed back. He had a gentian acaulis in bloom, in a litle trough, set just about eye level. So many lovely little plantings. A very inspiring garden to visit. Didn't notice even one tufa rock. :)). There was a deer in the next door garden, but his garden is all fenced to keep them out.

May, 2022

May 1, 2022
Watched a zoom presentation on the alpines of the central mountains of Chile. Excellent photography. Some very interesting plants. I have one of the Oxalis mentioned in his talk. It is on my list to get more. Its a bulb. Oxalis adenophylla. Maybe I can divide the one I have. I have had it for years, but it has not spread much. So, after lunch after the zoom presentation, I went out to the garden. It was 17 degrees. I wore my least ragged jeans and my fuzzy vest over a lighter long sleeved sweater. Mowed the lawn, back and front. Started the clean up of the trillium bed by the ugly water meter. Got just a bit of the grass edging done. After seeing Gordon's perfect garden (I love it!) I started pruning the Magnolia. I will do more to it... maybe next year. It has to recover from the work I did on it today, to shape it and cut it back from the driveway. Gordon's magnolia has only one trunk and evenly spaced shorter branches. oh my, what a beautiful specium. So, my magnolia will eventually get more work done. I started to try to bring the Irish heather under control, but it is too much of a mess so shall take it out and replace with something evergreen. My tree peony is just across the grass path from the magnolia. It grows up out of a globe cedar that I have pruned to be like a pot. The little planting needs more compost added. In front of the tree peony is a marvelous purple, fragrant wall flower, with a nice double snowdrop and a very deep purple hyacythia, to start the spring show, by the front entry. Next to the Irish heather that I will remove is the newly renovated area that I did a few years ago to hold the one and only milkweed that survived. It has tulips in bloom now. The david is next to them, with an ugly, straggly lavender, that will get trimmed back. I think I will add a primula or two in front of the david, with more compost. Behind the David are the Siberian Iris and behind them is the bamboo. layers!. And next over is the yellow oregano which is a rather agressive ground cover, but easy enough to control. Then the thyme circle. Thyme circle has had dolomite lime and some gritty pea gravel It should get more compost and sand mix to it, also. I don't know what I will put in the place of the Irish heather ... something evergreen to hide the ugly water meter. Or, maybe a new heather... azaelya? yeah, and take out the other old heather too, and put in another evergreen thing. I have rhodo Impeditum (30 cm - about a foot) on my list, but it is too small for this area. I can put the red flowering currant by the cedar hedge next to the california lilac. This area has kinnikiwick as the ground cover. Its a really good natural little shrub. We had about 1/4 inch of rain last night, so the waterfall plants got watered in. I added a bit of water to the pond today. I need to clean out that spillway thing, and get rid of the algae, and get more fish. I can finish the plantings along that side of the pond later. The quince needs a bit of pruning to shape it, and so do the roses. The crocus field needs a bit more time to harden off. I saw a wonderful crocus field that had gone to scilla and other things, on one of the facebook groups. Mine will need more of them, too. I must look it up again.Yeah... plans and plans and lots to do. I need a good source of compost, too. My old bin just does not produce enough, it seems. But that leaf mold is excellent. I added some kitchen scraps today. Every little bit helps.

May 2, 2022
rainy day, rained a bit over night. up to 13 degrees. Did laundry, made sausage casserole, vaccumed. Finished tweaking photos for page 7 of the Danube trip.

May 3, 2022
overcast and bits of rain. 12 degrees. Seems too cool for May. Made $5 on PN. Repotted the Milt. Breathless Beauty (Pansy orchid), and the lady slipper - Andean Fire. Watered and fed all the house plants.

May 4, 2022
Overcast and very high humidity. 15 degrees, but feels cool. Was out in the garden from 2:30 to 4:30. Had 2 sweaters on and was comfortable. Did some odds and ends stuff -- lowered the rock on the stone path past the fig tree. I have been tripping over this thing for years. Finally fixed it. Added 2 more saxifragias (names on the tags washed off). They are from the Saxefragias of Rex Murfitt.. nothing specail. Added turkey grit to the little gold wall bed where I transplanted them. Cleaned up this rockery. Added a couple more gold rocks to make seperations between the saxes and other plants. Made a dividing rock in the west coast planter, for the spot where I am going to put the gentian acaulis. So there will be the Bryan's rock, the primula marginata (it is expanding), and the gentian, when I get it, in this planter. Filled in with more turkey grit for top dressing. Pulled blue bells out of the end of the gold rockery, and added leaves with some clay over it to the next little bed. The soil is becoming nicely mixed. The older big gentian is growing up nicely. Spread turkey grit on all 3 levels of the wrap around gold rock bed. The iberis is in bloom, a couple of the saxes have blooms. Finished this area up to the feather rock. Have room for more alpines. Also have more room across the stone paths, for more alpines. Added some clay to the edge of the grass path -- need more clay there. Have to fill in where I have been digging out the grass edging, to let the grass grow and move the edging over a few inches. Used up about 3/4 of the little pots of turkey grit. There was a dead saxifragia. I put one of the new ones into its spot. Started to cut back the Irish heather. I need an evergreen for where the Irish heather was. It got just too straggly. Maybe an azalyea. The tulips around the david are in bloom. They look good. After seeing Gordon Murray's garden, I was so impressed with how clean, and well maintained the plants are, that I might try to improve my plantings. Finished page 8 of the danube album.

May 5, 2022
Was up to 11 degrees today and rained lightly all day. Emptied about 1/2 inch of rain out of the gauge at 7:30. Am finished tweaking the photos for page 9 and have started the page descriptions for page 10. So, 30 more pages to go. The pixie orchid has a bud forming again.

May 6, 2022
It was up to 12 today. and damp. Pat was away in the am and then away to lunch, so I had time to go out gardening before it started to rain. Was suppose to start at 2:00. I cut up the magnolia branches into a paper bag - twigs make good kindling when dried. A couple of cedars seemed to be falling over the deck so I cut a couple of them down. I now have a big hole in the foliage. There are taller ones behind the hole so, the Pees cannot see through. Tied up the honeysuckle a bit with some green twine. Swept the debris over the edge of the deck. Cut back a tall bamboo there, also. Took the little pots of saxifragias down to the brick yard, transplanted 2 or 3 into the brick holes, and one into the rockery. Rearranged a few rocks. dug over the strawberries near the brick yard and added compost to the top, and bits of heavy soil on top of that. Took a saxifragia to the waterfall mountain and put it in a spot. I threw about 1/2 pailful of turkey grit onto the little rockery and some on the waterfall mountain. I have 3 big rocks from the pond edge for use somewhere. I have added more soil to the gold rock wall rockery in the front and one saxifragia into the spot where one died. Slowly getting things cleaned up. Finished page 10 of tweaking photos for the danube album.

May 7, 2022
Was out from 2:15 to 3:45 - 1.5 hrs. Cleaned up the front of the Magnolia bed, adding more clay/soil to the edging at the front, by the cement vase. Have dug out dandilions and clover off the stone path almost to the water meter. Have about 1/3 of the old Irish heather dug out. Am thinking of putting bark mulch over this little bed when I have finished it; and maybe a rhodo Impeditum - purple with blue grey leaves. Its a very nice little rhodo that grows to about a foot. There are lots of the purple crocus hardening off in this area. This will open up the water meter area for the meter maids and tidy up the bed. I must get rid of all the bachelor button things, and add more tulips to extend that tulip area by about 2 feet. I clipped back the rock plant thing...rock rose? and will be adding some potting soil to it and covered with sand and pea gravel over to the edge of the driveway. Must get the trilliums cleaned up and add compost and maybe even some of the bark mulch... peat moss? I should take out that ladies mantle thing as it is quite invasive. Gordon Murray's garden didn't have any of these kind of plants in his little beds, and he kept them weed free. Cut a few more tops off the cedars by the deck that were getting under the drain pipe. Came in to watch the Kentucky debery race. Wow, what a race. The Preakness happens in 2 weeks. Finished page 11 of the tweaking of photos for the danube album, and did some work on the page descriptions. So, it seems I am 1/3 finished this part of the re-creation of the album. Making good progress, I think.

May 8, 2022
Made Pineapple chicken using up 5 of the ugly tasting chicken thighs. Skinned and deboned them and cut them into strips. Well, they were in bits and strips. Peeled and microwaved the less than perfect squash. Spent the morning fixing the sound, and note pad (I hope) and the printer (I hope) I have no idea how they all got so changed. I fixed the print screen about 4:00 am and sent the skype screen print of that wretched megashot.net on Face book. We phoned Dan and Carol yesterday after supper. Had a good chat. Everyone is ok. Pat goes for his Xray and MRI on his shoulder and elbow tomorrow. Hope they find what is causing the pain. Was a nice day today. Up to about 13, some cloud. The 70% rain did not happen, just a few drops. I was too tired and busy to go out. The orchids are looking good. The lilac is in bloom and so is the apple tree. The wall flower is looking really good in full bloom. The fern leafed peony is finished its blooming time. Got 3 or 4 photos tweaked for the danube album. Am very tired. I had no nap. So going to have a very early bedtime. Powered up the keyboard and the mouse. Made $20 on PN this morning. Put out the green bin. It is very full.

May 9, 2022
Had a fairly busy day today. Did light laundry day and cleaned up the suite bathroom and the other sink, dusted a bit in the dining room. Made a dollar in PN. It rained at noon and we had a quarter inch of rain. Emptied the gauge in the afternoon. As it was raining, and I thought I could not go out gardening I made cookies and got the meatloaf and vegetables ready for supper. By this time the temperature was back up to 14 degrees and no more rain. So went out at at about 3:30 and weeded a bit. Cut the dead stems out of the big leafed plant under the deck. Looks good cleaned up. Took a few crossing over branches out of the apple tree. It needs a bit more of this done. Did some weeding next to the rhodos by the deck and have about 3 - 4 feet of the stone path with its moss, weeded. Jeff Wright has to move from his place as they are selling it. They put his pots, cement pots and troughs out in the drive way and passers by took them away. His buckets of stone were dumped into holes that needed filling. The owner are doing a down and dirty make over before selling. Pat suggested I givwe my pots to him, and I agree. Would be nice if he could stay in the suite while he finds a good place to live. AND help with the gardening and maybe even with Pats car stuff that he cannot do with his sore arem. Pat went for his MRI and his Xray (this is another story!) today and was home almost before his appointed time to be there. He was early and they took him in early, then he had to go somewhere else for the X-ray. So, now that is done and we will see what the results are when Dr. Henderson gets them. I went to bed early last nite and got a whole nights sleep, so was up for this busy day. The humming bird was at the feeder for a longer time, so I guess, it deems the feeder cleaned up. I saw it in the front garden checking out the flowers, and Pat saw it eating at the wall flower. This afternoon I swa 2 of them doing this what I assume is a courting dance. So, we have our hummers back! The green bin is about 1/5 full after cutting up the cedar and bamboo branches and a couple of trays of weeds. Tulips in bloom, looking good around the garden. My computer is working amaing well and seems faster than usual. It does still have a mind of its own, it seems.

May 10, 2022
Was to Satin Flower nursery at 741 Haliburton Rd. Got a Satin Flower. Olsynium douglasii is also known as Sisyrinchium douglasii, a Red Flowering Currant - Ribes Sanguineum, can grow to ten feet high and wide. I am sure it can be pruned. The fruit is a dark purple oval berry about 1 cm (0.5 in) long, edible but with an insipid taste, and a Lathyrus japonicus (Beach Pea). Likes sandy soil. The lady said it is like a ground cover, so I guess it spreads around. Is edible but not as good as garden peas. I went out about 2:30. Dug out some old compost, and a half a pot of sand. Planted the Currant at the end of the little rockery about 3 feet from the cedar hedge. Dug a hole and put in sand/compost mix and dried leaves. Mixed the clay/compost mix with the sand/compost mix around the plant. Cut some cedar roots out of the hole. It had good looking roots. Its leaves are a lighter green than the cedars and its red flowers should look good when in bloom. I dug a hole and added compost and sand in the area the other side of the stone path, just below the fern leafed peony, and put the perennial pea in it. I should be able to keep this plant under control. Its soil should be more sandy than what it is in now. O well. I dug out quite a few weeds in the general area I was working in, but that front garden still needs more weeding. The penstemone is lovely in bloom and the fern leafed peony is just finishing up. I started to cut back the California lilac but was running out of time, so I went to the back and planted the satin flower in the moss garden next to the little blue hosta. This hosta and the primulas around this area are spreading out and will probably need dividing and adding compost to them. Weeded a bit in this area also. Went in about 4:30. It was 15 degrees with a very cold wind, so it was a 2 sweater day for me.

May 11, 2022
Was up to 15 degrees, overcast and has not started to rain yet, at 4:30. Was out from 1:00 to 4:30. Cleaning up the water meter area. I have taken out the Irish heather and left one little sprout to grow up again. Cleaned out all the weeds over to the tulips. Moved the rocks around and have more space to put in a little ground cover. Put rocks along the grass edge. I need to do this edging from the driveway to the stone path up to the water meter. Cut back the other old heather and will be taking it out, also. The tulips look good and I think the milkweed is going to grow. I would like to get a little impedium rhodo to put in that bed. Then the ground cover might be something that likes moss/acidic soil. Or maybe just moss. Or maybe just leaf mold, for the first year or two, anyway. That old compost bin and its leaf mold does wonders for the soil.

May 12, 2022
Was out from 1:15 to 3:15. Was a coolish 12 degrees and overcast. It started to rain lightly at 3:10 so had to come in. I finished digging out the old heather roots. I have been pulling bachelor buttons out of this bed also. There seems to be tulips back there around the bamboo. I dug out bamboo in the grass and cleaned up the peony rectangle, pulling out those wretched bachelor buttons that seem to like to spread like crazy. I clipped back the cedar hedge and cut out a few bamboo, and other weeds. The peonies - all 4 of them seem to be doing very well. I will have to feed them some good compost and maybe manure/soil mix. I am going to have quite a patch of lupines, as they seem to be coming up everywhere in that boulevard garden now. Maybe I can get them growing in the other boulevard rectangle. Clipped back some of the cedar hedge and started clipping the little honeysuckle hedge. This strip of the boulevard garden has a lot of grass growing in it. And so does the area around the siberian iris by the David. I might have another day's work to finish the trillium/magnolia bed. Finished tweaking the photos of page 12 of the Danube album.

May 13, 2022
Was up to 15 degrees. I still had 2 sweaters and my toque.. was a bit too warm. Dug the weeds out of the trilliums area. Put dried leaves over them. They are enclrcled with stones. Put a bit of sand compost mix around each of the 6 Trilliums. The old little one had 3 blossoms and is finished. The rest are taller and have one blossom. Dug out all of the bachelor buttons, violets, and michelmas daisies. Put bamboo leaf mulch over this area. I need a few more stones for the trillium surrounding. I have about 2 feet by 10 of the edging by the driveway to clean up yet. The iberis is in bloom. It will need to be clipped back. Then the whole area will get more crushed leaf mulch, if I can find any. The trilliums might get some peat moss/sand/compost mix over them over them. There is an autumn joy sedum forming a nice clump and a pink pasque flower and a purple one that is still in bloom. I am leaving the ladies mantle stuff for now. There are some sort of bulb looking weird plants. I think there are just 2 of them left. There is one gorgeous burgundy/pink aquilegia (Columbine) a blue one and a purple one showing blooms in the iberius. I would really like to get seed from them and move them over to by the tulips (where I took out the Irish heather). I must label them and try to move the seed from each. They might not come true as they have been mingling in this bed and are crossed with many others. They are perennials, so if I label them, they should be there for a few years. I have a couple of hours, estimated, to finish this bed. I rather like how the weedy stuff is gone. Once I get a couple of azalyeas and the litte rhodo in the front of the bed to hide the ugly water meter it should be pretty good. If we go away in the summer, I may not get these plants until the Fall, as I would not want them to dry up. With this crazy weather we are having its nearly impossible to plan anything. 3 more photos to tweaking to finish page 13 on the Danube album.

May 16, 2022
was up earlier and cleaned up some of my old emails. Still have lots more to do. Emptied half an inch of rain out the gauge. There are 2 humming birds at the feeder since I cleaned it up. They are getting it all eaten. Did more tweaking of the Danube album photo and am finished Page 18. Did the big laundry day. Made up 5 stuffed peppers for our supper.

May 18, 2022
Yesterday did some downsizing of more books in the library. readers digest condensed books put into bags for the recycle bin. and more into the bags for the diabetes truck. Have moved the teddy bears into the library empty shelves. Have 3 left in the computer room and 3 in the living room. I am getting to like this cleaned up computer/light garden room.
Today there were great wind gusts in the am. Worked in the garden from 1:30 to 4:30. Finished cleaning up the Mangolia/Trillium bed. It looks pretty good, now. Got rid of the violets, I hope. Clipped the globe cedar or whatever it is, around the pink peony tree; trying to make it look like a green pot around the peoony tree. The power went out at about 4.45 and was on again at 8:45 apx. We had beans and spam in the Unity; and wine, of course. Finished the wine in the house with chocolate, and the power came on. Got a bit of the page descriptions done for the danube album. I think I am about 1/2 finished.

May 20, 2022
On Wednesday, 18th, I finished cleaning up the Magnolia bed. Very windy day. Thursday, yesterday, I clipped the big hedge (almost finished when I ran out of battery and my energy, before lunch. After lunch we went to Fabric land and I got 2.5 meters of flanelette and .5 meter for the pocket and trim stuff. Emailded Navit that I had some gardening stuff to catch up and I would email her when finished to set up a time for us to meet. Pat wants to take the camper out there. The power was out for 4.5 hours, due to high winds. We did not get the rain though. We had spam and beans out in the Last Lodge for supper. Today the sun is shining and it is quite nice out. Took out the blue boxes. The paper one has one bag of the condensed readers digest books. Hope they take it. Took compost pot out to the back bin and pulled a few weeds. Cleaned the humming bird feeder and filled it. The crows that were hanging around seem to have found somewhere else to hang out. Swept the kitchen floor. I am up to page 19 on tweaking the photos and sorting the page descriptions. Got up to 18 degrees. Trimmed the front hedges and some of the honeysuckle stuff. Took down the Pees side of the California lilac. There were bees humming around. Cut back the cedars by the strawberry patch and the cutting garden. Cut back the irish heather a bit. The waterfall looks to be running perfectly level with less algae in it. Wonders never cease! And I was going to take its lid off and empty the silt out of it. Hmmmmm... guess I will just dip out the green stuff and see if it all clears up without any treatment. Maybe I can even get new fish next week, and maybe even wade in and pick the rocks out, since it is going to be much warmer after the big winds.

May 21, 2022
Got the photos for page 20 tweaked. Was out from 1:30 to 4:30. Weeded from the grass path to the thyme circle. Rearranged some of the stones. It is surprisingly not so weedy. Picked the bamboo leaves off the thyme circle. Was up to 20 today and quite hot even though I was in a t-shirt. The soil is still a bit damp but still could use an inch of rain... wishful thinking. PN gave me $5.00 worth of tokens. I turned them into $7.50 and put $7.00 into the bank.

May 22, 2022
Was up to 19 degrees. Made $28.00 on PN. Was out from 12:30 to 4:00 - 3.5 hours. Cleaned up the patch of golden oregan, and weeding along the stepping stones down to the thyme circle and around its edge by the Siberian irises. I see there is still a few violets in the iris on the water meter side. Started cleaning up the sun dial circle and discovered that the smoke bush had a lot of dead wood in it. Took most of the dead wood. The little hebe or whatever it is, just beneath the smoke bush was also suffering from last years drought. So, cleaned it up also. That inner garden bed is very very dry even now, after all the rain. I will need to add some sea soil and grit to this bed and to the sundial circle also. I moved a piece of a plant from by the cedars to in front of the feather stone. I hope it grows roots. I am hopeing it is the gas plant, but that might just be wishful thinking. Also packed hedge trimmings in under the hedge edges, for mulch. Hope shithead gets the idea that he does not need to scratch all the soil of the hedge plant roots with his freaking weed eater. Put a pailfull of crunched up leaves around the plum tree and put hedge clippings on top of that. So, maybe this tree well will have some mulch on it. Did 2 loads of laundry - mostly gardening clothes. Have the bedding and towels to do tomorrow, and maybe will get out to the garden for a while tomorrow. This weeding is taking longer than I thought it would, even though I am putting in quite a few hours a day on it. Its looking all quite nice. I will have to start watering soon, so I hope I can get finished in a day or 2. Watered the house plants.

May 23, 2022
Victoria day. laundry and ironing. Cleaned out more email folders. Got a few photos for the page 21 of the Danube album tweaked. Got up to 18 degrees. Went out at 1:45. Chopped up the branches from the roses, the California lilac, the driveway tree, the smoke bush and other debris. The bin is about 2/3 full. Added some more weeds. clippings from cleaning up around the bamboo and the Siberian Irises. Mixed a half pailful of sand the sea soil and spread it lightly on the thyme circle. The circle could use more of that mix. Started the clean up of the sun dial circle. Added some clay/sand mix -- about 1/3 of a pailful -- under the old hebe in the smoke bush bed. Started to reset some of the stones around the sun dial circle. The sun dial circle is going to need a top dressing of sea soil and sand mix. The polygala is in bloom. The lilacs are in bloom. The tree peony and the magnolia are just finishing up. The irises along the driveway strip are in bloom. Pete Rees passed away sometime in March, age 97, at their Thetis home. Pat found a write up of his life and work. Audree survives him in the Duncan care home.

May 24, 2022
It was about 12 degrees and overcast when I went out to the garden at 10:30 and was back in at 12:00 to make lunch. I top dressed the thyme circle with a mix of sea soil and washed sand. It looks like the bare spots might fill in. There are some buds on it, so it might have a nice bloom period. I clipped the cedars a bit around the bench, and took some dead wood off of the dark red Austin rose. Have finished weeding about half of the sun dial circle. After lunch and grocery shopping, I got outside at 3:00 and came in at 4:30. finished cleaning up the sun dial circle and added the sea soil and sand mix to it. It was raining very lightly while I was out there, but was 17 degrees, so warm enough to be out.

May 25, 2022
Cloudy and about 17 degrees. Was out from 1:30 to 4:00. Weeded the inner garden and added the sea soil/sand mix for a light top dressing. Started to weed the area by the west coast planter, but got too tired. Wasted the morning on PN and waiting for the Doctors call for Pat while he was down to China Town for his coffee clatch. Got the bean salad made and the stuff for supper ready. The front garden is looking pretty good. It rained a bit last night, but cannot really tell from the soil moisture. It is suppose to rain tonight or tomorrow night. When I am finished the weeding and mowing the grass path, I will start watering again. The lewisia tweedy that survived is the golden one. Goes well with the little gold wall where it grows. The grace ward thing and the globalaria are in bloom, and the penstemone or hebe in purple. I must propogate that plant. Pam got the piece of it I gave her, to grow. The beach pea has survived and seems to like where it is transplanted and the red blooming currant seems to be doing fine, also. I really must get the pond cleaned up and go wading to get the rocks and the nail out.

May 26, 2022
Cloudy, about 16 degrees. Was out in the morning from 10 to 12, finished weeding the West Coast planter bed. Took out the weed white heather. Moved 3 pieces of the hebe/penstemone thbing around the front garden. Hopefully they will grow roots. Moved dried leaves around and crunched them up, to make mulch. Finely munched over the stepping stones and the grace ward and the globalaria. After lunch I was out from 2 to 4 and mowed the top grass path and most of the boulevard garden, was too tired to finish. Put some of the finer clippings around under the plum tree and the bigger stuff into the green bin. There is some finer stuff in the back bin, but not much. Washed off the mower a bit on the front grass path, and watered around the front a bit. While I was mowing the young red headed guy asked if he could give me a hand with that. I said I mower did not have much charge left on its battery and he said he could bring his own. I told him that the next time he was by this way he should leave his phone number and I would get him to be my gardener. Must tell him that I will have to check with a parent to allow him to do this. So, we'll see. It seems to me he may want to make a bit of cash. But if he has his own mower, he may even have other people he is 'giving a hand'. Last time he wanted to give me a hand I was getting my green bin to drag out to the curb. Emailed dream threads girl that we would be ready to set up a time to meet her after Friday which is tomorrow. The front boulevard needs weeding yet and then the front will be looking pretty good.

May 27, 2022
Pat was to lunch with Paul and Liz, while I did gardening from 12 to 5:30; with Jack's plan B for supper. So the plans for the Father's day run are shaping up nicely using the Central Park as the base. Pat likes the place. I clipped the branches of the apple tree with the tent catipillars into paper bags and burnt them in the fireplace. I think I got most of them. Then I clipped back the taller fig tree brances... well, most of them anyway. I have a bag full of twigs for burning next winter. Finished this stuff about 2:00 and had a cookie break. Then moweed the back grass. Weeded the moss garden from the stepping stones to the stone path by the pond. Lots os violets. The moss is looking pretty good. The little maiden hair fern is doing fine. Must give it a bit more lime. The green bin is full. I see the Pees have left a tree branch next to the plum tree. Shitheads. The lilac is still in bloom. It rained a bit last night to water in all the front garden top dressing. There was almost 1/2 inch of rain. Scooped algae out of the pond. Then had to go in as it was time to go get Jack's plan B. Had a short tubby bath and change and went to get lottery tickets while Pat picked up the food. Finished Page 21 of tweaking the photos of the Danube album. I missed the Penninsula Streams Zoom at 1:00 today. Ooops.

May 28, 2022
It is only 12 degrees with bits of rain falling all morning. I see the Pees have chopped off another branch of some tree of mine... have not checked it, yet. And they left it out under the plum tree. Sounds like billybob got in trouble over something to do with 'ecology' that old lady Pee said 'sorry' to him about. Overheard this after he had been shouting across the street to the people with the harleys and the drummer boy. Will have to tell him that my lawyers are the Hells.

May 30, 2022
We left for Shirley and Dream Threads (Navit) and Cloud 9 (Jeff and Shannon) on Sunday, 29th, at 1:00. Stop in Sooke at Mom's Cafe for lunch and saw Glenda, working there. Pat caught up on news from home from her. It was a coolish day. We got to Shirley and went to Cloud 9 where we got camped in a small spot, Jeff hooked us up to 110 and gave us their wi-fi. There were a couple of girls from Netherlands? staying over in one of the little rustic cabins. Muscovey ducks everywhere. They are big! They use them for food and use the eggs, and they might be selling some of them as well. Both places have dogs for guard dogs. They get bears and cougars and no doubt feral people out there. They build their own houses and their businesses. Navit sells her bathrobs, kimonas etc on Etsey. She is going to remake my bear robe. with the fabric she directed me to get and re-make the bear to attach it to the new robe. Fabric $50 and Navit somewhere around $100. No rush to get it done. But hope she hurries. Would be great to have it to take on our trip to Sask. end of June. Jeff and Shannon really like our Last Lodge. It needs to be cleaned up inside. Pat has it all ready and we did ok on our test run. We have to remember how to do everything. The power was out up there over night and their generator ran all night but was not really noticeable. They have solar panels and collect all the rain water from all over the roofs of the buildings. It is stored in big plastic tanks, above ground. We had vegetable whip, halibut, french toast, canned tomatoes for supper, followed by chocolat and entertainment by Pat. Got an early enough start back home next morning, arrived home about 11:00, put stuff away and had lunch by 1:00. I napped from about 2 to 4. Brought home 2 gold rocks. Some of the rocks on the little gold wall bed had been moved around. Some kind of critter, I guess. The pond is getting pretty empty. Hope it is warm enough tomorrow to get the rocks out of the bottom of it, and start the algae killing process, and hopefully get a couple new fish as the old ones seem to be gone.

May 31, 2022
Was out taking photos in the morning. After lunch I swept out the Last Lodge and wiped up some of the walls, ledges and the floor. I finished that about 2:00 and had a cookie. Since it was 20 degrees I had decided to clean out the pond. I emptied the deck tub and put Elvis and his buddy into a small pailful of water, refilled the cleaned up tub. Washed off the deck a bit. Crawled into the pond (be sure to turn the pump off) fished out the rocks I could find. Threw out some of the debris from the bottom. Could not find the nail I dropped in there. Cleaned the algae off the water fall. Still lots of bottom debris, I think. Crawled out, refilled the pond. Reset rocks on the waterfall. The algae seems to be gone from the waterfall and its running fairly level. I have seen 3 fish in the pond -- a white one, a gold one and a red and white one. I might get some shubunkins, and maybe another gold fish and a sarossa. I don't know what messed up the rocks on the waterfall, but I suspect it was something chasing the lizards. They seem to love the waterfall rocks. Came in and had a bath, and then it was time to make supper -- 5:00.

June 2022

June 1, 2022
Watered house plants. Did banking, etc. Was 20 and cloudy in the afternoon. Was out for a couple of hours and finished the grass at the front, picked the bamboo off the thyme circle, cleaned up some more in the boulevard rectangle by the plum tree. Took the grass clippings to the back bin and the rest of the weeds, clover etc to the green bin which is heaping full. Took a pailful of clay from under the deck to the front and placed the 2 gold rocks from Cloud 9, and the other rocks that had been moved and messed up.

June 2, 2022
Filled the humming bird feeder. Vacuumed the kleenix out of the dryer and cleaned up the suite entry. There are 3 fish in the pond and 2 in the tub. The water is still running clear. Was out from 1:30 to 4:00. Weeded from the old sidewalk up to the epimediums: about 7 stepping stones. Lots of clover at the grass end of the stones. Lots of good moss. The primulas need dividing. The VIRAGS are having a potting up day. I could take some of my primulas.. but doubt if I could get that motivated. I will divide them in the autumn, I think. I am dumping the weeds in a big plastic bag that had the sea soil in it. Finished tweaking the photos for page 22 of the Danube album.

June 3, 2022
Rained last night and is raining a bit today. 18 degrees and cloudy. Made 1/2 a recipe of Swedish meatballs.. have about 30 - 33. Made up 3 jars of cranberrie sauce. baked 7 shabby beets and must peel, dice and butter them. Got the beets peeled, cubed and buttered. Have a frozen pkg for travelling, also a pkg of the meatballs. Made a batch of chocolat cookies. All this took until 4:30. I saw one of the grey shubunkins in the pond today. So that makes 4 of them, if not more. And, of course the 2 in the tub. Later in the afternoon the little fountain spray thing is working! Just needed a bit of sun, I guess.

June 4, 2022
Up earlier than usual for me. Went to Peoples Drug Store for our 2nd Modern booster shot. It only got up to 18 degrees today. It was cloudy with bits of rain all day. I finished the page 23 of tweaking photos for the Danube album. 16 pages to go... slowly getting finished.

June 5, 2022
Couldn't get to sleep last night. I think my booster shot was bothering me. Slept in but still did not get any more sleep to speak of. It is raining a bit again. Hopefully we will have .5 of an inch by the time its finished. It is 17 degrees at 2:00. Made another $ on PN. Have the bathrooms cleaned up, minestone soup for lunch, and have 3 loads of clothes washed. Earlier today I saw 2 gold fish at the same time. So, 2 gold, 2 white, the grey shunbunkin and there might be a more colorful sarrossa (gold and white) So, probably 6 of them! So, its time for a cookie and a nap, if I can get to sleep.

June 6, 2022
Up to 20 degrees. Kind of frittered away the day. Feeding the goldfish. There seem to be 2 gold fish, 2 white fish, 2 shubunkins, and maybe a sarrossa, so maybe 7 of them. in the pond. Took some more photos. Cleaned the bamboo leaves off the thyme circle. It is coming into bloom, no bees on it yet, though. The local bees like the columbines, the wall flower and the french lavender. The honey bees do like the lavender. There was a honey bee on the clematis, which is gorgeous this year. Lots of hugh blossoms.

June 7, 2022
In the morning I cleaned up under the head of the bed and figured out how to attach the lines to the radio/clock to make the humming stop. Troy my would-be gardener phoned too early and informed me that he would not be able to do my gardening. He sounded happy about it. Hope this has prompted his parent and step parent to manage an allowance or something for him. I told him that it was not working out, and to stop by sometime that would be convenient to everyone and pick up his $5.00 for yesterday's work. The rest of the morning I made $6.00 on PN and did email, facebook, etc. After lunch at about 1:30 I went out to weed. I cleaned up the bamboo off the patio area and put them into the garage. Clipped them all to the same length. Picked up the leaves and debris and put them in the old compost bin. Its getting quite full. Then weed more of the clover etc out of the stepping stone path, and put that debris in the green bin. It got up to 18 degrees today, and cloudy; so I was comfortable enough weeding out there. The rhodos are blooming and the roses. The little rockery at the front is all a-bloom, too. The globalaria, grace ward on the lower level with the lewisia and lots of saxifragias with white blooms on the gold rock wall; along with the red ice plant or soapwort, which ever one it is. The iberis is finishing and will be clipped back soon. The red geum, Mrs. Bradshaw over the silver and red sedum with gold blossoms under the burgundy smoke bush look good. Lots of columbines. The lupines and french lavender look really good in the rectangle by our driveway of the boulevard. The water in the pond is running clear. There are 7 fish. They seem to know to come to be fed when I stand up on the deck leaning on the railing. Brought up the last load of the laundry. Am tired.

June 8, 2022
was out in the garden from apx. 12:30 to 3:00. Cleaning up the rest of the stepping stones and the fig tree garden. Got up to the 2 stone from the old sidewalk and came in for the cookie break and to catch Dr. Cruz call regarding refills of meds. Was nice and timely! Then back out to the weeding at about 4:00. Finished the stepping stones and started the clean up of the fig tree garden. It is mostly done. There are 8 or 10 figs on the tree. So, the fig tree might just be allowed to stay. It will need a good pruning again in the Spring. I see how it responds well to its pruning. The species peony is huge, single pink blossoms. Lots of columbines and honesy, which the bees like. They also seem to like the rhodo that is in bloom. Got in at about 5:00 and started the supper. I had made the parnips ahead of time and then turned the oven on for them. Made potato pancakes and tomatoes for salad. The white fish left overs were done in the microwave. It all turned out pretty good. I had to rush the clean up so as to catch the 7:00 zoom meeting with AG-BC - Jay Akerly introduces Jamie Ellison from Nova Scotia. Wonderful presentation. Ellison and Ballard ? also have a book coming out. 2023 is the NARGS show (? not sure what it is called) in Nova Scotia. The presentation contained a lot of NF information and then the Nova Scotia stuff. Was excellent. Hope I can find it to add to my you tube stuff. Of course, Spriggs has a crevice garden in the Turo botanic garden in Nova Scotia. Feeding the 7 fish and the tub fish on the deck. We are to get rain overnight and tomorrow, and wind Pat tells me. Oh oh.

June 10, 2022
Yesterday it rained, quite a lot. I shopped for leggings. Found some but they are all too long, of course and I need to shorten them. Sorted clothes for the camping trip... the pile needs some reduction. Today I emptied an inch of rain out of the gauge. We went for lunch to the Flying Club for Seafood Won Ton soup. It was cold and cloudy, and the soup could have been hotter. Pat consulted with a guy at BMT (we parked the Last Lodge just across from their shop) about the bubbles on the paint. More on this later, probably. I made $10 on PN today. The pond is full and all the fish are there. Roses on the dining table. Got a 'clean' roasting chicken from Fraser Orr's Butcher shop. about 5 lbs for $20. Last night I found the Peninsula Streams videos on the Projects. I must add them to my youtube and to my links of my own notes on them. Waiting for the receipt for my snail mail donation.

June 11, 2022
Up to 20 degrees at noon. Cleaned up some of the documents this morning, capiccino, to Canadian Tire to get 4 nice new terry cloth kitchen clothes and matching red dish clothes, and a inner shower curtain and some stuff to clean the tree tar off the Last Lodge. Ran the dish washer and put away stuff. Made the bed (just sayin' about all my regular chores). Pat hung the new shower curtain. Did a bit of re-packing for our camping trip. Fed the fish. We had a bit of rain last night, not really measureable. Got rid of a couple of playlists on youtube and set up one for Peninsula Streams. This stuff takes up so much of my time.

June 12, 2022
It got up to 20 degrees today, but it sure didn't feel like it. Cloudy and very cold breeze. I made 3 pkgs of beef/barley soup and a beef stew this morning. Tweaked the photos for page 24 of the Danube album. Played on PN. Moved a few rocks around on the waterfall where some critter messed them up. Added a bit of water to the pond. All the fish are in the pond and tub. Roses and rhodes in bloom, lupins, o. poppies, columbines everywhere.

June 13, 2022
Was up to 16 degrees today with a cold breeze. Did laundry, including new leggings and t-towels. Did the application for seniors home owners grant with the Provincial gov. and then paid the taxes to Saanich from the bank by 'pay bills'. I was dreading doing this, but I did not run into any hangups and I might have learned some stuff. Pat was out doing stuff to get the Father's day run going with Paul and Liz. He says they are 'doing everything'. I guess they enjoy it. So things are coming together nicely for that. We picked up our meds and did some grocery shopping. I am tired again. Have done a bit of cleaning up in the 'gardening' folder and have much more to do. Supper was easy with bean salad, muscles, bagette and balsamic and olive oil, with frozen yogurt for lunch. We got the water and glory be... Barq's rootbeer for our trip, stashed in the last lodge.

June 14, 2022
Was 18 degrees, cloudy, breezy. Felt coolish to me. Watered house and deck plants. Finished the laundry and got a bit of a start on the hemming up of the leggings. Did 3 photos for page 25 of the Danube album. Helped Pat take the recyle stuff to the depot - $17.30. Got LB store stuff for the trip and have them ready to load to the van. Visited Tara at her work place. We will try and get a visit in at the end of summer. Did more cleaning up of the Gardening folder, and it is still full of a lot of junk. Why can't I do a good clean up? Seems I have to save everything. No one ever looks at this stuff, anyway.

June 15, 2022
about 16 degrees today, overcast, bits of rain at supper time. Did a few photos for page 25 of the danube album, made $1 on PN, got the hemming of my leggings and the ironing finished, made tuna surprise for supper and have a pkg frozen to take on our camping trip. Started the lists for the stuff to take out to the last lodge.

June 16, 2022
15 degrees at 2:00. Took several bags of canned goods etc out and packed into the Last Lodge this morning. Bryan Wade arrived about noon and cleaned out the gutters. Cost $262. this year. Everything is going up. I washed off the deck, filled the pond and watered a bit around the back. There were a few drips of rain, and we had the tinest bit of rain last night, too. The Sooke reservoir is 98% full. Finished tweaking the photos for Page 25 yesterday.

July, 2022

Monday, July 11, 2022
Got the 3 o'clock ferry after visiting Harvey and Valerie, caught the 3 o'clock ferry and were home about 4:30. Brought in some of the stuff. Was on PN and made $40., $11., & $12. Made supper of left over spagahetti, ben and gerry's Cherry Garcia, etc. Was up to 4:00 a.m. on my computer. On Sunday, made cappiccino, I unloaded all of my stuff and the laundry. Lost $30. and saved $15. on PN. Filled the pond and turned on the pump. Washed off the front step and watered a bit at the front. Supper of tuna surprise?. Today it is up to 26 degrees at 3:30. Did 7 loads of clothes. Put away all my stuff. Filled the humming bird feeder. Looked up the Shaw stuff for Pat. He cannot get his Shaw email. we cannot figure it out. He phoned Trevor. Trevor and Liz? now have 3 boys. He broke his leg. Sung will come to look at Pat's computer tomorrow. Made a jello, cottage cheese, pineapple salad. Pat has been getting groceries, etc.

July 12, 2022
Saw the quails.. parents and 7 or 8 little ones, running across the road from the post that has the Virginia creeper on it, to the other side. They knew to watch out for traffic. Amazing. Saanich Parks people just cut down the grass across the street. I wish they would not do that. That might be where these birds, butterflies and other creatures need to find food from seeds, etc. and protection from predators. Sung was here at 9:00 a.m. and fixed Pat's email...cost apx $150. too expensive. Maybe we need to find a new techie. I have been seeing a swallowtail butterfly and several admirals.. the black and white variety. I finished the laundry, shopped for groceries with Pat and got my plants and things moved back to their places in my room. Made sweet and sour pork and broccoli, with jellow salad for supper. It got up to 26 degrees today, all sunshine and high uv rating of 8. Filled the tub on the deck and watered the globe flower and the honeysuckle. The globe flower is finished blooming, as are many other plants in the garden. very tired and its only 8:30

July 13, 2022
It was up to 25 degrees today. A light breeze kept it cool in the house. Made $16. on PN today. After our lunch I vaccumed out the van, the laundry room, a quick zip around Pat's room, the stairs, the kitchen and the dining room. Washed down the van, cleaning shower, sinks, counter top, etc. And put the clean bedding on and towels out. I had cut back the grape and the fig tree, accidentally cut off 3 big ones. I hope the rest .. there might be 6 or 7 of them ripen. Had the water running on to shower the apple tree, the fig tree and the grape. When I finished the van at 4:30, the water was running down to the patio moss. Turned it off, came in and had a quick shower and change of clothes. I will be making salmon steaks, a huge baked potato (had it in the little oven from 3:00 on 375 and convection), and a half of the ceasar salad mix. We had this ceasar salad at Randal and Ellen's place. Its very good.

July 14, 2022
Got up to 25 today, sunny. I did the ironing... was not too bad for hot in the room. We have most of the blinds drawn, the dining room window open, and the patio door open. And the en suite bathroom window open this seems to keep it livable. I only had the little oven going for about a half hour, and one pot on the stove; so, the kitchen did not heat up much at all. Made $7. on PN today. Got my encore stuff sorted out. Have $9 worth of points to collect now. When I took the blue box out I noticed a ripe fig at the top of the tree. Pat came out and cut off the branch. The fig fell to the ground, but it was all moldy at one end. He said it tasted moldy inside. :(. I did not notice it being ripe when I watered just a day or two ago. Watched a 2.5 hour water garden (as in collecting runoff water) webinaire by Penninsula streams today.

July 15, 2022
Was out to the garden at 10:30. Got 17 bamboo shoots cut off and stripped of leaves. Some of the thyme circle cleaned up. It started raining lightly at 1:30 so came in and had lunch. It has stopped raining but still cool, even though the thermometer says its 20. The agave thing has two tall spikes in buds. Some of the thyme is in bloom.

July 16, 2022
I have been working on my web page stuff. Have made up the travel page with the 2022 trip to Sask. listed. Have removed the Google analytics script from all the pages... I hope I got them all. Reloaded them to the web page. It was only 18 degrees today. should have been out gardening. Watered the house plants. watered at the front with the sprinkler from 8 to 11.

July 16, 2022
Watered more with the sprinkler at the front, from 9:00 to 11:30. Cut off the branch of the magnolia tree that was hanging over the driveway. Severely cut back the white rose. I hope it grows new canes. The garden is soaking up all this water...it is sooo dry. Went out to Mechosin Museum place with the VCCC for icecream in the afternoon. Nice drive. Is 18 degrees with clouds. Sorted the rest of the Danube photos and renumbered them.

July 17, 2022
It is up to 24 degrees at noon. I have done the bedding and towels laundry. Was out to cut back the pink Simplicity rose to a few good canes. Also did some pruning back of plants that were leaning over the edge of the sidewalk. Then was up on the deck clipping back the cedars. I might try to cut off the leaning over branches from the snow storm, on the Pees side, with the long handled pruning saw. OR, I may get Davey tree guys in to trim back that cedar hedge to about a foot or two below the eaves.

July 20, 2022
Was up to 26 today. Was at Cannor and brought back a hebe, a rhubarb, and a little corsician mint. $38.64. Very expensive and limited selection of any plants. Had the sprinkler on the back to do the cutting garden, which is a very sad looking cutting garden. And then moved the sprinkler over to cover the pond and the behind the pond and fixed the waterfall rocks. While the sprinkler was running over the pond I cut up the clippings I had from the roses on the pees side, the branch of the magnolia, etc. The bin is about 1/2 full. I see that the rain gauge on the deck table had about 1/2 inch of water in it. Some of that water went through the cracks of the deck boards to water under the deck. Yesterday was laundry. day before was an icecream run out to Metchosin Museum. The days have been sunny with some cloud and about 23 - 24 degrees. This mornings paper said the Sooke Reservoir was at 92.1%.

July 22, 2022
At 1:00 when I went out to garden it was 20 degrees. As I type this at 5:30 it is 23 degrees. The ovens are both on this afternoon, and the microwave, with the stove fan on and it is nice and cool for our dinner. Took me 2 hours to cut back the holly tree and do a serious cut back on the firethorn. Have not finished the firethorn, as I need to do some cutting of thick trunks with the pruning saw, and ran out of energy before I finished. I took about another hour to collect the clippings from the Pees side and put them into the bin. The bin is full. I dug over the space behind the old garage for the new rhubarb and added a bag of composted manure. Came in about 4:00, after filling the pond. I used $10 worth of tokens (from doing a survey about Encore points) and made about $10. cash. I had added $10 deposit. I withdrew $37. to the bank. So, I guess I made $27. today on PN.

July 23, 2022
Sooke reservoir is at 91.5. It was 20 degrees when I started to make cookies at about 11:00, and when I finished the temperature was at 23 degrees. It is quite cool at 3:00 with the patio door open, and dining room window open, and blinds in living room closed. Wasted $13. on PN this morning. Have no more ambition to go out to garden today, after yesterday's marathon firethorn pruning. Watered the deck plants. made a little salad for Pat with the new lettuce. There are quite a few Admiral butterflies around and a few swallowtails. The fish are really growing bigger and bigger. I see all 6 of them when I put out food, and the 2 in the tub, of course. The Syrians seem to be renovating 3 old ambulance vans. They are making sawing, hammering, etc. noises at all hours of the day and night. They usually have several cars around this house next door to us. We have had some of the choicest neighbors... gawd ahmighty!

July 24, 2022
It was about 23 this morning. Cut my hair... it turned out not too bad, if I must say so myself. Wasted $10 on PN. After our sloppy joes lunch, after the FaceTime with Fran, at about 2:30, I made the Chicken cordon bleu casserole and the carrotts for our supper. About, 3:30 after the cookie break, I went out to garden. It was 26 degrees, no breeze, so was hotter than the last few days. I cleaned holly leaves out of the garden beds on each side of the old sidewalk, sweeping any stones and dirt back into the beds. I did several cardboard flats of this debris, putting them in the green bin, of course. It is full again. I cut back the germander, sweeping more debris into the bed, away from the irises. The firethorn needs a bit more work --- probably for a cooler day. I planted the rhubarb into its dug over spot behind the old garage. I made a well around it by heaping up the soil. Then I watered along the old sidewalk beds. I counted 6 figs out there and the grape has lots of clumps of grapes forming. The apple has very few apples on it. I got in just after 5:00 and started the casserole about 5:30. I had long pants and long sleeved sweater on today, so was quite warm, but I don't think I got any more insect bites. The temperature is now down to 23 degrees but it still feels quite warm in the dining room. Not too hot to eat up here though. Pat has put the fan into the bedroom window, so we are ready of the higher temperatures that are forecast.

July 26, 2022
Temps at 30 degrees at 11:00 this morning as I finished watering the house plants and the deck plants. The Sooke Reservoir is at 90.7% full. We are going into a heat wave that is to last until the weekend. We have been having bits of basil from the new plant, and a few of the new lettuce leaves. We are having 2 of the sinks replaced and 2 of the facets on the sinks. This is apx $3K. The guy will be here Aug 2, early. We shopped for groceries at Mitchell Farms and Country Grocer. We have cold cuts and lots of vegetables. It was 34 degrees when we got home from shopping at apx 3:00. Later, I made the potato salad, the swiss chard, and the salmon steaks. Took it all downstairs and had set the table. The wine, also was down in the fridge along with the ceasar salad. Was all very good and much much cooler in the downstairs bistro. Was 30 degrees when we brought up the dishes at 7:30. Still very warm. It is suppose to get down to 16 tonite. All the fans are going and it is slowly cooling up stairs.

July 27, 2022
Slept in this am. Was cooler. Lunch was spam and potato salad. After lunch Pat went to London Drugs and I was out in the garden. I watered the plum tree and cleaned off the thyme circle. Watered all around the front by hand, after letting the hose run on the plum tree. I think it was about 34 degrees, but was cool in the shade and with the water sprinkler going. The butterflies liked the mud. At about 3:00 I went to the back and watered the pots and the rhubarb by hand, and then sprinkled by hand around the fig tree, the grapes and a bit on the apple and the rhodos. Then made the shrimp salad, and appies, for supper in the downstairs bistro. The shrimp salad was very good. We had a bit of potatoe salad, all the wine and frozen yogurt. Now at 7:30 it is about 28, fans going and Pat insists on having the dining room window closed, with curtains closed, and fan going in the bedroom, windows open on the 'shady' side.

July 28, 2022
30% at 1:30. Filled the hummingbird feeder. Doing some photo tweaking on the Danube album.

July 30, 2022
Up to 30 degrees at 1:30. Wasted time on PN, all morning. Sooke reservoir is at 89.7%. Was 32 degrees when we got back from our run to the store and a litte drive out to Lee Valley, at about 3:15. Went out to water the deck and patio plants about 3:45 and finished about 4:45. Have the stove fan running and the patio curtain closed. It is about 30 degrees when I finished the watering and filling the pond. I will make a ceasar salad, the left over chicken and salami, icecream and blueberris for supper downstairs. This heat wave should be over on Sunday - Monday. Yesterday I did up some photos for the Danube album -- 3 more to do and I will be finished Page 26. I have reduced page 39 to half a page.

July 31, 2022
Is up to 27 degrees at noon. Finished page 26 of the photos for the Danube album. We had supper upstairs. I had made the liver, onions, bacon, twice baked potatoes, coleslaw, earlier in the day. At 6:00 the temps were down to 27 and by 7:30 when we finished supper they were at 25. So, we should be back to normal tomorrow.

August, 2022

August 2, 2022
Had to get up too early 'cause the sink fixing people were coming too early. And then they were late. Pat went off to coffee and pissed me off. He could have stayed to look after them. Then while looking at the new sink in the downstairs bathroom, I slipped and fell on something they left on the floor. Scared the 'ell outta me. The guy said it was nothing he did, but then Pat found some very slippery stuff on the door knob to the entry way, that he had also touched. Well, I wiped up that bathroom floor a bit. When we went to get ink at London Drugs, we got some cheap little carpets for the 2 small bathrooms. I felt really cold after my fall. Pat thought I was probably in shock. I was better after some lunch, a change of clothes to long pants and sweater, and a capaccino. Temperatures up to 21 today. I got nothing done in the garden. Probably won't tomorrow, either, as the guys about the heat pump are coming to see about the installation, etc. I finished page 27 and 28 on the Danube album. I have reduced the pages to 38, so have 10 more to do now.

August 3, 2022
Heat pump guy was here and talked all about heat pumps and set ups for us, etc. Pat has his email with pictures and prices, I think. By the time it was all said and done it would cost us about 30K. We are dithering about it. Darcy said they could be here to install it the end of August. Navit just emailed a photo of my done old bathrobe. The bear has a new coat. Can't get out there this week, as Pat has a lunch meeting on the 5th. We cleaned out under the sink in the ensuite and I vaccumed and wiped up the floor, and vaccumed the bedroom, hallway and dining room. All the carpets need cleaning and etc. Was 23 degrees today. The Sooke reservoir is at 88.7% now.

August 6, 2022
Temps up to 28 degrees. The Sooke Reservoir is at 87.8%. Watered and fed the house plants. Watered the deck and patio plants. Filled the pond. Have had some sort of upset stomach and headaches the last couple of days. I feel like it is from the stink from the stuff the plumbers left in the bathrooms. We have cleaned up under the sinks and vaccumed the floors. I have been unable to get ahold of Navit to tell her we are coming out Sunday, the 7th, early to mid afternoon. Seems I have been unable to get any garden stuff done, nor get ahold of that Navit.

August 7, 2022
Temperatures at 23 degrees. We have the van packed and having capiccinno. All the house stuff is closed. We should be at Sooke, Mom's cafe for lunch. I have finished tweaking photos for page 29 of the Danube album. We should meet Navit at the Shirley Market to pick up the old bear robe. After that we hope to get into the Pacheedat campground for the night, and around the loop the next day with another over night somewhere.

August 9, 2022
We drove the "the loop" on Monday morning and were in Lake Cowichan for lunch. We could not get a reservation for the Nanaimo place Pat wanted to go to, so we just went home, unpacked and had spaghetti for supper. Today it was up to 24 degrees. I worked on cutting up the firethorn branches for an hour in the morning, and for 3 hours after lunch. I wore long pants and long sleeved sweater because there are wasps out there. And there were wasps... no bites this day. The firethorn brances are all cut up and the green bin is full and packed down. We are suppose to get rain tomorrow ... sure hope so. I got in at 4:30 and had a shower. About 5:00 we went to Thrifty's and got a baked chicken and potato salad and a beet/orange salad, for supper.

August 10, 2022
Was 21 degrees at 2:30. The Sooke reservoir is at 86.7. Am stiff from yesterday's gardening. It rained a tiny bit at lunch time. Have done up the laundry and ironing. I do believe the bear robe did shrink. Have finished tweaking the photos for page 30 of the Danube album.

August 11, 2022
Was 25 degrees today at 5:30. After 3:00 I went out and watered around the front a bit, and let the hose run on the plum tree. Dead headed the wall flower and hosed off the thyme circle There is a lily blooming in the gold wall bed. Pat was complaining about the magnolia and the tree/shrubs on the other side of the driveway, including the virginia creeper. He has to get up on the ladder once a year and bring it down so that it does not get up on to the wires. Poor Pat! So after talking to him about taking it out or keeping it; I think I compromised at brining it down to manageable height. I started this chore at a few minutes after 3:00 and came in at 5:00. I have a lot of it pulled down. There was a squirrel's nest or two under there. It has a lot of dried out vines. The ivy is very healthy. When I got to the top of the vines I see that the ivy has grown into cracks in the post. So, it is a good thing we are taking it down, I guess. I am now contemplating cleaning out the area around the post, entirely. I do not know if round up kills ivy, creeper or st.John's worte. I see where people in the neighbourhood have made these stone areas....putting down some kind of plant growth deterent and putting stones on top of it. Maybe the Syrians will pave it over, as they have on the front of the lawn at there place. I need to find someone to take all the debris away when I am finished. Pat has a fig ready to eat, at the top branch of the fig tree. I think I will cut the branch down. Also phoned Davey Tree and they will have an arborist come to see what needs doing on the 17th between 9 - 11. I talked to them about the hedge between our place and the Pees. So that will get done, I guess. Once I get the creeper finished, it won't take long to do the rest of the front and water all. The simplicity rose where I reduced it in size is now blooming nicely. The Iceberg has not recovered yet. The rhubarb is going to seed. This is natural. It should have put down some roots by now. I will keep watering it.

August 12, 2022
Was about 21 this morning. I spent the time from 10 to 12 cleaning up the patio area, filling the pond. I have the piles of debris along the driveway with the virginia creeper stuff. So, it is quite cleaned up around the van and the patio area. Filled the hummingbird feeder. Yesterday Pat cleaned up the little solar fountain spray thing. We hope it works again. In the afternoon it was up to 26 degrees. I worked at taking down more of the virginia creeper from about 3:00 to 3:40... came in for iced cappiccino and a cookie. Was back out till about 5:45. I have about 3/4 of the thing taken down. When the Syrian came home from work and saw me out there, asked what I was doing and offered to help. I was tempted to let him, but had to go in for supper. I think he was going to go in and drop off his briefcase and change out of his suit and come out to help. O well. Pat and I do not know just yet how much of the creeper we are going to take down. Ground level would be good for me. The lower I go on clipping down the stems the thicker the stems become, so I do not know how much of this I can do with the long handled pruner. It has been a very good tool, but I think this bashing and crashing the creeper is taking its toll on it. This year has been full of this 'taking trees and shrubs down and cleaning up over-grown things'. I think I am trying to get things somewhat cleaned up for our move to Berwick. Yet it seems a bit much to be doing at 74 years. But maybe all the exercise is good for me. There was a pair of Flickers in the back garden by the little rockery this afternoon. They seemed to finding some bugs to eat. Sooke Reservoir at 86.5%.

August 15, 2022
Yesterday I did laundry. We went out to the Meadery near Shirley with the VCCC. About 10 cars. I got a bottle of the Cyn Cyster - $24..or so. We had it for supper, with our salads. Later on about 4:00 am I was having stomach problems. Finally some relief later in the morning. I think it was the Mead, messing with my system. Today it was about 26 degrees. I made pork and left over vegetables plus carrots onion, pepper into a soup. We had it for lunch and have 2 more servings for 2 saved and frozen. I made up the vegetable whip (Goop) for supper. We had the supper serving with basa fish, corn. Have 2 servings of goop frozen. After lunch we went shopping. Groceries at the co-op and lottery tickets, Home Hardware for compost pot filters, London Drugs for my stuff. Home by 4:00. Its still quite warm at 22 degrees. at 7:40, but is cooling off. Got a new humming bird feeder but am still using the old one and still hope to get a new bottom part for it. I guess I will have 2 feeders to switch out in the colder weather of the winter. The solar fountian is finished. I will need a new one. Cannor is going to want $50.00 for theirs when they get it in stock.

August 16, 2022
Was 18 degrees when I went out to the garden to continue taking down the creeper. I have it down to a knarly bunch of stems that look like a stump. I think I will leave it at that. Need to get the St. John's worte mowed down. Then I should be able to find someone to hall away the debris. The Davey Tree arborist comes tomorrow morning. Pat thinks I should ask them to take this debris... Would be nice if they could. I want Davey tree guys to take down the cedars by the deck at about 1 - 2 feet below the eaves. And I want them to take out the rest of the fire thorn. And I want them to take the yew trees to to about 8 or 10 feet. And shape the bay laurel round at the top and let it be about 8 or 10 feet high also. I am considering having Davey Tree guys take down the pin oak by the garage, also. (I'll ask Pat). I dead headed the roses, and some of the montebretias and threw the clippings on my growing pile of debris in the driveway. I came in from the garden at noon, made lunch, cleaned up the compost pot with new filter and new bag. I am a beat bunny.

August 17, 2022
Saw Ben from Davey Tree this morning about 10:00 ish. We got all the things listed that I want done: Top the cedar hedge between the Pees and us (winter - at least when it is raining) Clean up the rhodos and camillia along that side, take out the bamboo. Trim the sweet gum tree all around to shorten the branches and take branches off the roof. They have a truck with a long bucket arm to do this. Take down the yew trees to about 10 or so feet so that the oak tree branches are not entangled in the yews. Cut back and shape the bay laurel to about the same size as the yews, only in a rounded shape. They will prune back the lilac back to its lower canopy by taking out 3 of the larger trunks to the canopy height. Take out the rest of the firethorn and the blue Australian tree beside it. Cut down the sumac sticks. Cut down the pin oak, and the old lily of the valley shrub, leaving the big fern. There will be some work done on the cedar hedge cleaning up storm damage on the Syrians side. I think I have it all mentioned. I have hard copy in the garden folder and in email in the gardening folder. I have copies of the invoice (which I approved) comes to about $4,175.80 plus tax. Ben does work on the side that Davey Tree does not do. So, he is going to haul away the debris I have from the Virginia Creeper clean up. He will snip down the St. John's worte. He said it would be a separate pile. He has no mower yet, so I left him my scissors snipper, the rake, a shovel and my long handled pruner, in the wheel barrow. I left him a note on the black half barrel liner to use this for the loose dirt instead of taking it to the back. So he gets $150. cash for this job. Since he said he would be here early in the morning I said on the note that I would try to be up by 6:30. The Davey Tree stuff will be done in about 3 - 4 weeks. Hopefully it will be raining by then and the cedar hedge topping can be done also. At $4175.80 plus tax and $150.00 for Ben about $4,300.00 total is not too bad, I think. We pay their invoice that they issue by email after the work has been done. I have paid by cheque in the past. I sent a notice to Spriggs to get a copy of his book at the next VIRAGS on Sept 13 don't know where, but there will be all sorts of things going on at that in person meeting. Book will be $40 cash or cheque... Spriggs too wants cash. August 18, 2022
It was 17 degrees when I got up at 6:00 this morning. I thought Ben was going to come 'early in the morning' to take away the debris from the cleaning up I have been doing along the driveway strip, including taking down the Virginia creeper and the ivy. While waiting I raked out some of the dead plants and leaves from the front area of the St. John's worte. Ben says that the way to get rid of it is to pull it out. Well, I am going to mow it or clip it down and when it starts to grow again I might round up it or just leave it and keep mowing it down. I also did a bit of clipping around the rectangle bed by the driveway, cutting off the lupine seeds, and some of the lavender, a couple of branches of the magnolia. I came in and had breakfast, but Ben was still a no-show. I don't have his phone number or email except the Davey Tree ones, so he will have to come over when he can or phone me. Hopefully, he will get around to this soon. I have been thinking of screening some of the debris and soil from the drive strip into the black plastic half barrel. I see the arums are growing in their bag of dirt, so I should probably screen them too at some point in time. The rhubarb needs to be taken up and dug in deeper, with added top soil. The grass needs mowing; maybe when it cools down a bit more. It is 31 degrees as I type this at 1:50 today. I had to put a new light tube in the light garden. First I cleaned up the trays. Threw out a tiny orchid and the one that was too big for the light garden. So I finally got the light installed and working. I have 11 orchids left. I might try and put this thing on used Victoria. Finished tweaking the photos for page 31 of the Danube album.

August 20, 2022
Yesterday was quite hot. We went to the Recycle place and to lunch in Sidney. In the afternoon I made a big macaroni ham and pineapple salad that we had for supper. Today was much cooler. I was up at 6:30 taking care of email, using up my $5.00 of Tokens on PN. At about 9:00 Ben came by with his silver pick up truck and his tools. He has a good big hedge pruner, rake, shovel, broom and a tarp. Also has a pressure washer and other things I don't know about. He used the tarp to load debris onto, folded it and lifted the stuff into the truck box. He clipped the st.John's worte; on the Saanich property and up to the agave looking thing. I said I would do the rest, as there are plants in there that I do not want clipped down. It must have taken him a couple hours. The truck box was full and covered with the tied down tarp. I got his private phone number and his wife's cell. He uses his cell number for Davey Tree stuff, and the ipad they gave him. He uses his private phone with Davey so he does not need to be answering several different phones. $150. paid. 2 more months and he will be able to form his own company. I don't think Davey Tree minds him doing this side work, as long as he is not doing tree stuff that Davey would be able to charge for. It is 23 degrees at 1:30 as I type this. Sooke Reservoir is at 84.1%

August 21, 2022
Was 15 degrees when I went out to the garden at 7:30 and 20 degrees when I got in at 9:30. Yesterday I got the pump cleaned up and filled the pond, water is nice and clear but evaporates quickly with this hot weather. Between yesterday and today I have the 4 beige pots moved behind the old garage to surround the rhubarb, which is going to need more soil around it. In that regard I have the big pink pot moved back there and will empty it on the rhubarb, and add its plants into that area. I have cleaned up a bit under the fig tree and have some of the brown fronds taken out of the big fern at the back. Will get more done after lunch. The Queens Plate horse race was on from about 2 to 3. I went out at 3:00 and was in again at 5:00. Was warmer by a few degrees than the morning. The lawn mower was not charged, so had to put it away and plug it in to charge. Moved the beige trough to the rhubarb surround. Emptied the pink pot into the beige trough, adding 3 hyacinth bulbs to the trough. I had crocus bulbs from under the fig tree and added them to the soil at the front of the trough. I have to check to see that they are not covered by a round piece of plum tree wood. Added some of the soil from the pink pot into the beige pots. Put wood pieces from an old cedar trough around in front of the beige pots to hold the soil in to the rhubarb square and away from the garage siding. Added 28 litres of potting soil around on top of the old soil/manure mix around the rhubarb. Clipped more dead fronds off the old fern. Clippings from the daylilies, etc have been added to the old compost bin and it is almost full. Clippings from under the fig tree were added to the green bin and it, too is almost full. Moved all the old plum tree wood ... just threw it across the old sidewalk. Once I get the fern cleaned up the Davey Tree guys should have a better access to cutting down the old lily of the valley shrub and the pin oak. Watered in the rhubarb and pots by hand, then set the sprinkler to water the back across the cutting garden the the other side of the little rockery (apple tree, and the plants by the garage) Clipped back the jasmine a bit. Raked up a flat of firethorn clippings and holly leaves and added them to the green bin. There is a lot more clipping out weeds and dried out plants to do; as well as cleaning up the clippings from the cedar hedge by the strawberries; and then moving the tomato cages so the Davey Tree guys can get back there to prune the lilac, the yews and the bay laurel. I have to keep at this. The 3 to 4 weeks of time I have before they come to do the job is going to go by fast, and I would like to have it all done and cleaned up. Pat has had about 4 figs, so far. There are lots of grapes. The milkweed on the garden is blooming. The veronicas have bloomed. The cedar trough by the strawberries needs more soil. The Syrians have a lot of junk along the side of their house and it is over flowing on to the cedar hedge. They have several old ambulances being made over into what might be food trucks. Its a freakin' mess.

August 23, 2022
Yesterday did 7 loads of laundry, made spaghetti sauce. Today the heat pump guy was here at 8:00 to discuss the installation. Was gone by 9:00. Made $15 on PN. Finished tweaking photos for page 32 of the Danube album. Pat found another fig to eat today for a total of 5. While feeding the fish I saw at least 6 tiny ones. Some of them are light colored. I guess these are this years hatchlings. The Sooke Reservoir is at 83.3%. Was 27 degrees when I was out from 1:45 to 3:15. Mowed the back and front and around the end of the driveway and up the Syrians side, taking off more st.john's worte. Filled the pond. Got in and washed, put away the groceries, emptied the dishwasher. Watered around the front from 7:30 to 9:00.

August 25, 2022
Yesterday was a very warm day at 28 degrees. I watered a bit around the back. Tara, Andy and Freyja came to dinner. We had dinner upstairs of salads, roast chicken, peaches and icecream. Was very tiring as Freyja is very active. Today is another sunny hot day at 28 degrees. The Sooke reservoir is at 82.9%. I am taking the day off, except for putting the dishes (which Andy washed) away. And cooking the supper. There have been a lot of little tawny skippers at the verbena bodinaires flowers on the deck lately. Was out at 7:15 to 8:45. Did a lot of clipping down montebretias, tree branches, and a start on the perennials at the front. Watered the plum tree area in 2 spots for a total of about an hour. The water did not run past the edging boards. Then watered with the sprinkler to do the bamboo, the trilliums and over to the driveway with the sprinkler. Not sure how long but the area got a good soaking, I think. This happened while we had supper. Then turned off the sprinkler while I did the clipping. Have a load of tree brances and montebretia to go in the next bin. It is full now and will be emptied on Monday. Also started more of the driveway strip. It is going to get looking pretty good after I get all the old leaves and stems of agave looking thing cleaned up. Then turned on the sprinkler again for the front area on the Pees side. Not sure how long, but I can always do that after the paper is delivered in the a.m. Have a half bag of turkey grit taken to the front for the changes to the top dressing. The little primula marginata in the west coast planter is coming into bloom. The white rose is beginning to look a little better. I think I might keep it after the serious pruning of a couple of weeks ago. The rhubarb in the back is looking ok with its added soil around it. The fish are really growing and the water is clear. Has duck weed covering some of it. I think its good to give the fish some shade. I am thinking of taking down some of the black bamboo. Must ask Ben if he wants some of these for stakes in his new gardening venture in a couple of months. I must email Navit and let her know that washing the bear robe did shrink it, just about to the right size. If I carry my phone in the pocket, it does not do a lot for the fit of the robe.

August 27, 2022
Last evening on our way home from Cattle Point, where we had enjoyed a lovely evening of our lamb fest and left over chicken meals, our Last Lodge was hit by a bus. That driver pulled away from the bus stop just as we were passing (properly in our own lane). We were driving into the sun, but had the front visors down. This shaded Pat's eyes from the sun. I could see the shadow over his eyes against the sun and noticed it because I do not sit as high as he does and had to shade my eyes. There was an inspector from the bus company to inspect the accident. And he was apparently going off shift. Another inspector arrived and were talking to the driver. There was quite a lot of damage to the passenger side of our Last Lodge, including damage to the frame of the side door, and the step. I took a walk back up McKenzie to see if I could find any of the lost parts, with a view to the repair to the motor home. I found a pile of material on the street between the houses of 1840 and 1836. (At some time later I talked to the guy from 1836 house, but do not recall what we said. I hope he can be a witness to what all he saw happen.) I picked this stuff up and took it back to our vehicle. Pat looked the stuff over and told me that the mirror belonged to the bus. So, I took that part back and gave it to the bus guys. The mirror on our motor home folded in. The buses have cameras on board so this should all be recorded. The bus guys were not very interested in reporting to the Police due to this fact, and any other imagineable reasons. One of the bus inspector guys did some work on getting the side door closed and the step to move back in. The door got slammed shut but the step would not retract. Our mirror on passenger side had folded back, but we did not notice it until we were on our way home. Two of the Saanich police arrived, shortly after Pat had phoned them. They went about taking statements and directing traffic. I was very relieved to have them there. We have the card of the Police Officer who was taking the statements along with their file number re: the accident of the evening of August 26, 2022, on McKenzie Avenue, between the bus and our Last Lodge. All the facts and figures of time, place, names etc. will be on the statements, no doubt. So, Pat is going to make a claim with ICBC and get this thing resolved so we can get on with getting the Last Lodge on the road again. It was an awful ending to a lovely couple of hours having our dinner out at Cattle point with a view of the ocean. My camera has photos of that, but nothing of the accident as it had run out of battery charge. I don't use my phone camera. My name is Mary on the Police statement of this accident.
So, gardening stuff from earlier in the day of August 26th: I was out in the morning for about 2 hours, starting to get the Magnolia area bed cleaned up some more. In the afternoon, I got some more stones set surrounding the water meter, and around the trilliums. I got a hole dug into the clay, just above the edging stones. I added some sand and top soil to the hole and settled the Raspberry Ripple Hebe into its new home. Filled the hole surround with more top soil and sand. Also pulled out the tomatoe cages and bamboo stakes in the 'cutting garden' area, so that the Davey Tree guys can get back there to prune the lilac, top the yew trees and the bay laurel. Have more cleaning up to do back there as well as in the cutting garden/strawberry patch area. Had filled the pond and watered at the back.
August 27 - The Syrians seem to be doing a good clean up along there side of their driveway. Maybe when I phone Monie about the Davey Tree guys coming to do that cedar hedge, I won't need to mention the trash, just ask him to tell The Syrians to keep the children safe from the Davey Tree workers. I am watering the Magnolia bed, so as to get the Hebe watered in from 10:30 to 12:30. Sooke Reservoir at 82.3%. 17 degrees at 3:15 and cloudy. Very chilly and are closing windows. To London Drugs and got a new tea kettle.

August 28, 2022
Is a lovely day. 21 degrees and sun at 12:00. Watered the deck plants, made the bed, the cappiccino, ironed Pat's jeans, made him a ruben sandwich for lunch. There was a little hawk on the deck railing. I think it may have been a peregrine falcon. There are 3 figs out there that are just about ready to eat. Was out from 2:30 to 5:30. It was 21 degrees, lovely day. Watered around the back, especially the rhubarb. The rhubarb has a new little leaf coming up. Spent the rest of the afternoon digging the ladies mantle out of the magnolia bed (room). Dumped a heaping flat of roots etc into the bin, which is now very full at the curbside. I will see if the plant sale at the next VIRAGS meet on Sept. 13 has any plants that I might like to have. The back part of the Magnolia room has the trilliums (5, I think). I next need to get all the bamboo leaves raked up, or most of them anyway. They do not seem to be breaking down into compost, at all. Also need to get the bamboo out of the thyme circle, permanently. That means round up. And then I am considering taking down lots of the black stems, and perhaps get Ben to help dig a trench around the few stems I might leave and put down a barrier to stop it from running. I hope Ben might be able to use the black bamboo stakes in his next gardening company. But this may not happen till later in the Fall.

August 31, 2022
20 degrees at 9:00. Heat wave warnings again today. Sooke reservoir is at 81.3%. My sore arms from the day of digging out the ladies mantle with my rock harmmer, are healing. I am finally back to my 142.5. Hopefully I can continue this loss of weight for 26 more lbs. while doing the banking I figured out how to do an interact e-transfer, at last. And finished and cleaned up the pass words. Then just to push my luck I tried to scan with the Cannon Printer and found I had to use the Windows Fax and Scanner. There is an icon for it in the bar at the bottom. The navigator on the Canon needs to be installed. I doubt if I have that any more. I will have to look for any disk about this.

September, 2022

September 1, 2022
Downloaded August pictures. (See My Pictures - August Pacheedaht Garden) The last photo shows that we were at Cattle Point at 7:35 on the evening of August 27, when we got hit by the bus. There will be police reports, bus camera photos, etc. of the time the bus hit us. Pat has taken the Last Lodge to BMT for the estimate by ICBC today. Made $14 on PN. 21 degrees at 12:00. Sooke reservoir is at 81.1%. The Last Lodge is going to cost $15k - $20k and they start end of September. Was out gardening at 2:30 to 4:30. Watered at the back for about an hour. Cleaned up the left over stuff and put it in the bin. Finished the stones along the grass path of the Magnolia bed. Did some re-arranging of the gold rocks and clipping off blossoms. Put down more turkey grit over the beds and weeded a bit. The gentian has a couple of buds and the Ribes sanguineum - Red Flowering Currant has leaves or branches growing out. They had died back when we were away in June-July. I will take out most of the columbines. The center garden room looks much better without them. Turned the sprinkler on that area of the garden when I came in at 4:30. Looks not too bad when its weeded. It still needs more attention, and so does the thyme circle. But it does not take long to do it. I have room for a few more plants, for the little rockeries, back and front.

September 2, 2022
25 degrees, Sooke reservoir at 80.8%. Was out from 2:00 to 5:00 with a half hour break for an iced capaccino on the deck with Pat, and to put away the groceries. I got most of the area under the fig tree cut back, and the fig tree and the Harry Lauder's walking stick trimmed back a bit too. Some of the rhodo's dead headed. They seem to be forming buds. Maybe I will get a Fall show of blooms. Clipped back the perennials next to the garage and across the old side walk. Clipped back the apple tree a bit. Dug the stones that line the moss garden along by the fig tree. I will be renovating this bed too. I will be taking out all the volunteer columbines, and the big ugly peony. I will leave only a few choice plants. Then I hope to give the ground a layer of good top soil, some bone meal for the bulbs and perhaps a covering of fine bark mulch. Will be adding peat moss and top soil and maybe sand under the rhodos and dig out all the nasty tri-colored things I can find and any arums. Take out ferns from under the rhodos too. I think I will also remove the hellebore also, and put it under the deck. Mulch in the fall with the leaves. Have more pruning and cleaning to do around the pond and in the moss garden.

September 3, 2022
Spent the morning sorting out my purse stuff. I need a new little card holder/cash thing. Have to look at using the bagolini, but don't really like it. My little bag that Pat brought back from Italy for me is beginning to show some wear. I should give it some black shoe polish on the worn parts. The rest of the morning and early afternoon I played on PN. I appear to be $10 ahead of the game. Then I moved half of the stuff from the Last Lodge into the house. Still have the bathroom, bedding, towels and Pat needs to bring his stuff in. Need to look at all the outer bins and bring that all in, too. Should probably bring in the tubs with all the van info and maps also. It got up to 22 degrees. The Sooke reservoir is at 80.6% and it is 20 dgrees now as the supper cooks. No lunch today so I should be down a half pound. Was a good gardening day, but did not go out there, as I had this cleaning out the Last Lodge hanging over me. It will need dusting and vaccuming when the repairs are done.

September 6, 2022
I have finished bringing in the stuff from the Last Lodge. Washed bedding, towels, dishes, etc. This took most of the last 3 days to do. We had a bit of rain on one of those days. The temperatures are a bit more liveable, now. When we get it back from BMT we will clean it all out. Get a new runner carpet for the hallway. The Syrians seem to be getting their trash a bit cleaned up. There is still stuff leaning on the cedar hedge. I will have to call them when Davey Tree will be over to get access to their side of the hedge, I think. And to keep the children and everyone out of the way of harm. The whitish goldfish are really getting big. The tiny, little whitish ones are growing too. I hope they turn into shubunkins. Lately I have seen a big dragon fly around the pond edge. The hummingbirds are nearly finished their food. Seems to me I just filled it a few days ago. Old weird phoned today. She wants my trees cut back off her place. I don't have her phone number, she doesn't let people into her yard, so how the hell am I to communicate with her about this. Wish I could catch her daughter some time and get to talk to her about this. I suppose Ben could set up a time to do it with Davey Tree. But we cannot do this until it starts raining. Perhaps I could see about getting my black bamboo taken out... maybe just leave 3 or 4 stems and put a barrier around it to stop it from running. I will think about this, after the other stuff is done. The heat pump guys want access to the Pees side of the house in the area next to the chimney, so I am considering taking out the purple Jacamani clematis and moving it and its trellis to where the thorn bush is being removed. It can live in one of my big black plastic pots until the spot is ready for it. Watered a bit at the front near the Pees side, and watered at the back to the border by the Pees side. The fall crocuses are blooming, so hope they are getting some water.

September 7, 2022
Sooke reservoir is at 79.6%. Sunny, 21 degrees at 10:30.

September 8, 2022
Sooke reservoir is at 79.3. The Queen passed away yesterday. Balmy Prince Charlie will be the new king, at age 73. Gag, and the Duchess of whatever, his former mistress, as the what? queen consort. I do hope she does not get a crown.
Couldn't sleep at 6:00 this morning so got up. Made the cucucumber salad, made the chicken cordon bleu casserole. Vaccummed the kitchen, big bath room, dining room. Chicken soup for lunch. In the afternoon I watered around the back, in the hard to get places by hand. The western red cedar is going to get judiciously clipped back as high as I can reach and below to reveal the Irish heather. Watered the patio pots, and the deck plants. Filled the water tub on the deck. Something moved the rocks around on the waterfall, so re-arranged stuff, before watering and filling the pond. The pump stopped so I pushed the red button and it started again. Guess its time to clean the filter again. Also, I think the big black flat rock slid into the deep part of the pond below the water fall. I may have to wade in and get it out. In the meantime I do have the rocks rearranged. I have odds and ends of weeding to do at the front, some serious weeding in the moss garden and the cut garden at the back. I am becoming accustomed to the magnolia bed and thinking it is looking nice without all the weedy plants. I will get another rock rose or two and add pea gravel around them up to the trilliums. Then rake off the bamboo leaves, and put leaf mulch around the trilliums. I can add more pea gravel and compost to the original little front rockery. I am thinking of putting the purple jackamani clematis into the spot where the thorn bush is going to be removed. Maybe old weird will like it growing on her ugly fence. I should dig it out before the Davey Tree guys get here. I will need some top soil or potting soil to keep it in a pot for a while. The white rose and the pink simplicity rose are both blooming nicely.

September 9, 2022
In attempting to find the percentage of water in the Sooke Reservoir today, I came across this interesting Wikipedia page about the Greater Victoria water supply: Sooke Flowline. I could not find today's reading in the Times Colonist. Due, probably to all the Queen stuff, the weather page does not seem to be printed.

September 10, 2022
22 degrees at 11:00, sunny. Sooke reservoir at 78.8%. Finished tweaking photos for Page 35 of the Danube album. 3 more pages to go (30 photos). Was out from 2 to 4. Was 26 degrees when I got in. Clipped back the false bamboo, the lily of the valley shrub, and the Harry Lauders walking stick. Dead headed more of the rhodos. They have buds on them. I believe they might bloom again later in the Fall. Carried most of the clippings out by the telephone pole and did a bit of cleaning up along the driveway strip, on both sides up to the tree. Have lots to do yet. Spoke to the guy next door about moving the stuff off the hedge. Told him about the river just across the street and how it was fish habitat. Dumping chemicals into the stream kills the fish. He did not seem to know about the Colquitz. I don't know who's trash it is by the hedge. I asked him to move it off the hedge because I had Davey Tree guys coming to clean up that hedge. They would need the stuff moved off the hedge and the children kept away from the Davey Tree workers. Now, just before I came in there was nothing moved off the hedge. Perhaps I will have to call Monie, after all. The guy is from Lebanon, he said; and then said Palestine. He has excellent English and likes how quiet it is here. I guess these people need to be educated about what Canada is like. I don't think the trash is his, and he is probably seeing about getting rid of it. We did see a red 4 X 4 haul away a bunch of stuff that looked like furniture and more crap. I really hope they are coming back to get rid of the rest of their shit. Perhaps Monie could arrange to have someone take it away and charge whom so ever is responsible for it. Not to mention the chemicals dumped in the River.

September 11, 2022
Went to the Spencer's Farm for the VCCC corn roast at 11:00, despite my not feeling very well. The air has been very smokey and hazey the last few days. After getting home and trying to recover for an hour or two, I went out to take the bin to the curb. Dragged batteries off the hedge and put them in front of the other crap in the Paslistinians driveway. The red truck was there, but left a short while after. I see the cart that they have been hauling garbage away in is sitting on the other side of their front lawn. The neighbours on that side (Adam?) and friends are building raised beds across their front lawn going to what I think is the property line. One of the red ambulance things that has been made into something we think is a food truck sits along the front of the Palistinians place on the Saanich property, parked in a parallel position and blocking the view down the street. There is still all kinds of trash lining the hedge and killing the bottom of it. There are broken branches and all kinds of damage there. I spent a bit of time dead heading the rhodes and think I have most of it done. It was 25 degrees when I came in at about 4:00 and put away the groceries. The back was stinking of that pot skunk stink when I was out there. Gwaid Ahmighty! what has this neighbourhood come to! Finished tweaking photos for page 36 of the Danube album. 2 pages to go.

September 12, 2022
Since I was not sleeping, I got up at 6:30. Made $1 in PN. Finished tweaking the photos for page 37 of the Danube album. Pat is having a great day so far with getting his computer stuff fixed and the Picks have all gone green! The hazy smoke is not so heavy either. It is 18 degrees at 10:00. Did the laundry (bedding and towels). Vaccumed and serious dusting in Pat's room and the entry. I was out in the garden from about 3 to 4:30. Put the debris I had collected along the driveway into the green bin. Clipped some more off the St.John's Worte, around the agave looking plant, and around the Autumn Joy Sedum. Got the black berry and the bamboo out of the Spirea on the boulevard garden and cut down some sprouting trees from near the plum tree. There is still some of the thorny bush left to clip down in that area. I found 1 good plum on the ground, on the grass mulch. Was nice, and clean too. Rescued 2 more rocks from by the Sedum. Moved the frozen stuff out of the little freezer and am getting it defrosted. Then I will put all the stuff back in. I see I have another meal of Chicken Cordon Blue to make up. I believe it is the chicken, ham and cheese part of that casserole and needs the noodles and cream of chicken, and crumbs added. The people next door are doing nothing about getting rid of their trash that is on the hedge. There are a few pieces that I cannot move. One looks like a radiator, but its really heavy. They should be told about scrap metal places that will pay them for this stuff, as well as the old dead batteries. i got tricked into buying a 649 ticket on PN, but I do have a $5 token to buy another 649. Old Pee is throwing cigarette butts in my garden again. What a total idiot.

September 13, 2022
I was up in the middle of the night again. Did up most of the photos for the last page (38) of the danube album and will finish it today. So it is ready to make up the album. I wiped out the freezer and let it dry for a few hours, then reloaded it from the stuff that was in it and some of the stuff from the downstairs fridge freezer. 25 degrees at 2:30. Watered deck plants and house plants. Filled the pond.

September 14, 2022
The air is very smokey, so I have decided not to go out to garden. It is otherwise sunny and 22 degrees at 1:00. Made up the album for the 05 Danube trip. Finished at about 9:00 pm.

September 15, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 77.6%. 17 degrees and cloudy at 10:30. Was out in the front garden from 11:00 to 3:00. Was 22 degrees when I came in. I cleaned up the trillium bed (Magnolia tree bed) putting about 3 bags of dry leaf mulch on top of the trilliums. Have to get more mulch for the rest of the cleaned up area. I raked the bamboo leaves off and put them on the back woodland path. Watered it for about an hour.

September 16, 2022
Was 20 degrees at noon. Sooke reservoir at 77.3%. Made up the pages 2 and 3 descriptions for the danube album but not added to the codeing yet. Was out in the garden from 2 to 5 with a short break for a revel with Pat on the deck. Took 4 more bags of good dry leaf mold to the Magnolia bed and put it all down. Watered it as it was quite breezy. Watered more at the front with a view to move the purple jackamani clematis and cut back the Japanese anemones (tall pink things,) and anything else that might be in the way of the heat pump guys. Since we have to get a couple of things done before they can start was not in a rush to do it today. The grapes are falling off the vine so I brought them into the house. There are quite a lot of them. Cut back the winter jasmine and tied it up. Cut down the ugly peony thing under the fig tree... going to get rid of it, and the tall maltese cross thing, too. I have more of them in the cutting garden.

September 17, 2022
18 degrees at 11:00. Sooke reservoir at 77.1%. Finished index pages 1 and 2 of the Danube album, and set up a couple more pages descriptions to do tomorrow. After shopping the LB store and LD I went out to the garden at 3:00 and came in at 4:45; got cleaned up and was in the kitchen preparing supper at 5:00. I put about 1/2 bag of sand over the leaf mulch on the Magnolia bed. This bed is looking really good now. I hope to get some fawn lillies growing with the trilliums. Weeded about 5 feet of the stone path. Raked the bamboo leaves off the thyme circle. Put round up on the sprouting bamboo in the thyme circle. Cut off 3 or 4 black bamboo stems; with a view to taking out the bamboo to 3 or 4 stems and making a trench and barrier around the reduced bamboo so that it cannot run. I might want to sell the black bamboo stakes. I might have to get Ben to do this trench and barrier for me. The driveway strip is looking pretty good. It needs water. We need rain.

September 18, 2022
Was 24 degrees when I went out at 2:00. Watered around the back by hand, a bit. Cleaned up more of the stone path at the front. I am going to keep the columbines from taking over the smoke bush bed. I need to add leaf mold to the area that does not have sedums/thrifts on it. The red flowering plant in the trillium bed has 2 blossoms now. I have no idea what it is. It is not from Fraser Thimble farm. The grey dragon fly was around the pond for a while.

September 19, 2022
To Cannor. Got membership. Need to purchase $150.00 to get free delivery. No longer get $20.00 back on purchase after membership. Still get the 10% off purchases. The water department has no solar fountains... sold out... check back in March. The only Waterhawthorn is in the display garden and is not for sale. They cannot get any delivered to them. I did not ask why they were not propogating the one they have. No rock rose plants. Getting 2 bags of washed sand and 2 bags of fish soil (50)litres each delivered. Suppose to be delivered tomorrow. Did not get back to the guy who phoned about delivering. Did up the Plant Lists page to include the purchases of today at Wildwood/Cannor. $161. too much. So, I have a membership that gives me 10% off and free delivery if I buy $150.00 BAH! That's it for them. Ben should have his new company up in October. I should be able to get him to deliver dirt, sand and rocks, as well as take away debris. Am thinking of taking down the black bamboo except for 3 - 4 stems which will be enclosed, so that they cannot run. Again, Ben should be able to do this. I delivered notes to Parmars and the Palistinians. Old Parmar answered the door... he is definitely demented. I told him to get "Billie" to read it, and gave him the envelope and note. He just mumbled. Upon taking my note to the Palistians the young lady answered the door and tried to read the note. Said her husband would be home in an hour and his English is excellent. There are hoards of things lining the cedar hedge on their side. I very much doubt that Davey Tree will go over there. Their side of the hedge is not save-able. Should I call Moni about this? The Fisheries Department? It all just makes me sick. What the F#@^%$*K do I care. I will be moving in a few years. Who cares if the property is degraded, and the stream poluted? Pat needs to move the Last Lodge to Grange, and he doesn't want to do it. Well, thanks for the help, idiot. If I have to move it there will be far more damage on it than there is now.

September 20, 2022
Sooke resevoir at 77.1%. 24 degrees at 12:45. Cannor delivered the dirt to beside the house. I had to phone them to find out if it was delivered. I didn't see the guy arrive. All of it is there. I moved it into the back garage with the little hand truck. Pat moved the van before 8:00 a.m. today. Glory be. Davey tree guys got here about 8:30 with Ben leading them around and telling them what needed to be done. They seem to have both hedges sheared. Can now see through to the Syrians side as well, where they have all sorts of crap hanging, leaning and sitting on the hedge. Mrs. P was out to greet them when they went over to that side, and tried to tell them what she wanted done. I guess Ben told her what was going to be done and that was that. They took the camillia down and made it square, the rhodos are not clipped, they just seemed to run a trimming thing over them and the branch ends are all scraggily and broken. The hedge has a bunch sticking out. The yew hedge seems ok, except for one little bit sticking up. The bay laurel is not nicely done. I hope they finish it properly. I am just as glad they did all the hedges now instead of coming back in the winter, as planned. The Davey guy took me around to check stuff. He is going to clip the broken rhodos on the Pees side. The hedge looks not too bad. They took out the bamboo, but I will have to keep cutting it back as the roots will regrow. They missed the tree by the old compost bin and the guy will take it out. There is quite a stump where the firethorn was, not sure how I am going to get rid of that. The guy is going to take down the other bigger stump of the pin oak. The lilac looks pretty good. There are a whole bunch of guys picking up the debris and one guy up in the bucket cutting back the branches of the sweet gum tree.

September 21, 2022
It is 23 degrees at 4:00. The Sooke Reservoir is at 76.1%. All I did with regard to gardening was a review for Davey Tree guys. Just before supper, about 5:30 maybe I took the garden hose up to the deck and began hosing down the cedar hedge. All the debris was flying onto the Pees place. They, in particular Baby Pee, had a fit. Use of the f word every second word and many other nasty words in his fit. Oh my goodness he had just cleaned his place yesterday. Told him wash it all off with their garden hose. There were threats and bleats about throwing garbage on their property and promises to do the same to mine. He was going to take pictures and call the 'cops' like I had done to them. I asked him to please do so! Then he began shooting water at me through the hedge, and I told him, that was good. We would get all the debris and dead stuff off the hedge. More cursing and swearing. Told him to calm down and reminded him of their trashing my privacy hedge from day one, and to have a look at their pony wall and where their clothes line was located (right on the property line.) Called him an imbecile, and billie bob or whatever his name is, and a ...(don't remeber what kind of) a child. I think it was brilliant. There will come a day of reckoning about this propery line when it goes up for sale. there will definitely be a survey of the property then by the purchaser or by me. It will have to include the garbage collection on the other side of our propery (which is owned by another East Indian and rented to Syrians or Palistinians). These tenants seem to think they are in an industrial zone, with all kinds of dead car batteries, cans of what look like paint, lots of heavy metal things. I informed them of the river across the street. They seemed to have no idea of the consequences of power washing chemicals down the storm drain. My cedar hedge on their side is trashed too. I suppose their day of reckoning will come also. I do think the Deparment of Fisheries would NOT be happy about this mess. Davey tree guys said they could do nothing with it. So, got the trees watered quite a bit, but they will need more, and I need to get in under the hedge and along the rhodos to finish the job of pruning and picking up debris. Went in to finish making the supper at 5:50. After supper I have now finished the Danube album index pages up Page 7 with a good start on about 3 more pages. Pat was to the technician at the eye doctor place... cannot spell that word.. ophthalmologist. He had drops in his eyes for this test, and had to take a taxi there and back. Had trouble with getting the cab back to pick him up on Yates street. Why is the world full of idiots?

September 22, 2022
The Sooke reservoir is at 75.8%. Temperature is 18 degrees. Constable Cavenish called at about 10:50 a.m. The Pees complained to the Police about washing the clippings onto their property. She (Constable) said it is my responsibility to go clean it up. This kind of activity is called neighbour disputes and it falls under 'Civil Law" and they can do nothing about it except to advise us of places to take these matters to. She said not to have any thing to do with them, rather like ignore them. She also said I told them to "go back to Surrey or some such thing'. I asked her if they are allowed to call me a fuckin bitch and ? cunt, over and over again. She went on and on about they wanted no racial slurs. Of course, I totally denied any thing of the sort. Now racial slurs are more of an offense than calling a neighbour a fuckin bitch. What is wrong with this picture. So, I shall ignore them as best I can. We need to get on their property to have the heat pump guys install the outlet on their side.

September 23, 2022
Was up at 10:30 to 11:30 last nite and got a few more pages of the Danube album sorted out and ready for codeing. It is 17% at 11:00 am. The Sooke reservoir is at 75.5%. Finished page 11 of the Danube album. Added menues to all of the pages. Shopped with Pat. He has sorted out the Wade Plumbing heat pump stuff. There will be the electrician cost. They say they are installing in October, so I must get my clematis moved.

September 24, 2022
20 degrees and sunny at noon. Sooke reservoir at 75.3%. Finished the Danube album index pages to Page 13. 23 degrees at 4:00. I meant to go out and do some gardening, but got caught up in organizing the page descriptions for the album. I have finished copying the old Danube album page descriptions into the text page. They will need organizing into page numbers on the new album.

September 26, 2022
Not sure what I did yesterday. It got up to 24 degrees today. Was out from 1:30 to 4:00. Watered the cut trees -- hedges both sides, and yew hedge. Watered the bay laurel, the lilac. Washed leaves off the old sidewalk and the bed both sides. Washed the patio off. The electric guy will be here at 11:30 tomorrow and I have to tell him what we want, re the heat pump; as Pat might be tied up with the reimbursment for the install of the heat pump. I raked lots of the debris into heaps. Put the bamboo sticks in the garage into a pot in a twine binding. There is room in this pot for the bamboo sticks from the cutting garden. I still have to skim off the pond. Baby Pee was sweeping after my watering the deck hedge. The hedge along the Syrians side looks good from our side, but still has some crap leaning into the hedge on their side. Davey Tree were unable to do anything on the hedge on that side. They seem to be making some progress getting rid of stuff though. Transplanted the new lettuce, watered it a bit. Now at 7:30 it looks pretty good, as do the cut trees. If I get finished with the Electric guy tomorrow, make lunch .. I might have energy to mow the grass back and front. Pat got his new printer today. Hope he gets it set up. Have music going from 5:00 as I made supper and until 8:00 as I type this. Very relaxing. Made $5. on PN this a.m. Did laundry. Finished Index Page 14 of the 05 Danube album.

September 27, 2022
21 degrees at 4:00, sunny, light clouds. Sooke Reservoir at 74.7%. Filled the hummingbird feeder. Helped Pat out with some heat pump stuff. We will probably go with the extra panel, and forget about the EV plugin for now. Finished up Page 16 of the Danube album.

September 29, 2022
Yesterday I did up some of the page descriptions for the 05 album. Today I made sweedish meatballs, got my telephone appointment with Dr. Cruz for tomorrow afternoon. Was out to the garden from 4 to 5. Cleaned up the area around the pyracantha, mowed grass back and front. Was sunny and 20 degrees when I came in. Watering the back garden... started at 5:00. Changed the garden hose position at 5:37 and watered close to the deck until 7:00 while we had supper. Finished page 17 of the danube album.



September 30, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 74.1%. Temps at 18 degrees at noon. Changed the compost pot filter. Charged the keyboard and the mouse.

October, 2022

October 1, 2022
Well I just typed up a wonderfully long, gabby file about the situation in my garden renovations just now. I really don't feel like re-typing it all again, so I will just put a few things down again and not be so stupid as to not save it. Sooke reservoir is at 73.9% and it was 22 degrees at 1:00. I watered the house and deck plants, got some dusting done on the railings along the stairway. I vaccumed quickly all over the upstairs, yesterday. Made up 4 cups of chicken stock from our chicken feast from last night. Was up in the middle of the night from 2:00 to about 4:00 and reading some of the Spriggs book. Good rock information. I can see where I am never going to have a crevice garden though. I like to put some of my favourite rocks on display, as well as the plants. The little rockeries I have now are really rather flat and the plants that are growing well enough have been growing over the rocks. Eventually, these plants will be cut back to let the rocks show. I need to get my autumn blooming saffron crocuses and some little Iris planted into the renovated Magnolia tree bed. I have plans to remake the waterfall hill, by adding the beige plastic pot, filled with concrete bits and potting soil; to fill right up to the waterfall spillway height, and the next layer of pot would be lower, to accommodate the view of the first fall into the little run down to the fall over the blue slate. The containers will be covered with flat rocks, with a bit of room between these heavey flat rocks to grow a few plants that will cascade over the sides of the pots. I have a phlox waiting for just this spot to grow in. It could use more composted soil than sand to grow in. And the new little lewisia can have a ledge to grow on where it is totally protected from the rain or watering I do. And many other things about cleaning up the, quite frankly, the mess of plants (especially on the Pees side) of the hedge and the rhodos, and the camillia just looks awful. Anyway, that will be for another day. Davey Tree could do nothing with the hedge along the driveway. I do wish Moni would give his tenants some help in learning what to do with all the radiators, dead batteries and metal stuff in the hedge, on and beside it. They have to learn not to dump this crap in the storm drain where it washed into the Colquitz river. I am sure the Fisheries department would give that guy some instruction on how to clean it up or do it and charge him for the damage. Let someone else do this... I am too sympathic to their refugee situation and just do not have the heart for this. I suppose there was lots more on this topic that I had typed. I was just venting and getting some ideas down for proceeding in my garden. It does not take long when I am not tired. I do need to water, though. We do not seem to be getting any rain for a week or more. So, maybe tomorrow I will get out. It is good to get some of the housework sort of caught up. Finished the coding on Page 18, of the Danube Album... almost half finished. Did up all my month end stuff. Pat is trying to get his new toner type printer going... he should get Trevor to help him.

October 2, 2022
Was a lovely sunny day, up to 21 degrees. But we are in a drought and really need some substantial rain. It does not look like there is any in the forecast for another 10 days. Hope I can get out to water tomorrow. The dishwasher gave up the ghost yesterday, so now I am going to be washing dishes the old fashioned way until we get some stuff settled and done around here. Pat's attention to his eye degeneration first of all, I hope, and his printer, and etc. I made a new soup, Gazapo. Its a cold soup made of mostly tomatoes, bit of green onion and peppers. Finished the crepes by lunch time. Then made the soup. Finished the crepes by 4:00 so we have a nice supper for tonight. There was no vanilla ice cream in the store, so we shall have Black Cherry yogurt with blue berries for dessert. Its pretty good. I won $200 on PN today and put $190 in the bank. Then paid my HCP membership with that visa. $40. Still should give me a bit of headstart on my PN spening.

October 4, 2022
Yesterday, I did laundry, made another $21 in PN, there was more stuff, but cannot remember what all I did. I was awake for a couple of hours in the middle of the night and did up Page 19 of the Danube album and started to sort more pages. Finished the coding on Page 19 today. The Sooke reservoir is at 73.3% and a cooler, cloudy day today. Picked up meds and mailed my cheque to Davey Tree (emailed this info to Felicia, in town) while Pat got groceries. Made chicken soup. Pat got his printer to Print...excellent. He has a few more things to sort out with it. He has a meeting tonight, so supper will be earlier. Made 3 smaller pkgs of Chicken soup to freeze. And one for supper with the crepes. We have had no rain yet... Something like 85 days with a mere few drops one day. So, I hope to get out to garden, tomorrow. Finished the Vienna stuff on Page 22. Have started to sort the Budapest stuff, probably pages 23, 24 and 25. Tired at 9:28.

October 5, 2022
20 degrees at noon. Sooke reservoir at 73.1%. Watered the back, closest to the deck and hedges. Then watered by hand along the Pees side. Pulled the trellis for the clematis over. Should be able to clip all that stuff down over to the chimney, before the heat pump guys get here. They need to make one of the vent things for Pat's room which will be the lower level. Then watered by hand all over the front. Especially the hedge along the front. These trees are really dry and I washed out a lot of dried stuff. I might do a boxwood hedges trim after it starts to rain. The California lilac thing needs dead wood cleaned out of it. The rest of the plants seem ok. The grass at the front needs water, of course too. I will add more mulch to the tree well, too. I think I might trim the cedar hedge at the front back a bit when it starts to rain, also. And cut back the spirea bush. I will need to plant the autumn crocus bulbs and the little irises.. along in front of the stone path from the David over to the magnolia bed where there is room. Plus add more mulch to that bed. Won $110 on PN Lotto Max. Made cranberry with raisin sauce (2 jars), cole slaw and the half cucumber into salad.

October 7, 2022
Yesterday made the plum pie and cranberry sauce. Did up the W-8BEN form for the DI and Pat took it over to Mikey today. Don't recall whatelse. Today, Sooke reservoir is at 72.6% and about 22 degrees, sunny. Was out from 10:30 to 12:30 clipping back the rhodos, and camillia. The camillia still needs some work. Shaking the debris out of the hedge by the deck. It is now a see through privacy hedge. After lunch and a short rest I went out at about 2:00 and was out to 5:00 - Took out the old trellis that the Jackamani clematis was on. Clipped all the Japanese anemones and stuff from in front of the chimney to the hedge. Clipped back most of the boxwood hedge on the house side. Spread leaf mulch over top of this clipped back area. Watered all around the front and along the Pees side. Swept off the debris on their side too. Constable C. said I was responsible for cleaning it up. So, be it. The heat pump guys are going to need to get into the area by the simplicity rose to put in one of the vent things, for in the 'den' or Pat's room. I will be able to put another rose in this bed... maybe. Will see how it goes. So this heat pump stuff should be finished by the end of October. It may start raining near the end of October, too. So, I guess I can proceed with the rest of the clean up of the gardens. My new little Lewisia is trying to bloom.. its pink, and the one in the gold rock wall is yellow. Maybe I will try to get them in the same area. I have a phlox that needs to be at the top of a wall so it can fall down. So, I need to build up the last space and let it fall at the end of that bed. I can use another piece of cement block to finish that bed.

October 8, 2022
Sooke reservoir 72.4%. 18 degrees at noon. $19 to PN. Sorted 2 pages of descriptions for Danube album. Made the shrimp and vegetables for supper. All in marinade. Went out to garden at 3:30. Back in at 5:30. Put in the sativus (saffron crocuses - 2 spots of 5 each) in the magnolia bed. added potting soil, bone meal, and a bit of peat moss. Dug out some of the clay. Same process for the 10 JS Dyte little irises, except no peat moss. The iris went along the front of the Magnolia bed. There are lots of earth worms in this renovated bed. Watered the plantings for about 20 minutes. They will need more watering and maybe even more leaf mold on top. Saw old Pee dragging some debris from my plants on their side, out to his green bin area, maybe. Haven't checked yet. At 5:30 the tribe gathered for a powwow. I don't think Bobbi was invited.

October 9, 2022
21 degrees at 4:00. Washed and filled the humming bird feeder. Moved rocks around on the waterfall mountain. Changed my mind about adding the beige pots. I seem to be slowly getting little rock plants growing in the cracks and holes. I don't know where old pee took the branches and debris he carried ... probably dumped it across the road in the park. Finished pages 22 and 23 of the 05 Danube album. Finished Budapest. I got caught up in reading on some of the links. I have the duck dinner all ready to go. The duck is roasting and should be finished at 5:30, and then I take it out and carve it up and do the crackling, so it should be ready at 6:00 - ish. The yams, brussels sprouts and stuffing get done in the last half hour.

October 13, 2022
It has been coolish. I am over the second snafu, of Oct. 11th. I won't go into it all, except I spent 4 hours early this morning trying to get the Visa card cancelled. Applied the bonus dollars to the amount owing and that is all they could do for it. No suggestions about how to report this in real time. So, no more credit card. Well just one. Finished Page 25 of the Danube album. The heat pump project is slowly progressing. We have the electric in. Tomorrow the inspectors come to test whatever it is they test, and another one to test for asbestos. Each one of them want hundreds of dollars. I am sure its well over $30K by now. No idea of how much the grant back to us might be or when we might get it. We are in a terrible drought. No rain yet. With all this stuff going on, I have had no time to get out to the garden. We got our Covid booster shots yesterday and the flu shot. Arms are not too bad.

October 14, 2022
Sunny day, cool in the a.m. Is 23 degrees at 4:00. Made 6.5 pkgs of borscht in the morning with some for lunch. After lunch made the turnip and apple, and there is going to be some for supper with the rest frozen. Was out in the garden about 2:00 cleaning up the cutting garden. Am moving the cement blocks that the chair sits on. Have put tomatoe cages along the Pees side after raking twigs and debris off that area. Still have more to do in that 'room'. The people to test our home for the heat pump instalation were here to test for pressure??? in the morning, and the girl was here in the early afternoon to check for asbestos. Both of them will be charging a fee. We could use more insulation in the attic to bring the stuff up to a 50 level, whatever that is. We get some back in grants if the instalation checks out. So, our electric panel is upgraded. The heat pump instalation is moved to Nov. 1,2 and 3. So, eventually it will be done. And hopefully the grants in hand soon after. Had to pay the scammers through the credit card when I cancelled it. Spent 4 hours on the phone with the visa people and they did shit all. I finaly got the bonus dollars applied to the balance owing and got the card cancelled. Am not getting another one. Pat figures one visa is enough to deal with. I told the visa people I was going back to paper. And I will too. AND be ever more vigilant about shutting down the computer when anything odd like this happens ever again. Maybe I need a firewall, instead of this pitiful anti virus.

October 15, 2022
went to vote too early in the day for me, but got it done without waiting in line. Did an rsvp to penninsula streams for the 29th to pay at the door for 2 people. shall try to pay cash. Watered the house plants. Sooke reservoir was at 71.1%. was up to 23 degrees today. Had a look at getting upgrade to Win 11 and a better anti virus. bit defender or norton.

October 16, 2022
Was sunny today and 23 degrees. Very smokey air from the forest fires in Washington. So, did not go out to garden. Made the tuna casserole and lunch this morning. Have the Page 26 and 27 of the danube photo album done up. Did an interac for Greener Homes, with great trepidation. But it worked with no harm done. Cleaned up a bit more In email. Made 6.5 Borscht pkgs.

October 17, 2022
Laundry, paid Greener homes by etransfer. Used up $5.00 tokens on PN. Deleted more old emails and documents. Was too smokey to go out.

October 18, 2022
Finished the 4 pkgs. of squash/onion bisque, made the chicken cordon blue casserole for supper. Out to garden at 2:45.

October 19, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 70.3. Made Gazapacho - a big jarfull and some to spare. Did up the ham and had scalloped potatoes and ham for supper with a ceasar salad. Have 5 jars of ham juice to use with the 5 pkgs of ham. Was out in the afternoon from about 4:00 to 5:00. Finished cleaning up the cutting garden room. Moved the chair to a new spot. Put the old trellis from the Jakamani clematis along the pees side also. Have all the twigs and debris put in the green bin. Received the new debit card in the mail.

October 20, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 70.1%. smokey out and very light rain at 11:00. 15 degrees. I did not turn on my computer on yesterday at all. The Pees seem to be making all kinds of sawing noise - something to do with the deck, I think. The Palestinians also have been making great hammering and sawing noises on their side. PN has the $10/week available, but not playing. Finished page 28 and 29 of the Danube album. Got my card activated at the bank, got the cheques in the mail. $100. cash. Some small change for Pat. Was out in the garden from 3:00 to 5:00. Finished clipping back the Irish heather and iberis next to the cutting/strawberry 'room'. Cleaned up the weeds and leaves off the little back rockery. We had tiny bits of rain this morning. Should rain tomorrow. Have brought the garden hose and rolled it up on the patio.

October 21, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 70.1. Made 5 Irish Yellow Broth soup, 4 vegetable stock. It rained very lightly in the a.m. and finally got some rain at about 5:00. No garden time. Pat made his big roast beef dinner with gingered parsnips (saved 2 of the .5 pkgs). Had a short nap before supper. Watched football game in the evening.

October 22, 2022
Very cold last nite, I am turning up the heat in the bedroom at nite. .04 of an inch of rain in the rain gage this morning, and very light rain. Sunshine by noon and 13 degrees. Sooke reservoir at 69.8%. Heat pump guys to start the instalation at 11:30 on Monday the 24th. Made 2 jars (apx 1 cup each) of beef gravey and froze one. Use the rest for a beef stew. Used the beef medalions for the beef barley soup. Made 6 small pkgs, kept one out for lunch tomorrow, froze 5. Made 5 glass jars (apx. 1 cup each) of vegetable stock. Took compost out to back bin. Leaves are starting to fall. The blue box guys have not picked up the stuff yet. Finished this stuff at about 5:00. Sent donation to Pen Streams. Have deleted some emails, trying to clean up the email folders. Checked bank accounts, all's well. Am planning minestrone for tomorrow, have put the beans on to soak. Would like Pat to get the shin bone with some beef on it, in the a.m. Finished pages 28, 29, 30 of the Danube album, in the last few days. 8 more pages descriptions to go!

October 23, 2022
Made up 11 pkgs of minestrone soup and 2 jars of vegetable stock. Michelle phoned our land line and told us of Bev's passing in the morning. Funeral on the 31st. Info in the smith clan by Raelynn smith. We cannot go as we are in the midst of getting the heat pump installed, need new dishwasher, fridge.

October 24, 2022
Heat pump guys arrived at 9:00 - ish. Pat says there are 3 of them here. I think they expect to be here tomorrow. Pat phoned Lloyd last night. He is just ok, but keeps up a good humour. I am glad Pat can phone him and share news and information. John L. turned 88 recently. Well none of the above has anything to do with gardening. I have moved the small old microwave stand thing, to beside the computer and put the photo copier on it, and my chair next to it. The table that was beside the computer desk will go into the living room behind the couch when the heat pump guys get finished. The thing is really heavy. This allows more heat/coolness to get out of the heat register in this room. We had lunch in this room. Who knows . . we may take to doing this more often. I am throwing out the extra cactus. It rained quite a bit at about 3:00 am onward. We now have a bit over .5 of an inch in the rain gauge now. Spent some time sorting pages for the danube album, and some time deleting old document stuff.

October 25, 2022
Sooke reservoir is at 69.3. It is 10 degrees at 10:00, and starting to rain. Was very cold last night, but had the heat turned up in the bedroom and Pat's closet door closed because the heat pump guys are still getting into the attic from there. The heat pump guys arrived at 8:30 this morning. I was out of bed, dressed and recovering in the living room chair from the very early start. Pat went off to china town at his usual hour today. I spent an hour or so sorting soup recipes and making up list for the next soups to make. Sending snail cheque for 100 CDN funds to wikimedia, hopefully today. Updated my LD extras to the new terms and conditions. Finished Page 31 of the Danube album. 3/4 of an inch of rain in the gauge at 5:00 and still raining lightly.

October 26, 2022
Emptied 1 inch of rain out of the gauge this morning. Filled the humming bird feeder. Was 7 degrees this morning at 10:00. Sooke reservoir at 69.2%. Emptied the black cabinet/table and it is ready to go to Habit for Humanity if they will come and get it, and the old closet that is under the couch in the library. They might give us a $100 donation receipt for them or for each. Hope this works. Logi Tech wanted to install software for my keyboard. It popped up a notice on the bar at the bottom. I did not! When I get trevor to take my computer away to instal Windows 10, I need him to help me sort out the wires etc that I have stored in the bottom of the photocopier stand for what can go to gizmos for recycle. Must make up a list of questions for him. The heat pump guys were here at 8:30 again. Pat got a message on his phone from Michelle re Bev's funeral to happen on line (I guess there is a link for us to follow). Pat replied that we would be attending in that way, and sent our condolences; and got a thanks right back from her. So, that is sorted, I guess. It is 12 degrees at 2:30. Made the green bean soup, its delicious. The heat pump guys are still here, but finished 4:22. The heat just blasts out the things. Its gonna be great. Finished pages 31 and 32 of the Danube album.

October 27, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 69.2%. and 10 degrees at 10:00. Doing laundry. Had a walk about the garden looking at the heat pump instalment. Its taking up a bit of space but it looks ok, and it is easy to access. It is nice and toasty warm in the house, even downstairs now. The guy set up the things - one for each heat pump station or whatever they are called. He says to keep them all on the same mode and I think they are all on the same temperature also. So, by the time we got back from our outing to the Ferris oyster place on Yates it was all nice and warm. The library and the guest bedroom have doors closed, and just the register things turned on to about 10. We just got the bill for the Hydro for the Sept/Oct billing where we were 26% less than for the same period last year. The bill was for 267.00, so think of it... even less than that amount next year!! Plus the benefit of the coolness in summertime. We are to get heavy rain and wind today.

October 28, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 69.0. Emptied 2 inches of rain out of the gauge. The pond is full. It was 13 degrees at 1:00. Made 6 small blue pkgs of seafood chowder and 3 jars of vegetable stock.

October 29, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 69.1%. 12 degrees at 11:00 o'clock. Pat and I moved the great heavy table/cabinet thing into the living room, under the pass through window wall. It is lighter with all the stuff out of it. No doubt it will fill up again in no time. Spent 3 hours sorting Document stuff and emptying recycle bin. Have to do this for Pictures too, someday. Was out in the garden from 2:45 to 4:30. Finished cleaning up around the pond. There is some nice soil developing with earthworms along the side by the deck. Went to the Pees side and knocked down a lot of the dead, brown cedar hedge stuff. Swept it up on the Pees side. There will be more of it falling from rain and wind. Have a lot of this good soon to be soil stuff on my side of the hedge. Have to pick out the big pieces and put them in the green bin yet. I have a water hawthorn in bloom in the pond -- just one blossom. while cleaning out the cabinet/table thing I found the box for the solar fountain with a price of $59.99 on it. That is what I expect Wildwood (Cannor) will be charging in the Spring. The water pipe from the gutters seems to be okay with some of it running up the pipe and the rest falling towards the house drain place that is covered to prevent stuff from getting into it. I see that the gutter drain at the front by the heat pump thing is also open to draining directly into the ground instead of going into the storm drain stuff. The heat pump thing will also have a bit of condensation draining to the ground. I will need to do some planning for the clematis to get it to grow again up a trellis. I might need a new trellis thing for it.

October 30, 2022
It has been raining nicely in the last few hours. There is .5 of an inch of rain in the gauge at 11:00. Finished sorting out the last pages for the Danube album. They encompass the last couple of days of the trip with the visit to Dracula's Castle. How very fitting to be typing this on Halloween. BOO! Finished page 34 of the Danube album. Emptied 2 inches of rain from the rain gauge at 8:00 October 31, 2022
Made 2 blue pkgs and some for lunch of creamed spinach soup, this morning. Emptied .5 of an inch out of the rain gauge at 2:30. It is sunny now but only 12 degrees. We attended Bev's funeral virtually from about 1:00 to 2:00 today.

November, 2022

November 1, 2022
Very cold overnight and this morning. At 10:30 it is 4 degrees. The Sooke reservoir is at 69.0%. That is down a bit despite the rain we have had lately. In the middle of the night (about 3:30 am) I found I had no wifi. So, I brought my flash light and mucked about with the plugging the cables. I thought it was the amplify one that I had to fix, but that is wrong. It is the cables into the router, or what ever it is, provided to us by Shaw. Finally got it and went back to bed. The Amplify was not showing the time, etc. So, I went to the app on my phone and got to the point where it said I have already configured it, so left it alone and went back to sleep. This morning the Amplify is showing its info again too. Watered the house plants. The pansy orchid is in bloom and the hai maria discolor, and the pixie is opening up buds. Since we have added the heat pump, I am thinking we will probably be here for a few more years. So, I am keeping the light garden for now. I might want to add a mini moth orchid.

November 2, 2022
Sooke reservoir is at 69.0. 7 degrees at 1:30. Went out to the garden from 1:30 to 3:30. Cleaned up most of the bigger pieces from under the deck. There is a lot of good earthworm soil coming up from the debris near the cedar hedge. Have cleared the area near the down spout so the water does not clog the drain...(I hope). Put the clippings into the bin. Dragged the bin out to the end of the driveway and cleared up the clippings from the driveway strip, including some ivy, some roses, some St. John's wort. Still have more cedar hedge trimmings to put into the bin. Took some cut up branches into the garage for firewood. It was a cool out so I was in double pants and sweaters. Came in at about 3:30, had a bit of a rest, then made the spaghetti sauce for supper and will probably have at least 2 more pkgs to freeze. Finished the page descriptions for the Danube album. Have the 380 photos pages to do now.

November 3, 2022
Sooke Reservoir is at 69.0%. Emptied .5 of an inch out of the rain gauge. It seems we are neither gaining or using the percentage of water in the Reservoir. We are to have another great atmospheric river by this afternoon, with some high winds. There was light ice on the bird bath, the water table, etc. this morning; so it must have froze over night here, despite what the weather app on my phone says. At 1:00 it is now up to 5 degrees. The humming birds have been around. The pansy orchid (Milt. Breathless Beauty) is in bloom with 2 blossoms (it has been in bloom for about a month now), the lady slipper (Philippencase Grace Ward x nancy) has a bud, the pixie minateur cattalaya has 3 blooms, the hai maria discolor (Ludisia discolor)has been blooming for a couple of weeks, and continues on. Finished Page 8 of the bottom of each photo html.(Step 1 of the Photo html) Starting to rain lightly at 3:30, no wind. More rain at 6:00 and no wind. This is good!

November 4, 2022
Emptied 1 inch out of the rain gauge at 10:00 and it is 8 degrees. Sooke reservoir is at 68.9%. Made the red cabbage with some for supper and pkgs to freeze. Very tired and had to have a nap right after lunch. Finished page 14 of the bottom of the photo html.

November 5, 2022
Sooke Reservoir at 68.9% despite the 'atmospheric river' of last night where we were to have lots of rain and high winds. When I went to empty the rain gauge there was nothing in it. The wind must have blown it over? yet it was standing upright. Who knows!! We had a few blinking lights but the power did not go off. There were about 145,000 people without power, that is, on the Islands, I think. It is a warmer day today. 8 degrees at 3:00 and sunny. I got some photos of the orchids, yesterday. Finished page 16 of the photo html pages (161 of 380 pages) I got myself thoroughly confused with trying to add the bottom stuff from the Index pages to the photo pages. Wasted a couple of hours and may have messed up a few of the index pages... actually found page 18 had no menue on it. How that happened I have no idea. Added it in from a previous page. Since it is only the menu, I guess it is the same on all the pages. O Well. I did get some other good stuff done... got my PayPal working I think. And confirmed my Public Mobility payments, I think. Did a computer scan. It took about an hour and a half. There is no files to be fixed. Computer seems clean. The anti virus updated a couple of days ago. Trevor seems to have put some sort of a watch dog program on my computer. Interesting. I have to be most careful of clicking on these wretched scam things. Finished page 16 of the photo html of the danube album.

November 6, 2022
There was quite a bit of wind between 3:00 and 5:00 am. There does not seem to be much water in the rain gauge this morning. The humming birds seem to have been blown to the next province. I don't see them around this morning. Doing laundry today. I cannot seem to find all the files that I meant to delete that were taking up so much time on the scan. It was web page stuff in the Godaddy file. The dates on that stuff are mostly 2022. I don't understand that. Deleted a few GB from that Web Page Godaddy file. I will probably not miss them. Finished page 19 and got the menu added to index page 18.

November 8, 2022
Yesterday we went to the co-op for groceries and lottery tickets. The sleet/snow was falling as we got back home at about 2:30. Over night it got down to -1 and there was about 4 - 5 inches of snow on the ground and trees. By 10:00 this morning most of the snow had melted and its 3 degrees at 11:30. Updated windows. A few more photos of what was left of the snow at about 10:00. I had to clean the snow off the humming bird feeder. Then the two of them would not let each other settle down for a drink. The Sooke reservoir was at 68.8%. I don't really understand why it is not filling up, after all the rain we have been getting. Am finished step 1 of the photo pages of Page 29 of the Danube Album. I see I need to do up April, May and June on the Gardening pages, after I finish the Danube album, which brings me up to where I was before I moved from Godaddy. I might want to use the silver menu after that, on all the new albums.

November 9, 2022
Froze over night. Sooke reservoir is at 68.9%. At 1:00 it is 6 degrees, but there is still some snow in the shaded places. Emptied the compost bin to the back old compost bin. Made 3 small blue pkgs. of pork and vegetable soup. Tastes good. The pork had been roasted with garlic and some sugar on top, so the slight taste of sugar is very nice in the soup. Finished page 33 of the photo html codeing.

November 10, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 68.8%. 7 degrees at 11:00. Saanich parks guys are planting trees in the deer pasture. There are going to be 18 new assorted trees from Loenholm over to Gerda. Had a look at the river. It is not very high yet. We still need more rain. Have Pat's lamb dinner cooking in the pressure cooker and the rest of the stuff ready to be done. Pounded the schnitzel and made crumbs for Saturday's dinner. Finished step 1 of the photo html codeing for the Danube album. Finished up to page 7 of step 2 of the photo html codeing.

November 11, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 68.6%. 5 degrees at 11:00. Watered house plants. Up to page 14 of step 2 of the Photo html codeing of the Danube album.

November 12, 2022
Sooke reservoir is reported to be the same: 68.6%. 8 degrees at 2:00. It is sunny day. Up to end of page 26 of the photo html, Step 2. Made up the cucumber salad, have the brussel sprouts, goop, and schnitzel ready to cook.

November 13, 2022
8 degrees at 12:00. sun some clouds. Put Bev's info on the travel logue page and the visit to Isabelle. Finished page 38 of step 2 of the photo html. End of Step 2. Last step is the captions for all the photo pages. Finished page 2 of the captions.

November 14, 2022
Sunny day, up to 9 degrees. Did laundry. Was out in the garden from 2:30 to 4:00. Raked fig leaves and put them in the green bin. It is about 3/4 full. Took a red sempervivum down to the pond. Set a few rocks into the back of the mountain. Made a spot for the semperviveum (this is a much small one than the one mentioned below) near the top. There are some of the bright green rupture wortes (umbilicus) growing there. Added a bit of gravel around the spot. It has roots so it should take hold and grow, falling down the rocks, I hope. Skimmed off the pond. I see that the water hawthorne has about a half dozen leaves, so it too should grow more in the spring time. I need to get rid of the ugly bog bean things in the iris pot. Had a look around the front little rockery and have found a spot for the big Sempervivum tectorum. This one might grow 6-12 inches. It is going to be put in front of the feather rock. I must build the spot up a bit. It wants full sun. Finished page 3 of the captions.

November 15, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 68.2%. Finished page 7 of the captions.

November 16, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 68.1%. Light frost last night.

November 17, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 68.0%. Michael angelo was in and finished the ceiling shortly before noon. It is too light, but better than it was before. Finished to end of page 11 of the photo captions.

November 18, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 67.8%. 6 degrees at noon.

November 19, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 67.8%. 6 degrees at noon. Froze lightly last night. I have the new humming bird feeder out. Finished to the end of page 18 of the photo pages html of the danube album.

November 20, 2022
Light frost overnight. The squirrel was in the oak tree this morning, hanging upsidedown to get the acorns. The oak tree has some gold in its colors this year. Eileen and Don had their 55th anniversary a day ago. 7 degrees at 11:00. The grey cup happens in Regina today. I need to get the green bin out, make the half time appies. I was up most the night last night. I am almost finished Jack London's 'Burning Daylight" book on my phone. What a rollicking good read with a happy ending too. I must return to it again some day. My pansy orchid is still in bloom and the lady slipper has 2 buds. There is something very fragrant on the light garden! Yesterday afternoon we went to the Lansdown Appliance store and purchased our new Asko dishwasher for $2027 with delivery, install and removal of the old one. Looked up the old dishwashers. We had 2 of them.. first one lasted 19 years and second on lasted 15 years. This one is supposed to have a 12 year warranty. We get delivery in a couple of weeks, maybe. Was out in the garden from 2:00 to 3:30. It was 7 degrees. I raked the magnolia leaves and filled the green bin for tomorrow's pickup. Transplanted the big purple seperveum into the front rockery. Made a spot for it by adding the big pumice, a rock with the red rock from on the deck railing, more clay to seal between the rocks a bit, moved the big rock over a bit to accommodate this rock. Then put the sempvereum in and filled around it with soil and chicken grit and filled in around the top with more chicken grit. Moved a flat rock to stand on its edge to make the edge of this pocket. I have another flat rock or two to finish the back part of this little front rockery. This little part might look like a wide spaced crevice garden. :) But it is getting close to the red flowering indigenous shrub (currant). I might move this special little shrub, but not sure where I could put it. Made the appies and watched the grey cup football game. Argonauts and bombers - good game!

November 21, 2022
emptied .5 of an inch out of the rain gauge. 10 degrees at noon. Was up for a couple of hours last night. My computer was on. I must have left it on after working on the Danube photo html last night. Watered the house plants. Did all the laundry. Finished page 21 of the photo captions of the Danube album


November 22, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 67.4%. We have had a good rain. Emptied a little over .5 inch out of the gauge at 2:00. Cleaned out the lazy susan area this morning, still have to do the counter top and under the sink. The guy phoned at 2:00-ish, and said that they will be dilivering the dishwasher some time between 9:00 and noon, tomorrow. Someone else will be installing it. I have activated my $5.00 LD extras birthday voucher. Finished page 25 of the photo codeing for the Danube album. Wasted all together too much time trying to find out the names of the horesmen on hero's square. scanned my computer. I have no idea what that Guru.net thing is and if it is something Trevor has put on my computer or what. It took 1:09:02 to scan. I believe that is less time since I deleted a lot of stuff. Says it found zero things. Can't find the log. to hell. took out the compost and cleaned up under the sink.

November 23, 2022
Sooke reservoir 67.4%. Warmish day. The guy came and took out the old dishwasher, put in the new Asko one. Did the ironing. Put the stuff back under the sink and counter top. I did not sleep well last night. So had a couple hours nap. Still do not feel very well. Moved the table on the deck back to its place. Finished page 28 of the codeing of the photo pages of the danube album.

November 24, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 67.4% so I guess we did not lose any per centage. It was up to 10 today. Made Gazpacho soup and froze 3 jars, have about 2 in the fridge and one left after supper tonite. Shopped out at Langford, could not find a duck or a whitefish or our Dempster honey oat bread. Finished page 30 of the captions on the Danube album. Sent Penn Streams a $10 membership. I still do not see the receipt of the $200 donation.

November 25, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 67.3%. Emptied .25 of an inch of water this morning. 8 degrees at 10:00. I have 2 blossoms on the Blc. California Girl x Sc.Beaufort (Pot. Lisa Taylor Galils 'Nora') Was awake at about 5:00 and emptied the dishwasher. It said it was on NORMAL. I guess I got it right. The dishes were nice and clean. There was a 4.0 earthquake just southwest of Tofino at 5:10 a.m. It was quite shallow the paper said. I did not feel it. Finished Page 33 of the photo codeing of the danube album.

November 26, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 67.0%. Light frost last night. The minateur cattalays (Pot. Lisa Taylor Galils 'Nora') is the very fragrant orchid in bloom now. The ladyslipper (Philippense Grace AM x Nancy) now has 4 blossoms. It is yellow with those hanging down, twisty things (sepals?) in burgundy, and the pansy orchid (Miltonia) is still blooming! 7 degrees at 11:00. There was a 4.9 earthquake near Tofinia early this morning - more info when I get it. I saw 2 humming birds this morning, so it looks like I have not lost one. Have finished the 2005 Danube album. Checked all the 05 danube, progress updated and so is Travel. All ready to load to my web page.

November 28, 2022
Yesterday to the VCCC 60th celebration, at that golf course in Royal Bay (the old gravel pit area) where there are very many newer homes being built. A lot of these houses are the condo type, and they all look alike. Apparently they are expensive and well built with all sorts of amenities. Good to see the people, food was sadly lacking. Of course, every restaurant, and other businesses are unable to get enough staff. People cannot find places to rent or buy for reasonable rates. We are short workers in everything, as well as the professional careers; ie: doctors, nurses, etc.
Today it is 4 degrees at 11:00. Doing laundry. Loaded the 05 Danube album and it worked wonderfully well. Started the 2012 model T Days album. I can use the incognito window with the File Zilla. Pat has taken the Last Lodge to BMT to get it repaired.

November 29, 2022
Sooke reservoir is at 67.3%. It seems to be filling up, slowly, at last. It is 1 degree at 10:30. We have had a light snowfall - maybe an inch. The snow is still falling, but it will melt as it gets a bit warmer. There is a wind warning for as high as 90 km/hr this evening. That is about 56 miles per hour. I have the slow cooker making a beef stew, in case our power goes out later. The heat pump on the downstairs moniters said Df. Pat swept the snow off the outside unit and the pump started up again. Brilliant, Pat. He took the car to the ? garage for some body work at 8:00 am. He has a car rented that they had for him. Not something he is accustomed to. We have coffee at home, instead of back downtown to Quonley's. I will put the humming bird feeder back outside now, as I just saw a little hummer looking for its feeding station. At 5:00 the wind has come up with some gusts, the snow has mostly melted and its probably frozen now.

November 30, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 67.2%. 4 degrees at 10:00 filled 2 humming bird feeders and put them. Am bringing them in over night as it goes to freezing. The high winds stopped at 8:00 last night. I slept quite well all night. Got more done on the 12MTdays album. Finished the 4 index pages and have a start on the photo html pages. Made sausage and rice casserole for supper. Downloaded and installed adobe acrobat reader. It opens pdfs.

December, 2022

December 1, 2022
Put the humming bird feeder out at 9:30. At 10:30 it is 1 degree. Downloaded November photos. Grocery shopping. Banking stuff. Vaccumed. 0 degrees at 4:00.

December 2, 2022
Finished the 12MTday album and loaded it, and it works. Started the set up of the April album. Printed the list of the thumbnails of the album.

December 3, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 67.3. 3 degrees at 10:30. Emptied .5 of an inch out of the rain gauge. Did up a FB post about the plant mentioned in Bill Mc's VIRAGS news letter of Nov 2022. The little plant he mentions is Kelseya uniflora. I had thought my plant might be a dianthus of some kind. I got 3 comments saying it was not a Kelseya, but it WAS a dianthus. Jay Ackerly said it was Dianthus simulans, so I will go with him. He put a photo of his attached to his comment. On checking the list of plants in the garden rooms, I find that it is already in there as Dianthus simulans. Maria Hendrix requested a friend and I accepted that. I was out in the garden from 2:30 to 4:30 raking leaves. Got the patio area and the front raked and picked up. The bin is full and at the curb. Put some on the plum tree area. Baby Pee seems to think he has to blow the mulch off that tree well.

December 6, 2022
Did laundry yesterday. Made cucumber salad. Sooke reservoir is at 67.3%. Did up the April album, and have to code it all. Light rain today.

December 7, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 67.1. Did the ironing. 7 degrees most of the day. F Watered and fed the house plants. Skimmed off the pond. Have finished the first step of the Index pages of the April Album. It has 22 pages of coding to do.

December 9, 2022
Yesterday I made 7 pkgs. of Ham and chickpea soup, with another for supper. Skimmed off the pond. Was windy over the night of the 7th - 8th but we did not hear it. Today I made rum balls. Grocery shopped with Pat. I have the menus added to the Index pages of the April album. The Sooke reservoir is still at 67.1%. We are getting some rain but it just keeps us even up for water in the reservoir. We have been in drought since May.

December 11, 2022
No rain in the last couple of days. I have made rum balls, been catching up on my gardening youtube presentations, etc. Brought my Alpine gardening club of BC membership up to date - $30. annually for December 31st each year. Yesterday I skimmed off the pond, repaired the rocks on the waterfall, cleaned out the pump filter. It looks not too bad now. We had big winds 2 nights ago so there is lots of leaves down again. Slept through most of the wind. Some people without power, but we have been ok. Our heat pump is working great. It keeps telling us that it needs its filter cleaned and Pat manages to get it going again. I have a boquet of fresh flowers in the big green vase. They are surviving quite nicely these 3 days later. Have some of the page descriptions done on the April album. My mmmmee.me domain is coming up for renewal for $45. I think I will let it go, as I have far too much to do with the cooking, housework and the gardening as well as my .com web page. Was out raking leaves from 3:00 to 5:00. Put some of the leaves in the old compost bin, the rest to the woodland garden area. Have about half of the leaves fallen from the front tree put onto the woodland. Have some leaves left to put on to the back woodland area. there does not seem to be as many leaves to collect this year.

December 13, 2022
Caught up on a lot of gardening bulletins, youtube presentations, etc. yesterday. Sooke reservoir at 68.3%. Hurray, some gain in the water level. 7 degrees and overcast at noon. Looked up the Bamboo farm. Nice website. They do planters, fences, gates along with their bamboo. Their black bamboo is 'slow' to run. True, mine walks. I hope to be cleaning the clump out a bit and down sizing it, next year. Closed for the winter. This is not the Vanisle Bamboo on Facebook. He might be in Courtenay. I cannot now find his post about all the tufa rock he has and his crevice gardens. Was out from 2 to 4. Picked up all the leaves (3 bags full) and put them in the back woodland area. The old stumps of the sumac have rotted away the roots and I am able to pull them out. This leaves a bit of hole in the soil but I can fill it from surrounding soil. So, the ones that Davey Tree cut down this year should eventually disappear too. Moved 3 flat rocks to the new little rockery in the front. Am making the very last spot into something that looks more like a crevice garden. I need a smaller cement paver to finish it, and put more soil under the last flat rock to raise it up to be the highest rock in the crevices. I have put some clay around the bottom, then a bit of the big pumice pieces with potting soil and sand next to that. I will add some pea gravel next and more of the potting soil and sand mixuture. I need to tamp this all down and let it settle over the winter. I need some stones to block the ends of the crevives as they are lower towards the front. The top dressing should be chicken grit. This part of that rockery will be in shade in the summer when the tree leaves out. I must see if I can get more pumice that is the fine stuff, instead of the larger white stones.

December 14, 2022
Sooke reservoir is listed at 68.3% again. Was cooler today. Pat has arranged to see Derrick from WhiteKnight painting or whatever. We are to have the ceiling in livingroom, dining room and the hallway, painted with a lighter yellow tone, called mayonaise on the Moore's paint example. This is a small job and we have the basic rate of $960. It might happen next week. I have taken out the plants, the glass things and cleaned out the little display cabinet. We have to take out that cabinet, take down the curtains and the pictures yet. I have cancelled my LinkedIn account. We go to the Horts Center of the Pacific tomorrow morning and get my membership card. I am paid up for 2024 I think. Take email notification with me. Must take the pots to drop off, also. Wikipedia sent email thanking me for donation but do not get tax receipt. They are in Washington DC. I see I gave Penn streams and have a tax receipt from July from them for $100. The $200 cheque has not been cashed and will take 6 months to be stale dated... February, perhaps. Francesca left them, probably about July. They have a whole bunch of new young people with all kinds of degrees. Well, five of them, I think. Ian looks really tired on the last video, they did. Did up some page descriptions on the April album.

December 15, 2022
Was 6 degrees and sunny. Were to HCP to pick up card and deliver pots. To lunch at Dakota Cafe (by Airport). To Broadmead to LB store, to Thirfty's and to Canadian Tire. Home by 2:30, so we got quite a lot done. Put away all groceries, etc. Too tired to go out to finish the little rock garden at the front and transplant the Lewisia and the creeping phlox. A few more leaves have fallen

December 16, 2022
Sooke Reservoir at 68.8%. Finished the page descriptions up to page 17 in the April album. Made the tuna surprise casserol after lunch and then went out to the garden at 3:00. It was 4 degrees. Came in at 4:30 and it was 3 degrees. It is to be colder for the next few days and down to freezing overnight. I finished making the last spot in the yellow wall rockery. It is done in the crevice garden style with only 3 standing rocks and finished off the back with a square cement paver. The paver is dug in a bit, plus has 2 grey bricks behind it. Put pumice rocks in the bottom, and then sand mixed with potting soil. It needs to settle. The front part of this rockery has settled quite a few inches. I added more clay to the cement pavers along the side and have the rocks along the top of the paver more level now. I stressed the roots of the phlox, dug it a hole with pumice rocks, sand and grit and a bit more potting soil in it. Its roots are covered with some little topping rocks. Added another red brick to the wall. The yellow topping rocks look more level now, and they slant slightly into the planting bed. Planted the new lewisia tweedy in the area just below the other one. After getting some of the soil off its roots, I put it down sideways with the root pointing slightly downward and into the bed. Covered them with sand, pumice rocks a bit of soil and grit. Covered that with some small rocks. Hopefully the roots will extend and this one, too, will survive. The older one is yellow and this one is pink. A bit higher up the yellow rock wall I transplanted one of the little red seperviums that I had growing in a pot with sand, grit and a bit of soil. All this went into the hole with the little red sempervium hanging over the yellow wall. I will need more chicken grit to add to the top dressing all over this little rockery. And maybe in the back one too. I have quite a few spaces for rock plants, now. I might have to go to a VIRAGS plant sale. I need to re-arrange a thin rock in the back newly made crevice looking garden spot. My saxifragias are not doing well. I think they need more light and need to be crowded together.

December 17, 2022
Sooke Reservoir shows the same 68.8% as yesterday. Slightly cooler day at 3 degrees at noon. We have had a tiny bit of rain, but may get more later. Finished the page descriptions of the index pages, so am ready to step 3 on the index pages. Spent too much time trying to find software to do my photo albums. Nothing seems to suit my old fashioned photo albums, so might as well continue with it. Vaccumed kitchen, my room, dining room, living room, bathroom, kitchen entry way, and Pat's room. Vaccumed and moved the Curtain from the dining room, after Pat brought it down. Emptied the dust buster and the little vaccume cleaner. Moved a couple of other things out of the living room. The painting guys are coming at 9:00 on the 21st. It rained lightly this afternoon.

December 18, 2022
Was 3 degrees this morning and slushy rain falling. Pam phoned this morning to wish me a happy birthday. We had quite a long chat. Then she made me learn to use the messenger thing. It is pretty neat. They all have it as they have friends and relatives all over the world that they can use it with. Talked gardening stuff of course. She is finding that she is very busy and the garden is always the last thing to get attention. Totally understand that. After lunch about 1:00 I went to take the green bin out. It was only about 1/4 full. I ended up raking leaves and filled the bin at about 2:30. The temps had fallen to zero, and the light rain had turned into little snow drops. Also the leaves kept falling. There seems to be about 1/3 of the leaves left on the tree. They did not turn the nice usual colors. They are green and yellow with just the odd one a nice red color. My little crevice garden area looks pretty good, needs more grit, sand and soil, with room for the topping stuff. Have done 4 loads of washing, so tomorrow will only be the bedding and towels. This is Sunday and Wednesday the painters come. It will be the coldest day in the week and then it is suppose to start warming up again. Pat finished his beef roast, I will make the mashed parsnips with ginger, riced potatoes and canned tomatoes for the salad.

December 19, 2022
Froze over night and some light snow. -5 this afternoon and snow. Pictures of the snow. Found out how to do the 'scene' icon to get night shots. Put the camera on the scene icon, tap the fuction button and choose the kind of photo. Maybe there will be more snow tomorrow, and I will try it. Charged the battery. Made squash soup and having it for supper with the left over chicken cordon bleu casserole. The hummming birds came to the feeder, but not very often. Have both feeders in the house now and will make up more food tomorrow. Pat went downtown in the morning and grocery shopped in the afternoon. We have the living room almost ready for the paint guys on Wednesday. We have 2 or 3 inches of snow. Finished page 12 of the April step 3 of the index pages.

December 20, 2022
Was a foot and half of snow down. Don't know what the Sooke reservoir is at as we did not get a paper for a couple of days. We didn't get mail either. Was out from 2 to 4 shovelling off the front step and the driveway. Pat can get the car out if need be, so maybe the painters will be in also. We have not heard from them today. We have the rooms ready for them and the driveway cleared. But it is beginning to snow again at 4:30. I am surprised that I could do all that shoevelling and now just resting my muscles. Must be all that gardening I do. Had a cup of left over coffee, with a teaspoon of honey, about an ounze of kalhua and a bit of milk. Was delicious with an orange and a rum ball. This morning I did a few snow pictures. Cleaned and filled the humming bird feeder. They have been around to feed despite the freezing temps. I have set the feeder up on the turned over blue bin, since the snow is piled on the water table. It is not quite dark yet and the hummers are around, and its lightly snowning with some great globs of snow falling off the tall cedars.

December 21, 2022
Was a high of -7 and the low of -8. It has been the coldest day of the year. Winter soltice, and the shortest day of the year. It is to start warming up tomorrow, but will still be in the minus degrees. And then on Saturday the 24th we are all above freezing again and it begins to seriously rain.... so say the weather forecasts. The ceiling painting guy did not make it...too much snow and ice. He hopes to get here tomorrow, and so does Pat hope he gets here. Sadly Bernice lost her husband Mike this morning after his battle with cancer. I will have to call her once she has time to process all the stuff. I kept changing the humming bird feeders today as they would freeze up. Now at 4:41 there is still a bird at the feeder. I have no idea where they go at night, but they are surviving. Finished the 3 steps of all the coding on the Index pages of the April album. Now I need to get the coding done for all 330 photo html pages, adding the descriptions, menues and changing the colspan stuff.

December 22, 2022
Painter guys were here. Worked from 9:30 to about 2:30. they a did a fine job.

December 23, 2022
Froze over night and got up to 1 degree by mid afternoon. At 3:00 the snow is slowly melting. The huge icicle at the dining room window is dripping and slowly reducing in size. Moved most of the stuff into the living after vaccuming. Pat is starting the curtains stuff. I have totally finished Page 1 of the April album. 21 pages to go.

December 24, 2022
It is 9 degrees at 3:00. Have finished the menus of the photo pages to the end of Page 5 of the April album. We have the living room all back to how it was before the ceiling was painted. The Christmas cactus is in bloom. There is 3 blosoms on the Lc (mini catalaya) Secret Love Hsinying. Gorgeous deep magenta. We have had rain. The 1.5 feet of snow is slowly melting and running away. The huge icicle in front of the dining room is about half the size it was before the rain started. Still too messy to drive on the street.

December 25, 2022
We have finished the dining room. It has been melting some more. But there is still slush and ice on our road. I cleared a little path of snow on the deck so I could see the pond. Glory be! The pump was running all through the big freeze and the hole is surrounded by some fairly thick ice by the looks of it. I did a Merry Christmas photo of the white rose of christmas plus added 2 other photos to an album on FaceBook. I cannot seem to figure out how to make them appear on the same post. Must look that up. I have the duck in the oven and all the rest ready to go into the oven in their time, now at 4:00.

December 26, 2022
Did the light laundry. There were some high winds, but they seem to have diminished by 11:00. It is 11 degrees. Emptied about an inch of rain out of the rain gauge. We had some rain early in the morning. There are quite a few leaves down. A few robins at the holly tree, but it seems the berries are not ready just yet. Lots of birds around the garden and the little forest across the street. Photos of a couple more white roses, but really they are finished. Swept off the step. Made up 13 cups of duck stock.

December 27, 2022
Made up cranberries. The Sooke reservoir is at 69.1%. 11 degrees at 1:30. Pump is running good. All the ice is off the water tub on the deck. I think the fish are still alive. Finished the menues on the photo html pages to the end of page 9.

December 28, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 69.5. Made the duck and veggies soup. 2 half pkgs. Its very rich from the duck stock. It can have more veggies added. My shoulder is still sore from moving furniture around in the living room a few days ago. Pictures this morning of the humming birds and there was the mother squirrel on the deck railing. Also took some photos of the waterfall. It is sunny and 8 degrees at 1:00. Finished menues on the photo html pages to the end of page 12. Took twenty minutes, was not rushing. Was out to rake leaves at 2:00 and back in at 3:30. Have the green bin about 3/4 full. Cleaned the leaves off of the rock plants, sedums, thyme circle. Was about 8 degrees when I went out and about 7 when I came in. The big winds that we were to have did not happen here. My arm is a bit sore, but will be ok with rest.

December 29, 2022
Sooke reservoir at 69.1 - I think this must have been a typo in the Newspaper where I get this info. Was a bit of rain today and about 8 degrees. Downloaded the blue box schedule and made a copy of it. Shopped at Tillicum/London Drugs, after lunch. My arm feels better after the good rest. Finished the menues on the photo html pages to the end of Page 15. Pat paid off the ceiling painters at apx. $1000. It is a very good job. Took out the blue bin for tomorrow's pick up. I found arrowroot biscuits in the baby's section at London Drugs, so I might make more rum balls, as well as the Pat's pudding. Ralph and Sandy's 50th was in October, and the whole family is celebrating that and Christmas in Hawaii.

December 31, 2022
Spent the morning looking at Facebook rock gardening stuff. I really need an new oxalsis adenophylla, and some Primula alloni - adrian evans, if possible. It is 9 degrees at noon. The Sooke reservoir level said 80.1%. We have had a lot or rain lately. Swept off the deck. Emptied an inch of rain out of the rain gauge. I am up the end of Page 19 of step 1 on the photo albums of the April album. And totally finished Page 1. I really need to get the dry stream made again as in the photo 47(?) on page 18 of the water garden, in the April album.

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See the Plant List page for annual Garden purchases

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Continue on to Journal Entries for 2023

Back to Journal Entries for 2021

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Welcome to the bottom of the page

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Albums:

January - we occasionally get snow
February - more rain, and some bulbs up
March - first spring bulbs blooming
April - rock plants blooming, grass needs mowing, fruit trees blooming
May - the garden is in full swing
June - lovely warm days of medium temperatures and roses in bloom
July - we need to water a lot in the summer as we do not often get rain.
August - the Fall perennials starting to bloom and fruit is ripening
September - harvest time in the vegetable garden and time to plant the winter garden
October - glorious fall colors and sunsets, fruit ripening and rains begin again
November - sometimes a lovely month with the Fall colors and warm rains
December - more rain, the garden is mostly greens and browns, very peaceful.

Alpines - I have a few small alpines in various little rock gardens around the garden
Animals in the garden The pond attracts wildlife to my garden. The deer do not seem to bother my plants as I have numerous herbs planted all around the garden.
Birds in the garden There is a small woods and a stream in the Park across the street from our garden. So, we have a good variety of birds in the garden.
Boquets - Creating flower arrangements for the house and for show is an
added benefit for creatativity as well as visual satisfaction.
Boulevard garden I have planted a little garden in the propery next to the street that is owned by the city.
Bugs - butterflies, bugs
Fruit and Vegetables - grapes, figs, pears, apples, plums, and vegtables
Indoor gardening - orchids, cacti, African violets.
Market - photos of produce or flowers bought at the market.
Mushrooms, lichens.
Moss Garden with shade plants: primulas, hepaticas,
Garden paths and Garden art - I have converted most of the lawn to gardens and paths
Vistas and Views in the garden
WATER AND JAPANESE GARDENING - I built my pond with its 8 - 9 foot diameter. It is surrounded by the moss garden with a Japanese garden design.
Wish List Someday there may be fences, gates and special plants in my garden.
Woodland garden - I am trying to establish a few indigenous plants in this area.
Survivors This album will contain photos of flowers growing in some very difficult places. They are generally called weeds but I think they have a special beauty and appeal.
MISCELLANEOUS I have made this page into a list of some of the miscellaneous things in the garden. There is always room for expansion here. These items may not appear on all of the menus, but only on this page.
Outline of the garden changes - This is the first page of a series of three giving a tour of the my garden.
A description of the garden rooms - This is the second page of a series of three giving a tour of the my garden, and showing the creation of the garden rooms as well as some of the renovations over the years.
Annual Garden changes photo albums The third page of the series will be annual photo albums of the changes in the garden for the year, beginning in 2009.
Excerpts from Garden Journal In 2012 I began to keep a Garden Journal on my Computer. There will be monthly notes from each year after 2012. When I first started my garden I had note books for daily entries, diagrams of planting beds, lists of plants used in the garden and the purchase prices. My plant lists are constantly changing so I have not been keeping them current. The Journal Notes will mention renovations.
Lists of the Plants in each Garden Room I have started to make rather comprehensive lists of the plants in the garden rooms. When a plant becomes well established I will add it to the list. If a plant should die I will make a note of it to up date the list. It may be a while until I get this finished. Posted on January 15, 2021.
This page also contains the annual PURCHASES and the annual Garden rooms; although these annual garden rooms might not be completed for some time.

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Annual Garden Journal Notes

Annual Journal Notes 2013 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2013 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2014 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2014 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2015 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2015 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2016 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2016 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2017 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2017 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2018 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2018 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2019 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2019 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2020 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2020 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2021 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2021 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2022 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2022 from my garden journal . See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2023 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2023 from my garden journal. See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Annual Journal Notes 2024 - This is the page of the annual Journal Notes excerpts beginning in 2024 from my garden journal. See the bottom of this page to go to the Journal Notes for the next year.
Outline of the garden changes - This is the first page of a series of three giving a tour of the my garden.
A description of the garden rooms - This is the second page of a series of three giving a tour of the my garden, and showing the creation of the garden rooms as well as some of the renovations over the years.
Annual Garden changes photo albums The third page of the series will be annual photo albums of the changes in the garden for the year, beginning in 2009.

Annual Garden Photo Albums

• Garden 2028 - Put in 202 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2027 - Put in 2027 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2026 - Put in 2026 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2025 - Put in 2025 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2024 - Put in 2024 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2023 - Put in 2023 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2022 - Put in 2022 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2021 - Put in 2021 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2020 - Put in 2020 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2019 - Put in 2019 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2018 - Put in 2018 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2017 - Put in 2017 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2016 - Put in 2016 stuff here. magnolia bed reno.


• Garden 2015 - drought, pond edges renovations,


• Garden 2014 - Put in 2014 stuff here milkweed, pond reno....Finished.


• Garden 2013 - Put in 2013 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2012 - Put in 2012 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2011 - Put in 2011 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2010 - Put in 2010 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2009 - Put in 2009 stuff here....Finished.


• Garden 2008 - Put in 2008 stuff here....Finished.



• Garden 2007 - Put in 2007 stuff here.



• Garden 2006 - Put in 2006 stuff here.



• Garden 2005 - Put in 2005 stuff here.



• Garden 2004 - Put in 2004 stuff here.



• Garden 2003 - Put in 2003 stuff here.



• Garden 2002 - Put in 2002 stuff here.



• Garden 2001 - Put in 2001 stuff here.




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Links:

(VHS) Victoria Horticultural Society: http://vichortsociety.org/

(HCP) Horticultural Center of the Pacific: http://www.hcp.ca

(VIRAGS) - Vancouver Island Rock & Alpine: http://www.virags.ca/

Alpine Garden Club of British Columbia http://www.agc-bc.ca/home

Victoria Orchid Society: http://www.victoriaorchidsociety.ca

Native plants: - http://russellnursery.com/natives/

Harry Jans informative site about growing alpines. His travels, and smug mug photo albums. https://www.jansalpines.com/

David Badke collection of mosses, lichens, mushrooms https://www.flickr.com/photos/davidbadke/albums/72157673563005916
This is a fine reference source of information on the lichens, mosses, and mushrooms found in my location.

MOSSES CO2 and NITROGEN FIXING

Fawn Lilies(erythronium)

Swan Lake Sanctuary https://www.swanlake.bc.ca/">

Phlox http://www.butterflywebsite.com/articles/phlox-for-butterflies.cfm

CRD natural gardening https://www.crd.bc.ca/education/natural-gardening

Saanich Native Plants - https://satinflower.ca/

Growing Primroses https://www.barnhaven.com/primroses/

Plant photos by common name: - http://calphotos.berkeley.edu/browse_imgs/plant_com_1.html