Flower bed and veggie garden update

It's been awhile since I was able to update both my flower bed and veggie gardens.  The veggie garden is sadly no longer active, but I have plans for that.  All I need are some helping hands, because I was really tired after I finished what little I accomplished on Saturday. 

I'll begin by showing where I went for my free bEARTHday breakfast.  I'll keep you in suspense, though until T next Tuesday.

I came home to change clothes before going to my next function, which was with my no-names, no-faces group.  I noticed how sad some of my earliest blooming tulips were beginning to look.

It wouldn't be long until 

all my tulips would be no more than a fond memory this year.

Last year, not a single tulip bloomed, so I was quite happy that even ONE bloomed, much less so many.

Although they are hard to see in the late afternoon sun, my irises are about to bloom, too.

They certainly blend in with the landscape, at least until they bloom.

My friend Angela pointed out the reason I have not nor will I ever have holly berries on my holly bush is because you must have both a male and a female bush in order to make berries.  Go figure.

 These were on their last petals, too. 

I dug up a good portion of my hosta on Saturday after I mowed the lawn.  I was going to move the drainage piece that had once gone to my "fish pond" I removed last year, but I learned it was screwed in place, so I left that for another day.

 I cut the hosta into three pieces, but one isn't doing well.  In fact, you can barely see it, but if you look above the "lre" of my watermark, you might be able to see it.  The other two, on either side, seem to be doing well.
 

Fast forward to Tuesday morning (April 23), and this is what I saw.

You may not be able to tell, but it is raining rather hard at the moment.

Two of the new hostas are doing fine, but I have my doubts on the third one.  The one on the far side of the drainage pipe is the mother plant.  I need to move the ugly plant stand to the back or get rid of it all together.  It is disruptive.

Some of you were here when I showed where I got wood from my neighbor's trailer.

 I actually was planning to show my unfortunate veggie garden, but got caught up with making art and showing how I actually recycle from my friends and neighbors trash.

Imagine my surprise on Tuesday when I walked outside and saw the trailer was gone.  Had I not taken a photo of the trailer early Saturday morning, you would never have believed from where the wood came.

I even tried to stand in the same spot to show where it had been.  My neighbor must have cut the strip of grass in between our two houses, too because I didn't do it on Saturday.

On Saturday after mowing, I tried to place all the bricks around the now defunct veggie garden.  I also cut the blackberry bushes back a bit, too.

Two of the four hay bales are now in the garden.  I allowed this area to go last year, since I chose not to plant anything there. It needs to be cleaned up, and made presentable.  You can see something is growing in my metal compost container, too.

Thanks for joining me today as I updated you on the status of my front flower "bed" and my now defunct veggie garden.  I am truly grateful for your visit.  I hope to take a day off soon and just catch up with everyone.

T Stands For "T"

Today is my bEARTHday.  I hope you did some tiny bit to save the planet today.  I saw on the weather channel this morning that Austin, TX is banning all napkins, paper, and cardboard from the landfill.  It must either be composted or recycled.  I plan to do my part, since I have FOUR compost containers on my property.  Restaurants must recycle their food waste, either through composting or donating it to human and/or animal shelters.  Speaking of animal shelters, today (April 22) on my original blog is DOUBLE KIBBLE DAY at Free Kibble.

I want to invite you to T Tuesday.

To begin, I have a major problem with our links.  Mr. Linky would not let me change blogs because I don't pay for the service.  Inlinkz has changed, too.  They have a new code.  I don't know if the code is going to work or not, so if it does, we will all be happy.  If NOT, we'll have to add our blog addresses within our comments until I can find a better link up.

This is another of those letters I found in a dumpster.  They were filthy and I gave them a good scrubbing.  When I did, I knocked off some of the paint sprayed on the originally black letters.

This is my altered "T."  I probably shouldn't have leaned it against another piece of wood I found in my neighbor's trailer. but it was the only way I had for it to stand up straight until I can add a backing.

This is my teacup I am using as my T Tuesday entry.

I recycled several teabags, too.  This red rubber stamp came from the Dollar Tree (where their motto is Everything is a dollar), which I'm sure is similar to the pound stores in the UK.

This beautiful stamp, one of my favorites, was sent to me one year by Valerie.

These flowers, recycled from originally being placed at my grandparents grave sites, scream Springtime, so I am also joining both Moo-Mania and More, whose theme this fortnight is Spring Fever, and Try it on Tuesday, whose theme this fortnight is Springtime.

A few close-up photos.

The tiny sprig of Eucalyptus tucked in behind the jonquil (or maybe it's a daffodil) is the only part of this floral arrangement that was not previously used at their graves. 

The teacup came from The Graphic Fairy (link found on my original blog).  I printed it on 110 lb card stock using my laser printer.  I then colored it using water soluble crayons.  The gold outline on the cup and saucer was made using a metallic gel pen.

For my final recycling entry, I first chose a letter I found in a dumpster.  After cleaning it, I added scrap paper I colored using either walnut ink (the darker paper) or strong tea.  I used three teabags, two of which I stamped, along with repurposed flowers from an arrangement I put together, then deconstructed, originally left at my grandparents' graves.

I tried to find a better place to display the "T,"

but all my surfaces seem to have wood that causes the letter to blend in with the background.

Now it's time to cross our fingers.


EDIT, thanks to Eileen, here is how to access the link:

https://fresh.inlinkz.com/p/bd08c37c431d4daebdc79e6038f78195 

in a new tab. 

In looking over the Inlinkz blog here is what they say YOU (aka, the entrant) can do to edit or delete your own faulty entry:

Once a link is submitted in an Inlink link party, entrants have the option to edit it or even delete it, in case of a faulty submission.

Entrants can edit or delete their own links after submitting.

To do that:

Simply hover over the link you want to change

An edit and a delete option will be displayed at the right bottom

Click on the pencil icon

On the pop up window, change the URL and the caption of the submitted link. Save.

To delete a link, click on the red trash.   The link will be removed.

! Remember, there is no chance to recover a link, once it is deleted. It is a permanent change.

The edit and the delete options are visible only to the entrant and only from the browser they that entered the link. Cookies should be enabled as well.

(Bleubeard and I sincerely hope this works)

Who, what, where, and why?

I'm not sure this turned out as well as I envisioned it in my mind, but since I spent a  lot of time working on it, I had to show it anyway.

Who,

what,

where,

and why?

I think it loses something without the letter W in the word, even though the "W" is the big plastic letter.   

I tried to keep the words colorful and the black "W" part of the background.

As I previously mentioned, even though I spent a long time on this, it didn't turn out as well as I envisioned it in my head.

The words were computer generated, printed on 110 lb card stock on my laser printer, then colored using water soluble crayons, a Christmas gift from 2 years ago from Cindy.

For Day 22 of 22 leading up to bEARTHday which is today, or Earth Day, I began with a large letter I truly found in a dumpster of a frame shop that had gone out of business.  I was able to dig out enough of these letters to fill a box.  None however were vowels, so I could never create a word.

The wood to which I attached it?

It came from my neighbor's trailer that he parked in my yard.

Thank you for following along with me on this 22 day quest.  I had planned to make a few brooches, but time got away from me.  I'll be back later today with T and a final recycled project.  I'll probably be late because several friends have a few things planned for me.