Hangin' With the Cool Kids

I graduated from Heidelberg American High School, in Heidelberg, Germany, in 1978.  When American kids graduate in a foreign country, it's a bit difficult to hold onto relationships or have reunions at the old school like stateside folks can.  We didn't really have a class alumni association, the Internet didn't exist until relatively recently, and keeping track of everyone was all but impossible.  With Internet search engines, sites like Classmates.com, and now Facebook, it has been possible to gather fellow Heidelberg graduates together from time to time.

Last night was one of those times.

A dozen or so of us gathered at the Zum Rheingarten restaurant about a half hour north of me, and we had a blast!!

There was plenty of beer, as you would expect of people who spent their high school years in a country where the legal drinking age was 16.  This was my glass ... I had to take a picture of it because I liked the way the sunlight lit the glass.  Then I drank it.

The restaurant used a dry-erase marker on a china plate to indicate our reserved table.  What a cool idea!

This is me, my friend Mike, and my sister in law.  It had already been a long, hot day, and I can see it all over my face.  I was SO ready for the rest of that beer, and a good German meal.

Another artsy shot, with a beer bottle and Mike's souvenir Heidelberg license plate.

The group photo, taken by our lovely server, as we closed down the restaurant.  (The guy in the red shirt next to me is my bratty little brother.)

Any time a group of Heidelbergers gets together, a party is sure to erupt.  It doesn't matter which class we were in, how young or old we are, or if we ever knew each other in school.  Once a Heidelberger, always a Heidelberger ... the bond is strong. 

(written by Hartwood Roses.  Hartwood Roses blog.)

Feeling Fragmented

This has been a very fractured week so far.  I have worked on a lot of things ... none of which was the blog. (sorry about that). 

Project #1 ... Weeds.

The weeds in the Rose Field are threatening to take over, and I had to resort to fairly drastic measures on Monday.  Poor White Pet is being held hostage by some huge yellow-flowered weed, and this isn't even the worst of it. 

The paths are paved with spurge,

and whatever this weed is,

It's almost pretty when you look at it up close.

I haven't been out weeding like I should have, because it's been horribly hot, and now the weeds have the upper hand.  But, I have chemicals!  Monday morning, I carefully sprayed herbicide on the weeds in the paths and between the roses.  Some of them have already started to wilt.  (insert evil laugh here)

This pokeweed isn't feeling too well right now.

Project #2 ... the Basement Bathroom.

When it gets too hot to work outside, I have been ducking inside to work in the basement.  The bathroom floor is all scrubbed and it looks fabulous!  I had hoped to be able to just clean up the cupboard that I bought in Lucketts, but it was a bit rougher than I wanted ... so I sanded it lightly, and put on a coat of paint and glaze.  The inside is now my favorite shade of turquoise!

This is just a tease ... I'll show you the rest of this when it's all finished.

Project #3 ... the Rambler Fence.

The ground underneath the Ramblers is covered with ground ivy, Bermuda grass, and some kind of wild sorrel.  All of this stuff spreads like mad, and the only way for me to get rid of it now is to use my trusty herbicide.  Before I can do that, I have to give the ramblers a pretty drastic trim to keep them away from the chemical.  

Here's Paul Transon after his haircut.  I like how I can now see the canes underneath the rose.

I was making really great progress, until I got to 'Francois Juranville'. 

As I was assessing the situation trying to decide how to proceed with this rose, I caught the attention of a pair of mockingbirds.  I assume there's a nest in here, because one of the birds squawked repeatedly, dive-bombed, and flapped me in the head.  This rose can wait until I locate that nest.

Add to all of this a fair amount of laundry, some grocery shopping, and a vet appointment for the itchy allergy cat ... and we have a week where I've done a lot of stuff, and I haven't finished a thing.

Raindrops on Roses ....

I woke up yesterday morning to the sound of RAIN!!  A good rain.  Nice, steady, gentle rain ... that continued until about mid-morning. 

Haven't seen this for a while.

Raindrops beading up on the new 'ride'.

The view outside, through the kitchen door.

A puddle!

Another puddle!!

A little stream running off the side of the driveway.

The rainy vista, as seen from the front porch.

Ditto ... view from the side driveway.

Didn't have to water the nursery pots yesterday.  Look how big the roses are now!!

I know the roses are happier now. 

... you suspected that I was going to end a post titled "Raindrops on Roses" with this, didn't you?

Happy Sunday, Everyone.

Flowers on Friday ... Despite the Heat

No matter where you live, if you follow any blogs that are based in the eastern United States, you have heard that we are experiencing temperatures this week that have approached, and some days exceeded, 100 degrees (that's 37+ for our friends who use the Celsius scale).  Despite the heat, and the fact that we have not had a drop of rain in over two weeks, some of the roses are blooming quite nicely.

Indigo

Odee Pink

In the interest of full disclosure, I have to tell you that I water my rose gardens using a drip irrigation system ... but not too much.  It's meant to be Mother Nature's emergency back-up plan.  I run the system once a week, letting it drip at the base of each rose for a few hours to gradually hydrate the soil directly underneath each rose.

Mrs. John Laing

Mutabilis

Flowers on roses in the heat of summer can be much smaller than those produced in cooler times of the year.   Others produce fewer petals and have a more open bloom form.

"Grandmother's Hat"

Druschki Rubra

As usual, the best blooming roses in the garden right now are the Chinas and Teas.  They love the hot weather, and they produce flowers continuously all summer.

"Carnation"

Comtesse Riza du Parc

The Polyanthas (a tough, work-horse class of roses) are also blooming full force.  These roses will be some of the last to finish the season in November.

Gartendirektor Otto Linne

White Pet

Though the Dog Days of summer aren't the best time to be in the rose garden, it's nice to know that there's still beauty to be found.

(written by Hartwood Roses.  Hartwood Roses blog.)

Don't Try This at Home

Our extreme heat for the past few days has forced me to work on indoor projects.  Project #1 on my mind is still the basement bathroom.  (No, it's not finished yet ... but I'm getting closer.)  I painted the walls and ceiling yesterday.  Yesterday's item on the To Do list was cleaning the floor ... the only original feature in the room that was fit to save.

What it looked like before the demolition began.

A close-up of the filthy floor.

The floor is encaustic tile (a super hard, matte finish tile, where the color goes all the way through), and it had every assortment of dirt, crud, rust, and whatever else on it.  To make it worse, the drywall guy didn't use a drop cloth, so there was drywall dust ground into the grout.

In this photo, I've already scrubbed the upper right corner.

Here is my arsenal of floor cleaning supplies.

You're not seeing things ... that IS a palm sander.

I tried the usual floor cleaning products, and was dissatisfied with the results.  The crud was really stubborn.  In desperation, I tried 220-grit sandpaper with a spritz of 409 ... it worked!!

Scrubbing the floor with sandpaper by hand was going to take WAY too long ... so that's when I grabbed the sander.  This is definitely not a suggested use for this particular power tool.  It reminds me of a teeny little floor buffer.

This is miles better than it looked before cleaning ... pretty good for a 70-year-old floor, don't you think?

It's still taking a while to get the floor clean.  There are paint splotches and drips from prior paint jobs, and other crud that requires scraping.  After scrubbing with the sander, the final step is to use a scrub brush and work the last of the caked drywall dust out of the grout.

I should have the floor all finished by later today.  Next step:  baseboard and door molding!

(written by Hartwood Roses.  Hartwood Roses blog)

Watering the Pots

I have more then 300 roses in pots, waiting patiently for space in the garden.  As hot as it has been so far this summer, keeping them watered has been a real challenge.

This is the temperature in the shade on our back deck as of 2:00 pm today:

About half of the pots live along the fence behind the greenhouse. Over the weekend, I had an idea to make watering them easier.

I am using my stash of parts to make up an irrigation line that should cut the watering time (and effort) considerably.  I ran a piece of 1/2" tubing down the center of the lines of pots, inserting a group of four feeder tubes every one foot along its length.

The other end of each feeder tube has a Shrubbler to water the pot. 

These little sprinklers are completely adjustable, so each pot can get just the amount of water it needs.

This set up will water about 180 pots, and it will cut my workload considerably.  All I have to do is hook up the hose and let it run for about 15 minutes while I'm doing something else.

Ultimately, I still have to get more gardens designed and built to hold all of these roses.  This new irrigation system will keep the roses happier, and more evenly watered, until then.  It will also make my life a bit less stressful.

I'll be hiding in the a/c working on indoor projects for the next few days.

(written by Hartwood Roses.  Hartwood Roses blog.)

No Flowers Today

I know that it's Friday, and I'm supposed to be showing you pretty rose photos.  I don't feel like being upbeat and happy today. 

Please visit my other blog, Greyhounds Rock Fredericksburg, and I'll tell you about it. 

Sincerely,
Connie