Tuesday, April 27, 2010

The joys of stormy weather

There was a lot of weather through the area over the weekend. Fortunately for us we just got lots of rain. The photos show what our yard was looking like after about an hour of downpour. Most of it was gone by later in the day. We've had worse.
The end of our yard. The storm ditch is full and starting to overflow.
We are on a hill so everything flows down and ends up in the two creeks.
Our back yard drainage system at work. Who needs a pool :) We do have to re-surface the blacktop at some point.

Friday, April 23, 2010

The story of two volcanos

Mmmmm. Iceland and Chile are quite a distance apart but both had volcanic activity that has impacted many people. My nephew (safe) is serving a mission in Santiago which is north of the Chilean eruption. That particular volcano had been dormant for about 9,000 years before it erupted last year. Some photographs taken then are quite awe inspiring. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-563975/Amazing-pictures-The-lightning-storm-engulfed-erupting-volcano.html

The Icelandic eruption hit a bit closer to home as John arrived with 3 Dutch participants from the convention he had been at in Atlanta. Like many travelers they were stranded till flights could be arranged. Originally they had managed to find a flight out of Nashville for this coming Sunday but John was able to find something on Wednesday and after some scurrying around to get ready they were off. We enjoyed having them stay with us but I am sure they are more than happy to be back home.

Photograph taken by O. Eggertsson showing the Icelandic eruption.
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/04/more_from_eyjafjallajokull.html

We took our visitors to Oprymills and showed them Opryland at night which is quite lovely even without all the Christmas decorations. Kris and I are going to return during summer break with our cameras and takes lots of photographs. They also drove around parts of Nashville and Bellevue on their own and we made an emergency trip to the walk in clinic.

The pollen is quite extensive this year. Nik's doctor has put him on allergy medicine and has seen a lot of children that are not usually impacted. Even with my medication I've been feeling somewhat "foggy" in the brain :0 (Does not make for good hostess interaction). I wiped down the book case in the sunroom yesterday and the dust was yellow !!!!!!! Last week I had to hose down the van.
We are making progress with scraping down the next set of shutters on the front of the house. They are a bit more fragile than the last set so we will have to be really careful when we take the sander to them.

The Music City Marathon is on this weekend. John has volunteered at it almost every year it has been in operation. The rest of us were supposed to be participating in a regional church event, part of it in conjunction with the Methodist church, but as of this afternoon that has had to be postponed.

Friday, April 16, 2010

Slooooooow progress

Almost everything in the left hand lower bed was supposed to have been dug up by now and some of the plants moved into the right hand bed. We are having temps in the mid to high 80's so I for one can only stand to dig in the dirt either early morning or early evening. I do have a temporary "Lucy proof" scheme in place on the new flower bed. Now she just rolls around in the plants that need dug up. BIG SIGH :)

Monday, April 12, 2010

Ground cover

Some of our ground cover is in bloom and we have not finished cleaning up the winter mess yet :)
Looks like this one has decided to grow up our side fence and wall instead of across the ground like the rest of it's buddies.

Gotcha

So I transplanted plants last week to our old vegetable bed and came home one day to discover big holes. We have decided to do-over and put the grids back down. The plants are dug back up and waiting in pots. John bought topsoil today (the bags say top soil but it looks suspiciously like mulch to me). So what happens. Luuuuuucy get away from there !!!!!!! Aaaaargh !!!!!! We shall see how things go once we have finished the project.

Friday, April 2, 2010

We Testify of Jesus Christ

During this Easter season we hope you each can reaffirm your relationship with, and understanding of, this wonderful man know as Jesus Christ our Saviour. As a family we are looking forward to this Easter weekend as we plan to attend General Conference. Having the opportunity to be spiritually fed through the words of wise leaders is truly a blessing.
http://jesuschrist.lds.org/SonOfGod/eng/?cid=wpats1