April 26, 2007
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The Hummingbirds are back !!!!!
The hubby and I were having our morning coffee on the deck in back this morning, as usual. I had just stepped back inside to refill my cup when I heard this loud HISS coming from the hubby. He says….quick…..come here…we have a hummingbird at the feeder. Lo and behold, a pretty little ruby- throat was perched and eating the bright red syrup *grin*
I was ecstatic! I just love to watch them feed. Most of last summer was made so much more interesting because of them and their different personalities. We had one that was a bit of a bully. I think he (or she….not sure since the colors were kind of dull…black, gray and white) God made the males of the species very colorful and left the poor females with just personalities …. LOL In the early evening hours, a teeny, tiny little gray and white one (it could not have been more than an inch-and-a-half tall) came by too feed and look us over. It was so adorable. I am just glad to know that life has resumed it’s cycle and they are back. *grin*
We are supposed to be getting a hellacious storm tonight. The skies are thick with clouds and the air feels humid so I guess sometime in the next couple of hours we will get the rain we so badly need. It produced tornadoes in Texas and Louisiana but most of the fury is supposed to have passed when it hits us.
The hubby quickly planted his new pink dogwood tree so it will get all the benefits of a natural rain. His trees are all doing well so who am I to say?
He has suddenly gotten *into* flowers. He brought home another (his fifth ) basket of flowers. The prerequisite is that they have to be in bloom and colorful. His latest acquisition is this beautiful red flower. I asked him what it was and he said to me….red. He’s a man….what else can I say? We have these metal things that look like shepherds hooks placed here and there around the house and hanging baskets on the hook parts. Right now they are all sitting on the deck, partially sheltered, because the rain we are getting is also supposed to have wind gusts up to 50mph. I wondered if he was paying attention but I guess he was.
What really strikes me is how *agricultural* the Beast has become in the last 10 years. It started with the house we bought in Ft Lauderdale after all the kids were gone…..the BIG one. We had a half acre lot and he suddenly started planting fruit trees. We had several varieties of oranges, two or three different limes and lemons…even a PINK lemon tree ! I didn’t know there WAS such a thing until we had two of them growing in our yard. I assumed someone just added the pink color to the powder for making the instant stuff……..but the fruit looks like small striped watermelons and is definitely pink inside. Amazing !
Now that we are living in a non-tropical area, we have apple, cherry and peach trees the Beast has planted. He did his online research and we have all the varieties necessary for them to reproduce. I had no clue that crabapple trees are pollinators for regular apples, did you? I also know that we have three different varieties of cherry trees because two of them are good for making pies and the third is a good eating cherry and necessary to pollinate the other two. **laughing**
The Beast found the pictures he took last year when he found the house and I wasn’t with him. We were kind of amazed at how different it looks less than a year later. The grass has grown and covered what were bare spots last summer and I am not counting the addition of the trees. I did tell the hubby that our house needs some color. It ‘s just WHITE. I would love to put shutters next to the windows to decorate it kind of like we did on our house in California but we have ONE window it won’t work on so that’s out. *frown* We will have to settle for painting the window frames and the gutter I think.
We have thermoframe windows. The kind where it looks like you have these little square panels but they are actually INSIDE the windows. Makes it easy for cleaning but if you WANTED to paint the little strips, forget it. At least it helps keep the house nice and toasty in the winter and cool in the summer. Very efficient. I also notice that it seems to block a lot of the sound of storms. I hadn’t considered that. I always loved the sound of a good thunderstorm at night. Now I don’t even hear it unless it’s accompanied by some window rattling lightning AND thunder. I got up one early morning last year to go out on the deck for a smoke and discovered we were having a major storm. Shocking to say the least. I ended up in the garage but I DID open up the door to enjoy the storms fury.
Whoooo hooooo…..our storm has started here !!! The wind and rain is audible since I have the window in my computer room (actually the third bedroom ) open. I am going to close now and make an attempt at enjoying it. I will haul a kitchen chair over to the back door and sit there with the door open.
Have a great day and enjoy life.
