No More No Mow May?

 

We recently learned that our town ended the No Mow May program due to concerns over lawn health, the administrative burden and complaints. Seriously? Who knew letting grass grown taller that 8" was so controversial or that there are actual "standard turf requirements" and the city has a Weed Control page. Even the squirrels are stunned.

Apparently, the cancellation happened last year, when our street was being torn up and everyone's lawn looked looked like the surface of the moon. At the time most of us were so outraged by the toddler in the White House destroying democracy that nobody even noticed the city enforcing the "Lawn Care and Weed Cutting Ordinance". Actually, I never knew there was one.

The last of the excavating was done in February. Why do projects in a timely manner when you can drag it out for months? 

Then the snow melted and things got really ugly. So far our ignorance of the legal height requirement for our lawn has not resulted in a fine. Maybe it's the "mullet" approach? Short grass in the front yard, overgrown free-for-all in the back. Besides, there really isn't any grass back there to measure.  

On the bright side, our silly two-tone crabapple put on a great show this spring and was a big hit with the bees. Maintaining biodiversity isn't hard when you have a very tall hedge and nice neighbors.

The weird pattern in this photo isn't AI, it came from the window screen which started showing up right after a system upgrade to my phone. Why do these improvements always end up making things worse? At least the fuzzy patterning obscures the power lines.

Dealing with all the construction issues and city ordinances and crazy laws is exhausting. There's a full moon tonight, which usually means The Crew are looking for something fun to do that involves decorating or thowing a party. This one happens to be a blue moon.

Unfortunately, it doesn't really turn blue and the whole concept is based on a mistake printed in Sky and Telescope magazine in 1946, but that doesn't bother them. Since it's a Sunday night and they didn't have anything else interesting going on, they decided to give the second full moon of May some totally unnecessary attention.

In folklore, it's a good time to harvest herbs and flowers for home remedies. Right now, there are mostly poisonous plants blooming in our backyard so that's definitely out.

Then the new summer lights for the backyard were conveniently delivered this afternoon.

There certainly were a lot of them and since the squirrels have nibbled their way through several previous sets, these have an extra heavy cord. 

That was definitely too much of a good thing and they will probably look way better outside. Since a blue moon is a rare occurrence and nearly over already, they decided to spend the evening checking out the new Halloween decor online. Maybe even brush up on a city ordinance or two.

Thanks for stopping by, see you soon!

A Springtime Ramble

Those of us who inhabit the frozen north don't get too optimistic about spring.

Those April showers can turn to something solid at the blink of an eye.

Then Easter comes around we start to think maybe winter might actually be over, which is a pretty good reason to party. Fortunately, there are individuals around who are always cheerful and ready to celebrate anything, anytime. A belated Happy Easter to those of you who observed it.

Thanks to a creative farmer at our local Saturday market we have Easter Eggs all year round. The colors are interesting enough and no messy dyes to clean up. I'd love to see their flock someday.

 A few days ago, on a dark and stormy night complete with lightning and buckets of rain, we thought, "it's pouring down, let's go out for dinner."

Anytime it's not snowing is reason enough to leave the house. 

This photo was supposed to capture the rain dramatically falling on the river but it just ended up looking like a wet street. I was reminded of Nighthawks, a painting by Edward Hopper, which has always seemed a little forlorn to me. Maybe it's those empty, mid-century tables against the dark night that are giving off such a lonely vibe? In reality, they were about to be pushed together and taken over by a raucus group fresh from happy hour. Not a sad story unless your were seated next to them.

The following morning our backyard was flooded but compared to nearby towns, we were really lucky not to need a boat. Somehow, the tulips and daffodils survived and so did all the bunnies. 

Burt was ready to do some gardening but that didn't seem wise under the circumstances.

Since there was no way those pansies were getting planted in the swamp, they ended up in the springoween decorations.

 

Who can't use a little extra color this time of the year?

Eventually, what goes up must come down . . .

and spooky spring has to be swapped out for Halfway to Halloween . . .

. . .  because spring has actually arrived and so have the Halloween decorations at Lowes.

It was a huge relief when our magnolia started blooming a couple weeks ago. During the street work last summer, it lost three big limbs to sloppy digger operators and worst of all, a lot of its root system. We are cautiously optimistic. So far it's acting like nothing happened but that seems too good to be true. At least the neon X is fading.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend and a wonderful spring!

and . . .

a Happy Birthday to Laura!

Thanks for stopping by, see you soon. 

  

March

 

It's been awhile since The Crew have made an appearance here. There doesn't seem to be a right time to put up a silly blog post while a facist dictator is terrorizing our cities and killing school girls in Iran. I have spent the better part of this year worried about the safety of my family and friends who live in the Twin Cities area. I'm pround of them, they've held up well, but having to live with an invasion of ICE agents murdering their neighbors hasn't been easy. There are fewer masked agents now but wisely, no one is letting their guard down. When we don't stand up for what is right, the assholes win.

Earlier in the month, our local art center stunned us with a subtle statement on the current administrations assault on migrants. Every other year The Paine Art Center and Gardens invites area florists to show off their special artistry. I have to admit it would be great if they did it every year because walking through rooms filled with flowers is always a welcome diversion at the end of winter. This year's exhibit in the art gallery featured the folk art of Mexican festival culture. The elaborate masks and dance costumes are on loan from the collection of The Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture in Spokane, Washington. 

There is a tradition throughout Mexico of creating colorful, handcarved masks and elaborate costumes to be worn by performers during danzas, the communirty celebrations that take place around religious holidays.

The masks portray a wide variety of subjects taken from religion, folklore, politics and popular culture. Everyone is fair game with a good dose of humor and a fair share of political commentary. The carving on this kindly elder is amazing, you can see him passing out candy as well as sage advice. 

Can't imaging what tales these guys might be intended to illustrate. Maybe there were some members of the community who needed a reminder not to stick their noses into everyone's business? This seems like the sort of exhibit that would travel around and it's funny and not too scary for all ages. I'd recommend checking it out if you happen to notice it in your area.  

In the rest of the art center (or what passes as a historic home here) the floral arrangements could only be described as profuse but naturalistic. Most of the flowers were noticably darker and subdued. 

There was a noticable amount of Resistance Yellow here and there. In the "Great Hall" of this Tudor inspired 1920's mansion, tables and chairs are set up by individual florests to show off their skills at creating tablescapes for special events like weddings. They're intentionally over the top, fantasy pieces but this year, among the half-dozen dining tables, covered with flowers and china, there was one was done all in black. Everything from the floor length tablecloth to the place settings. It puzzled me at the time but later I realized it was in remembrance of lives lost unjustly. There was trail of artificial monarch butterflies leading through the gardens from the mansion to the conservatory. They symbolize resilience and migrant justice but they are also our nation's only monarch. 

Next, on Pi Day, His Madness had to stand up for science in the light of all the funding cuts to research projects and education. The government has to pay for all those masked ICE agents somehow, they can't expect the billionaires to chip in.

In spite of the ire involved in creating it, the result was just peachy.

Now for something silly. Nothing says spring in our neck of the woods like big piles of ice blown ashore on the lake. Anytime we drive through the park it seems like half the town is out crawling around on them. To be fair, it doesn't happen every year and you can never tell how big they will get, but it is a sure sign that winter is almost over.

Three days later we got over a foot of snow, hello spring!

Fortunately, most of it melted just in time for the No Kings Rally! I kind of messed my sign and HM's broke but we showed up and that's all that mattered. 

This was the morning rally, there was another downtown in the afternoon. HM has declared himself to be the offical Mad Pinhole Photographer of civic events. It was one of those rally situations where everyone lines up along the street and hopes no one shouts anything mean while they drive by. That rarely happens and also, it was 25°F. so nobody was rolling down their windows. Lots of horn honking in solidarity, that's okay, but really loud.

There was the usual heavy police presence. The officer was kindly explaining to HM that it was okay to photograph him but he couldn't pose for a photo. 

Abraham Rochlin was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1917 and emigrated to North Carolina. His company eventually became one of the nations leading producers of plywood. I love a good sense of irony.

The officer may not have been interested in posing, but you can always count on a unicorn!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope everyone had a good weekend. 

See you soon!

Keeping the Party Going?

It's hard enough to give up the cookies and candy that come with the holidays, but then there's the dreaded job of taking down all the decorations and hoping they'll still fit in the closet. Facing the prospect of spending the rest of the winter in dimly lit rooms with all the life sucked out of them, I'm thinking, what's the rush? 

This year, The Crew decided to add a small, Christmas tree to the holiday decor in our kitchen, mainly due to an overabundance of baking themed ornaments that someone can't stop buying. We were all a little surprised by their choice of color but according to Burt (via Google), black trees symbolize elegance and individuality. They are a modern twist on tradition and can be a bold canvas for personal expression. He also may have accidentally selected black when ordering it. Whatever, it matches the curtains and is a suitable comment on 2025.  

The shipping was delayed so it didn't arrive until last Monday. Putting it away until next year would have been the logical thing to do but that was never going to happen. So, a unanimous decision was made to consider observing the medieval tradition of keeping the festive decor up until the second of February or Groundhog's Day or Imbolc or Candlemas - they all happen on the same day so there must be something special about it. According to legend, decorations left up after Candlemas will become possessed by goblins. That might liven up the rest of the winter a bit but we probably don't want to let things go on for that long.

Since they've committed themselves to the party going a little but longer, Ivy thought it was a good time to try out that white chocolate gingerbread cookie recipe she didn't have time to make in December. Maybe some mulled wine would go well with them and while they're in the kitchen they might as well get some decorations on that new tree, too.

If they can keep it standing up.    

While Ivy stabilized the tree and added some decorations, Burt gave Kib some assistance with the liquid refreshments. Some things are best left up to the professionals. Kib's version of mulled wine is pretty standard but he likes to make it a little extra, so he adds the fruit and spices to a bottle of port instead of wine. It's a team effort, he monitors the mixture until a wisp of steam comes off the surface, then has Burt to move it off the heat. In the meantime, Burt's job is to keep from wandering off.

When the mulled wine was finished he moved onto his next assignment as a tree topper. It's only a part-time job until we find the giant star cookie cutter currently stored somewhere is the basement. 

In the end everything worked out. Who knew white chocolate ginger cookies and spiced port would go together? All those cookie cutter and kitchen ornaments found the perfect home and the Crew got to add another tree, even though they don't think it should count since it's under six feet tall. As much as we would love to keep the party going it's probably time to start to disassemble the Christmas decor   because Poe's birthday is on Monday and that means Valoween is just around the corner. 

Thanks for stopping by, stay spooky and have a great weekend.

See you soon!

A Fruitcake, Some Snow and a New Fridge

 

We have been living in a state of perpetual twilight ever since the snow started to fall a few days ago. As much as my Halloween loving heart hates to admit it, a little sunshine would be nice. Autumn is definitely over if the snow is deep enough to cover the big orange X on our magnolia.

It looks like it's going to be a long winter.

So, we are going to need plenty of dessert.

The day after Thanksgiving The Crew got started on making the Christmas treats. Burt and Ivy would rather spend hours following a long, complicated recipe than be out in the Black Friday frenzy. 

So, they chose to make the fruitcake first because it has to sit around for weeks marinating in brandy before it's edible. That process also keeps a certain individual from snacking on it before Christmas. 

It's wise to check for any leftover pecans.

His Madness was called upon to expend the physical force necessary to mix everything together.

It's always a team effort.

By the end of the day they managed to produce this lumpy stump. 

Luckily, all that unattractiveness doesn't matter because it got soaked in brandy and wrapped up to spend at least three weeks in the fridge. What better way to inaugurate a new appliance (delivered less than a week before Thanksgiving) than by abandoning a fruitcake in the bottom drawer? 

That was the original intention anyway, Ivy let go too soon.

Both Burt and the fruitcake are fine, although the cake does outweigh him.

Eventually it landed in a safe place completely intact, and the marination portion of the process could begin. I couldn't pass up the opportunity to take an Instagram-type photo of the inside of the fridge while it's still pristine. There won't be anymore chances like that!

Hope everyone is having a great weekend and thanks for stopping by.

See you soon!