Gardening + Me = No Weeds!

I've spent a fair amount of time the last 2 days getting caught up in the garden. It has been wonderful, even pulling weeds! The humidity was lower this morning than it has been, an added bonus. The dogs accompanied me at almost every step. Max will leave me to chase carpenter bees (leaping into the air to catch them, mesmerized by their buzzing and flight). The leaping and cavorting only lasts so long until he is completely worn out. The carpenter bees are onto him and usually stay just out of reach. Then he usually will come stand by me wherever I am working and watch for spiders, toads, crickets, snakes, skinks, basically anything he can grab and make off with as a treasure. I have been working on him to leave the earth worms alone. He got hot today and went and stood in the sprinkler, Cooper followed, and then they both came to see me (shake off and drip a wet kiss on me)! Cooper is afraid of the lawnmower or any big noises: the neighbors were working on a noisy-engine car so he came to sit very close while I weeded. We have a bag of bones in the barn freezer from the last cow we butchered so I gave them each a raw chew toy, they loved that, and hopefully they won't bury them in the beds.

Dave is back from his trip to a friend's camp down at the Atchafalaya Bay (Shell Island). He brought home lots of catfish and stories of the adventures!

Max found one caterpillar on his own (got the pic just before he squashed it with his foot!) the other one I found on the back of the hop leaves (there were four of them hiding there). A white fuzzy caterpillar was discovered by the watermelon patch. It was on the top of a T-post and was one of the ones that should not be touched, lest all the fuzzy hairs end up in your skin. I have heard that the pain from them is excruciating.

We have been enjoying a couple of strawberries a day and look forward to the blackberries ripening. The vines are covered with fruit. The apple, fig and nectarine have fruit on as well.

Yum! The slicing and roma tomatoes are doing very well and are laden with fruit. The cherry tomatoes look horrible. The tips of the leaves are curled up. I will post a separate post about it, and hopefully to get input from you all.

The red roses in the pic are at the height of their bloom. I can't remember the name of them, but they are one of my favorites because they look like this most of the spring/summer and because they are easy to grow from a cutting.

Have a great week and a Happy Mother's Day tomorrow!!