After 3 weeks of staffing conferences, we headed out on a much anticipated camping trip to Gov. Dodge State Park. It was even more fun than we anticipated. The best part of the trip for me at least was walking about 1/3 mile out from camp around 11:00 at night and seeing lightning in the distance to the right, a full moon to the left and fireflies everywhere else. (who cares that we were carrying trash and could have been mauled by ravenous bears or raccoons). Very dynamic.
Other than that, we had a great time with friends from church who came with us and got to do some great hiking, canoeing and water coloring (for Sarah)/photo taking (for Matt).
The only bummer about the whole trip was coming home to find that we left our refrigerator slightly ajar. Luckily we didn't have a whole lot of food in the fridge. Oh well.
Some of the pics from the trip are here: http://fpphoto.blogspot.com/2009/07/camping.html
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
My Zucchini Plant the Eunuch
As I've continued on in my gardening adventures, I've been very hopeful about a zucchini plant that's been growing on my balcony. I had lost the battle for zucchini in my community garden plot to some cucumber beetles, so I've had all my hopes riding on this one plant. To my dismay, half of the flowers that bloom have had no fruit on them so I've been cutting them off thinking this would allow the plant to put all it's energy into the flowers with fruit on them. However after about a week, the small zucchini fruit starts to wither and die.
Completely frustrated that I can't seem to grow what is the easiest plant to grow, I started asking around to see if I could figure out what I've been doing wrong. And I discovered I've been castrating my plant! Who knew that a zucchini plant actually puts out two flowers. One flower has all the female parts and ultimately produces the fruit and the other flower has the male parts and really is only good for pollinating the female flower (unless of course you like to fry the flower and eat it). So in other words, I've totally been castrating my plants...and my husband upon learning this has become quite concerned.
All is well now though and I have learned my lesson. Never cut off flowers from a zucchini plant. Luckily zucchini's are quite forgiving.
Completely frustrated that I can't seem to grow what is the easiest plant to grow, I started asking around to see if I could figure out what I've been doing wrong. And I discovered I've been castrating my plant! Who knew that a zucchini plant actually puts out two flowers. One flower has all the female parts and ultimately produces the fruit and the other flower has the male parts and really is only good for pollinating the female flower (unless of course you like to fry the flower and eat it). So in other words, I've totally been castrating my plants...and my husband upon learning this has become quite concerned.
All is well now though and I have learned my lesson. Never cut off flowers from a zucchini plant. Luckily zucchini's are quite forgiving.
Wednesday, July 01, 2009
Barbie Rapunzel
So I've been watching about 11 InterVarsity Staff children this past week during InterVarsity's National Staff Orientation. The highlights from the week you may ask?
1) Watching Barbie Rapunzel 5 times (I think I can quote it and I definately have had the sound track in my head the whole week)
2) Going down to the lake and watching people fish (these city kids were mezmorized and they could have spent the whole day watching these poor fish in buckets die and pestering the poor fishermen with questions like "Can you catch a fish for me to take home?")
1) Watching Barbie Rapunzel 5 times (I think I can quote it and I definately have had the sound track in my head the whole week)
2) Going down to the lake and watching people fish (these city kids were mezmorized and they could have spent the whole day watching these poor fish in buckets die and pestering the poor fishermen with questions like "Can you catch a fish for me to take home?")
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