Sandy's garden in Solon, Ohio

For the Repas-Pacsuta Family Reunion we stayed with my in-laws at their home in Solon, Ohio. My DH said that it would be warm there and so I was expecting something close to Texas weather. We got there and it was a high 90's day, but it was NOTHING like Texas. We were able to sit outside and, yes it was warm, but it was quite pleasant. I very much enjoyed the weather while we were there.

The weather there seemed like Spring in Texas. There were flowers blooming everywhere. Their property extends into the woods. The trees are mostly maples and are full of birds. Sandy said that they had a deer with a fawn, but that it had been weeks since she had seen them. We saw them twice while we were there. Beautiful to look at, but not so good for the garden. Sandy has to usually fence everything off to keep them out of the hostas.

This bed has the Liatris blooming. They were just covered with bumblebees.

You can't really tell, I hoped that the picture would turn out better, but these flowers were just covered with bees. You can make a few of them out. I have yet to see a bumblebee in Texas. In fact, I haven't seen very many bees at all.

A close up the Asters in the garden. Sandy said these come back every year.

Finches at the birdfeeder.

John gong after the Japanese Beetles. He would shake them off the tree into a can filled with soapy water.

Szalonna in Ohio

The Repas-Pacsuta Family Reunion was held in Aurora, Ohio on July 19, 2008. We gathered around my SIL's condo pavilion and sat around the grill cooking Szalonna, which is Hungarian for bacon. A day for artery hardening, but it was well worth it!

Here is a pic of my FIL, John, cutting up the Szalonna for preparation for cooking for the next day. The Szalonna is a smoked slab of bacon on the rind, that is cut into small chunks and off of the rind.

Below is a picture of the fire getting started on the grill and then everyone sitting around the grill cooking it up. Before you knew it everyone was standing around the grill waiting for the next piece of rye bread to be done!

The secret to a really good Szalonna sandwich is to make sure that the bread is a good rye bread and saturated with the bacon fat and then placing the cooked bacon on top. Top with your favorites, in this case, we had onions, bell pepper, and tomatoes, and it is wonderful! This was my first Szalonna tasting. I can hardly wait for the next time.

I told my DH that we need to have our own Szalonna party here in Texas. So, I'm on the lookout for a good Hungarian meat market.

What kind of flower are you?

"You are a health conscious person, both your health and the health of others. You know all about the health benefits and dangers of the world around you."

Well, I don't know about knowing all about this, but I do tend to think of others before myself. Sometimes this is not a good thing. I do believe that it is important to think about what is best for me. Not so easy to do, but I try.

I am an Echinacea What Flower Are You?

This plant is usually found in sunny locations, but they will do fine in dappled shade especially here in the hot Texas sun. There are several species but they each have that unmistakable form. The flowers are arranged individually on sturdy, 2-6 ft. stems and long-lasting soft lavender or purple petals surrounding an iridescent red-orange, coned center. The leaves are rough, scattered that become small toward the top of the stem. Because of the prickly center of the flower one of its common names is hedge hog.

Echinacea is one of the most cultivated flowers for use for medicinal purposes and has been used as a folk remedy by Indians and the early settlers. Today it is most commonly used as a boost to stimulate the immune system to help us ward off the common cold.

An excellent variety for your garden and for cut flower arrangements with a vase life of 5 to 7 days.

Sunflowers

A few weeks ago I received an email from an associate at Keep Denton Beautiful about The Great Sunflower Project. This is a project designed for research into learning more about bees and where and when they are at work pollinating our gardens. To help with this research, this project sent out sunflower seeds.

Whether your garden contains vegetables, fuit trees, flowers, or even herbs, many of these plants must be pollinated before a fruit forms. And as the headlines for the last year have made clear, bees are under threat.

Very little is known about bee activity in home and community gardens and their surrounding environments, but they are a crucial link in the survival of native habitats and local produce, not to mention our beautiful urban gardens. Our local pollinator populations require our understanding & protection, and to answer that call this project was created to learn more about our local pollinators.

The seeds are for Helianthus annus. The flower grows to about 3-4 inches across on 3-foot tall plants.

I didn't really have a place set up for these seeds so I took the cinder blocks that I had in the corner of the house and set up a small garden against the back wall of the house. I've been getting prepared for an organic backyard farm and this is a perfect first step.

I planted the seeds and while I was at it, I also planted a tomato, jalapeno, and a bell pepper. Then in the holes of the cinder blocks I planted some alyssum, basil that was growing from seeds from last year's plant, and marigold.

I'm quite pleased with it. I'm looking forward to that first seedling coming up and am hoping for a bumper crop of bees to visit my little farm.

A walk around the block.

My exercise these days comes in the form of walking around my block a couple of times a few mornings a week. I leave my cell phone at home and just walk. I think about the day and mostly I think about my neighbor's yards. Most look like every other yard , but some have their own personality. There's the house that has a couple of wicker chairs and a table set right between to hold that morning cup of coffee. Everyone now and then the owner forgets to take the cup inside and I wonder if she got so caught up in the beautiful morning that she's running late for work!

I always look for treasures on the side of the road as I walk. One morning I came home with three pinecones that are now in my front planter. Another day I found a pillow?! I brought it home and washed it right away and it now graces my bed. I've picked up flower seeds and pecans. I found a dead dragonfly and brought it home to pin into a picture frame.

Another walk took me by the abandoned house that has wild honeysuckle growing through bushes and trees at the fence line. As I walked by, the scent of it lightened my step and my spirit.

Destiny - a matter of chance?

Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for; it is a thing to be achieved. ~ William Jennings Bryan

These words have always touched me. Since I first read them I have looked for the way to reach my destiny. I turn down different roads each time I go looking. Some turns are good and some are not so good.

The most wonderful turn I took was saying yes to the man that asked me to marry him. This turn in the road has been the most wonderful one in my journey to my destiny. It is a risk taking turns in the road especially when we can't see around that next corner. But I am so glad I decided not to care what was around the bend because I would be with a good man.

The turn that I took that wasn't so good - well, it changed a lot of things in my life. I took a chance on making some serious changes in where I was going to live, how I was going to make my living and I found out that it was the wrong turn for me. I ended up losing site of my own goals and dreams and found out that what I was trying to do really wasn't for me. I ended up very lost and feeling very alone. And then I ended up getting very sick. Trying to get back up and walking on that road again has been a challenge.

But this is the thing about destiny, if we don't go down those roads, whether they are the right ones or not, we are not going to know which way to go. That last turn could have ended up being the right one, but there was no way for me to know that unless I took the chance and took that step at the fork of that road in my life. This is another thing about destiny, sometimes we just know that a certain road is not the right one. I knew before I ever started on that road that it wasn't the one for me to take. I still left but it was for all the wrong reasons.

When we set out to achieve our destiny, we have to look close at what it is we want for just us and no one else. If we take a left instead of a right and find out that we should have taken the right, then there is no reason why we can't turn around and go right. There isn't anything wrong with that. If it's right for you, then that is what matters.

Here it is a year later. I told myself I would give myself a year to heal. I took my time and just let myself be for awhile. Stopping and taking a break from walking down the road of destiny is something we have to do sometimes. I'm glad I did.

The road of destiny beckons to me again and slowly but surely, I'm starting to take those steps and am ready to go around the next bend in the road.