Memorial Day in VT.

5-27-23 VERMONT: We’re here, finally, the trip was a traffic nightmare, especially I-84.

The gardens are all busy with perennial rebirth. I am looking for all my plantings to appear and worry whether something is just late or dead. We seem to be pretty good, depending on some late sleepers waking up. 

I think we have trained Blue to the canine fence, but Judy is still nervous about letting her loose without supervision.

The upper pond has thousands of tadpoles. They have a tougher time in the lower pond with fish and turtles preying on them. 

One of the elms is dead and will need to be taken down. The apple trees are gorgeous--a Memorial Day regular event.

New blooms: ajuga, primrose, Virginia blue bell, columbine, lamium, honey suckle bush, water avens, star flower, golden alexander, trillium, azalea, apple tree, lilac, violet, bleeding heart, forget-me-not, tiarella, pulmonaria, spurge, epimedium, alkanet, marsh marigold, wild strawberry, Mohican viburnum, cowslip, blueberry, celandine, jack-in-the-pulpit, creeping veronica, buttercup, vinca, sweet woodruff, gill-over-the-ground, baneberry, false solomon’s seal.  

The apple tree by the deck. When the wind blows it's like snow.

Other apple trees.

The big picture, with an apple tree in the pond.

Bleeding hearts under the apple trees.

A few tadpoles, they're developing their hind legs.

A female rose-breasted grosbeak, not nearly the dramatic male I showed a few weeks ago.

Gray catbird, rarely seen at the feeder.

Mid-May II.

5-24-23 SHORT HILLS: We are off to VT tomorrow after weeks in NJ. I have done more pruning here, and we had Frank’s Tree back for  removal of a big dead branch on our locust tree. The remaining ash trees do not look healthy, I think they will need to go next year.

We have the first batch of new bird babies flitting around. House sparrows and house finches. They have been draining the feeders daily. I saw a house sparrow mom and baby both perched on a feeder while the mom fed seeds to the baby. The proud dad was hopping around on the bird bath. 

New blooms: purple rhododendron, peony, kousa dogwood. 

Peony, I like the single flowers more than the more common doubles.

Tree peony.

Purple rhododendron.

Kousa dogwood.

House sparrow mom on the right and baby on the left. The mom was feeding seeds to the baby while...

Papa was watching.

Brookline Re-visited.

5-20-23 SHORT HILLS: Thursday we drove to Boston for Maggie’s graduation from Boston U. with her MSW. The graduation was in the afternoon at the Hockey Arena in the heart of BU-ville on the Boston side of the Charles River. BU extends for blocks and blocks from Back Bay to Allston, mostly between Commonwealth Ave and the river. 

We have been to many, many graduations beginning with our own and our children’s and our grandchildren’s and now our grandchildren’s graduate school graduations. It is thrilling to see your child or grandchild get their diploma and, now, their hood, but boring to watch everyone else’s relative do the same thing, and the speeches—zzs-town for the most part. 

Afterwards we drove down to Boston harbor where Val and Steve are staying, admired their hotel, and then the five of us went to dinner at Lucia to celebrate the graduation.  

Judy an I were staying in Brookline at a hotel on Beacon Street not far from where we lived in the early 60’s when we were both BU students, Judy an undergrad and me in med school. On our way out of town the next morning, we visited the street where we lived back then. It is totally gentrified, we hardly recognized the neighborhood, but took pix of ‘our’ building. 

While we were in Boston, Lily graduated from NYU Law School, and Lucy graduated from NYU French Institute with a Masters. Lucy goes to France soon to do research for her thesis in Paris. Lily will soon be working for a big law firm. Maggie will be returning to NYC after a decade in Boston. 

New blooms: English holly, Japanese snowball, tree peony.

Academic procession in the hockey arena.

Maggie with Hood and Diploma case.

Smiles all around now that it's over.

Dinner at Lucia.

Judy at 34 Garrison Rd. Our apt was the middle one.

The front door to our building. That is my BUSM alumni hat.

Mid-May.

5-15-23 SHORT HILLS: We’ve had some days in the eighties—feels like summer. I have continued to do pruning and trimming, there’s lots more to do. I laid the flagstones that the tree crew had taken up, afraid that they would have damaged them with their heavy machines. Those three feet by two feet slabs of slate are heavy. 

I saw a Rose-breasted grosbeak at the feeder yesterday. We see them a lot in VT, but never before in NJ. The House wren is here and is singing a lot and has moved into the nest house.

Bill and Lynn were here Friday for dinner and to meet Blue. Blue seems to be fitting in with the pack very well. 

Thursday we go to Boston for Maggie’s graduation from BU with an MSW. The same day Lily graduates from NYU law school, and the same day as Lucy graduates from NYU with a Masters in French. 

Judy was at Newark BI today for her first dog therapy visit there since the start of Covid—many hugs and kisses. 

New blooms: hawthorn, deutzia, chokecherry.

Rose-breasted grosbeak. See one once and you never forget it.

The wren house between lilacs behind it and bridal wreath spirea in front. There are Rose-of-Sharon in there also, to bloom in August.

The house wren perched nearby watching the house.

House wren again.

Deutzia is very happy in the shade.

Charleston II.

5-12-23 SHORT HILLS: I promised pix of Charleston after we were there, but I just remembered that I never posted anything. Here, at long last, are some pix from the old parts of Charleston, which are filled with gorgeous houses and parks. There are government buildings made of stone in Greek revival style.  The area around College of Charleston has lovely houses converted to dorms and lots of old live oaks dripping Spanish moss. One unusual style point has the main entrance to the house from the street, not in the center of the building, but on one end, and it opens onto the porch. The porches are often two stories with elaborate moldings and railings. The porch ceilings are painted blue. Why? So ghosts will think that the blue ceiling is open sky and will not hang around that house. If you want to know why that scares ghosts away, you'll have to ask one.

Beautiful old tree at CofC.

Horse drawn carriage tours are a frequent site, and they're frequently passed by cars.

A stately house [they're all stately] with the porch on front. The entrance door is still on the side of the front.

Door on the side of the front opening onto the porch.

Another one.

Here's a variation with a lot of porch--a good idea in a hot climate, especially before AC.

Street number. 

Blue Makes Herself at Home.

5-9-23 SHORT HILLS: Blue is rapidly learning the routine and has been accepted by the older dogs. Judy is walking her in town now to teach her lead walking. She is happy with our fenced yard, and we are happy to let her roam.

I did some pruning here this morning. There’s a lot to do, the result of last year’s drought. Rhododendrons did badly. Most of the deciduous trees and shrubs did well.

New blooms: burning bush, honeysuckle, double file viburnum, chestnut, bridal wreath spirea, Carolina allspice, Siebold viburnum.  

The first butterfly of the season, an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail. Somebody took a bite out of the left hind wing.

The Dog Whisperer with three friends-Maizie, Blue and Blanca.

Maizie.

Bridal wreath spirea.

Double-file viburnum.

First rhododendron.

Leucothoe, more white bells.

Blue's First and Second Days.

5-6-23 VERMONT: The trip back to VT with Blue was mostly uneventful. She was a little car sick, probably nervous about leaving her home for her whole life so far. The meeting with the pack of three went pretty well, but she did run away twice. She came back the first time, and came to the car the second time. She ate and drank nothing the first day.

The second day was better, she ate some breakfast and then all her dinner. She drank water. She was OK with the others on several walks around the yard. She is much less anxious today than yesterday. Judy thinks she will be a good therapy dog.

I did a bunch of stuff today, I finished the pruning and hauled the branches away, I skimmed the pond and treated the two ponds, I put the lattice back up that was removed to get the heat pumps in place, it was damaged and will need to be replaced, we did a dump run this morning. 

Tomorrow it’s back to NJ, another new place for Blue.

New blooms: pachysandra, trillium.

Here she is--the nervous Miss Blue.

Blanca relaxed now, was even more anxious than Blue on the her first few days.

We woke up to this sky in Bangor as the rainy weather system was breaking up.

Later that morning, I saw a raptor on a dead tree from the hotel room window. It's an osprey.

Trillium, the leaves, sepals and flowers are all in sets of three, all equilateral triangles.

Star magnolias finally opened.

Two of the four painted turtles I saw today, all sunning on the banks of the big pond.

Bangor, ME.

5-4-23 BANGOR, MAINE: It was another trek, from VT to NH to Maine. We’re here to pick up our new retriever, Blue, from her kennel, Goldenridge, in Hampden. She was a breeding dog, now retired at age five, who we are adopting, and whom Judy hopes to convert to a therapy dog. We get her at noon and then drive back to VT, hopefully in time to pick up the other three who are boarding in Orford for a big meet and greet.

We did about 320 miles from VT to Concord, NH to Portsmouth, NH to Portland, ME to Bangor, all on highways with only one stop in Kittery, ME at Bob’s Clam Hut and the Mobil station. We usually stop at Bob’s during the summer when it’s jammed to the rafters, but today  it was easy to order and the food came out fast! 

In the last month we have driven from South Carolina to NJ and on to VT and now ME. Throw in a few days driving in FL and we drove the whole east coast except for Georgia. 

It’s still raining here, I think that makes a week.

This is the bird that Merlin and I think is an American tree sparrow. It's an iPhone pic which explains the quality.

Rain Every Day.

5-3-23 VERMONT: A low pressure system is sitting on top of New England and raining on and off, mostly on, all week. Yesterday I got  out during a dry afternoon and pruned the honeysuckle by the steps and started on the lilacs in front of the old house. There’s a cart load to be dumped and several branches on the grass to be hauled away.

Today the heat pump installation was finished, and Hillary was here for a walk around in the rain. 

We had a visit from a pair of mallards yesterday and a pair of black ducks today. They all leave as soon as they spot the dogs. There was an American tree sparrow at the feeders yesterday—a first for me.

We had dinner at Katie and Andy’s house yesterday. Tomorrow Judy and I drive to Bangor, ME to pick up another English Cream Retriever from the same breeder from whom we got Blanca. She is also a retired breeding dog who has had a least two litters. Judy wants another therapy dog. She will be named ‘Blue’—Judy’s choice.  

New blooms: alkanet, trout lily.

A female Mallard on the upper pond.

A pair of Black ducks on the lower pond.