The Bristow Blog: Saturday is Farm Day!

Mom and Dad came over today to enjoy another Saturday at the Farm. Today’s mission involved tacking our front flowerbeds as the recent rains (and hail) have rendered the garden too muddy for planting. We started the day at the Coachlight Restaurant for a wonderful breakfast with our friends, Marylane, Judge Joe Sam Vassar and his lovely wife, Marsha. From there, we went to look at some used tractors since our Farm becomes Green Acres after only a few days in the Bristow sun. We spotted a few possibilities, but the salesman was a bit evasive this afternoon (i.e. not answering his mobile telephone).

Unable to find the salesmen, we went on the Wal-Mart to select our plants. For the side bed beneath the kitchen window, we selected salmon-colored azaleas, a dwarf burning bush, and several hostas. In the flower bed directly in front of the porch, we intend to plant our Japanese Maple Tree alongside some large landscaping rock(s) with various hostas and nadinas. Beneath our bedroom window, we planted some beautiful hydrangeas as well as another burning bush directly next to the window. We also trimmed up an existing crepe myrtle nearby that bed. Hopefully, these plants will fare better than our initial garden planting. As we began planting the large bed beneath the kitchen window, we discovered perhaps why Grandad never developed that flower bed: It is approximately four inches of rich soil sitting nicely atop a huge collection of giant sandstone. We literally hammered holes through it with the spud bar, a tool Mom affectionately called “The Giant Nail.” After hammering our holes, Dad’s solution was to pack the hole with peat moss, my solution, to very liberally apply Osmocote. Clearly, we did both. Apparently, we finished our planting just in time for a forecasted freeze tonight. Keep your fingers crossed!

In addition to these beautiful plants, Mom and Dad bought Joshua and me a new garage door opener for our birthday. We had a garage door opener in place at the time of the purchase, but the seller’s shady son, in his campaign to pillage the Farm house, managed only to maim, not remove altogether, the existing garage door opener. Thus, his fine handiwork left it inoperable. Since we moved in, we have intended to replace it, but instead, we have manually opened the door each day, a very tedious task when you are doing it in high heels in the rain. Dad and Joshua removed the inoperable opener, pondered what it would cost to Fed-Ex this item to its would-be thief, and installed our fancy, and very quiet, new machine.

We finished a quiet evening at the Farm house with family dinner, cooking pork tenderloin and enjoying some fresh strawberries. Mom and Dad headed back to Broken Arrow a few minutes ago, and the clouds outside have lifted, leaving the night still and cold, the kind of dark you only experience when you are far enough away not to see the distant glow of the city. The memories we have and will share at the Farm truly remain as precious as the beauty of His creation in our flowers, our night, and even the wild weather With more Farm days ahead, summer will surely be here soon!