Tag Archive for: birds

This past Memorial Day, my mother had the entire family (minus my daughter, Rachele, who is in the Navy) over for brunch to celebrate the beginning of summer.

As we drove up to the farm, we were greeted by the following sight…

Memorial Day at Family Fsrm

My nephews along with my son, Kai, were selling lemonade made from the lemons from the backyard tree.

Memorial Day at Family Fsrm

They had quite a few people buying a refreshing cup of lemonade, including my son-in-law, Jeff.

Memorial Day at Family Fsrm

Kai and the boys were kept busy filling cups with lemonade.  In addition, they also sold homemade jam made from the peach trees.

Memorial Day at Family Fsrm

My daughter, Brittney and Lily (my granddaughter) came over too and Lily got her first taste of lemonade.

Memorial Day at Family Fsrm

As we entered the house, we were greeted by delicious smells of eggs, sausage, fruit and cinnamon rolls.

I couldn’t wait to finish eating so that I could go outside with my mother to see what was growing in her vegetable garden.

Russian gourds

She was most proud of her Russian gourds.

Russian gourds

Okay, they really aren’t Russian, but my sister-in-law brought the seeds in Russia for my mother.  You can buy the same gourd seed in the US.

But, we like calling them Russian gourds because it sounds more fun and exotic.

Russian gourds
Russian gourds

Her pattypan squash is also growing well, above.  This summer squash is a lot like zucchini.  My mom plans on cutting it into small pieces and adding to salads, much like you would cucumbers.

sunflowers

Her sunflowers provided much appreciated shade for the garden as well as seeds for the birds.  My brother considered trying some of the seeds.

sunflowers

If you want to keep the birds from eating the seeds, you can place a paper grocery bag on top of the flowers.

zucchini

Lots of zucchini were beginning to form.  If you are relatively new to vegetable gardening, then zucchini is a great vegetable to get started with in the summer.  They are easy to grow and there is something so satisfying when you bring a large one inside.

My 2-year old twin nephews took some time to play in the toy front end loader…

Memorial Day at the Family Farm

Then it was time to celebrate Kai’s birthday.  He is now 11 years old.

Memorial Day at the Family Farm

His favorite gift was a ‘Navy’ hat from his big sister, which we bought at the Naval base after we saw our daughter graduate.

Memorial Day at the Family Farm
Memorial Day at the Family Farm

His second-favorite gift was a huge squirt gun from his grandma.

Late May is also the time that we pick peaches from the trees.  

pick some peaches

So my mother and I headed out to pick some peaches for me to take home so that I could make peach jam.

pick some peaches
pick some peaches

I love making peach jam and enjoying it throughout the year.

own peach tree.

The peaches, above, were picked from my own peach tree.  We planted it in January and I was quite surprised when it produced so many peaches.  But, I certainly wasn’t complaining 😉

Of course, I didn’t have enough peaches from my own tree, so I used those that I picked from my mother’s trees to supplement my own.

own peach tree.

When you pick peaches, use them the same day if possible because they are so soft and bruise so easily.  I waited only one day and already had some soft spots on my peaches.

My mother taught me how to make peach jam a few summers ago.  I blogged about it back then in “A Harvest Of Peaches and Jam”

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I wanted to thank those of you who left such kind comments regarding my last post about my daughter Rachele’s graduation from Navy basic training.