I believe this is a drone fly. It’s still a great pollinator.

May seems to have been cooler and wetter than I remember. Or…maybe my rememberer isn’t so good anymore. We are almost through May already. My Colorado peeps planted their tomatoes this week because they think…maybe they are safe from frost. I remember the first summer we lived in the mountains outside Glenwood Springs. I plowed a huge garden in the abandoned horse pasture and planted everything I could think of. Rows and rows of corn, tomatoes, beans, carrots…I was an earth mama on a mission! I envisioned canning all this yummy food for my family and feeling self-sufficient. That was the dream. The reality hit hard.

I was born and raised here in West Virginia. My dad and my grandma grew wonderful gardens. It seemed like they just plowed and threw the seeds out, and everything grew. I was young and unaware of the hard work that went into growing a successful garden. But I was hopeful when I marked out that 30×40 piece of unbroken ground.

I think I planted everything in mid-May, just like I was told to. I hoed and weeded and watered incessantly. I strung tin pans on twine all the way around the garden. The folks who lived up the mountain laughed and laughed. Apparently, this was a West Virginia thing. In Colorado, they put up electric fences. Or frequent farmers’ markets. Anyway, everything was coming up beautifully. My tomato plants had little baby tomatoes on them. The green beans were flowering and would soon grow long fingers of goodness. The corn was up. I thinned the carrots. Things were going well, and I left Hubby #2 to hold down the garden while I took our daughter to visit her grandma in late June.

On June 23rd, my husband called and said, “I have some bad news for you. We had a hard freeze, and everything is dead and lying on the ground. I’m so sorry.” I was crushed. So much work…so much time…so much money spent…and for what? It was a lesson learned, and after that, I also frequented the farmers’ market. I might just as well support those who were successful at growing things in the semi-arid elevation in the Rockies.

After I moved to West Virginia as a new widow, I yearned to plant a garden again…this time in the rich soil and temperate climate of home. Life’s uncertainties kept me from that goal until Mr. FixIt and I married in 2018. We tried a garden just big enough to plant a few tomatoes, but the ground where we put it wasn’t ideal. After three years of failing, I figured gardening just wasn’t meant to be. That’s when Mr. FixIt built me a beautiful raised bed that I don’t even have to bend over to work on. We only have tomatoes and marigolds in it. I have rhubarb in a big pot along the fence and a couple of tomato plants in another container. I’m feeling pretty accomplished at the moment. It’s not a big garden, but we are in our early seventies now…we don’t need to be putting in a big garden anyway.

I took a walk through the pollinator gardens this morning with my coffee. The field daisies have bloomed, and the pictures don’t do it justice! Little polkadots of white sprinkled over the bright greenish blue of the Kentucky Bluegrass make me smile. I’ve noticed more bird species coming around since I expanded to seventeen pollinator gardens spread out over the five acres. House martins are swirling and diving all around. I must get a Martin house put up. Lots of butterflies flutter by when I’m on my morning walk. I left great swaths of white clover for the honey bees, but we still aren’t seeing many. Lots of bumble bees, wasps, and carpenter bees are out there, so things are still getting pollinated.

And here it is…Memorial Day weekend already. I hope you all are safe if you are traveling. Enjoy your gatherings and remember those who gave all in their commitment to protect the downtrodden of the world.

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And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling, 1 Corinthians 2:3

***Gratitude Journal*** Today, I am grateful for the abundance of beauty that surrounds us as we go about our work on our little homestead.