It's Time To Go

The movers are here and it's time to go to.......

Click the link below and I'll see you at...

http://pineconelane.blogspot.com/

Love ya'll,

Shelli

Goodbye.....The End......

Look who has a new sandbox for her first birthday!!

It is hard to believe that it has been a year since Olive Louise was born. And for a year we have been making the 5 1/2 hour trek to New Orleans to send time with her and her parents. Therein lies the explanation of this post's title......We are moving!!!

It really is goodbye to....

     our sweet Turkey Creek Garden home in Ruston. As happy as I am to be closer to the Jilberts,  it has been SO hard to say goodbye to my fun Master Gardeners, precious Sunday School class, amazing Bible study group, and salt-of-the-earth neighbors and friends.

It really is the end of...

     this blog that I started when I retired from the classroom and knew I couldn't go from talking to a classroom of teenagers every day to staying at home and talking to the walls. Blogging has been lots of fun.


We've bought a 1980s ranch fixer upper on 7 1/2 acres in Summit, Mississippi.

Yes, it does need help- lots of help!! I'm a big Fixer Upper fan and am going to try to pull off a complete Joanna Gaines makeover.

Then there is the property. It has two garden areas and loads of potential, but the home hasn't been lived in for more than a year or two, so the landscaping has run amok! Think leaves and weeds! My goal is to finish the house by the end of the summer so that we can get to the landscaping and gardens in the fall.

But all these projects will take a back seat to enjoying more time with our sweet girls and son-in-law.

To celebrate the new branches we are growing as grandparents in Mississippi, while still staying in touch with family and friends, I am starting a new blog! I will give you the link in a week or two, then let the projects begin!! I hope you'll join us there!

Love ya'll,

Shelli

God gives you a life and says, Okay, what are you going to do with it?

~Alice Cooper

The happiest moments of my life have been the few which I have passed at home in the bosom of my family.

~Thomas Jefferson

Every house where love abides
And friendship is a guest,
Is surely home, and home sweet home
For there the heart can rest.
~Henry Van Dyke

Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!

Psalm 107:1 

Bring Your Best Bud

Do you have a best friend, a best buddy, a best bud? Someone who is loyal and dependable, as well as fun and joyful?  Gardeners often think of the daffodil as our best bud (pun intended). Each year daffodils demonstrate their loyalty and dependability by popping up with little or no effort by the gardener, bringing fun and joy to our post winter surroundings. This year’s North Central Louisiana Master Gardener Spring Seminar will celebrate this special flower in an event entitled Daffodils: Bring Your Best Buds.

The seminar will be held on Saturday, March 4 at Lomax Hall on the Louisiana Tech Campus. Registration is from 8:00-8:30 and  the seminar ends at noon. The entrance fee is $15. The event consists of three components- guest speakers, an informal daffodil show, and a photo contest.

Speakers:

Celia Jones, a tireless promoter of daffodils, carries on the tradition of growing heirloom daffodils on her grandmother Annie Lou Holstun Jones’s farm in Bienville Parish. The farm has been featured on HGTV, in Southern Living, Fine Gardening, and other magazines and newspapers. Celia will share her love of daffodils with us.

Greg Grant is a county agent in Smith County (Tyler), Texas and an award-winning horticulturist, author, and garden speaker. He lives in his grandparent’s dogtrot farmhouse and gardens on his ancestral land in Arcadia, Texas. Greg will teach us about the best daffodils for southern gardens.

Kathie Rowell wrote gardening articles for The Shreveport Times when she was features editor there. Many of the plants in her Shreveport garden come from her grandparents’ garden in Ashland. Every day she writes about gardening on her website, Louisiana Blooms. Kathie will inform us about other bulbs and companion plants to use with our daffodils.

Daffodil Show:

Bring daffodils from your garden for an informal flower show. You don’t have to know the name of your daffodil variety, just bring your beautiful buds. Bring them in a small vase, recycled jar from your kitchen, or just a wet paper towel! The flowers will be arranged into groups that can be enjoyed during the intermission. What a great opportunity to learn more about the wide variety of daffodils from fellow gardeners! Members of the American Daffodil Society will be on hand in case you want to become a member.

Photo Contest:

Bring a picture of your daffodils (or other spring bulbs) and enter them in the photo contest. Photos should be 5x7 or 8x10 in size and matted with a simple white mat. Your name and phone number should be printed on the back of the mat. Prizes will be awarded!

Along with speakers, a flower show, and a photo contest, the morning will also include coffee, refreshments, door prizes, and a raffle! Whew….by noon everyone should be convinced that the daffodil is truly a gardener’s best bud!! But wait! There’s more!! The Master Gardeners planned their seminar to coincide with the Jonquil Jubilee held right next door in Gibsland, Louisiana, so that after a morning of daffodil inspiration, you can drive over and see fields of these beautiful flowers in their natural habitats.

Bring your best bud to the NCLaMG Spring Seminar; your other buds will meet you there!

Sunday Schoolisms Plus #30: With Every Choice

People often think of Christian morality as a kind of bargain in which God says, "If you keep a lot of rules I'll reward you, and if you don't I'll do the other thing."

I do not think that is the best way of looking at it. I would much rather say that every time you make a choice you are turning the central part of you, the part of you that chooses, into something a little different from what it was before.  And taking your life as a whole, with all your innumerable choices, all your life long you are slowly turning this central thing either into a heavenly creature or into a hellish creature: either into a creature that is in harmony with God, and with other creatures, and with itself, or else into one that is in a state of war and hatred with God, and with it fellow-creatures, and with its self. To be the one kind of creature is heaven: that is, it is joy and peace and knowledge and power. To be the other means madness, horror, idiocy, rage, impotence, and eternal loneliness. Each of us at each moment is progressing to the one state or the other.

                                                                                   C. S. Lewis
                                                                                   -from Mere Christianity

New Year Resolutions for the Gardener

Are you a resolution maker?

Are you a resolution keeper?

Oprah Winfrey says the New Year is “another chance for us to get it right.” Here are some gardening resolutions to head you in the right direction for the new year.

1.       Adopt a “Why Not?” attitude.  Daylilies need sun, hostas need shade, and bamboo will take over your yard. There are some fixed rules in gardening, but never let that stop you from experimenting!! Your garden is your garden, and if you always wanted a beautiful patch of daffodils, but assumed you didn’t have enough sun, plant a few and find out! Why not?! There’s not a gardener I know that doesn’t have a story of an improbable success.

2.       Keep a gardening journal. Was Edmund Burke a gardener? He said,” Those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it.” That is exactly what will happen to you if you don’t write down how that new variety of tomatoes you tried last summer didn’t produce worth a flip, or if you don’t order your favorite daffodil bulbs by a certain date they will sell out, or how beautiful your roses were this November after switching to that new organic granular fertilizer in August! And with your new “why not?” attitude you will definitely have successes and failures to record in your journal!

3.       Add the LSU Ag Center website to your favorites. A wealth of gardening knowledge specific to our location is just a click away! Visit the LSU Ag Center site for information on landscaping, flowers, fruits and nuts, vegetables, equipment, and more. The list of Louisiana Super plants, plants that have been tested at the center and selected for reliability and superior performance under Louisiana growing conditions, is invaluable. But my favorite component of this site is the articles by consumer horticulture specialist Dan Gill; his wit and knowledge are priceless.

4.       Test your soil.  Drive to the new location of the LSU Ag Center here in Ruston at 307 North Homer (aka the old Temple Baptist Church building, aka the Police Jury Complex), and ask for a soil test kit. The directions are easy to follow, the cost is about $15, and the results will tell you exactly what you need to add to your soil. Good soil equals good gardening!!

5.       Grow something edible. There are so many ‘food movements’ taking place in the world today- Urban Gardening, Farm-to-Table, school gardening, Guerrilla Gardening, Grow Your Own, farmer’s markets, and the list goes on. Resolve to become a part of it! You don’t need a vegetable garden to participate- grow your edibles in pots or a couple of hay bales, or let a squash sneak around in your flower bed. Just grow something you can eat!

6.       Plant at least one pollinator friendly plant. Fulfill your responsibility to the environment by planting a plant that supports our local pollinators. You can choose a tree, shrub, vine, or flower, but resolve to plant at least one this year. A list of pollinator friendly plants for our region can be found at www.pollinator.org.  This is important!

7.       Don’t commit crape murder.   Crapemyrtles do not require pruning beyond removing the suckers at the bottom, but if you insist, you can prune your crapemyrtles without murdering them and destroying their natural growth pattern. More importantly, you don’t have to be in a hurry to do anything to them!! If you will just hold your horses, our winter birds, such as the gold finch, will feed off the trees’ seed pods. In February, we will post a video on our Facebook page (North Central Louisiana Master Gardeners) showing the correct way to prune crapemyrtles.

Happy gardening in 2017.

Happy New Year!!!!

Happy New Year!

Then out through the gates of the midnight—
      The door of the past was ajar—
      His robe like a shroud wrapped around him,
      The Old Year vanished afar.
And as morn with her soft rosy fingers
      Flung open the gates of the East,
      The New Year looked out from its chambers
      With a smile and a blessing of peace.
~Eliza A. Wetherby Otis

At This Year's End

There’s a fire burning outside my window

With leaves of red, orange, and gold.

There’s a fire burning outside my window

That tells me the year has grown old.

There is a coldness in the morning air

Bare limbs mark the pale blue sky.

Fruits and flowers of the summer fair,

Have withered brown and finally died.

And I am melancholy, heart and soul

Paralyzed by this year’s regrets, mistakes.

I cannot shake their strong grip and hold

Mired down in doubt, with time too late.

But with Christmas and Christ’s sweet birth

Comes the chance to start all things anew.

With His forgiveness, love, and worth

The old year I can bid adieu.

Lord, do not leave me; hold me tight

And by Thy mercies guide my steps

Into this new year, dark as night

Made crystal clear by Your precepts.

And when the fire outside my window

Burns again at this year’s end

Help me with certainty to know

I was in your path, your purpose, dear Lord, Amen.

Love ya'll,

Shelli