The Gas-Up and Around the Yard

A couple of weeks ago, on a perfectly beautiful summer day, we went to the Annual Gas-Up in a town called Gallupville, about an hour and a half from here. We've been before and we always enjoy it, but it's been a couple of years. Basically, it's a big field full of antique steam and gas-fired engines, good food, and nice people. I loved the laundry exhibits - we sure do take a lot for granted!

These are old chain saws! Needed two people to operate them

This is a steam-powered sawmill. They cut some nice boards while we watched.

A nice exhibit of old milk bottles.

This guy eyed us the whole time we were eating lunch at a picnic table.

Pete smiling and happy after sausage and pepper sandwiches!

We've had some very hot weather here - enough to keep the air conditioning on for days at a time. I remember that happened last summer too. It was so hot we had the air conditioner running all the time and hardly ever had the windows open. It somehow doesn't seem like summer when you can't have the windows open and smell the outdoors. But the plants have all been watered often and are very happy.

Stella D'Oro Lillies around an old wishing well.

Pete watering the vegetable garden this morning. We have flowers on the tomato and pepper plants. The cucumber and zucchini plants are really getting big, but we only saw the first flower on them this morning. But the plants themselves are beautiful - the tomatoes are almost as tall as I am.

Last but not least, this is a picture of one of the flower stems on my hosta. My front yard is full of hosta - probably close to a hundred plants. I went out one day and found a lot of the stems with this papery white growth on them. I've been told mealy bugs or leaf hoppers. I'm thinking the latter, because when I washed the white stuff off with a blast from the hose, white hairy looking bugs jumped off. On the gardening forum I quickly joined, the advice was to just hose them off with water and hope they get eaten by other bugs or spiders while disrupting the eggs they have laid. And if that doesn't work, use insecticidal soap or Neem Oil spray. After hosing them off twice, I definitely have lots less, but some come back after about 48 hours. I'm thinking I'll hose them off a couple more times and then use the Neem Oil on them. Does anyone have any experience with them? The hostas are such a big part of our landscaping that I would hate to lose them.

Hope you are all having a wonderful, healthy summer!