ONE A PENNY TWO A PENNY

One of the big treats at Easter time is all the different kinds of Easter candy. Some of them have been around for years and we never grow tired of them.

When my own kids were growing up, we used to wait until they were asleep and make up their Easter baskets and hide them. Those were the days.

By Jim Langham

My first garden was located in the remains of what had been a small chicken yard. It was the last week of March when I was a young child and my grandmother, who lived with us, asked if I would like for her to help me put out a garden.

With the place of high esteem that gardening held in our family, I was delighted; it was a real self-esteem builder. I could hardly wait to tell neighbors in our little hamlet where drawing well water from a pump, sharing daily with neighbors and putting out a family garden was a way of life.

It was after school on a balmy afternoon. Grandma had it all set, the process and the planting. I spaded a plot in soil that housed rich manure from having housed chickens, then broke the clods down and then, with grandma’s instruction, worked up the soil until it was fine enough to plant.

By Nancy Whitaker

ME AND JACK SPRATT

It seems like since I am older, it takes me forever to go grocery shopping. I think I am just going to stop for a few items and it shouldn’t take that much time. Wrong!

Now, since I am older, it takes me quite a while to grocery shop, as I spend more time reading labels. My husband has to watch salt and sugar intake. We both have to watch fats as well as carbs and proteins.

If I read a label on something it may be low in sugar and fat, but high in sodium. If I find a food low in sodium, nine chances out of ten, it is high in carbohydrates. It seems as if our diet and menu has evolved into chicken, turkey and fish.

By Kylee Baumle

My husband and I have had a vegetable garden ever since we’ve lived here, which is going on 36 years. Over the years, we’ve grown the usual fare; peas, green beans, carrots, radishes, lettuce, corn, spinach, beets, broccoli, but in the last eight years or so, I’ve tried to plant something a little different, just to keep it interesting.

One of the first years that I tried to get creative, I planted an assortment of purple vegetables. We’re used to seeing green veggies, but imagine a garden full of purple or burgundy ones!

We had purple-podded beans (which turn green when you cook them), burgundy okra (beautiful plant and fruits, but we didn’t eat them), red Chinese beans (a.k.a. yard-long beans), purple lettuce, and even burgundy sweet corn (just as tasty as yellow). It was a beautiful thing to behold.

By Joe Shouse

This past weekend I lost something very valuable to me. I guess you could say I lost it, but actually it was snatched away in the middle of the night and there wasn’t anything I could do about it. What I lost was something we all lost; it was one hour. That magical time in the early spring when on a very early Sunday morning at 2 a.m., like a hidden thief, the clock springs forward one hour and it becomes 3 a.m.

I know it’s just an hour and I know we get it back in the fall, but there is something about losing it that I don’t like. Maybe it’s the idea of getting less sleep on that particular Saturday night. I’ve tried going to bed an hour earlier to help make up for the hour I will have taken from me, but it doesn’t seem to work. Or maybe it’s the idea of getting used to the morning when the sun rises earlier or is it later?

And, in the evening when the sun sets later, or is it earlier? You see, it’s confusing. Why do I have to wait for seven months to get my hour back?

By Kylee Baumle

In that order, plant them. Potatoes on Good Friday, peas as soon as you can work the soil, but what’s with the poppies, you ask. They’re a summer flower, right? Right. But if you don’t sow the seeds now, you might get a scant crop of bloomers.

There are perennial poppies – Papaver orientale – the big, blowzy flowers you see sometimes along the ditch banks in May. These you usually buy as plants at the nursery, sitting them carefully in your garden because they hate to be moved, and they come back every year.

Another perennial poppy we can grow here are the Icelandic poppies (Papaver nudicaule). These are sweet little things looking like the darling offspring of their Oriental cousins and come in orange, white, salmon, pink and yellow. As perennials, these are short-lived, most times only lasting for a couple of years in the garden, so allow them to self-seed if you want them year to year.

By Nancy Whitaker

IN CASE OF EMERGENCY

Most of us here at the office are organized; at least we think we are. When it comes to our desks and work stations, it is pretty much up to each of us as to what we want on and in our desks.

Of course there are the necessities we have such as paper clips, rulers, tape, scissors and rubber bands. Personally, I like keeping those items out on my desk, so I can have quicker access to them.

Of course, there is the phone, computer, and file folders on my desk which are items I use every day. I also see business cards, pens, pencils and a stapler. So far so good.

By Kylee Baumle

Throughout the year, I attend various home and garden shows, flower shows, and other horticultural events. Some of them I return to every year, which might puzzle those who aren’t as passionate about gardening as I am. If you’ve seen one garden show, you’ve seen them all, haven’t you?

Not by a long shot. It’s true that I’ve stopped going to a couple of them because the time, energy and the long drive to and from the events didn’t garner enough return on my investment. Some shows are more home than garden. I’m there for the garden.

By Nancy Whitaker

PEAS PORRIDGE OR DEAD RINGER?

There are so many old sayings, beliefs and old wives tales which are passed down through the years, sometimes it is hard to distinguish fact from fiction.

I know there is probably some type of story as to how each of these old sayings got started, so I did some research on the topic. I was very surprised to find out some of the stories behind some of the old sayings so I thought I would ask you, “Did you know?”

By Kylee Baumle

I went to visit my grandma the other day. At 98, she’s a treasure and a pretty amazing person. Though she’s in good health, she lives in an assisted living facility now. She’s done her fair share of gardening in her day and several years ago, I sat down to talk with her about it. I was curious as to how much or how little things had changed over the years.

She was a young girl in the 1920s and that’s a long time ago by anyone’s standards, even hers. But some things never change, especially when it comes to the affairs of Mother Nature. Seeds get planted, they germinate, and they grow.