I was sure the deer would eat them, they look pretty tasty!  I was pleased to see them welcoming me to the house this afternoon.

I was up at the house yesterday waiting for Sears to come by to take a look at the messed up stove they delivered to me and in the meantime did some garden work.  I worked for several hours pruning the giant lilac bush (still only about half way done).  Look at this lovely sparrow's nest! I was careful not to disturb it.  There was a huge frog sitting in the middle of the bush too just checking me out while I worked.  Later I got out the pick axe and dug about 15 HUGE rocks out of this flower bed and planted these beautiful Echinacea and Cone Flowers.  A really cute Chipmunk stood by watching me work.  Its amazing how unafraid it was considering how nervous they can be. I was completely exhausted afterwards, but I feel really happy.  Hopefully the deer and rabbits won't eat the flowers and plants before they take root.  Since there was no hose I'm crossing my fingers for a big rain this weekend!

One big step forward! Yucel and I drove up to the house on July 4th with a U-haul and my car loaded with furniture and lots of cleaning products.  I had to laugh when Yucel (driving the U-haul) got pulled over for a "random search" on the Triboro Bridge. He was wearing some silly orange sunglasses that made him look a little bit like a crazy Turkish Elton John.

The house still isn't finished, but its getting there!  

It was so lovely and peaceful to sleep here (except on Saturday night when the smoke detector went off for no apparent reason and scared us half-to-death!).

Our temporary dining table.

The kitchen counter is in! Its so beautiful, I love it. Its Corian, Glacier White. (The cabinets still have to be painted).  

The property is basically 3 acres of weeds at this point, but its beautiful.

We went to Home Depot for these chairs.  Yucel put them together and we lounged here admiring the neighbor's beautiful house.

Yay! 

Yes, this is really in my yard.  Somehow I didn't notice this last August when I bought the house, it must have been totally overgrown with weeds at that point.  I saw it today for the first time and I just had to laugh.  Its a classic upstate garden feature.  Oh and I saw this for the first time too. This is truly scary, its an open well, about 5 or 6 feet across, who knows how deep.

This will have to be capped off right away. Not only is it completely dangerous, its the ideal mosquito breeding ground. Its behind the shed and is sort of camouflaged by some falling down fencing.  When Ron told me I had a well back there I was expecting something about 1/4 of this size so I was totally astonished to see how big it is. The well is actually very beautifully made and looks quite old, so its too bad its just an accident waiting to happen.  It seems like it should be capped with some sort of stone or a slab of cement or something so that it doesn't rot out over time?  Any ideas about this are very welcome!

Besides the scary stuff, there were some very sweet daffodils standing brightly at attention and one of the apple trees had some blossoms on it. 

This lilac had these two buds emerging.  But the lilac bushes (I think 3, but definitely 2) are desperate for some help.  They need to be cut back so badly, I hope they don't go into complete shock when I get to work on them. From what I've read, the branches that go straight up on trees are called "sucker branches" and they steal all of the vitality from the plant.  Have you ever seen so many of these?

I'm so ready to have some time up there and get working in the garden!  The interior of the house is moving along, when I go up next in about 2 weeks I'm expecting great progress. Fingers Crossed! 

Things are growing in My Brooklyn Garden, and not just my plants!