Friday Smiles 437: garden update (sort of)

 

It's Friday and I'm joining Friday Smiles which is hosted by Annie (at A Stitch in Time).   Let's visit her and the other wonderful ladies who also share their smiles each Friday.   

It's been a wicked week here.  First, my friend Joseph and his sons visited during a severe heat wave.  In fact, we had heat advisories for several days this past week.  Second, my bamboo is back with a vengeance.  It refuses to die, so every day I take my loppers and cut the bamboo down to the root.

My herbs seemed to love the heat.  I, on the other hand, did not.  The little green and yellow striped caterpillars that turn into swallowtail butterflies have eaten all my dill.  Three pots have been stripped to nothingness.

After letting the caterpillars munch a few days, this is all that is left of my dill.  Thankfully, I had already picked a lot of the dill and I have some tiny shoots that will go inside when (and IF) it gets cold.

The really good news is, I got tired of cutting bamboo every day, so got the heaviest plastic tarps I could find.  They are certainly heavy and will hopefully kill smother the bamboo.

I need to buy stakes to keep these in place over the winter.

Although you probably can't see them, there are grommets every few inches in which I can place stakes.  The other side is silver and this side is black.  They are certified to hold up under cold and inclement weather conditions, too.  They are both 40 ft X 12 ft (12,192 meters X 3,658 meters).  This really, really, REALLY puts a smile on my face!

Of course, I'll have photos of my friend Joseph and his sons just as soon as I've gone through the more than 700 photos I took this past week.  In the meantime, here are a few more signs from the Indian Hills Community Center in Colorado.  These signs are all thought up by the very clever Vince Rozmiarek, who has created them for over five years.  They have now gone viral and are everywhere on the internet.

And finally, one that is really quite relevant in the light of what happened in Afghanistan and as we remember 9/11 in a couple of weeks.

Now let's join Annie (at A Stitch in Time) and the lovely ladies who join her for Friday Smiles.  Thanks again for visiting and spending a bit of time with Bleubeard and me this Friday.  We would love to have you join us, too.