Weather Man Be Nice, Planting Season is Approaching

It's pretty sad when the biggest topic of the day is the weather.  We have almost made it!  It's April 3rd, right after Easter!  This past Winter was one out of my wish list for Winter weather.  We had just a few snowfalls that needed to be shoveled.

The rest of the season was handled by salt pellets of some sort or another to melt the little bits of snowfall.  Because of the cold weather and the snow being so light, I was able to clear a path on my sidewalk with my leaf blower for some of the storms.  There were hardly any ice days of which to speak.  I had to buy an extra supply of calcium chloride.  What I had left over from last year came with tiny pellets of black substances such as ash.  Not only did I need to clear off the snow, when it was all over I had to clear the black pellets off my sidewalk.

I'm am attempting to move on to Spring and Spring subjects, but again the forecasters came in with their scare tactics.  Punxsutawney Phil predicted six more weeks of winter and he was so right. True, the counties East of Pittsburgh are expected to get early snow but we here in the Burgh should dodge the ball and get more rain rain with snowflakes in the air.  The snow is daunting in that the chill factor comes into play but it isn't anything that we seasoned people from Pittsburgh are not used to.

So, once more I'm in the planning mode for what will be my subjects for the coming weeks.  We just gave and the Easter Lilies, tulips and daisies for Easter.  Coming up In May will be Mother's Day, which by my friend's, the horticulturist, advice is the time that it is pretty safe to plant outside.  I brought last year's hanging planters and the front porch planters inside this year.  It's time to plan what is going to go into them.  Some survived like the lantas and others don't looks promising like the hibiscus.

A frew years ago I had Ivy Geraniums hanging planters and it was a profusion of wonderful red and whites.  I over populated the front porch planters with them that year so I have to be choosy if I plan to do the geraniums again and only put one plant per container.  Then I can put some other smaller blue flowers around them to keep up my Red, White and Blue Theme that I try to achieve each year.

I love Bougainvillea but they are too hard to keep and I've only been able to keep them one season.  I first found this plant at a local volunteer fire department flower sale and I got so many compliments on my hanging planter that year that I continued to try to grow them in hanging baskets.  Reading the article I linked I see that they are a climbing annual and can be grown in our area if gardened properly.

I've been searching the internet for a Butterfly Bush.  I would love to see butterflies and humming birds in my yard.  The ugly garage on the far side of my property was torn down yesterday so I need something to break up the edge of my property line now.

This what I want to see from my porch
Source:  www.network54.com

After reading an article though, I've decided on Fuschia instead of the Butterfly Bush.  Those are more controllable.

That's my thoughts for today.  I guess I'll have to work on my plans for summer a little further before I purchase anything for this year.

I'm not one to start my gardening from seeds so I will be haunting my favorite places to find plants soon.  I have mostly bought from Home Depot and KMart but I recently saw an ad from Lowe's.  I also shop for hanging plants at a local florist, Burke and Haas, Always in Bloom.

Last year, I found a hanging honeysuckle for hummingbirds at Winschel's Hardware Store on  Butler Street in Etna.  I plan to look there again this year because I planted the remaining planter in my yard and it did not make it to bloom this spring.  I was so happy with this hanging planters because it attracted hummingbirds within a half hour of my hanging it on the porch.

Mother Nature's Revenge Updated

Woke up this morning to a coating of snow on the alley outside my window.  Do you believe this?  Once more Mother Nature dealt the Pittsburgh area along with other eastern states a hearty laugh as she sent snow into our valley after bouts of warmer weather and our preview of the beauty that God has in abundance.

A few years back I showed you pictures of the gorgeous dogwood trees and azaleas in our neighborhood in abundance.  My neighbors yard is alive with crocus that are all under a layer of wet snow.  Actually, crocus normally flower in early Spring so this is not a phenomena.  It's just a strange site to see flowers peeking through snow.

The main concern I have is that a recent backlash from Mother Nature is not coming in from the Southwest and is heading into our area from South to North and Westerly.  This equates to Northeastern, which when this type storm is rain, it is a storm of some magnitude and one to be ready for rather than just let it happen.  This morning's snow came out of the north and it is wet and is coating some of the streets which I didn't expect.  I was expecting just a layer on the grassy areas.

In 1963, I experienced my first Northeastern when I was supposedly vacationing at Virginia Beach in September.  We were traveling South and enjoying the shops and sights at Williamsburg when the rains started.  By the time, we got back into our car we were wet through and traveled the last leg of our trip to Virginia Beach in teaming rain.  Dry once again, it only took getting out of the car and into the motel office to get drenched once more.  We arrived on Sunday and were planning to stay until Saturday, but there was not a break in the weather the whole first part of the week.  The rains just kept coming.  Needless to say, our vacation was ruined and we left for home days in advance.

A cold and blustery wind came out of the North and the winds kicked up to over 35 miles per hour on Wednesday sending trash barrels careening out of place because they were recently emptied.

So!  Batten down the hatches and don't put those coats back in storage because you are going to need them for a while longer.  Punxsutawney Phil was sure right this time we are not getting Spring any time soon.

Easter Brunch Going Nontraditional

In our family, we have two distinct nationalities that we observe.  My first husband was Polish and one of our boys married a girl of Polish descent.  Last year it is her turn to have Easter Dinner for her side of the family and we are invited.  For dinner she will be serving ham, kielbassa, mashed potatoes, corn and rice.

Ham and Kielbassa on serving tray

 I didn't hear her say she was having potato salad or horseradish but that is what we normally had with our ham on Easter.  The traditional part being the ham.

This year my daughter hosted and she had it all, ham, potato salad and the works.

My second husband was Italian and from the time the children were early teens we observed the traditional Italian brunch in our house.  My husband made the trips to the Italian store to buy the ricotta cheese, shredded mozzarella, capicola, genoa salami, Italian sausage and pepperoni.  I don't know if the tradition was more about the fritta or the trip to the Italian store.  All I know is that my husband didn't miss this shopping spree.

Frittata

Before we had the Labriola's Italian store in Aspinwall, he would make a trip to the Strip District to get all of the goodies for Easter Brunch with the addition of what the children called toe cheese.  Toe cheese was a ball of provolone and it smelled awful as it was being cut into pieces and enjoyed by my husband with a glass of vino.

This year will be no different, we are having traditional Fritta for Easter Brunch at my house with a twist.  I'm serving pancakes for my grandchildren who are not so fond of the egg dish.

Easter Braided Bread

For years, I baked Easter Bread on Good Friday and placed the traditional colored eggs into each twisted loaf.  This year I turned things around and I made something different.  Holy Saturday, I baked three loaves of Pepperoni Bread.  Now this is something new to me because I have only eaten Pepperoni Bread that my daughter made in recent years.  I made sure she was on hand to show me the way to make it.  It's not made with whole slices of pepperoni like I thought but cut up pieces mixed with the shredded mozzarella cheese.

Pepperoni Bread

My bread tray will have a very nontraditional look.  There will be Hawaiian Rolls, Jenny Lee round cinnamon bread and my homemade pepperoni bread.  I have had a craving for the Jenny Lee round cinnamon bread so I bought a couple of loaves when I saw it in the bakery section of our Giant Eagle.

I guess you might say, I'm going with the flow.  I'm trying to keep up the traditional brunch but I've started making it more to my style.  In years past, I baked homemade bread every Saturday and Easter Bread for the holiday.  This year, I bought my dough and let it raise before I made my pepperoni bread.  I'm a product of my age, I need to take short cuts in order to keep up with my advancing years.

All I can say is Happy Easter and I hope you enjoyed your holiday.