Blue Jeans and Cotton Tees

Living among the Amish does have it’s benefits.

The teenagers who like to drag race down the gravel road are in horse and buggies and they don’t have loud rock music blaring out of the open windows.

They’re quick to lend a helping hand and don’t mind my laundry flapping in the breeze as some of my city neighbors did.

And they grow amazing gardens!

Even this year when most of their “English” neighbors (including myself) had sorry-looking excuses for a vegetable patch, they harvested beautiful vegetables.

Even when a vegetable is done producing, they don’t leave the garden idle. They go in and plant annual flowers so that in the late season, right up until the first frost, their gardens are beautiful.

One of my favorite Amish flowers is the Cocks Comb. It’s deep vibrant colors create an eye-catching display that flaunts itself in front of the browning countryside.

It’s so perfectly and tightly formed that as a cut flower people are amazed that it is real.

The seeds of the cockscomb are formed under the brilliant flower in little seed pockets. As the flower dries, the seeds will fall. The Amish will dry the flowers upside down and harvest those seeds to plant again the next year.

I have tried for several years to grow cocks comb but have so far produced only anemic looking specimens that pale in comparison to their Amish cousins.

So, for now, I enjoy the beauty of their gardens.

Every year I get one or two cut flowers from the neighbors and enjoy them fresh before drying them and saving the seeds.

Then next year, I’ll plant those seeds again because hope springs eternal in the heart of a gardener!

Our road was quite busy tonight with a parade of Amish buggies.

Since our nearest neighbors to the north and the south are Amish, a buggy sighting is nothing unusual. But to see this many in one evening, told us that one of the neighbors was having a work night for the young people.

A work night is a big social event in the community. The young people all gather at one of the homes. Then the girls help the lady of the house with whatever job she has (quilting, canning, snapping green beans) while the young men help the man of the house with something (digging fence posts, laying fence, a building project).

Then after they’ve worked awhile, they gather together and play volleyball and enjoy refreshments provided by the host family.

It is pretty late when they return home. We will often hear the buggies on the gravel as we lay in bed. But we don’t mind. It’s refreshing to know that these youth had an evening of service and good clean fun.

And we also wonder if there’s any courtin’ being done down there in the moonlight…

It’s a very good feeling to finally have some garden planted! The rain hold off long enough for the ground to dry so we could get in some of our early spring garden. (Although it is pretty late in the season!)

We have had a very cold and wet spring here in the Midwest which has delayed almost everything from the lilacs and tulips to the farmers in the fields. But the cold is slowly losing its grip and the apple trees are in full bloom and the daffodils are dancing in the wind!

Because our soil is very heavy and clay-like, it holds water for a long time. It also severely clods up if worked too wet. We needed several days with no rain and some warm sun and strong winds to dry things out enough to get the garden planted.

We finally had a small window of opportunity one evening and we took it! The entire family was out and worked diligently to plant our peas, lettuce, cabbage, spinach, cauliflower and broccoli.

It was a good thing that we did because more rain came in the next day and it’s been raining every third day since.

The calendar says that it’s time to get my tomatoes and pepper plants, and put some corn and beans in, but the ground temperature says otherwise. It is still much too cool for my warm season plants, so they, too, will be late this year.

I buy all of my plants from 2 small Amish greenhouses in the neighborhood. Not only are the plants nice and hardy, they come with lots of great advice! I’ve learned to ask any gardening questions I might have and watch their gardens carefully. Usually they are harvesting peas and eating fresh salad about the time that I get mine in the ground!

These year, thanks to my handy-dandy cold-frame, we are enjoying fresh baby lettuce and spinach already! Although my peas are in the ground, I noticed yesterday that theirs are already about 5 inches high. Oh well, at least I’m gaining on them!