Blue Birds Fledged

I now better understand the meaning of the term, "empty nest syndrome." Never having any children, Al & I never had any leave home.

We worked around the yard on Sunday. Earlier in the day we checked the Bluebird nest and could see at least 2 babies inside. They were probably all there though. We didn't open the lid to the nest because we knew they were close to fledging and didn't want to cause any problems. Later in the day I noticed Mom and Dad hadn't been hanging around the nest. When there are babies in the nest they are constantly coming and going in the nest. We checked inside and confirmed our babies had left. Although we knew it was coming and we were happy they made it through this stage, it was still sad. They were safe in the nest box. We haven't seen them since, but Mom and Dad are flying around and we feel they will teach them to come eat at the bird feeder pretty soon. We first saw them in the nest on May 23 and they fledged on June 17th, which was day 16. They may have hatched before May 23, but that was the first day we saw them and they were obviously pretty young.

Our garden is doing pretty well. I made a large batch of stuffed green peppers from our garden. It was my first attempt, so hopefully it will be good. I put a little allspice and cloves in the ground beef. I had stuffed green peppers years ago made by a friend with an Iranian husband. She used those 2 spices and it had a wonderful and unique taste. We'll see how mine are doing.

We have picked a few cherry tomatoes, but most are still pretty green. I just noticed a few regular tomatoes starting to turn red. I also noticed a few with black spots and bite marks taken out.

We have one yellow squash and a LOT of blooms. We don't know why we haven't gotten more squash. Is it too early or is there a problem? I guess we'll wait and see.

We are doing well with green and jalapeno peppers. I got a recipe for stuffed jalapenos. You mix browned sausage with cream cheese, stuff that into the peppers and bake them. Sounds good.

Our friends Terry and Ralph Warner are coming for a visit in their motorhome on Thursday. We had a 50 amp hook up put in and Al fixed the septic for a RV dump station. They will be staying at "Mockingbird Hill Campground."