This Sunday was the 25th annual Garden Tour and Fair in Mcminnville. 
We didn't get to go there last year since I sprained my ankle on the Friday before, so we were looking forward to go this year.
Again, like last year, the temperatures had been rising steadily throughout the whole of last week and on Sunday the predictions were for a scorching 92F (33C)!!
Not the best temperatures to be out and about but I guess cold and rainy weather would have been a lot worse! 

We went early hoping to beat the heat some and were at the Fair at 9:30 am.
Apparently lots of people had the same idea:

               

We slowly strolled by the more than 70 garden- themed vendors ... traditional and specialty plant growers, amazing garden art, wearable art (clothing and jewelry) and even some garden furniture ..
        
            

                                   

After browsing for an hour we were happy to escape the rising temperatures (already around 86F/30C at 10:30!) for a little with coffee at Union Block coffee on 3d street where they, beside serving good coffee and a vegan coffee-cake (not bad!), had the AC going full blast ... ah, bliss!

          

             

We finally braved the outside again for the tour of the 5 private gardens that were selected this year.

  
    
         

One of the gardens had a very peaceful Asian theme full of beautiful large statues, lots of azaleas, bamboo and hydrangeas.

And this following one, situated on top of Hill Rd, sported a pretty water-fall and even a pool on the south-side, overlooking the vineyards and hazelnut trees down below and Mt Hood and Mt Jefferson in the far distance!



                     


Of course the roses are stunning around this time of the year, especially in this lovely garden which the owner tributes to her mother who was an avid gardener and grower of beautiful, old fashioned plants, especially (sweet smelling!) roses!



Look at this arbor ... I want one just like that in my future garden!

                                                      

  One of the gardens was embellished with beautiful pottery the owner makes herself:                                              

                                  

  There even was some entertainment:      

                                 

We were done at 1:00 pm and when we got home around 1:30 pm the temperature had indeed reached 92F!

   

It had been a beautiful morning but we were glad to stay inside for the rest of the afternoon where our AC worked hard to keep us at a comfortable 76F.

The meadows around us are already being mowed but the berms are still producing new (to me) flowers, like these Meadow Checkerblooms on the left and big yellow Mule Ears on the right.

      

Soon, they will disappear when the summer heat will be too much even for them ... but these daisies will last longer, they'll go on forever:

                           

I haven't seen too much of the deer lately, since the logging trucks have started to bring trees down from the hill, but yesterday I came up these two ...

 

And to end with some more good news: the frogs have stopped their insane, excessive croaking for more than a week now! 
I guess the hierarchy has been established and the mating has ended so it seems that            once again peace and quiet has returned to our little piece of paradise.
                                             

 

Just like last year, the wild rose I dug up from somewhere on my landlord's property (with her approval of course), is flowering profusely. 
No scent, unfortunately ..

The weather has been very stable, temps in the high 60s, low 70s and no more frosty nights for quite some time now so I decided to buy my summer plants and warm(er) weather vegetables.
It wasn't until I came home with these cute little Million Bells, similar to mini-petunias, that I realized that my big hanging baskets in the front of the RV are actually planted with the same! They're in a different color at least so it's not very obvious. 

 

  

    

 

What were supposed to be my cold-weather vegetables, like lettuces, spinach  and arugula, are finally waking up (after I re-sowed them 3 times!) and are looking almost ready to eat.

 and I added some dill, basil and cilantro to my herb planter:

 

     

 

Those yellow dots by the way are marigolds, of which I planted two in each box. Apparently their strong aroma masks the scent of nearby vegetables, confusing pests like tomato hornworms and whiteflies. 
I can use any help I can get!

And those strawberries I planted so diligently in my 2 large, self-watering planters, raised on a table and covered with chicken wire so the chipmunks couldn't get them?

     

Well ... that didn't work squat! Already the next morning several of them (still green by the way) had a bite or two out of them!
So I took them out of those planters, which freed them up for a butternut squash and a honey-dew melon:

 

 

 

 

... and divided the strawberries over three hanging baskets I'd saved from last year:

  

 

 

Well, wwhaddayaknow? This time the birds started to peck on them! ... sigh ... so I had to bring out the %$#@! bird netting, that sticks to anything but what you want it to, and wrap them all up!
Who's next? Bring it on!

Sadly enough our landlord got a little carried away with his new big mower and mowed down 'our' wild grasses next to the RV.

 

          

Granted, they looked a little unruly but there was the occasional wildflower popping up and I liked the wind rippling through the high stalks ... oh well, we'll probably have a second growth!
Fortunately I picked some of the wildflowers before he did that, and there's a lot more of them in other areas, and brought them inside.

 

                                    

                                                   

The bees have been flying for a while now and my little bee-house has been used already by both the orchard-mason bees as well as the leaf-cutter bees:

 

                                                       

Masons on the left, cutters on the right ..
 

I've been on a shopping spree this week .. which is quite the adventure for me since I'm definitely not a big spender, but my mum had sent me some money for Christmas and I still hadn't done much with it so here it goes ..
First up; new hiking shoes and sandals! 
I've used Merrell's Jungle Mocs for years as my go-to winter shoes, and I love them, but I was looking for something a little more 'hiking' shoe now and found these, the Merrell Crosslander (top right):

 

                                                        
I love them! Very lightweight, very comfortable, surprisingly 'roomy' for the tootsies and with excellent traction!
I also splurged on new hiking sandals, the straps of my previous ones constantly slipped loose and although I added some Velcro to them they kept doing so.
I went for Walmart's Dream Pairs, a lightweight, comfortable sandal. Waterproof and best of all, the strap stays tight!

But wait, there's more ..
My hand-blender, which I used for our morning smoothies, gave up the ghost so I replaced it with a blender, something that has been on my wish-list for a while:

  

It works so much better for said smoothies, although I might still replace my hand-blender for a new one as well because this won't work for pureeing soup (in the pan) of course.

O, I almost forgot (I know, but I said I went on a spree), I got me a cute new reader case for my Kindle since my old one was falling apart:

This one has two nifty upgrades, besides looking so much cuter than my old, boring black one, it has slots for cards (library, etc.) on the inside and two strips there on the left side which create a stand when you want it upright.

 

                                           

So far I'm happy with all I got, everything fit just perfectly, I didn't have to return anything, which is quite a miracle.

To top all this off I'm planning to pick up this silverware set on Wednesday at our local Walmart:

                        

We're sick and tired of our old set, which has very heavy grips that always find a way to slide off the plates when bringing them to the sink after dinner or tip over the bowl or cup your spoon is sitting in, etc. 
These are supposedly well balanced and quite light, so out with the old, in with the new!

So .. thanks again Mum, I think I'm going to enjoy all of this for quite some time!

 
I also finally finished my puzzle. 
I love this one, although it took a long time to finish, which had more to do with how busy we've been of lately ..

This morning another proud mama duck showed up with her little ones! 
I have no clue where she has been hiding, the nest had to be somewhere under the overhanging blackberry bushes or maybe on the right side of the pond where a few trees and shrubs hid it from sight?

                   

 I counted seven babies, lets hope some of them survive! 

 

After the first pink wild roses its now the time for the white ones to make an appearance.
They're even more prolific, they grow in huge masses alongside our road. 

 

I say white, but the buds are actually a soft pink, so pretty, and they also have a slight sweet smell ...

                                                       

                                                        

My own rose has quite some buds and the first are opening. It's not as happy as when I bought it, two years ago, I probably should put it in a bigger pot.
I bought some new fertilizer as well so this year I'll make a little bit more of an effort and feed those poor plants, something I've not been very good at in previous years.



Fortunately lupines don't need much to feel good and mine send up three beautiful tall spikes:


                                                                 


The logging road I follow into the forest twice a week is lined with Giant Hogweed. 
Those plants grow so fast, I swear, they're like bamboo, shooting up a foot in the blink of an eye!

I also came across these large shrubs covered in round clusters of white flowers. My plant identification app says its a Pacific Ninebark:

                                         

 

                                         

The bees and butterflies love them and me too!

In one of my previous posts I showed a picture of this Oregon Bigroot, growing everywhere in the ditches along the roads:

 

They also go by Manroot, Old-man-in-the-ground and Wild Cucumber. 
Especially that last name is starting to make a lot more sense now those little flowers have grown into this:

  

How cool!

Too bad I came across this little snake, what I think is a Rubber Boa, which unfortunately didn't make it across the road ..

They are completely non-venomous, they are constrictors, and entirely harmless to humans. They are actually very docile and some people have them as pets ..

He might have been killed by one of these big trucks that have been driving up and down our road for a couple of days this week :

They are logging somewhere up the hill and are using several trucks a couple of times in an hour to bring them down. 
I always make sure to be a good way off the road into the berm or ditch but the truck-drivers are very nice and slow down as much as they can for me.
They leave a lot of dust behind though!

Speaking of dust, we've been working hard these last 2 days to clean the RV!

 

 

 

But besides dust, the main thing that we have to get rid off after another wet Oregon winter is mold!
It took us 2.5 hours for the roof alone and another 3 hours to scrub the rest of the thing down!

                                                           

And as I'm writing this James is crawling around on the roof again to treat it with a special rubber-roof coating which protects it against dirt and sun (oxidation).
It has to be done twice a year either on a cloudy day or in the evening when the sun doesn't shine, like right now. 
Fortunately this goes fairly fast .. 'only' an hour or so!

Well, it sounds like he's done, so it's time to finish this post. 
In the past two weeks we cleaned the car, the truck and now the RV is done as well!

                                                   Time for some R&R!