Springtime in Central Florida

It is springtime. I love to wake up early and work on my garden. I can spend an hour watering and pruning, and wondering where all the fruit is. Technically, it is my second year as a gardener.

Central Florida weather has been super dry; we've only had a few actual rain days this whole year. The grass and many trees are dry or look dead. Granted, the air is moist at night, and in the morning the top layer of soil is wet, but we've yet to have real downpours, though I know they are coming. 

NATURE AROUND ME

Flowers on the blueberry bush

Each morning is wet with dew; hence, I love my rainboots!

I happen to love frogs, too, and they are everywhere!

And I love the moon, of course, no matter where I live.

This is "the forest" in my front yard. 

WE HAVE CHICKS

We bought eight one-week old chicks, but today they are five or six weeks old. The are so big and have most of their feathers. Since the weather is consistently over 55 degrees -- if we can finish the coop this weekend -- they will be ready to move from the brooder in the sunroom to their new home outside. Yay! They are going stir crazy! 

An Easter-egger

Watching Eva do algebra. Fun.

The coop is almost finished. It has a run, and we are going to add a larger second run. We also need to add hardware cloth around the perimeter to keep out predators.

Unfortunately, one of the Rhode Islanders was crippled. We tried some remedies, but they did not help. Then I looked around for an animal rescue, and I found a vet who worked with a local rescue that would take our little girl -- so long as I gave up my parental rights. I was so sad to let her go, but caring for her was time consuming and I was grateful to find someone who would at least try to care for her. 

MORE WILD ANIMAL KINGDOM EVENTS

My son with a gecko on his back.

This happened in my front yard. Yikes! 

WHAT WE'VE BEEN DOING

Strawberry Festival (exactly one year later). We stood in this same spot for another picture.

Dragged my family to an antiquarian book fair in Tampa. Didn't buy any books. 😩

My girls and I went to see Shen Yun, finally, in Lakeland. At first I was apprehensive because I was not in favor of supporting anything from China. Then I learned that Shen Yun is about China BEFORE COMMUNISM. Even Shen Yun isn't permitted to perform in China. The show was unique and artistic, though it had an Eastern religious message, which felt almost like Jehovah's Witness meets Seventh Day Adventist. There was even a skit about the Communist government killing people and harvesting their organs. Very interesting, and certainly entertaining. 

One day we went strawberry picking.

First beach day of the year - Coquina Beach.

Apparently there were waves due to rain in the Gulf. 

And that has been our springtime, so far.

One Year in Florida Today!

Yes, today is one year since landing in Florida. 

The night before we arrived in Plant City, our final destination, we stopped in Pensacola. After dragging all of our bags and valuable items from the van into our hotel room, and securing Dodger in his pen, we walked across the street to a Cracker Barrel. We were so exhausted and hungry. Our waitress was super friendly and sweet. At the end of our meal she made conversation with us and asked us where we were traveling. 

My husband, laughing, told her we just moved to Florida. "OH, from where?" she asked excitedly. And Gil, not wanting to spoil her excitement, sheepishly eked out, "California." 

Recognizing his shame, she quietly leaned in and replied, "You're on the run; I get it." Then she welcomed us to freedom. 

This month has seen a lot of changes. Yesterday I had to turn in the key to the rental house, and I felt a little sad about saying goodbye to the place that was such a blessing to us. It truly was God's timing that we ended up there, and now that part of our lives was over. 

Last weekend we helped move our oldest son into his new house in Port Charlotte, Florida. He had been renting a place in Venice, which was up in March; and again, in God's timing, found a house that was right for him and took the opportunity. Again, I felt a little sad about his moving further away, but mom's have to let these things go. 

On a fun note: Governor DeSantis is having a rally at my son's work today, and he gets to hear him speak. 

And finally, I'm disappointed in myself for not stopping to enjoy what is before me. One thing I loved about my life in California was that it was pretty easy. We hiked a lot and I stopped to enjoy the dry brush and sporadic wild flowers, the dead trees and rocks. Occasionally there was a trickle of a stream. I admired the peace of nature, even if it was brown and the same everywhere. It was still peaceful. 

But now, now that I am surrounded by ABUNDANT LIVING NATURE EVERYWHERE, I haven't taken time to soak it in as I should. I practically live in Jurassic Park. The sounds of exotic birds are everywhere, and everything is super size. Sadly, I have not taken pictures of all that is around me, and mostly because I haven't stopped to admire it. But I'm working on it. 

Thus, I do not have much to share. But this is what I have: 

My husband and the kids are building a chicken coop. 

There are frogs everywhere. I must check my rain boots in the morning before I put them on just to make sure I don't squish anyone. 

This beautiful creature was on my car. 

Oh, this cracks me up. There are many of these things on power lines above, and I don't know what they are; but they remind me of the covid virus emoji. 

Here is what it looks like most mornings from my front porch: 

And here is the chicken coop painted: 

I am mostly doing gardening for therapeutic reasons (see, I'm not alone), but in the end I hope to produce food. This is a blueberry bush:

Jalapenos: 

I live in the strawberry capital of the United States. I should be able to grow strawberries: 

Squash:

Oranges:

A variety of veggie seedlings. I need to move those into larger pots now:

My garden for now, but we hope to expand this if the experiment works:

My herbs:

And another way to grow from seed:

So we've been here a year. Would any of us return to California? No. No way! Especially not the High Desert. I am grateful that God answered our prayers -- multiply prayers -- to remove us, our kids, and to let me be here to care for my dad.

Granted, it has been tough on the soul. I miss my church family and my church and the kids miss their friends. I also miss my granddaughter. And I miss the dry weather in California. Getting used to the smell of mildew is trying. I don't miss the daily wind in the desert. It is calm here. If you see a breeze, you think: Oh, it's windy today. 

The winter, being the last season to experience, so far is the best. We wear shorts and tank tops most days. Sometimes you need a sweatshirt, but not past 11AM. We had one day of 30 degree weather on Christmas night. Brrr. We actually put the heat on. But I'm not looking forward to the wild weather again, in spring, summer, and early fall. I do not like it. 

Living in rural America is awesome. People practice self-sufficiency by nature. It's common sense. No one is waiting for government to do something for them; in fact, the least governmental intrusion the better. And while everyone has no trespassing signs on their property, these are the friendliest, most inviting neighbors we've every met. We've only been here 2.5 months in our new house, and we have been introduced to five neighbors. One only owns the lot next door, and yet he still came over to speak to me. 

Here in rural Florida, property owners burn their own yard waste in unattended huge bonfires. That would never happen in California. Not only because of the wind and dry conditions, but the government would never trust humans to do it safely. Only vagrants are permitted to light fires. Property owners? Not so much. 

And my husband and I are blown away by the efficiency of government, when necessary. Everything thus far has been quick and simple. Frankly, California is a mess. I am so sorry, but I do not think there is any hope for that mess. Such a waste. If Florida adopts the policies of the West, it will all be lost. 

I hope to take more pictures of my experience of this beautiful place. Hope to. And if my son adds any pictures of the rally with Governor DeSantis, I will share here, too. 

First Christmas/New Years in Florida in a New House

In November, the contract closed on the house one day before Thanksgiving. Initially I thought we should wait until Nutcracker and Christmas were over before we started the arduous task of moving in (which was only twenty minutes from the rental house). 

In the meanwhile, we visited the house almost daily to paint and clean it ceiling to floor, and to install new blinds. Every trip we made, we loaded up the vehicles, little by little, and brought boxes of our things over to the house.

Before we knew it, we changed our mind and wanted to spend Christmas there. The most official items to drive over would be the beds because once they were at the new house, there was no sleeping in the rental again. 

A week before Christmas, we were officially moved in. YAY!

Even my oldest came to help paint, and of course Dodger joined us. 

Therefore, the Friday after Nutcracker, and one week before Christmas, we rented a U-Haul and brought all of the beds and furniture over to the house. But before this day, the kids decorated for Christmas; therefore, before we even had the furniture in the house, they set up the tree and stockings. 

The CRAZY time before moving in...

And so we spent our first Christmas in Florida...at my brother's, in Nokomis. LOL. But the week before everyone came up to our new house to celebrate Sophia's 18th birthday. 

But New Year's Eve we went to bed early, and woke up at midnight to the lovely sound of firearms. (It happened in California, too. Doesn't matter if guns are restricted or not. People love to shoot at midnight.)

P.S. I am late posting this, but I am doing it now before I post my one-year in Florida post, which is coming up in a few weeks! We have been so busy-busy-busy. Every Saturday it's something else, and we still are not done. Therefore, I really have no pictures to show of our first couple of months in the new house. Technically, we are not even moved out of the rental. 

I'll be back in a few weeks. 

To be continued...

Hurricane Ian 2022: our first Florida hurricane

 Last week was a blur. 

Anticipating Hurricane Ian was more horrifying than the hurricane itself, at least for those of us in Central/Western Florida. It arrived on Wednesday evening 7-8 PM, and it left the next morning sometime after 2-3 AM. I know because I did not go to sleep until after 3 AM, when I knew for certain that the wind gusts and the howling had died down for at least an hour. 

On Monday evening, my 26-yo, who lives in Venice, Florida, decided to come stay with us, even though by that time, we were being told that Hurricane Ian was headed for Tampa. We live 24 miles east of Tampa, but far enough from any threat of storm surge. Now that the storm is over, he made a very wise decision to stay with us because the hurricane made a sharp right, just south of Venice, which was also hit hard and is still dealing with flooding.

Tuesday was a day of anticipation. We did not do school because we focused on last minute preparations and a lot of communication with people not in Florida. We had food, drinking water, flashlights, ice, and gasoline for the generator. We brought all the loose items on the covered patio into the house and garage. We locked up the sheds. We brought in the garbage pails. I prepped some food that we could eat without having to cook.

Some of our neighbors were covering their windows and putting sandbags in front of their doors.  

Not the hurricane. Just a usual afternoon in Plant City.

My husband had to be at work all day Tuesday, and by the time he came home, it was pouring. That's  normal. I felt better when he told me they decided to close the plant Wednesday. 

Wednesday morning a little wind and rain arrived. 

This was 8 AM.

I expected there to be more rain, like a pouring down rain. Only the wind picked up. 

This was 11 AM. 

Three hours later, it increased; and this is still not Hurricane Ian.

I think I started getting nervous because some people (not in Florida) were sharing their own fear. It was not encouraging. And I was listening to the news coming from my father's TV in his room, and they weren't helpful either. Very sensational. Their predictions were that this was going to be the most deadly hurricane in Florida's history. The image of the path of Hurricane Ian, in deadly RED, covered the entire center of Florida, which panicked those particular people outside Florida, who brought it right back to me. 

When I was young, I experienced a hurricane while living in New York City, but I never remember being afraid. Now I was full of anxiety. I worried about the roof coming off. I worried about the walls crashing down. One person asked why we did not get out of there, when there was nothing we could do about it now. I considered all of my neighbors who were sheltering in place. Surely they knew something. 

But in the end, as the winds became stronger, I drew strength from reading my Bible and praying. I kept in touch with a friend back in California, via text, who was very encouraging. Also, another sister in Christ called me and reminded me that King Jehoshaphat, who called on God because he did not know what to do, but his eyes were on God, was instructed by God to send his choir to the front lines where they sang praises to God. Then God completely destroyed their enemies. And I knew I needed to just look to God and praise Him in order to remove this silly fear of the unknown. And so I did many times that night. 

Now, this was the last time I went outside and got video. It was 5pm. There was a loud squealing noise coming from the house every time the gusts picked up, and my husband went out to see if it was coming from the roof. But he said everything looked secured. 

My kids handled this really well -- better than me -- and they played board games and actually had conversation.

Then at 7PM, the power went out. Hurricane Ian arrived.

No power, no water, no internet, and shoddy cell service. And the wind howled and the gusts picked up. We estimated that the gusts were as much as 60 mph for a time, but mostly 50 mph gusts with 30-35 mph steady wind, and coming from the High Desert in California, we are used to that.

Meanwhile, we used our flashlights, and the kids continued playing games.

If only I could have removed the sound, I may have never felt unnerved. The wind sounded like a freight train continuously going by overhead. But I must say, never once did our house shake. It was solid. And it did not rain as I had imagined. 

The kids and I tried to sleep in the living room, but it seemed to be the loudest part of the house. I put the pillow over my head to drown out the noise. When there was no more squealing racket for an hour, I discerned that the storm had moved on. It was 3:10 AM when I went to bed and slept for three or four hours. 

THE AFTERMATH

Ignorantly, I did not expect to see what we saw Thursday morning, which is odd since I was prepared for the roof to blow away. Instead, all of the damage was related to fences and vegetation. That's all. 

This tree lost a limb, which blew across the street, 

and the roots came up and it is now leaning over.

Finally, one positive outcome from the hurricane was that when the fences came down, we literally met our neighbors. No, seriously, we met a great couple next door and helped them clean up their yard. Neighbors were cleaning up their yards immediately the next day.

Hi, Neighbor!

For the next two days, I used the griddle to cook outside and to boil water to wash dishes. It truly was extra work and I was on my feet all day; I have great respect for pioneer women. 

Later Thursday, my husband and I went to find gasoline for the generator, which we used only to power the freezer, fridge, and cell phones (which were useless because if you wanted cell service you needed to stand out on the leech field in the yard), and we found one neighborhood gas station that still had gas and long lines, and everyone was ornery. We filled up our gas cans and got out of there quickly. 

Overall, we went without power and water for 48-hours. When the power went on, Friday night, it was like Christmas Day. We had water! We washed dishes, ran the dishwasher, and took showers! 

Unfortunately, many people are still without power even today. And still many have it worse. 

My husband said we learned a lot of lessons this last week. I learned that we have more than we even deserve. 

And I also learned that I'm no pioneer woman.