Gardening Preparation

Buying seeds is one of the small joys of life that continue and continue.. there are always more varieties to try..

Can one grow the beautiful plant photographed on the seed packet, or will it all end in failure?

I walk around the yard and take photographs of the various plants as they are growing and make note of what is successful and what is not and perhaps why.

The homesteading friends I pass along pictures to, to find out what some of the plants are I don't recognize already established.


At this time this year I am concentrating on the herb garden, garlic, and tomatoes. As well as a variety of seeds to especially remind me of Heaven.

Michaelmas Daisy, St. John's Wort, Jacob's Ladder, Lenten Rose. . .

How well they will do after they are transplanted out of the seed trays or planted fresh time will tell this season.

The blueberry bushes were eaten down close to the earth by the fauna this winter -- was it the deer or the rabbits?

I see signs of life in two of them, there are three more that I do not see fresh green on yet. . . It was only the other day that the hydrangea showed signs of life. . . there's nothing like seeing those signs of life after the winter, when you do not know whether the plant ever will.

I've been given a lot of Marigold seeds to plant. The Lily of the Valley I planted last year and showed no signs of adapting have clearly settled in and shown their first shoots.

The arbor vitae I planted last year are doing well, the Green Giant is growing most quickly, the American one and the Emerald Green not too far behind -- after all they are starting from smaller.

The yew cuttings are growing as slowly as ever since I transplanted them to a garden bed from being overwintered in the house. Yew grows slowly normally so I am uncertain how much is the shock of transplantation or not. . experience will tell how well I can propagate these shrubs.

Jacob's Ladder...

This plant towers at over two feet tall.. it is often found with lavender blossoms, but I have seeds for a white variety. This plant's name recalls Jacob, who lying down took a stone for a pillow, and then saw this vision in his sleep, of a ladder standing upon the earth, with the top touching heaven, and angels ascending and descending upon it, and the Lord leaning upon it, who spoke to him. [c.f. Genesis 28:10]

I shall have to investigate this plant's possible medicinal uses. I am not at all experienced in using herbs for medicine so the planting of this garden and reading old and new references on herbal uses is interestingly new light for me. Fresh herbs are normally the best so I will no doubt find some helpful ones.

When I think of this ladder of Jacob I also think of St. John Climacus who wrote the Scala Paradisi, 'Ladder of Paradise' or Ladder of Divine Ascent.

'The holy virtues are like Jacob’s ladder, and the unholy vices are like the chains that fell from the chief Apostle Peter. For the virtues, leading from one to another, bear him who chooses them up to Heaven; but the vices by their nature beget and stifle one another.'

St. John Climacus

I finally have a place to Garden.

The Closing is on the 12th

I will be moving soon, God willing, the closing is on the 12th.

   I will finally have space to garden and work on projects.

And so I am very grateful.

I think I shall publish some before and after pictures of the renovation.


Deo gratias et Mariae semper Virgini . . .

Here I am just another Open Diary Refugee

A lot of folks have switched to places like ProseBox or Tumblr.

Tumblr sure looks nice for folks who can make it work, I tried making it work reasonably for an hour and then decided since I didn't have to do it for someone else, I wasn't going to bother myself.

Prosebox was a bit uncustomizable and odd too. Will it be so new and small that it's here today and gone tomorrow?

But in any case, whatever will be will be.

A lot of memories from Open Diary. . .

I was there.. way back..

My second diary, began on 2-19-2006, and de Lilliis ^MS was a diary I enjoyed writing. Before that I had a diary called 'A Knight of Our Lady' which had a lot of my growing up in it, which in the end was why I closed it down since it had too many of my mistakes but there was a lot there so it's touching.

That diary begin in 1-17-2002. Or at least that's the first entry I see, that was a bit go so I don't remember the details.

So many friends come and gone from those days. Some kept some lost. Mistakes and successes, joys and sorrows. Strange how it all turned out.

The diary circles will now be gone, books, pets, spirituality, politics. . .

The Open Diary philosophy oddly enough always seemed to be more of a 'closed diary' philosophy in regards to search engines, which truly was of great benefit for the participants. They were less popular and perhaps a lot of what they wrote that they shouldn'tve perhaps a lot of it -isn't- permanently enshrined elsewhere in some website archive. Or at least not one of the open to the public ones.

But at the same time this half-open diary method probably harmed the site's long term success. It's still odd though, why it wasn't more profitable and possible to keep going, sell to some other site, etc. in the end. The two weeks notice was a rather short end too, I know folks would've appreciated a longer warning of the closing, though one can be thankful both it didn't just simply disappear without warning, and for all that Open Diary did for folks throughout its existence. A hard end doesn't change any of that.

I don't know where I'll go in the future to blog about personal stuff. This little blog never quite worked out I don't think its hmm, networking features are all that compared to Open Diary. It's out there it's true but without bookmarking, comments instead of notes.. doesn't quite do it.

Well we'll see. One fellow's doing audio diaries. I doubt I'll ever do anything like that, certainly not for more than a lark. Hmm. What if he tried to do an audio fish's diary? Blup-blup-blub blub-blub-blup? That was a great one Rodge!

And all this amidst record cold, crashing computers, my poor fish under the weather. . .

Well Rebecca, Hope.. White Dove.. Sherry. . . Ash. . . Lama. . . Libbie. . . Precious Scribbles. . Aphelia. . . Jonmark. . . Willy and Wilma. . . Julie. .  Sarea. . . In His Grip. . . Everyone All my friends.. near and far. . .

I've saved my diary. I'll never forget. I've been saving lots of diaries last entries and home pages, just saving them so I can see them if I want again. And so I can keep in touch and keep track.

I'm here. Even if I don't post much, the blog won't go anywhere so I'm here.

Be safe out there. Keep close to God!

Take care.. Prayers..

Always prayers!

Farewell Open Diary

Farewell to OpenDiary and all it is. . .

Memories. . .

Time to take down a few.

Communism & Socialism

'The final goal shared by these teachings, whether of Communism or Socialism, even if approached differently, is to excite by continuous disturbances workers and others, especially those of the lower class, whom they have deceived by their lies and deluded by the promise of a happier condition. They are preparing them for plundering, stealing, and usurping first the Church's and then everyone's property. After this they will profane all law, human and divine, to destroy divine worship and to subvert the entire ordering of civil societies.'

Pope Bl. Pius IX

'The Holy Spirit is the master of prayer, and causes us to abide in continual peace and cheerfulness, which is a foretaste of Paradise.'

St. Philip Neri

Nine Ways of Being Accessory to Another's Sin

NINE WAYS OF BEING ACCESSORY TO ANOTHER'S SIN

1. By counsel.
    
2. By command.
    
3. By consent.
    
4. By provocation.
    
5. By praise or flattery.
    
6. By concealment.
    
7. By partaking.
    
8. By silence.
    
9. By defense of the ill done

. . .


'These are those who would not think of failing to hear Holy Mass every day, and, at the same time, will not deprive themselves of the satisfaction it affords them to attend the theatres, although the Church has always regarded these as pernicious, considering the ordinary sort of entertainment therein presented.

Again there are those who sometimes read books of piety, and afterwards pass the night in reading novels filled with the venom of bitterness of falsehood and immorality.

This caused Gerson, one of the most famous lights of the University of Paris, to say, of a novel writer, that if he knew him to have died without doing penance for his sin, he (Gerson) would think no more of praying to God for that man's soul, than he would think of praying for Judas.'

St. Jean Eudes

Illegal Christianity & Ignorance

It is becoming more and more illegal to show any public Christianity, or Christian business practices.

Not that there are many who do so in the first place, which is a part of the cause. Besides the conspiracies, knowledge whichof repressed, unacknowledged. . . And those in public positions of purported fidelity.. complicit in its repression.

It makes one think about the curse of ignorance. . .

The more ignorant one is of the Faith the more of a curse it is. .

Ignorance is a consequence of sin, though not necessarily one's own.. From generation to generation.. from parents to children.

A positive sort of ignorance.. Enforced by cultural mores. . .

A true beast of ignorance. . . As in Canaan or worse.

God save me from ignorance! God save us .  . .


Ignorance

'But only the high priest entered the inner room, and that only once a year, and never without blood, which he offered for himself and for the sins the people had committed in ignorance.'

Hebrews 9:7

'If any one sin through ignorance, and do one of those things which by the law of the Lord are forbidden, and being guilty of sin, understand his iniquity, he shall offer of the flocks a ram without blemish to the priest, according to the measure and estimation of the sin: and the priest shall pray for him, because he did it ignorantly: and it shall be forgiven him, because by mistake he trespassed against the Lord.'

Leviticus 5:17-19
'There are four degrees of ignorance, the first invincible, which is without blame; the second vincible, but hardly so, which has some fault and is subject to punishment; the third crass, which has more blame; the fourth wilful, which has the most blame and the heaviest punishment.'

Cornelius a Lapide, Commentary on Luke

'There is a way that seemeth to a man right: and the ends thereof lead to death.'

Proverbs 16:25

'An ignorant person is like a dying man lying unconscious: he does not know either the malice of sin or the value of his soul. He goes from sin to sin, like a rag dragged through the mire.'
St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney, the Cure of Ars
'To excuse yourself on the grounds of ignorance is to excuse one sin by another.'

St. John Chrysostom

'Hell is ignorance, for both are dark; and perdition is forgetfulness, for both involve extinction.'

St. Mark the Ascetic

'All sins which are due to ignorance can be reduced to sloth, to which pertains the negligence of a man who declines to acquire spiritual goods because of the labor associated with them. . . Since knowledge is further removed from morality than prudence. . . it follows that ignorance has the nature of mortal sin, not of itself, but on account either of a preceding negligence or the consequent result, and for this reason ignorance is reckoned one of the general causes of sin. . . All sin proceeds from some ignorance.'

St. Thomas Aquinas

'Unbelief has the character of guilt from resisting the faith rather than mere absence of the faith.'

St. Thomas Aquinas

'He who is ignorant of the enemy's ambush is easily slain; and he who does not know the causes of the passions is soon brought low.'

St. Mark the Ascetic

'Innumerable souls are miserably lost through ignorance of religion the source of every other calamity.'

St. Frances Xavier Cabrini

'As regards my opinions concerning the present state of the Church with relation to the election of the new Pope, what opinion of any weight could a miserable, ignorant, and unspiritual person like myself possibly give? There is need for prayer and much prayer. All the human science and prudence that there is cannot extricate the Church from the present state of relaxation and confusion in which every section finds itself; the all-powerful arm of God is necessary. As regards the bishops, very few of them possess genuine zeal for souls. Almost all religious communities - and one could omit the "almost" - are relaxed. As a result of the present state of general confusion, observance has collapsed and obedience is a thing of the past. The state of the secular clergy is still worse: so, in a word, there is a need for a general reform of all clerics and ecclesiastics if there is to be any improvement in the present great corruption of morals among the laity. So we have to pray to Jesus Christ that He would give us as head of the Church one possessed of more spirit and zeal for the glory of God than of learning and human prudence. He should be free of all party attachments and devoid of human respect. If, by chance, for our great misfortune, we should get a Pope that does not have the glory of God as his sole purpose, the Lord will not help him greatly and things from their present condition will go from bad to worse. However, prayer, which can provide a remedy for so many present ills, will move the Lord to put His hand to the problem and remedy the situation.'

St. Alphonsus Maria de Liguori

'It was my desire to be silent, and not to make a public display of the rustic rudeness of my tongue. For silence is a matter of great consequence when one's speech is mean. And to refrain from utterance is indeed an admirable thing, where there is lack of training; and verily he is the highest philosopher who knows how to cover his ignorance by abstinence from public address.'

St Gregory the Wonderworker

'We must cover the failings of our neighbor with the mantle of charity, attributing them to ignorance or inadvertence.'

St. Paul of the Cross