I get mail!

      Owning The Little House on The Prairie entitles me to a free box at the local post office. (Any mail sent to me at zip code 57061 will get to me. 😊)  Every Wednesday The Town & Country SHOPPER, from Brookings appears in my PO box. This advertiser is distributed free to everyone with a mailbox. This week's SHOPPER's front page was an order form for trees, grasses and planting supplies from the Brookings County Conversation District.  Bare root trees are $60. for a bundle of 25. 

     I've ordered trees for years. One day R.M. and I planted 700 bareroot trees. That's too ambitious for me now. The order form lies on my dining room table and I pour over it contemplating what I should order. What is ordered now will be used for replacement plantings in established tree rows where trees have died.

    This process of pondering an order reminds me of something from my childhood. Fireworks were a "do it yourself" project is those days. Advertiser fliers for fireworks came in the mail. Offered were combination packages that we perused carefully, questioning which would give us the 'most bang for our buck.'  Three brothers would debate for days before sending in our orders and wait impatiently for the merchandise to come by mail. There were also powerful firecrackers that we could buy. Some were 3 inches long, others 2.5, and there were also cherry bombs. These three would explode underwater. With smaller firecrackers we'd place them under tin cans to see how high they'd send the can. The big ones, mentioned above, would blow tin cans apart. Dangerous? Yes! I once looked down the barrel of a roman candle to see why it stopped and got a burst in my eye...lucky I'm not blind. 

    Okay, back to trees. Perhaps a combination of lilac and chokecherry would be good replacements. The  order form isn't due until March 31, so????????????

Takk for alt,

Al

                         With Pear at her university graduation in Chaing Rai.