Te amo, Papi.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Saturday, April 10, 2010
We're Officially in Kansas (Oklahoma), Toto.
We woke up this morning to a rumbling outside the window. No, for once it wasn't an April thunderstorm, but you're on the right track.
Family, you will be very happy to know that after 2 years in Tornado Country, we finally have a hidey-hole.
There was enough dirt left over from the hole to spread to several spots in the yard for eventual bed-making. We're putting 2 flower beds in the front yard, and a really long one in the garden.
After the really hard winter we've had and knowing the wind we face in the next few months, we decided we couldn't put off the shelter any longer. Though I really hope we never have to stay down there for any length of time because I'm SUPER claustrophobic and it's hard for me to breathe down there. Also, it's going to be a challenge to convince the cat and dogs to get down there with us, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
Family, you will be very happy to know that after 2 years in Tornado Country, we finally have a hidey-hole.
There was enough dirt left over from the hole to spread to several spots in the yard for eventual bed-making. We're putting 2 flower beds in the front yard, and a really long one in the garden.
After the really hard winter we've had and knowing the wind we face in the next few months, we decided we couldn't put off the shelter any longer. Though I really hope we never have to stay down there for any length of time because I'm SUPER claustrophobic and it's hard for me to breathe down there. Also, it's going to be a challenge to convince the cat and dogs to get down there with us, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
Friday, April 9, 2010
April Flowers
The thing about springtime flowers is that you wait for months for them to arrive, and then when you blink, they're gone. I've been taking pictures of all the new floral arrivals, but even as of this posting, they've changed. Oh well.
This is the border along part of my front flower beds. It already looks very different from when this was taken because several of the daffs are gone and more orange/striped tulips are open. Joe likes to pick the "grapes" off of the muscari, so some of those are looking a bit weak these days.
It's not flower season around here without some bright geraniums. I had intended to overwinter last year's geraniums but got sidetracked and left them out for all the freezes...they didn't make it. These puppies are at least twice the size (I found an awesome nursery in town that has the best plants hands down) and I SWEAR I will overwinter them. However, the pictured plant I found split this morning, and I wonder if I'm having some kind of root borer problem. I saw the same thing happening with some seedlings in the veggie garden, so we'll see.
Do you see those sunny little faces flanking the blueberry bush?
My sister-in-law gave me some bulbs from her garden club in Virginia last November, and I didn't get around to putting them in the ground until January. I planted them in between the blues in the berry patch for something to look at while I wait impatiently for berries, and they came right up.
Isn't this a lovely sight? My pergola, the hubs building pea trellises beyond the gate, the unfinished gate (it's now finished and pretty impressive), and new wisteria plants. I really know nothing about wisteria other than it vines and is good to plant on pergolas and arbors. These have pretty purple flower clusters that are actually starting to bloom, but these pics are a week old, so bear with me.
And finally, our new apple trees are blooming and leafing out. I'm glad the last freeze didn't really seem to affect them, and the blossoms are so cute.
Come onnnnnn, apples!
This is the border along part of my front flower beds. It already looks very different from when this was taken because several of the daffs are gone and more orange/striped tulips are open. Joe likes to pick the "grapes" off of the muscari, so some of those are looking a bit weak these days.
It's not flower season around here without some bright geraniums. I had intended to overwinter last year's geraniums but got sidetracked and left them out for all the freezes...they didn't make it. These puppies are at least twice the size (I found an awesome nursery in town that has the best plants hands down) and I SWEAR I will overwinter them. However, the pictured plant I found split this morning, and I wonder if I'm having some kind of root borer problem. I saw the same thing happening with some seedlings in the veggie garden, so we'll see.
Do you see those sunny little faces flanking the blueberry bush?
My sister-in-law gave me some bulbs from her garden club in Virginia last November, and I didn't get around to putting them in the ground until January. I planted them in between the blues in the berry patch for something to look at while I wait impatiently for berries, and they came right up.
Isn't this a lovely sight? My pergola, the hubs building pea trellises beyond the gate, the unfinished gate (it's now finished and pretty impressive), and new wisteria plants. I really know nothing about wisteria other than it vines and is good to plant on pergolas and arbors. These have pretty purple flower clusters that are actually starting to bloom, but these pics are a week old, so bear with me.
And finally, our new apple trees are blooming and leafing out. I'm glad the last freeze didn't really seem to affect them, and the blossoms are so cute.
Come onnnnnn, apples!
Thursday, April 8, 2010
If You Peas
This post should have been up a few days ago, but for some reason we've experienced hugely frustrating internet outages in our part of the world lately. The outages tend to occur when it is very windy, or right at 5pm. Good times.
Anyways, this is a peas post!
Right now my Oregon Sugar Pod II snow peas are growing like crazy these days. I wish I could say the same for the regular peas that I have (all 3 rows of them) but they're still sputtering here and there. In any event, the snow peas are supposed to be bush-like, which means that they don't necessarily need a trellis to grow on. However, how can resist these little hands?
If a trellis will make the snow peas happy, a trellis they shall have. And speaking of trellises, we've had a bit of a trellis showdown here on the WatRanch lately. Bill wanted to employ his design from last year, with some improvements. Last year we planted 6 feet of peas whereas this year we planted 100 feet of peas. Therefore, recycling was not a complete option.
This is last year's trellis. It was made entirely from recycled wooden pallets that we pulled from a dumpster and some twine. It did it's job for the most part, but to hand-string all of the twice would have been too labor intensive. So Bill improved upon his design by using plastic garden netting, more pallet wood, and PVC piping:
(Ignore all the Duplos strewn about. I have to throw them at Joe to distract him from walking all over the growing veggies.) There is a wooden stake in the middle of this panel to stabilize the netting. While I appreciate the help in the garden, it became evident fairly early on that this design was not quite perfect. For example, it was hard to align the netting in the middle of the peas, so there will be some that have to reach a loooong way to get to the net. Plus, it's not the prettiest design in the world.
My turn. By investing $.89 each at my local feed store, I bought several stakes of iron rebar and threaded it through the netting. That made it easier to pivot the trellis sections to reach the most peas possible.
Hard to see it, isn't it? The netting in the immediate foreground is the top of the trellis that I was standing behind. I LIKE that it's hard to see, because it makes the garden appear neater, which as you can see from the clutter in these pics, it isn't. In terms of stability, I think my design will hold up against our spring gully-washers much better than Bill's, but time will tell. And yes, I promise to report honestly those results.
Compare from right to left. Of course this will all be moot in a few weeks when the peas are blossoming and I'm too excited to care about neatness.
Anyways, this is a peas post!
Right now my Oregon Sugar Pod II snow peas are growing like crazy these days. I wish I could say the same for the regular peas that I have (all 3 rows of them) but they're still sputtering here and there. In any event, the snow peas are supposed to be bush-like, which means that they don't necessarily need a trellis to grow on. However, how can resist these little hands?
If a trellis will make the snow peas happy, a trellis they shall have. And speaking of trellises, we've had a bit of a trellis showdown here on the WatRanch lately. Bill wanted to employ his design from last year, with some improvements. Last year we planted 6 feet of peas whereas this year we planted 100 feet of peas. Therefore, recycling was not a complete option.
This is last year's trellis. It was made entirely from recycled wooden pallets that we pulled from a dumpster and some twine. It did it's job for the most part, but to hand-string all of the twice would have been too labor intensive. So Bill improved upon his design by using plastic garden netting, more pallet wood, and PVC piping:
(Ignore all the Duplos strewn about. I have to throw them at Joe to distract him from walking all over the growing veggies.) There is a wooden stake in the middle of this panel to stabilize the netting. While I appreciate the help in the garden, it became evident fairly early on that this design was not quite perfect. For example, it was hard to align the netting in the middle of the peas, so there will be some that have to reach a loooong way to get to the net. Plus, it's not the prettiest design in the world.
My turn. By investing $.89 each at my local feed store, I bought several stakes of iron rebar and threaded it through the netting. That made it easier to pivot the trellis sections to reach the most peas possible.
Hard to see it, isn't it? The netting in the immediate foreground is the top of the trellis that I was standing behind. I LIKE that it's hard to see, because it makes the garden appear neater, which as you can see from the clutter in these pics, it isn't. In terms of stability, I think my design will hold up against our spring gully-washers much better than Bill's, but time will tell. And yes, I promise to report honestly those results.
Compare from right to left. Of course this will all be moot in a few weeks when the peas are blossoming and I'm too excited to care about neatness.
Monday, April 5, 2010
Mutt Monday: Fences Make the Best Mutts
Oh those wiley mutts! Just when they think they've got the whole acre figured out, every smell accounted for, and every blade of grass counted, we go and throw a double whammy--rabbits! fence!--at them. Their world is upside down! Are they allowed inside the fenced garden? No. Can they please go in to eat...um...see the rabbits? No.
We finally finished securing the entire perimeter of the garden this past week by attaching trellising to the base of the shed, because the little dog from next door was easily coming and going from under the shed. With the trellis in place, we paid little attention to the world outside the fence...until this weekend.
Notice anything funny about the trellis under the shed? Take a closer look.
Here Hokie has become reptilian and slithered under the shed on her belly so she can be close to us as we work in the garden. Or does she have another motive? Hey, by the way, where is her partner in crime?
Aha! Boston not only slithered under the shed, she went all the way through to the other side. Why, pray tell, would an otherwise sensible dog do such a thing? Well, that wooden object on the other side of the fence that she is trained on is the rabbit hutch, of course.
I'm not sure if they're working as a team, with Hokie as lookout for humans and Boston looking out for rabbits. More likely, Hokie is hot and bored and wants to see what we're doing, and Boston is claustrophobic and rabbit-crazed.
"Here, bunny bunny. Come out and plaaaaayyy...."
*By the way, I keep forgetting to announce the results of our name-the-rabbits poll. With 44% of the vote, the winning names are: "Raleigh & Durham." It's no coincidence that several voting constituents are residents of the fair state of North Carolina. Since we believe the white bunny is a girl, she will be Raleigh and the boy will be Durham. I know you were all on the edge of your seats over this one.
We finally finished securing the entire perimeter of the garden this past week by attaching trellising to the base of the shed, because the little dog from next door was easily coming and going from under the shed. With the trellis in place, we paid little attention to the world outside the fence...until this weekend.
Notice anything funny about the trellis under the shed? Take a closer look.
Here Hokie has become reptilian and slithered under the shed on her belly so she can be close to us as we work in the garden. Or does she have another motive? Hey, by the way, where is her partner in crime?
Aha! Boston not only slithered under the shed, she went all the way through to the other side. Why, pray tell, would an otherwise sensible dog do such a thing? Well, that wooden object on the other side of the fence that she is trained on is the rabbit hutch, of course.
I'm not sure if they're working as a team, with Hokie as lookout for humans and Boston looking out for rabbits. More likely, Hokie is hot and bored and wants to see what we're doing, and Boston is claustrophobic and rabbit-crazed.
"Here, bunny bunny. Come out and plaaaaayyy...."
*By the way, I keep forgetting to announce the results of our name-the-rabbits poll. With 44% of the vote, the winning names are: "Raleigh & Durham." It's no coincidence that several voting constituents are residents of the fair state of North Carolina. Since we believe the white bunny is a girl, she will be Raleigh and the boy will be Durham. I know you were all on the edge of your seats over this one.
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Silent Sunday: Joe Deere
I know it's in his gene pool to be obsessed with cars, but I didn't really anticipate that translating to lawn equipment, too.
Happy Easter, everyone!
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Dear Family
I realize I might have caused a bit of a stir with this post in which I discussed the mudswallows that nest outside our front door. Let me clear up any confusion caused by my poor writing by clearly saying I AM NOT PREGNANT. Sorry. When we FIRST saw the mudswallow family, we really wanted to be pregnant, and unbeknownst to us, we were pregnant. Two years ago. I guess what I was trying to say was that I felt karma rewarded us when we didn't knock down the bird's nest by giving us the pregnancy we were hoping for. Two years ago. Not now.
Geesh, that was kind of embarrassing. In case anyone was wondering, I am much too busy chasing after this little guy to think about adding to the brood:
Geesh, that was kind of embarrassing. In case anyone was wondering, I am much too busy chasing after this little guy to think about adding to the brood:
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