Lots of time, lots of activity...

OK, so most of the activities have been this week. We had a frost over the weekend, so Wilson had to cover the tomatoes and cucumbers in the big garden. We brought the hanging tomato plant indoors - to liven up the laundry room no doubt.

We've started new cucumbers in the windowsill. They need to be transplanted into the big garden... maybe today?

We've started our container gardens:

1. 2 Green Bell Peppers
2. 2 Yellow Bell Pepper plants (one bought on accident - thought it was purple, had to re-buy)
3. 1 Grape tomato plant and 1 Celebrity tomato plant in Miracle Grow soil.
4. 1 Grape and 1 Celebrity in regular mixed soil.

And we have some big pots:

1. 1 Jalapeno Plant
2. 1 TAM mild Jalapeno plant

And in my herb pot, we have cilantro, parsley, basil, and chives.

Oh, and I have some lettuce sprouting in peat pots. I also planted a couple Japan Plum seeds in peat pots, just to see if they will grow. I saw lots of small trees (saplings?) under the big tree, so they must grow from the seeds, right?

And I finally got around to mulching the flower beds yesterday! (I should take a picture of the grass that died under the bags of mulch in the front yard. Pretty.)

Today's plans include planting a yellow tomato plant in a pot and mulching the planted vegis. Wilson is supposed to be bringing home a drum cut in half crossways (top to bottom). One half will be cucumber plants. The other will have a red bell pepper, a purple bell pepper, and whatever else I can find to plant. He's also bringing in a drum cut the other way for eggplant.

What has happened? Is this just spring fever that makes me think I can deal with all of this growth? Hopefully, it's just a little green rubbing off on me.

Rain!

We got 1/2" of rain yesterday so I didn't have to water. Yay!

And this morning, I planted more cucumber seeds. We apparently threw the old seeds away, all of them.

I also planted two Japan Plum seeds.

More 'Maters?!?!

Just spoke with Wilson about the vegi garden. I need to make a list of what we've still got to plant, just so I can remember:

1. 3 more Celebrities in the big garden. I want to put eggshells under at least one, maybe one with the MG and one with the 13-13-13.
2. 1 Napa Hybrid Grape tomato plant in the big garden. Ordered from www.burpee.com and waiting to be delivered.
3. 2 Celebrities in one of the tubs. (Since we don't own the house we're living in we don't want to create some big garden.) We are waiting on our hydro mats from Gardeners Supply (www.gardeners.com).
4. 2 Napa Hybrid Grapes in one tub.
5. 2 Green bell peppers (purchased from the high school) in one tub.
6. Cucumbers in the fourth tub. I need to plant these in the peat pots, as well as more for the big garden. Guess I should do that today.
7. We still haven't mulched the flowerbeds, but we did finish up the landscape bricks. They look pretty awesome. I'll have to take another picture when they're finished.

Cukes and more 'Maters

Today we planted two dozen cucumber plants and more tomatoes. I had started these cucumbers in peat pots in the kitchen windowsill. Wilson and I dug little trenches, added a scoop of Miracle Grow potting soil, and put three peat pots (with two plants each) and covered them almost to the leaves.

Then we decided to plant the tomatoes we bought last night: 3 Big Boys, 2 Creoles, and 2 BFN444's (disease resistant). We also planted the 3 Celebrities we bought from the local high school. We decided to do a little experimenting.

Big Boys:

• Planted the first one like the others: on top of a scoop of Miracle Grow potting soil.
• Planted the second one with some 13-13-13 fertilizer.
• Planted the third one on a tablespoon of bleach with the Miracle Grow soil.

Creoles:

• Planted one with the MG soil.
• Planted the second one with 13-13-13.

BFN444's:

• Planted one with the MG soil.
• Planted one with 13-13-13.

Celebrities:

• Planted one with the MG soil.
• Planted one with 13-13-13.
• Planted one with just the soil from the original pot.

We're going to buy 3 more Celebrities from the school. I would like to do one on egg shells. I read two articles in Progressive Farmer and combined their infomation. The first was about end rot, and how it is caused by a lack of calcium in the plant. The second was about a grandmother who grows vegis for her sick grandson and uses eggshells in her garden. Eggshells are calcium, right? Plus I just made a ton of brownies for a karate fundraiser so I saved the shells from the second half of production.

Quite the little scientists, aren't we? (We picked some Swiss Chard from Poppa's garden - will cook tomorrow night. First time to try it.)

Vegi time!

Today Wilson and I were all set up to plant tomatoes in his family's vegetable garden. His PaPa had planted his 4th of July tomatoes from seeds in his greenhouse, sitting on a heating pad under a warming light. PaPa said he wanted us to put a scoop of the Miracle Grow Potting Soil in each hole under the plants.

Then Wilson was called to run a tractor, leaving me alone with the plants. For someone with such a black thumb, this was so intimidating! Three generations of professional farmers are depending on me to plant their tomatoes? Isn't planting one of the most important parts of the process?

PaPa and Wilson's dad Poppa came out to ask where he went, and to see just what in the heck I was doing in their garden. They told me exactly how they wanted the tiny plants put into the ground - and I followed directions.

I planted the whole row (14 plants) of 4th of July tomatoes. Then put the other 23 into pots and in the greenhouse.

When Wilson got off the tractor, we ran the soaker hose and watered the new babies.

Water, Water Everywhere!

Watered (almost) every morning this week. The sunflowers in my windowsill are growing so quickly! They'll be ready to put in the ground this weekend. And the cucumbers are an inch or so tall. I'll have to find out from Wilson when we're going to plant them.

On My Own

Wilson had to go back to work today, so I worked on the two new beds alone. We decided to try a mixture of topsoil and peat moss instead of the Miracle Grow mix ($$). So I mixed the loads in the wheelbarrow and filled out the beds, leveling them as I went. I felt so productive!



Then I laid out the beds, pulling dozens of plants out of those little 6-pack container. 12 dozen, in fact. I was determined not to have too few plants this time. I ended up with a few too many, so I filled in the gaps in the other beds. (Did I mention the tiny one on the other side of the steps? I had just put Mexican Heather in it on Saturday.)



Added one extra plant this time:



Coleus Rainbow Mix, Sun to Shade, 15" high. Tried to plant them in clusters around the existing lillies.







Watered and Miracle Grow-ed the plants in the regular mixed soil. Wanted to add the mulch, but ran out of time / energy.

A Day of Rest

Took today off. Went to Margaret's house for lunch and spent the day visiting and playing. Found that someone (or something) had dug a little hole in my round flowerbed. We asked the boys who dug it, and they all vehemently denied it. I threatened them with a loss of baseball if any of them ever mess with the flowerbeds. I think they took me seriously.

What happened?

Wilson and I spent all day in that tiny flowerbed today. He tilled up the ground and we tried the Miracle Grow bed mix - just because that's what we could find on that first trip to Lowes. Realized that it had enough organic matter that we didn't need to add the peat moss. (OK, so Wilson realized that - after all, he's the farmer.) Once it was perfectly leveled - again, Wilson's idea - we got to planting!

Here's what we planted, with notes to myself included:

Texas Bluebonnets - for my Texas relatives and in-laws. State Flower of Texas. Full Sun. Grows to 8-12" tall.

Mexican Heather - to remember our trip to Costa Maya and Cozumel, Mexico. Sun to partial shade. Grows 12-24" in height.

Dusty Miller - because Wilson likes interesting foliage and I like something other than green. Full sun, 6-10" tall.

Sugar Daddy Petunias - for Wilson "Sugar Daddy," as the boys call him. Full Sun, 12-15" high.

Flower Power - just because they were pretty. Full Sun, 12-14" tall.

And an azalea with white flowers - whose card I lost. Geez.

So we get all of these pretty flowers in the ground and I realize that we didn't buy enough. There were gaps! What happened?

And we made a decision. We expanded our little "manageable" flowerbed across the front of the entire house! Wilson loves sunflowers. He started growing them for duck hunting, something I don't understand. Anyway, he loved the way they look. So we are going to grow the 4-4.5' ones in front of the front porch and the 12-16' ones in front of the front wall (with the 4' ones in front of them to break up their height). We're going to plant little annuals, like the ones in the round bed, in front of them.

We had known that we would be planting the sunflowers, so we bought them yesterday. We planted the seeds in those cool little peat pods. Have you heard of these suckers? They're so cool. Plus our local high school ag department is using them so they can't be too bad. (We bought a few bell pepper, tomato, jalapeno, and cherry tomato plants from the ag dept this week, too. Babying them inside for now.)

Went back to Lowes for more soil and more plants. Bought a TON of plants to make up for buying too few last time. Also bought cypress mulch, enough for all of the beds.

Flowers, Spring 2007

Today we broke ground on the new flower garden. I didn't want anything too big, just a little rounded corner next to the front porch steps. Something I can manage. Wilson handles nearly 3,000 acres on a daily basis - I just want like 16 square feet.

Last night we went to Lowes for soil, peat moss, landscape bricks, some hose connections, labels, Miracle Grow, some seeds, a small azalea bush, and what I thought was a ton of annuals.

Landon and I decided where to place the bricks and started digging out the grass. It was hard stinking work! By the time we were finished, Landon looked up at me and said "Wow, Mommy! You're sweating!" Guess he's never seen me do that.

I am actually feeling better, having gotten my hands dirty and gotten a little sunlight.