Ruined Crop

There will be no zucchini for us this year.

No zucchini bread.

 No fried zucchini.

No zucchini cakes.

No turkey zucchini meat balls.

No zucchini lasagna.

Nothing.

Zippo, Zero, Zilch.

The geese ate all of it.

See. There is barely a leaf left.

I planted four zucchinis this year.

There was going to be a mega harvest, now there will be none.

I was even preemptive and put a fence up. A cute plastic coated green one (thanks mom!) rather than the chicken wire we use around our other vegetable gardens. Well they could fit their heads through. And they devoured it. There is also a cucumber planted at the end of the raised bed. They left that alone.  

 

Moral of the story, use the ugly fencing and geese don't like cucumbers.

Front Garden

Earlier this spring we 'deconstructed' our garden off of the porch. We moved the plants to a different flower bed. The rocks that made the boarder were moved to the front yard to create a new garden in the dead patch under the arborvitaes.

 

 

 

 

I wanted to show you what it looks like now that it's full of color.

 

 



First Fruits

Tomatoes are actually a fruit. And we have some!

They aren't ripe yet.

But soon we will have tomatoes coming out of our ears. There will be fresh salsa.

BLTs

and of course canning.

Moth

When I was picking berries on Sunday this guy was resting on the shed. If you know what kind of moth it is let me know, I'd be interested to hear.

The first photograph doesn't show the massiveness of this guy. Lets do a size comparison.

That's a big moth.

A Itsy-Bitsy Frog

Wordless Wednesday

Darn Geese

Bruce the Toulouse Goose and Christmas have a knack for getting into things they are supposed to. They are like toddelers, they have to put everything int thier mouth.  

Exhibit A:

My lily.

Good thing we have allot. I couldn't find geese damage on any other plants, yet.

Exhibit B:

The purple cabbage. I had them sitting on the goose food bin on the back porch. The wind must have knocked them down. There was only one survivor. 

This is why we put a fence around the vegetable garden. They would eat everything before it had a chance to ripen. 

Darn Geese.

Wordless Wednesday

(Bruce still looks like crap)

Sole Survivor

Last year we tried planting asparagus. It didn’t work to well. You see we bought the crowns and procrastinated. They sat on top of our fridge in a brown paper bag for a few weeks. By the time we got them in the ground some of them were a tad moldy on the ends. Then we completely covered them with dirt. You are supposed to cover them a few inches and slowly fill in the trench as they grow throughout the summer. And then it didn’t rain. It was dry last year, really dry, and I neglected to water.

We decided to give it another go this year. Mr. B retilled the plot and we made it into a raised bed, easier to fill in with dirt throughout the summer. After we tilled we let it sit for a few days and then bought the crowns. I went to weed it before I planted them this weekend, they only sat two days. While I was weeding I came across this little guy.

Somehow he managed to survive our neglect, the drought, and the Garden King.

Ready for Planting

Mr. B finished moving the dirt this weekend and tilled the garden. She's all ready to produce some great veggies this year. 

I started some seedlings inside a few weeks ago. They are ready to head outdoors. 

The plan was to plant today. However it is cold and damp. Which doesn't make me want to play in the dirt. Maybe tomorrow.

I did get all my flowers planted this weekend and the asparagus, zucchini, and cucumbers all tucked away in the raised beds. Just need to do the big garden. 

Ode to the Garden King

She never fails, she's a tough old girl

A few good pulls to start and give her a whirl.

She's chain driven, she will not slip

She'll eat up that dirt lick-ity split.

She kicks up the rocks 

and gets dirt in your socks.

She tears through the roots 

to make room for the tender new shoots.

Making room for the lettuce and peas
the carrots and beans.

We shall have peppers and beets
tomatoes and leeks.

We will plant lots this spring.
oh Garden King you sure are a marvelous thing.

Down Goes the Mountain

The mountain of dirt is almost gone. We have raised beds along our goose run and a huge flower bed in our front yard. We also removed a garden dug into the hill and filled it in, it looked like crap, got very little sun, and was so far away from the house that I never weeded it. 

Mr B has assured me that by the time I get home from work tomorrow the last cart loads of dirt will be gone and the garden tilled and ready for our veggies to be planted. 

(Almost) Wordless Wednesday

Mom and I went flower shopping on Sunday, I still need to plant.

The dandilions are taking over the yard.

Our lillacs are in bloom.

 And Christmas is still a sassy boy.

Raised Beds and a Mountain of Dirt

While we were playing lumberjacks on Saturday I had a load of dirt delivered. Mr. B told me to get five yards of dirt. So I ordered five yards, the guy said he would bring a truck load, it would be between five and six yards.

It's a mountain of dirt!

Don't worry we had big plans for this mountain. And I have a few back ups in case we still have extra dirt.

One of the main plans was constructing a raised bed along the sides of the goose run. We can't expand our vegetable garden any further in the area we have it with out cutting down a tree. So I thought we could plant some things in different areas of the yard. Who says they all need to be in the same plot o' mud.

Mr. B framed these up for me, based on my rough description on hand motions. He's getting really good at deciphering what I want.

Then we filled it with a layer of leaf compost.  We dumped most of our leaves at the edge of the woods past two falls. This spring we dug down through the top layer to get at the good stuff underneath. It will continue to break down and feed the plants in the garden.

Last year I kept asking Mr. B to help me build some compost bins, it would be nice to have and most of my flower beds could benefit from some good food. He kept telling me no. Well while we were working on this endeavor he agreed that something to contain the leaves/compost would be easier. We will be building some simple three sided corral for composting soon.

After the compost came the dirt. Several garden carts full. Praise the Lord we didn't have to wheelbarrow it. It's been enough work just shoveling it. We also moved some to the front flower bed. I'm hoping to show you that in a few days when its not just a pile of dirt, but has some plants in it.

Now all we need is the plants. I'm thinking asparagus on one side, as it comes back every year. And the cucumbers and zucchinis on the other, as they take up a bit of garden space and are lower maintenance compared to the tomatoes.

Oh and we will need a fence around it. We have to sassy boys who want to eat everything they are not supposed to. Bruce, Christmas, I'm talking about you.

As for the mountain of dirt I would say we still have about 1/2 to 1/3 of it left. I guess we might have to implement the back up plans. Oh darn.

Playing at Lumberjacks

On Saturday some helpers came to cut down some trees with us. I decided that we needed to cut down some scraggly pines that were by our raspberry patch. They were blocking out most of the sun and the berries were doing poorly. I also have a scheme to add some blue berries and black berries to the patch and eventually put a picket fence around it. Surprisingly Mr. B was completely on board. Well at least with the cutting down trees part. We shall see how many years it takes to get my fence. 

As usual no before pictures because I'm an airhead. And no during pictures because I was busy manning the ATV dragging branches to the burn pit while the boys were busy wielding chain saws. Here's what it looks like now. 

Still some clean up to do.

Even after a few days the berries are doing much better, at least to me they seem like it. And although they dropped one of the trees on them they did bounce back nicely. 

The irises that were in that area, not so much. They got trampled. Oh well, there root system still looks good and next year they will be just fine. I'm planing on transplanting them any way this week. 

Now we just need to find an day with little wind. I think we have a bit of burning to do. 

You bring the marshmallows and we'll have smores. you'll need to find a long poker-stick. I have a feeling this is going to be a big fire.  

Wordless Wednesday

Deconstruction

The past two days we have been working on deconstructing one of our flower beds. It sits off the back porch. Once again no before pictures because I'm an airhead.

 Early in the spring it looks nice, then it rains and the dog tracks the mud into the house. Then it progresses to the summer and the weeds start to take over and Gus decides that it would be a good spot to wrestle with his friends and the day lilies make the perfect place for an afternoon nap.

It had to go. 

We contacted the concrete guy last fall and have a plan in place to have a patio poured. But first I wanted to move the plants, and the rocks that made the border. 

The plants have been moved to a garden on the side of the house. Well it used to be two gardens, but this weekend we connected them and tore out the bushes in one of them. We tilled and then moved the plants. 

The rocks were moved to the front yard to make a boarder for a new flower bed. 

More on that to come. 

Wordless Wednesday

A quilty blog that I follow used to do a wordless Wednesday post every week. Just photos. I thought I would give it a try. More motivation to get out there and use the camera. 

Here are some shots from the garden. 

Spring Came

Spring came on Sunday, it was a beautiful sunny day. I went for a nice long run, yeah I'm still doing that, I don't understand were the drive to do that comes from either. I just have to. Gus and I took a walk around the yard to survey the damage from the winter. Boy there is A LOT. But we will get to it. I'm sure we will spend the next several weekends putting all the gravel back into the drive way and picking up all the branches and tree limbs that fell. There will be a nice bonfire for any one willing to come help, hint hint sistas....

We have some flowers coming up! Which means I better get on it and rake out the gardens sooner than later. 

I brought out the kiddie pool and the birdies had the first decent bath since the fall. Did they enjoy that. 

Geeky side note, look how I was able to capture the water droplets. I told you that having a good camera would instantly make me a better photographer. 

 Spring was here this weekend, then it went away and has been cold an rainy for the past few days. Oh well I've been honing my driving skills. Mr. B and I recently acquired Giselle. She's a MINI Cooper. And a six speed manual. Thank goodness my husband can have the patience of a saint. I'm getting there. No panic attacks or meltdowns while driving, even though I did stall a few times at a light today. Yeah I was that person who held everyone up at the green light. It was rather mortifying but I held it together. I was in the car all by myself no one to rescue me. I had to do it, and I did. We had another lesson tonight and I am starting to understand the feel of what Mr. B refers to as the "sweet spot" on the clutch. 

Mr. Gus's New Toy

Mr. Gus found a new toy laying in the yard this weekend. He carried it around and munched on it all afternoon. 

You know what it was. 

A zucchini. 

That's right a zucchini. By the end of the afternoon he had eaten the whole thing. At least someone around here is getting his vegetables.