The garden grows 3

The garden is coming along so nicely! I get so excited when I see the area getting greener and greener as the space fills up. Everything is doing really well, and we don't have any pests to speak of!

The flowers are all doing really well too. I'm surprised since the dirt in around the flowers is eroding away through the rocks every time we water. So I've been trying to lightly sprinkle the water over them from high up to minimize the water impact. It seems to be working. Next year (or maybe later this summer), I'd like to do something to keep the dirt from eroding through the rocks. I'd also like to get some mulch for around the flowers, bark or rock chips...

But before we get to that, we need to finish the sprinklers. We got a GREAT start on them this weekend. My dad and Phil came over and we got the first (main grass area) zone done and started the side grass zone on Saturday. After we finish that, hopefully next weekend, we can get the grass started and edge out some flower beds! I am so excited to finally have the back yard looking like a back yard. It is so hot and dusty back there now. I CAN'T WAIT to have grass!

Corn and Japanese "Ichiban" eggplant

Tomatoes. Still just one roma growing. There are many, many flowers though, so I'm expecting more tomatoes any time....

The lettuce keeps growing and growing and growing.... And it's so tasty. We've been eating a LOT of salads. I still think I may need to pull up half of it and start a new crop (spaced better) before this gets too out of hand.

Green beans. Doing pretty well. There are a lot of new leaves growing. No flowers yet.

Green beans closer up....

Left to right: carrots, basil from seed, bell peppers, basil from starter plants... The basil is doing incredibly! We have been picking it and putting it in a lot of salads and I added it to a homemade salad dressing. So yummy. It did start flowering, :( so we had to "pinch off" many of the tops of the plants, but that should keep them growing leaves for a lot longer. At least while we wait for our seed basil to get bigger.

The broccoli seems well. It's getting very big. I have no idea how long until we actually have "broccoli", but the leaves are getting massive.

The cucumber plants we got from Mike's work are getting big. I'm worried that the cucumbers, zucchini and squash are WAY too close to each other....

Butternut squash. I hope this grows well. I would love to make some butternut squash ravioli or soup.

My sad zucchini plant. We started this from seed in March. It's green and has a flower or two, but the stem looks dead. I don't get it at all....

I can't believe that my seed lavender is growing. It growing very slowly, but I think it's going to make it. I LOVE lavender. I put a few of my larger plants out front in 16" pots and put lighting in them. I'll put pictures up next week.

The flowers:

Don't remember what these are called, but they're the ones that I posted last week that had a few buds on them.... They bloomed beautifully!

The blue camanula. Still blooming. I love this one!

Cactus thing with tiny flowers. I had no idea it was going to get flowers. So cute!

My "lotus blossom" is still growing babies.

Not sure what this is doing, but I like it!

Summer is here...

We know summer has arrived in the Inland Northwest when we get the first big thunder/lightning storm...

I took this video on Friday night from our back deck.

10,000,000 Strong For Giving Cancer The Bird

10,000,000 Strong For Giving Cancer The Bird

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I'll Miss This Kitty

Sachi and Phil got back from their vacation on Wednesday night. Or technically Thursday morning (they were delayed getting in until after midnight). Mike was awesome and went to pick them up for me since I was already exhausted from driving to Missoula and back plus working a full shift, and he didn't have to work in the morning. The kitty was sleepin with me, and hesitated to come out when Phil called for her. Mike had to shake the food container. She wanted to stay and sleep with me, I just know it. She was so sweet and I love having her around. She was a biter, but I haven't know a kitty that wasn't. I'm sure she was just teething and will grow out of it.


When I came home from work yesterday, I called out "where's the kitty?" (more or less as a joke since I knew she wasn't there), and I burst into tears because it made me sad she wouldn't be there anymore. I'm going to look for a kitty today. We really need one. It was nice having something to cuddle with that would follow us around the house.

I'm super excited to get sprinklers in this weekend and *hopefully* grass. It looks like it may rain though. Yikes....

The Garden Grows 2

I was at Target yesterday to pick up a prescription, but the Pharmacy was closed for lunch. I had about 20 minutes to kill, so I wandered back to the "seasonal" section where they have the garden and outdoorsy stuff. There, I stumbled across a garden fertilizer that looked EXTREMELY interesting. The brand is "Terracycle" and the fertilizer is all natural and contains worm castings. Mike and I needed to get fertilizer for the garden anyways, and I knew it would be a while before I got to the Nursery in town that we usually like to buy from, so I bought this stuff. A gallon container only cost $8.99. A steal for an all natural fertilizer. We fertilized the entire garden with half of the gallon and it should feed for 3 months. I went online to check out this company, and I LOVE them!! All their packaging is from re-used (not recycled) products. This fertilizer came in a USED gallon milk jug, the liquid fertilizer comes in a USED 20 oz. soda bottle that has been fitted with a spray nozzle, which is really cool. Each bottle is different, you can tell which was a Coke bottle, which was a Dasani... On their website, you can sign up to collect used candy wrappers, drink pouches, yogurt containers, corks, etc., etc. I can't say enough good things about them. Check out the website and watch the youtube video below... I think you'll agree, they are AWESOME!

This week's stand-outs in the garden:

The lettuce is growing like CRAZY! I'll never have to pay for a bag of lettuce during the summer again. This is great! The top right is the starter lettuce, the rest is from seed... just 4 weeks along...

I've begun haresting the leaves of the starter lettuce this week. Mike and I both had a salad on Friday night with homemade meatloaf, and tonight I had a HUGE salad alone for dinner. It was so tasty and fresh. I can't wait to use it in tacos, or tuna salad wrapped in a giant garden fresh lettuce leaf...

The basil plants we got from Mike's work are growing so fast. I harvested some the other day for a tasty pasta salad with balsamic vinaigrette and it already grew back to where I could pick more rihgt now if I wanted... Basil is by far my FAVORITE herb. Mike grew some in a hydroponic container at the apartment and we used it in everything. I'm hoping to dry some to use this winter.

Progress

I spent a lot of time working on the backyard this weekend. I had planned on digging the trenches for the sprinkler system, but instead got things "leveled out". I had big piles of dirt at the edges of the "wall" I dug out, so I spent a few hours yesterday moving the dirt with a shovel and raking it out. Now the upper part of the back yard is pretty level. And as close to level as it will probably get. At least now, we won't be mowing on a huge slope. Today, I shoveled and raked a little more and cut the stairs cleaner. After Mike got off work, we went to Walmart and bought 10 retaining wall stones to edge and define the top step. It's a baby step toward getting that wall and stairs done. I mostly wanted to see what the stones would look like.

Yesterday, I bought most of the sprinkler supplies and my dad is coming to help out next weekend. I can't wait to have the sprinklers done and the grass started. I want the grass to be established before Janna, her kids, and Sophia come up here in July. They need some space to run and play. Plus it's just hot and dirty out there now. The grass will keep it cooler and prevent dirt from getting tracked into the house.

I lent my camera to Sachi to take to Vegas and San Diego, so these pictures were all taken with my phone....

The new stones marking the top step. I'll have to pull at least a few of these out to dig the sprinkler trench through, and probably to level them more...

View from below...

and above...

Cat sitting

We must buy a kitty!

We are kitty sitting my sisters cat, Sylvia, while Sachi, Kamron and her boyfriend, Phil are in Vegas and San Diego with my parents. I volunteered to cat sit at our house, so the kitty wouldn't be lonely... It also gives us a chance to see if our house is big enough for a kitty and if we have a decent space for the litter box. Turns out, yes and yes... I took a door off of the cabinet in the main bathroom and put her litter box there. So far, there is no odor and I think she likes the privacy there. She also runs around like crazy, loves hanging out by Mike's computer, is VERY curious about the toilets, and makes the CUTEST little whimper noises when she sleeps. She's a licker and a nibbler, but I think its cute. So... one of these days when we have the money, and the back yard is more done, we're getting a kitty!

Mike even loves her. The first night here, my sister warned us to keep our door closed because she likes to climb all over them when they're asleep. Mike was busy cuddling with her while he was lying in bed and didn't want to put her out, so she slept with us, between our pillows. Mike is crazy about her, and it's making me feel more like he is ready for a (human) baby... But first, I gotta get this yard work taken care of. No way I can do it while being pregnant.

Getting into trouble... I think she knows more about the computer than I do. She steps on it, and all kinds of crazy things pop up...

Akward position for sleeping on Mikey's lap...

Sleeping in my lap...

The garden grows!

I am amazed by how fast everything in the garden is growing. We added a few more plants this weekend and now the garden looks like a garden. Well everywhere except where the potatoes are planted. Out of the 15 pieces of potato that we started, only 1 survived. I still need to look back at the pictures of what I planted where, to figure what we ended up with...

The window-box lettuces that we started from seed in March. I think they need thinned. The ones we started from seed just a couple weeks ago are growing much more rapidly...

Overview of the (back box) lettuces, newly planted green beans, (front box) beets (very small plants on the left), broccoli, butternut squash, zucchini, cucumber, carrots, basil, bell peppers, more basil, and tomatoes...

Tomatoes!

Green beans...

Newly planted corn and Japanese eggplant (they'll grow long and skinny)...

The big lettuce that was not started from seed...

The lettuce (mesclun) that was started from seed...

Broccoli...

Our first roma tomato! Originally, I had thought it was a cherry tomato, but if it were it would be ripe by now. It's about an inch in diameter...

Basil! These are some of the plants we bought from the greenhouse at the hospital Mike works at....

Peas! We have peas! Probably 10 or more...

The flowers:

I forgot the names of most of them and I think the tags were thrown away when my sister was helping to plant them...

Purple ground cover viney thing... When we got it, it had tiny purple/blue flowers on it. Very pretty...

Campanula. Currently my favorite. Gorgeous flowers...

Supposedly this grows similarly to a strawberry and also produces fruit you can eat. Mike bought me 2 of these...

No idea what this one is called. I think it's related to "hens and chicks". I'm pretty sure it didn't have the babies growing on it when I bought it... I LOVE this one. It reminds me of a lotus blossom or something you'd see on a lily pad...

Nora Barlow. According to the picture on the tag, this is going to have amazing pink flowers...

Don't know the name, but it's getting ready to bloom...

The landscaping:

I spent an evening and an afternoon digging to level out the lower part of the yard to get ready to (someday) put in a retaining wall to separate the upper and lower back yard. I can't wait for this to all come together!

View from the deck...

The steps I cut into the hillside. Eventually, these will be re-shaped and covered with brick paving stones...

View from the side of the house...

Landscaping...

I'm so sorry for the lack of posting. I have been so busy since the weather got nice. I've been getting very tan from being outside on all of my days off and a lot of evenings after work, but Memorial Day, my sister and her boyfriend came over to help with some landscaping and ideas and I was in the sun for 11 hours.... I got the sunburn of death and was my back was as read as a lobster. For about 4 days it hurt to touch it, move my shoulders, back, arms. I couldn't sleep... then it peeled (yuck) and now it is VERY itchy.

Our garden is coming along nicely. We have peas, tomatoes (cherry, roma and grape), basil, peppers (bell?), broccoli (from starter plants. I think all of our seed starts died), cucumbers, butternut squash, carrots, beets, potatoes (maybe? we planted late and may have lost them. There are sprouts coming up, but they may just be weeds.), TONS of lettuce (mostly spicy mesclun mix and 2 starter plants), lavender (both from seed and starter plants).

We moved rocks that were in the retaining wall on the side of the house (where the peas are planted to build up the garden area.) This is what my sister and her boyfriend, Phil, helped with. I'm so happy with the results, and it didn't cost anything! Except for the flowers, seeds and plants. The rock was already in our yard. What a score! This weekend we're planning on getting the sprinkler system started and start the retaining wall that will divide the upper (back yard) from the lower (side/front) yard. I can't wait!

The veggie beds. The back bed is lettuce (and Kamron's basil cravass). The front is (left to right) broccoli, cucumber and butternut squash, carrots (in pots, then a row of the ones we planted, but died), bell peppers, basil and a cherry and roma tomato plant. The bed to the right has potatoes, but they're not worth blogging yet.

Broccoli, cucumber, butternut squash, carrots.... Carrots were from seed, the rest we bought as started plants.

Rainbow bell peppers, basil, cherry tomato, roma tomato...

Our first cherry tomato!

The lettuce bed... with exception of the two plants on the upper left, everything was started from seed just 2 weeks ago...

The started lettuce plants. These were looking pretty wilty just after planting, but now they're looking mighty delicious.

I didn't think our seed lavender was going to make it, but I was wrong. They're growing. Slowly, but surely...

The seed lettuce we started in March? We've transplanted a couple times. I didn't think it was looking very good, but after we transferred it to this window box (outside) it took off! I can't wait to pick salad from my back deck and be eating it within 5 minutes. Maybe I could grow my own blue cheese dressing. hahahahaha

Lavender starter plants we got from Mike's work. They're starting to bloom and man-o-man do they smell amazing. I'm still looking for a place to plant them in the garden....

The peas are flowering! Peas are a favorit snacking veggie for us, so I can't wait to start harvesting some of these. We're going to have a ton. We probably have 20-20 pea plants out there. They're turning yellow for some reason, but otherwise looking good. I need to have Mike look into why they're yellow. Nutrient deficiency?

I've got a lot more to write about, but for now it is off to bed.

Some things to look forward to:

• Hanging baskets. Both beautiful and a pain-in-the-butt
• Yard Sale! $$$
• Kamron's garden
• Kamron and Amaurey together again (at long last)
• The flower garden
• Re-planting the tree