Where does the time go!

I have to apologize! I can't believe it has been over a week since I last wrote. That just goes to show you how absorbed into my garden I have been. Anyone who has tried to call me will verify that because I don't answer the phone when I am working outside.

This morning was a teenage hormonal experience. (No offense to our teen readers.) After speaking to Alicia and finding out that her radishes had sprouted, I was very excited to see if anything had come up in my garden.




I was like a child at Christmas time, scanning everything for the best thing, then getting close and really checking everything out. My front box was full of sweet surprises! I have 2 full squares of arugula that have sprouted, 1 box with several spinach shoots, 2 red onions coming up, and musclen salad green coming through. I was so giddy it was almost embarrasing.




Then I looked up to check my back box only to find that the cat had been digging AGAIN! My sudden rush of excitement turned to a quick desire to strangle my cat. (Not really, i love her to bits, but stop messing with my garden cat!)



There have been several great things in the yard; my rhubarb is getting pretty big, the peas are sure growing and the strawberries have blossoms on them!!!









I mowed the front lawn and weed whacked this morning, and thanks to my extreme inaccuracy, I now have a beautiful vase of garden fresh flowers on my sill. (Isaac helped me rescue them after I mowed them down.)

Ah, so good to say spring in finally here! And just because gardening wasn't enough today, we also baked whole wheat bread, tried out a new spelt bread recipe, and made 3 sub style buns. Check it out! And try it out.... recipe to come (the family is waiting for dinner right now.)


Cheers,
Nadine

Full swing

Well, it finally happened! I honestly never thought that we would get our back corner cleaned up. Not only is it cleaned up, but it has two beautiful beds in it and one that is almost fully planted.




It took me a while to figure out my planting configuration and I'm only just starting to look into crop rotation once my first set of veggies are harvested.

In the front box I have:
48 green onions
27 red onions
22 spanish onions
9 bush bean plants
2 red leaf lettuces
27 spinach plants
32 mesclun blend salad greens
32 arugula plants
1 green zuchinni vining plant

and room for 2 tomato bushes and 27 more bean bushes.

And I still have the back bed to fill plus a smaller but deeper side bed that the boys are putting together.



It was a lot of work, but we had a lot of help and the kids did a great job shoveling and moving over a yard of the soil mixture.

In the garden...

Well, I was hoping to have my crops all planted in my new square foot gardens by last weekend. It didn't happen though. Mother Nature didn't seem to get my memo about needing some sunshine!

However, the back corner of our yard that we have had to "renovate" for my project is almost done! We had to pull out an old water feature and pond liner, remove all the rocks (fist sized and larger) and then level the ground for the beds to go on. We got all that done, but the leveling hasn't been the most successful because the ground is very muddy due to all the rain we have been getting. (Doesn't Mother Nature know we need the rain AFTER we do our planting!!!)

But I guess it all worked out okay because my soil, which was delivered yesterday, wasn't mixed to the right formula. We had a slight miscommunication and I ended up with 3 times the amount of peat moss in the mixture. The company has been awesome and they are taking it all back and fixing it up for me, and that gives me a few more days to get my garden leveled and the boxes finished. I am looking for some before pictures, but the after pictures are definitely on their way!!!

Thanks to all the rain that we have been having, I have had a few crops of rhubarb from my garden!



It was delicious stewed with a bit of water and sugar! Although Alicia found it too bitter for her liking :)





The box program has been going well. I am learning to use many vegetables that I didn't know how to use or even what they were!



This was my home made version of a chef's salad. It was on a base of green leaf lettuce, with mizuna and red kale. Then some sliced red pepper, red onion, and celery. Topped with sliced ham and turkey, a hard boiled egg and a sprinkling of grated parmesan cheese. It was really good.