Just Dreaming

Oh, the things I've been dreaming of for the yard!

Chickens. Clucking and scratching and eating bugs and weeds and table scraps. And with all that, egg production, too. And I'm not afraid of the prospect of eating chickens after they are done laying. I could go for some home-raised chicken broth.

Composting. Putting yard waste and shredded junk mail and other scraps to good use? Yes, I think I will.

More vegetable garden space. I'd like to grow a lot more food than we currently are able to. That means more raised beds, and maybe some container gardening too.

Rabbits. And/or other small meat animals. Yes, I am thinking about the possibilities of raising our own meat.

Just some ideas I've had floating around...

Okay, okay...

...okay. This happens to blogs all the time. But instead of lamenting about it, let's just move right along, shall we? I'm back. That's what matters, eh? A few updates:

-Doing Paleo diet, again, only this time, REALLY half-assed. In fact, I'm calling it the half-assed paleo challenge. Or "challenge," more like. I also like to call it the "don't worry" paleo diet. Try to eat paleo, and make it a priority, but if you slip up don't freak out and feel like the whole thing is ruined. Just move right along and get back on the horse or the wagon or whatever the hell.

-Garden went well, although less productive than I had perhaps hoped. Some plants didn't make it. Others did, but produced little or practically nothing. And there was that blossom-end rot issue with some of the tomatoes.BUT. I have to see it as a learning experience, which it REALLY was, since now I know what it's like and how I can change things next time.Hooray, glass half full!

-Found a new rec center to frequent, and I love it to death! Now to save up money to actually JOIN it. It's pretty great and will be worth every penny.

State of the Yard Address

A lot of my hopes for the yard have been dashed lately. I know that in the end this will all be for the best, since we'll be getting a topsoil layer to help make our rocky terrain more useful for growing stuff. But right now...

THIS is my poor garden. It had to be moved out of the way when the yard was being excavated. Hopefully it will be put back together by the end of the week, at which point we can FINALLY plant these guys:

The garden wasn't the only casualty of the landscaping work. Our poor little trees were subjected to some stress as well. Look at the oil left behind by the machines!

There is some good news, though--while inspecting the fruit trees, we found that some of them had fruit beginning to grow:

 Sadly, many of the little fruits fell off thanks to the machinery, but some still remain and now we are looking forward to some fruit from our own yard!

Oh, and that rock area we created? Gone, too. Well, I guess it's all to make way for bigger and better things, so it will be worth it. Right now, my back yard is quite desolate. At least all of the weeds are gone!

Even the best-laid plans...

...can turn into a pile of meaningless trash in an instant.

What we started.

Over the weekend, we learned that we won't be able to landscape the yard the way we had wanted to. The city has a nice list of rules regarding how yard landscaping must look, and even though not all homes in our neighborhood adhere to these rules exactly, we have been targeted by the city because we've lived here a year and by law must have a landscaped front yard by the end of the month. And they are telling us how to do it.

The front yard must be mostly vegetation...what they really mean is they want grass. Oh, grass...just what I was hoping to avoid. I'd dreamed of xeriscaping most of the front yard--perhaps even all. A landscaper came to look at the yard, and he said that the easiest way to quickly satiate the city is to put in a bunch of grass. And so, the front yard that I wanted to be mostly rock and bark will now be about 80% grass.

The landscaper claimed that grass was the best choice as far as saving time on yardwork goes. He may be right, in some ways. But I was completely willing to work a little harder to have what I had dreamed of.

I guess that part of the back yard will still be left for us to create as we wish, but not until after the landscapers scrape away about 6 inches of dirt and rock and replace it with topsoil, effectively erasing all the plans and outlining we'd started. Our garden will be uprooted. I'm not even sure when I'll get to plant my seed starts at this point.

So our plans aren't totally worthless, but right now it feels that way. Like all the stuff we were willing to do doesn't matter. And I guess we'd better get used to the idea of mowing a lawn Every. Damn. Week. All. Summer.

So a lot of stuff is on hold right now, and gardening might not be a reality until June. I'm hoping that I can still make a lot of my projects work out despite the setback.

State of the Garden Address

Ok, so as of today here's how things are progressing.

Seeds I've Started Indoors (and how they are doing):
Tomato, Gourmet Heirloom Blend: 3/4 sprouted. They seem to be doing quite well :)
Tomato, Bonny Best: 1/2 sprouted. Doing okay :/
Pepper, Golden Treasure: 0/2 sprouted :(
Pepper, Sweet Golden Cal Wonder: 0/2 sprouted :(
Eggplant, Black Beauty: 2/3 sprouted. Only 1 seems to be thriving, however. ;/
Lettuce, Salad Bowl Red: 7/12 sprouted/thriving...originally more sprouted, but they dried out. Still, the majority are doing well :)
Pumpkin, Orange Smoothie: 2/2 sprouted and thriving...I think starting this indoors was a mistake since they are already big-ass sons of guns. Doing great :)
Winter Squash, Delicata: 0/2 sprouted...they may need more time? :(
Melon, Casaba Golden Beauty: 4/4 sprouted, 2 of which are already thriving :)

Seeds I've Started Outdoors (and how they are doing):
Pea, Dark Seeded Perfection: Planted 16. These have finally, just BARELY, started showing their lovely little faces! About three little sprouts are now visible, so I'm quite joyful :) I'm going to try to keep them pretty wet and hope they keep on growing like a boss. :/
Carrot, Danvers Half Long: Can't remember how many I planted...but regardless, nothing yet :(

So far, not too bad, right? If nothing else, I've got tomatoes, eggplant, lettuce, pumpkins, melons, and peas to look forward to! Next step is, I think, to move the thriving/larger plants to bigger containers, and soon I'll start hardening them off.

What's up, Doc?

It's been one of those kinda crap-tastic days.
So...what better to do than plant carrots?

Sprouts are doing okay inside so far. Not much from the eggplants or peppers yet, but tomatoes and lettuce seem to be doing quite well!

Catch-up for this week...

Seeds are sprouting!
Tomatoes are doing the best so far. There are a few peppers and lettuce seeds just starting to show their little green selves, too.

This little guy? That's a freakin' Canby thornless raspberry. For sers. This is going in my yard! FTW! Did I ever mention how much I love raspberries? Well, it's a LOT.

Aaand...here is the totally finished raised garden bed, complete with the soil mix, square foot gardening sections laid out, and PEAS planted! Awesome.

I still don't really know what I'm doing, but I could probably fool a few people at this point. Let's see what actually happens...

We did it!

A few hours on a nice warm spring day, and the garden bed project is done!

 D. was oh so willing to help a TON with this project. Don't get the wrong idea, though, because I worked my ass off too! D. is just more photogenic than I am. Plus, he knows how to use a drill, so there you go.

Thanks, D., for the pose.

We drove out to Lowe's once we'd built and moved the wooden bed. We stuffed 12 bags of topsoil, 10 bags of manure, and some peat moss into two small-ish cars. Believe it or not, it smelled worse outside the cars than inside on the ride home (thanks to the mink farms we passed on the road).

Haul. Dump. Mix. And...we misjudged how much we would need, but we got the bed 3/4 full anyway.

We'll have to hurry and get the rest in there so I can plant the peas!

Little Project: Umbrella Stand

So what do you do when you need access to shade for garden work during the middle of the day? And you just happen to have a couple of PVC pipe pieces leftover from a previous project? And you have extra containers, and plenty of rocks?

It' not a pretty sight, but then again, neither is the rest of the yard. This will be great for shade while working in the garden!

Materials: Check!

Another trip to Lowe's, and we now have the supplies for the garden bed.

The materials we ended up getting cost about $60. This includes screws, some drill bits, the wood, and some stakes.

We were planning to use cedar or pine as suggested in the guide we're following for this project, but the store did not have those kinds in the wood size we needed. We found Douglas Fir to be a less expensive solution, and it came in the right size. I understand that this kind of wood will rot faster, but since we are only planning to stay in this house for a few years it should be okay in the long run. Hopefully it will hold up as long as we're here, but I don't really know what to expect. This is all one big adventure, isn't it?

We've estimated that the cost of soil to fill the bed will probably be another $60, since we can literally use none of the native soil and will need to bring everything in. This little project is getting somewhat expensive, but I knew going in that starting up would require an initial cost.

Now to put the thing together.

Am I really ready for THIS?

Good question.

But you know, sometimes it's true that thinking too much about something before you do it is a bad idea. This might be one of those times. If I really considered what I'm getting myself into, I might turn back this very second.

Here are the seeds I have and am planning to plant/grow/kill/whatever very soon:

• Dark Seeded Perfection Peas
• Purple Plum Radish
• Delicata Squash
• Orange Smoothie Pumpkin
• Salad Bowl Red Lettuce
• Danvers Half-Long Carrot
• Black Beauty Eggplant
• Sweet Golden Cal Wonder Pepper
• Casaba Golden Beauty Melon

March 19th is the earliest date in my region to start seeds indoors, and I'm preparing myself to do just that. Most of the seeds I have will need to be planted straight in the ground later on, but a few I can get going inside the house. Here's the thing, though--I really don't know what I'm doing. Sure, I've been reading, but I've never actually done real gardening before on this scale.

Here's the area I'll be working with.

Thanks for helping, Bailey.

See that dirt that's all raked and pretty-like? That's where the raised bed is going to go. Let me assure you that although it might not look like it from the photo, I want to re-emphasize the fact that the ground is PURE FREAKING ROCK and really quite impossible to grow anything in unless it's a certain type of weed, sage brush, or wild flowers. I don't think the "soil" is capable of sustaining much more than that. So we'll be bringing soil in instead.

See those black planter things? They're left over from when we planted trees last year, and I'm thinking of utilizing them as part of the garden. They're big enough to each fit a pepper, tomato, or other kind of plant. That way, we wouldn't need to make more than one raised bed.

Now excuse me while I figure out how many plants I can actually fit in the space I'm planning for the garden.

So, I want to start a garden.

A serious garden. A garden that grows enough food to actually be substantial. And I want to do it from "scratch."

First, let me tell you what I'm up against. I live on land that is pure rock, meaning what soil there is happens to suck. It's the poorest soil you'll ever see. This heroic part of me had the silly thought of "oh, I can make it work!" But no. I went out there with a shovel and couldn't dig an inch down. This, by the way, was when the ground was "muddy." So no, I won't be planting directly in the native soil. (just a side note--when we planted trees on the property, we did indeed need to rent a jackhammer to dig the holes. A JACKHAMMER.)

Check out that exceptional soil quality!

This means raised garden beds (which we will need to build), soil brought in, and plenty of amendments to make it workable. Oh, this is going to be an adventure!

First things first: the seeds! I'm going to try starting them indoors in a couple of weeks. More on that soon.