Soggy Spring

Well, old man winter apparently heard about my hint comment and is trying to get back at me.  He seems to be throwing an all out tantrum, flailing around, throwing rain, snow and wind every which way.  I recognize the tantrum, because it feels strangely similar to the fits my baby has begun to throw. (The doctor says it's normal and I should be worried if she doesn't throw tantrums.  Easy for her to say.)  We are to expect snow tonight, nothing serious, just annoying.  Old man winter also seems to have some influence over springtime's decisions and has convinced her to not allow us to see the sun for a few weeks.  Seriously, he has got to get over it and move to the other hemisphere already.

It is nice to see that Spring has plans to move on in anyway, snow squalls and cloudy skies not withstanding.  There are blossoms on a few bushes and the leaves on the lilac bushes have made themselves known.  There is a tint of green haloing many of the neighborhood trees; a little foreshadowing of the coming leaves. 

In garden news, I batted my eyes at the wonderful husband and he put my little raised bed garden together, well, the outline anyway.  I moved my winter sowing experiments inside to try to protect them from the tantrum throwing toddler.  It seems to have backfired though.  She now wants at them even more.  We still need to get materials together for the second raised bed.  The dirt is still a bit of a problem, although I did break down and use a home depot gift card to purchase four bags of steer manure (cheap, but still... I'm a rancher for crying out loud!) and some special garden compost stuff, which came with a mail in rebate.  Six dollars back will buy me a few seedlings I think.  We did not buy enough to fill two raised beds, but it's a start I suppose. 

We have some friends that have some top soil that we could use, but the getting it here is difficult.  As of right now, my plan is to use the bags we just bought, once they are empty, to transport some dirt here.  It's going to take a few trips and we'll have to wait until things dry out a bit.  I'm not really anxious to plop a few bags of mud into the back of the van.  Our minivan has  been cussed more than a few times lately for not being a truck.  Sure would be easier to haul all of my garden stuff around if I had a truck.  I realize now that I have been spoiled all those years on the ranch.  There was a never ending supply of compost, trucks to haul it, tractors to load it and space to put it.  This urban gardening thing is tougher than I thought it would be, and I'm not even started!

I'm linking up with the Homestead Revival Barn Hop!

Preparedness Challenge: 72 hour kit

Amy, at Homestead Revival has been hosting a weekly preparedness challenge at her blog each Saturday.  Since preparedness is a topic near and dear to my heart, I was very excited to take part.  Then life happened and suddenly it's week 5 of the challenge.  Back before my life got hectic, I had planned to go through what is needed for a 72 hour kit.  I feel pretty confident in being prepared for emergencies as long as I can stay in my home, but if I had to evacuate for some reason?  No idea what to take.  That's what a 72 hour kit, or Bug out bag is for. 

The list I have is slightly overwhelming. The items listed include; water, food, warmth and shelter, light sources, tools, first aid, communications, personal sanitation, extra clothing, money, important papers and something to put it all in. It lists all these things, but then tells you not to overload your bag... Prepare for everyone in the family, including pets, but keep it to a minimum.  Honestly, this is why I have avoided this project for so long.  I'm frozen by all the requirements.  So, I think I'll take it one section at a time. 

I'll start with the extra clothes.  It's really not feasible for me to keep winter clothes in the 72 hour kit for the duration of the winter, because we are using those clothes throughout the winter.  We would have to grab all our winter gear on our way out the door.  Now that winter is over, it's time to think about preparing for the hot months.  Hats would probably be a good idea to have on hand, or stuffed into the bag.  However, nights here still get cold, so sweatshirts or jackets need to have a place as well.

As part of our preparedness to leave in a hurry, I decided to let my kids practice packing their own backpacks.  We make weekend trips to Grandmas house often and each child gets their own backpack.  They are responsible for packing their clothing for the weekend.  Since they are already "trained" to pack quickly (some of these trips are spur of the moment things) I think they will be able to quickly pack the needed extra clothing if we were to need to leave in a hurry.  Except for the baby, of course.  I would be in charge of stuffing another bag full of diapers and wipes.  :)  Finish off with a few water bottles and granola bars, sunscreen and mosquito repellent, and I think they'll be packed.

Dirty thoughts

I got my hands dirty today.  I guess I need to find my old garden gloves.  The dirt in the planters around the patio is now loose and on it's way to being planted with all sorts of greenery.  In my wild hacking with the trowel, I discovered a few living somethings that apparently survived the winter.  Hopefully they'll survive me too.  I'm trying to remember what was there last fall, but I don't really have a clue.

Horrible picture, but there are definitely some shoots coming up

The square foot garden is not yet put together and my husband now plans to make me another one.  Oh, joy!  I think he secretly likes gardening as much as I do.  Too bad he doesn't like tomatoes, because that's basically what he'll be getting.  I've always had to work my tail off just to get a few red tomatoes, but now I'm in a much warmer climate, so I'm going to go crazy.  As crazy as you can get in a 4 foot by 4 foot space anyway.

In my planning and musing, I overlooked one major thing.  Dirt.  I'm going to need dirt.  The square foot gardening guru claims that you must make a mix of compost, peat moss and vermiculite.  I looked up some prices and laughed myself silly.  I can't afford all of that.  Not enough to fill two 4x4x1 foot boxes.  I'm trying to come to grips with buying even the cheapest of compost.  Paying for dirt just feels so wrong to me.  All my life, I've lived within easy distance of all the compost I could want.  We keep young colts and calves in the corral during the winter in order to keep an eye on them and feed them the better stuff.  In return, they create a lovely compost.  I've never had to think too hard about dirt.  I'm really struggling with this -pay for dirt- concept.  My sister has sort of offered to load up some barnyard stuff in her little truck and bring it to me, which I wasn't about to accept.  That's too much work and too far a distance for anyone to come just for dirt.  But now... I think I'll give her a call.  What could she have to do that is better than hauling compost around? 

Well, off to think some more dirty thoughts

Cold morning

Woowee!  It's a bit chilly out there this morning!  Snow/ice last night and warnings of a hard frost tonight.  My kiddos suddenly have the urge to set up a stand on the sidewalk.  A water stand with the leftover water bottles that we bought for a camping trip.  They were thwarted in their attempts yesterday by mean old mom reminding them that school was more of a priority than selling water bottles for 6 dollars.  So, first thing this morning, they were out sitting on their camp chairs, with the cooler of water.  Who cares that it's barely above freezing and nobody is out?  Surely there should be a line of customers waiting to pay for cold water on a cold day.  They did drop the price to 3 dollars.  Maybe I am a mean mom...  Sure has been peaceful this morning...

I have been wandering around outside at various times of the day.  My landlady probably thinks I'm going nuts.  Walk out onto the patio, look around, nod my head, mutter something to myself, wander back into the house... repeat in an hour or two...

I'm not crazy though.  Since she gave me the go ahead to do whatever I want in the planters surrounding the patio, I've been trying to figure out the best strategy to use them.  The patio does get some sun, but it's also shady a lot of the day, so I'm trying to figure out where the sun shines the most throughout the day, and where it hardly shines at all.  Here's a picture of what I'm working with.

The planters are about a foot across and about 40 feet total in length.  The side on the right seems to get the most sun and the far left never gets any.  The majority gets sun from 10 till late afternoon, but I just don't know if I'll be able to grow anything besides lettuce here.  Guess I'll never know till I try.  I'm seriously considering cutting a few branches off of that pine tree to let in more light, but I don't know that the landlady will be that flexible.  I still need to put together my 4x4 foot garden bed.  She said I can do more... hmmm.  Hopefully I can get things together this weekend.

In other news, today is the last day of wrestling practice for my little man.  Thank goodness.  I know he loves it, but I'm done.  I'm ready to have my Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday evenings back. 

In a stroke of genius, or so I thought, I remembered to throw our aprons into the wash with the kitchen towels and cloth napkins.  It seemed like a good idea at the time.  They were very dirty.  Here's what I pulled out of the dryer.

That is four aprons hopelessly tangled.  Yup, I'm a genius.  Such a genius that I was able to get them back apart in (not so) record time.  But as I worked with the knots, I decided to show you our family wall of aprons.  I made all but mine.

Last Christmas, I made aprons for my two kiddos and one for my husband to grill in.  They were a big hit with everyone.  The kids feel official when they help me make cookies.  Mine is a plain red, not very cute, stolen from my mom's house, apron.  I've been planning on making myself one for a long time, but lack of inspiration (or a pattern) has kept me from acting.  Maybe if I had a cutesy apron, I would remember to wear it and save a few of my shirts from my crazy cooking style.  Maybe.

Checking in

My goodness!  I haven't posted in a while, have I?  Work happened and then spring break happened and then I got hooked into a book.  An audio book, actually, but it doesn't seem to matter.  When I get into a book, I can't think about anything else.  Audio books are good because I can still make dinner and do dishes while "reading".  The book is now over, so here I am.  :)

Spring break was an adventure.  The kids and I traveled to the ranch and were enjoying the beautiful spring weather.  The snow was melting quickly, and there were bare patches in the meadows.  Of course, I forgot the camera.  I did use my  mom's but I forgot to email myself the pictures.  Typical of me.  Then, we woke up one morning to 8 inches of snow.  Eight!  It kept snowing all that day too, but it was harder to measure since the snow was melting at the same time.  Crazy old man winter.  I think he's getting a bit senile.  I understand that he doesn't want to feel like he's not needed anymore, so I tolerate frosts and little skiffs of snow into May, but 8 inches?  He is obviously in denial, so if someone could strongly hint to him that his services aren't needed anymore, I would definitely appreciate it.

I'm trying to get caught up with the blogs on my reading list.  I hope I haven't missed anything too important.  I've missed my blog world while I've been gone.

Renewed garden hopes

Happy Spring!  There are crocuses blooming in the front yard!  I know this because my son picked one... every year we go through the "don't pick other people's flowers" routine.  One day he will get it.  Maybe.  He's so cute when he brings me flowers though.  We'll have to plant a few flowers just for him to pick.  That would be fun, don't you think?

I took the opportunity to spring clean my car today.  It had an entire winter's worth of garbage and toys and crayons in it.  My husband kept asking me if we could clean out the car one of these days.  "Of course!",  I say, "I'm tired of the tire changing stuff being under my feet!"  I think I finally got the message that by we he means me.  So there I was, head down, bottom up, digging the insane amount of trash out from under my son's seat and explaining to my daughter where to put the pop cans that she found.  Then my landlady opened her garage and needed to drive past, which meant that the laundry basket bursting with random gloves, toys, etc, and the grocery bags stuffed with trash needed to be moved.  It's embarrassing for me to know that other people know how messy I really am, so I tried to not make eye contact.  She stopped to talk anyway.

Are we going to renew our rent contract?  Yes, I think so, I say as I try to gather as much garbage as possible right there where she can see.  Then there's a little chit chat about her grandkids, power bills and new sprinkler systems and then she says, "Would you like to put in some square food gardens by the fence?"  She has seen me out there, looking over my pitiful little garden plot.  Eyes come up..."YES!"  She also informs me that the planters around the edge of the patio are fair game as well.  It's shady, but I think I can figure out a few shady plants to put there.

It turns out that my landlady used to square foot garden herself. (not at this house unfortunately)  I should have asked a few more specifics about what she has pictured, or how many boxes I can do, but I have to have such questions working in my brain for a few days at least in order to actually ask a worthwhile question to anyone, and I definitely could not form any sort of question while I sat on the floor of my mini van trying to get that yellow colored pencil out from under the edge of the chair.  No worries though.  She offered me some videos that she has about this gardening method, so I have a little time to prepare for another garden discussion.  Remind me to ask how far down the fence we can go.

I'm so excited!  As it was, my plot was 11 feet by 1.5 feet.  Not a lot of space to grow tons of veggies like I want to do.  I'm not a pro at square foot gardening, but I'm sure I can figure something out.    And now the garden planning gets to start all over again!  Too bad I have to wait for my winter sowing bottles to sprout before I know how much of what I will have.  That would make planning a bit easier.  But I guess I can pass the time by figuring out how to get some gardening boxes going. 

A refined palate

Rocks, leaves, grass, dirt, sticks... all things that a one year old loves to eat.  Why do I try to share my food with her?  Or stress about her getting enough fruits and veggies?  All she wants to eat is bird poop from the yard!

She is loving being outside though.  We spent quite a bit of time wandering around, her sampling everything and me trying to convince her to stop doing that.  Finally, she was content to just carry some rocks around.

I have one more spinach sprout.  That's how desperate I am for spring, I'm giving you updates on each measly little spinach plant.  Just one more week, and I think it'll be time to plant some peas!  I'm used to getting things started really early in order to get any kind of harvest at all, so I'm antsy for things to get going.  I feel kind of silly though, since none of the neighbors have even started looking at their garden plots yet.  They probably think I'm crazy, lining up re-purposed 2-liter pop bottles against the fence, and peeking in through the spout everyday. 

Photo by Terry Sohl

I did do a little research on my "chickens".  Turns out they are called ringneck pheasants and they are not native to America.  They somehow got here from China and made themselves right at home.  The females only lay eggs in the spring, and they will lay up to 20, then sit until they hatch.  Their life expectancy is only 10-20 months, perhaps due to the fact that humans like to shoot them and eat them.  So, they might not be the best laying hens to have around.  I don't really want 200 fertilized eggs in April, and then none the rest of the year.  Besides, it sounds like they need all the baby chicks they can get!