Category Archives: Square Foot Gardening – Raised Beds

December 4, 2016 · 5:34 pm

Last Harvest of the Fall 2016

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I had a nice harvest today – the last one of the fall season, since we’re due for hard freezes Wednesday through Saturday next week. We had a nice amount of lettuce, plus my cute little bitty heads of cauliflower.

 

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I’ll clean out the garden a little bit at a time, since it’s so rainy and cold now. I should be able to clear things up in another session or two. We’ve had such fun with the garden this year. I’m not sure what I’ll try to grow next year, other than tomatoes and lettuce. My luck with the rest has been spotty, at best, though it was really interesting to watch things grow. I’ll do a lot of studying and decide what I would like to try next year. I haven’t had much luck at all finding spinach plants, so I may try to see if I can get plants started inside starting in about February. I know, I’m still carrying the name of the Serial Seed Killer, but maybe NEXT time….

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December 4, 2016 · 5:05 pm

Rain and Smiles

Nino Chakvetadze - Zen to Zany via Cathy Ruggiero

Nino Chakvetadze – Zen to Zany via Cathy Ruggiero

We’ve enjoyed a cold one today. The temperature hovered in the 40s with a bit of rain off and on. Tomorrow is supposed to be the better chance, and then a freeze with a chance of snow!

I just came in from harvesting the rest of my fall garden. With three days of hard freezes this coming week, I’m taking it down a bit at a time. I’ll post pics in a bit.

This has been the perfect day for seeking comfort – with a pot roast in the crock pot for dinner, lemon pudding made for my husband, chocolate pudding for me, sausage balls for lunches and snacks and a nice pot of hot coffee to ward off the chill.

My hands got so cold while I was harvesting, I’ve been sitting here for several minutes with my hands around my coffee cup – not drinking, just enjoying the warmth!

I wish I could tell you I did all kinds of productive things today. I enjoyed reading a favorite book, tried to take a nap under my cozy throw, but basically did only what I felt I had to do.  I happy to say I enjoyed every minute of my sloth, though. :0)

Hope you’ve had a good day, too.

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December 3, 2016 · 1:11 pm

Appreciating the Rain

Anita Opper via Zen to Zany

Anita Opper via Zen to Zany

I’m delighted that we’re having rain today. Not a good, soaking rain, but rain nonetheless, and for that I’m grateful. The temperature has finally gotten to 50 degrees F. here, and I think that will be the high for the day. The next few days are supposed to be very cloudy with another chance of rain Monday.  AHHHH!

The sad news is that Tuesday night or Wednesday a strong cold front is coming with killing freezes for several days, probably spelling the end of my fall garden. If the temperatures get down to the 20s, it won’t do any good to cover the plants with sheets. :0(

I’ll plan to harvest all I can by Tuesday evening.

We’ve had a fun year of gardening!

  • The biggest thing we did was build six 4’x4′ wooden planters. We installed three of the raised bed planters while the spring and summer garden lived to give us more tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, etc. We planted our fall garden in the new raised bed planters, enjoying broccoli, some cute little cauliflower heads, lots of lettuce of three different kinds and radishes. I also tried to grow celery from what I bought at the grocery. I planted the cutest little bright green plant in the garden. It STILL is a cute little bright green plant, but no celery. I’m trying some more inside, just for giggles.
  • When the spring/summer garden finished, we installed the other three planters, so now we’ll have six ready to go for the spring. We’ll plant our tomatoes in two brick planters we converted to square foot planters. One gets lots or sunshine and wind. The other is more protected, in the hook formed by the back of the house and the porch. I’ll have the winter to figure out where I want to plant things, using my fall printout to make sure I achieve crop rotation on the south side of the main garden.

Meanwhile, we’ll enjoy today’s cold rain, hope for more rain tomorrow and Monday, harvest the veggies we can in preparation for the freeze Tuesday night into Wednesday.

I hope the weather where you are is either pleasant enough to enjoy being outside, or that you can stay safe and warm inside.

Make it a wonderful day!

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December 1, 2016 · 3:01 pm

Stellar Fall Day

 

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The temperature is about 63 degrees F. The sun is shining. There is a bit of a breeze, but nothing like the awful, gusty winds we had yesterday. It’s hard to think of how this could be a prettier day.

 

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I feel rich today, looking out over the valley beyond our land. Even though we didn’t have much fall color this year, due to the summer-like temperatures we had for so long, I love our view.

 

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If you can look at it, it seems as if it’s all yours. We’re very rich in view on top of our ridge line in Arkansas.

I’ve decided to quit WORRYING about whether it’s going to frost or freeze each night. I’ll simply go out and cover the plants each night before it gets dark, and then we’ll be in the best shape possible.

When the first really hard freeze comes, the garden will be over. We’ve had a fun year in gardening, moving from our square foot garden on the ground’s surface to our raised bed planters now. I’m enjoying every minute of our fall garden, however long it lasts, hoping that the cute heads of cauliflower will get a bit larger before I need to harvest them. I’m looking forward to planning how I’ll plant the spring garden, since we’ll move our tomato plants out of the main garden and into planters on the east side of the house in the spring.

I’m going to try to get out in the next day or so to finish mulching leaves for the year. I’d like to make enough mulch for two more large leaf bags to store in the garage for the spring before I call it quits.

I hope the weather is such that you can get outside and enjoy it today.

 

 

 

 

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November 30, 2016 · 6:56 pm

Arrrrgh!

Ramblings from a Desert Garden

Ramblings from a Desert Garden

This gives you some idea what I’ve been doing for the last 30 minutes or so.

I’ve been watching my local news website for the weather forecast, particularly seeing if we’re forecasted to have a freeze or not. Earlier today, the website said, “No.” I was clear until next week.

Then I checked the 10 day forecast from the weather channel, plus a 10 day forecast from Google. They said, “Yes.”

I then listened to the local newscast. They had changed from “no” to “yes.”

Of course, by this time, it was pitch black outside. If I had known it was supposed to freeze tonight, I would have gone out and covered everything up about 4:30 this afternoon. :0(

My husband reminded me we have flood lights that we can shine on the garden. I couldn’t remember for sure where the switch was, so he came out with me, carrying the teeny tiny flashlight he has on his key chain.

We turned the switch on inside the shop, but nothing happened. We then spent the next half hour trying to figure out what was wrong. We weren’t getting electricity from the switch to the lights for some unknown reason. After messing with it for awhile and not being able to figure out what the deal was, my husband went out to the garden with me and held the flashlight while I spread huge sheets over the three raised bed garden planters and secured the sheets with clothes pins.

I was freezing by that time and wanted to come in. My husband decided he would fight with the problem a bit longer, so he’s still out there now. I tried to get him to come in, saying we could look at the problem tomorrow when we had light and hopefully a bit more warmth, but when something fails to work as it should, he feels he has ‘let me down.’ He’ll work on it for awhile longer tonight, hoping to figure it out pretty rapidly. If that doesn’t work, he’ll come in and quietly stew about it until he figures out something else to try…

Luckily, we still have some homemade chicken soup/stew I made the other day that will warm us up tonight.

I guess I’ll start covering up the plants each night while it’s still light so I don’t have to worry about the weather forecasters changing their mind.

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P.S.  It’s about an hour later.  I fed animals and went back outside, just to keep my husband company, if nothing else. He figured out the switch had failed – the first time we’ve ever had that happen.  He replaced the switch and the two floodlights came on outside as they should.

HOORAAAAAY!

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November 29, 2016 · 5:46 pm

Garden Wrapped Up for the Night

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I just spent an hour in our raised bed, square foot garden,  weeding, pruning, and harvesting lettuce and some small bits of broccoli.

 

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These pics were taken before I started pruning. You can see some of the leaves that needed to be cut.

 

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This is mainly broccoli and cauliflower.

 

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This is a good pic to show the whole fall garden. I can’t tell you how much I love being able to take care of things without having to bend over double or get up and down on my hands and knees over and over.  I got the three planters covered with sheets before I left because it’s supposed to freeze tonight.

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I never thought I would describe cauliflower as “cute,” but I have the sweetest, teeny, tiny heads of cauliflower I’m trying to protect. The largest one is about 2-1/2 inches across.

 

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The lettuce is still producing, though I’m having to prune more and more leaves off, due to the incredible changes in temperature. (Example – 70 degrees this afternoon, and 32 degrees tomorrow morning…) If you look carefully, you can see a salad blend plant in this pic – toward the upper left hand corner – it’s burgundy.

 

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Here’s a difference kind of lettuce. It’s still looking pretty good.

 

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This is the ‘celery that could’ (like the little engine that could in the children’s story.) I planted it weeks ago. It’s still little bitty, but – as you can see – very healthy and green. I’m cheering it on, trying to protect it as much as possible. SWEET little celery plant…

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November 21, 2016 · 1:22 pm

The Garden Still Lives!

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For two nights this week I’ve had to spread sheets over our fall raised bed, square foot garden, trying to bring the plants through the freezes. Last night it wasn’t supposed to freeze, so I held my breath and didn’t cover the plants. I went out to check on things this morning and all our plants were still alive! I have several different types of lettuce that I’m HOPING I can continue to harvest into January. Time will tell. The above is head lettuce.

 

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I’m not sure what this is called, but the leaves are frilly and curly.

 

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This is kind of ruffle-y.

 

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This is one of the two raised bed planters that are almost entirely devoted to broccoli and cauliflower, although you can see two lettuce plants on the left.

 

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This planter is almost entirely lettuces. If you look carefully, there’s a ‘salad blend’ brownish lettuce in the center. The weather was so warm I almost lost the lettuce plants due to them trying to bolt. That’s why the plants are so tall. I have no clue what will happen, but I’m harvesting every two or three days for as long as they’ll allow.

 

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This is the treasure I found this morning – a teeny, tiny head of cauliflower! Isn’t it cute? :0)

I tried to grow celery this year, planting three ‘bottoms’ of celery I had gotten at the store. Two immediately croaked when I transferred them to the planter, but one is still alive, quite green, but only has small leaves and doesn’t seem to be growing. I’m just glad I tried, kept one alive, and will keep trying.

I finally folded up the king sized sheets I used to cover the planters. We MIGHT get much-needed rain tomorrow and I don’t want the sheets to get wet.

So far, so good!

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November 19, 2016 · 11:40 am

We Made it Through Freeze One!

Ramblings from a Desert Garden

Ramblings from a Desert Garden

I covered my fall raised bed garden plants yesterday afternoon in preparation for our first freeze of the season. This gives you an idea of what my garden looked liked, except mine are boxes up in the air about 4 feet or so. I used three bed sheets anchored with a gazillion clothes pins, trying to keep the covers from blowing off in the gusty, cold wind.

I forgot to take my camera, but I was too cold by the time I finished to take a pic anyway. :0)

My plants made it through the first freeze of the season. I went out to the garden, afraid that the sheets would be bunched up against one fence or another in the garden, but all stayed where I put them! And when I took the sheets off, the plants seemed to be fine. HOOOOOORAAAAAY!

I left the sheets and clothes pins in the empty planter boxes, ready to cover things again tonight. If I can pull the plants through another two nights, I think we’re home free until NEXT Saturday, unless they change the forecast.

We turned the heat on downstairs for the first time this season yesterday.

We just put up a cat cube in the garage for our newest cat, Smoke, who is used to sleeping on the back porch. We closed that off to her about three weeks ago, and she’s finally learning that we feed Abby and her on top of the wood pile in the garage. I hope she likes the cube, as it will allow her to be safe and warm this winter.  (You can see from the pic that Abby’s cube on the left has been well used. My husband built a strong support for each cube and then anchored the cubes to the wooden support so they won’t move as the cat jumps up or moves around inside.)

 

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Appendages crossed that we make it through Freeze #2 tonight!

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November 16, 2016 · 3:47 pm

Harvest – Nov. 16, 2016

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Today I harvested a bit of broccoli and some nice lettuce.

 

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Today and tomorrow I’m going to look at everything carefully in the garden, spruce things up out there, and get ready to cover the plants up for the coming freezes starting Friday through the weekend.

 

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Last year we were extremely lucky, picking fresh lettuce for our salads through mid January. We got spoiled, and I’m hoping we get spoiled again this year. All appendages are crossed!

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November 16, 2016 · 3:25 pm

The Fall Raised Bed Square Foot Garden

fallgardennov1

You can see two of the three 4×4 foot squares of our raised bed, square foot garden in this picture. I’ve been trying to grow broccoli, cauliflower, two kinds of lettuce, celery, and radishes this fall. You can also see the three NEW squares we now have ready for the spring.

 

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I harvested some broccoli and some lettuce this afternoon. I’ll post pics as soon as my camera battery is recharged. (Don’t you wish WE could recharge our batteries by just plugging into an outlet on the wall?)

 

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Our weather here is nuts. We’ve been having some really nice weather for the past couple of weeks. Today and tomorrow, though, the highs are in the mid 80’s – followed by Friday, Saturday, and Sunday with possible hard freezes. I’ll go out and clean up the garden as much as possible this afternoon. Tomorrow evening we’ll take down the automatic irrigation system for the garden. I’ll still be able to turn it on manually, if needed, but we don’t want the system to freeze. I’ll also plan to cover the plants with sheets for the three days. We usually have a cold snap that kills everything, followed by warmer weather. I’ll do what I can to keep things going as long as possible.

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November 4, 2016 · 3:02 pm

Distracted!

Have you ever started to do one thing – and then got distracted by something else so that you didn’t do the original thing at all? That’s what happened to me after we got home from Lunch Bunch and errands today.

I got ready to mulch leaves, getting out the mulcher unit, canvas barrel, big rake and the power cord. Before I started that, I decided to check on my husband, who was out in the shop doing some stage of reloading ammunition.  He was fine and happy, so I went back toward the house and my mulching.

As I got toward the house, though, I decided that I had better do the garden first before I got too tired, so I got my gardening scissors and harvest bucket and went back out to the garden. It’s almost 3 hours later, and I still haven’t mulched one leaf…

I did, however, get the garden under control.

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This is the raised bed square foot garden now. There are six 4’x4′ raised wooden ‘tables’ full of Mel’s Mix (combination of peat moss, vermiculite, and as many different kinds of compost as we can find or make. We’re using mushroom, barnyard, and cotton burr mushroom, plus some we’ve made).

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Fall garden from the side.

 

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Fall garden from the front.

 

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New beds we just finished that we’ll start using in the spring.

It had been over a week since I’d been out in the garden, so there was a lot to do. The ‘fall’ weather has been more like summer this year, just now starting to cool off, so some of the plants are trying to bolt. I’m hoping that the dip in temperatures will prolong the harvest, but I’ve been really pleased with the head lettuce, in particular.

 

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This is today’s harvest. The lettuce is a combination of ‘salad blend’ and ‘head lettuce.’

 

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The broccoli is trying to bolt, but I’m still hopeful we’ll get more good eating before winter.

SO – now that the garden is under control and the harvest has been washed and put away, I’m resting a bit before going out and doing the leaf mulching I was trying to do in the first place!

cliparting.com

cliparting.com

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October 25, 2016 · 8:11 pm

The Irrigation System is Working!

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My husband worked really hard in the bright sun today, adding irrigation to the three new raised bed planters.  In the middle of each raised box, we have a sprinkler. The three of these are tied together by lengths of hose mounted on 1 x 2s that span the length of the three planters. Then the three sprinklers are attached to the main control, a faucet that we can use to control the amount of water that is sprinkled onto the plants. We can control the north side of the garden separately from the south side. These are attached to a hose that runs to the outdoor faucet on which we have a control system with a timer that allows us to select when the plants are watered and for how long a time.

 

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These are the three new planters on the north side of the garden. We’ll use these starting in the spring.

 

 

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These are the three planters on the south side of the garden where I’ve planted two kinds of lettuce, some celery, radishes, broccoli and cauliflower.

 

 

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The two kinds of lettuce (head lettuce and salad blend) are mainly in the closest planter in the picture, though the bright green in the second planter is also head lettuce.

 

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This is the garden, with the picture taken looking to the west. I need to harvest again soon! :0)

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October 25, 2016 · 2:17 pm

Happy Tuesday!

amazon.com

amazon.com

My husband and I took advantage of early voting this morning. We only had to wait about 5 minutes after checking in. I LOVE it that we don’t have to stand in line for hours waiting to vote!

When we got home, we put our groceries and other stuff away and relaxed with a cup of coffee. Then my husband went out to the garden to work on the irrigation system for the new raised beds on the north side of the garden.

While he did that, I got some chicken breasts in the crock pot, trying out a new recipe for tonight. I particularly love getting something in the crock pot before I start a bit project. I’m just not in the mood, when I’m hot and tired, to try to figure out what to have for dinner, much less cook.

Today I’m taking advantage of our really wonderful weather to try out our new WORX leaf mulcher. We used something else last year, but we had to put the leaves through it twice, and it was a real hassle. This one has been set up and waiting for the right time. :0)

I love making our own mulch. We can make as much as we need, on our own schedule, not having to go buy it. Our weather has been such that we’re not having much color this fall. Our leaves have fallen as much from not enough water as from the changing season. Anyway, I have lots of material to work with, so I was excited to try it out today.

 

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This is the WORX leaf mulcher. You can see that the black shredder is up in the air, sitting on a round frame with legs. There is a large leaf bag on the frame, right below the orange part. I rake up some leaves, use the yellow ‘hands’ to dump the leaves into the pop-up tan canvas barrel, then take the barrel over to the WORX. I put in about a third of the leaves in the top of the leaf mulcher, make sure the leaves are down into the black part nicely, then turn on the shredder and wait a few seconds. I turn it off and the black top is empty, having shredded the leaves into the black leaf bag under it.

You can lift the black thing a bit to see how full the leaf bag underneath is getting. It took me about half an hour to fill the first leaf bag. I took it to the garage for storage until I use it in the flower beds, brought another leaf bag out with me and got it set up again. I’m finishing a break now, but I’m delighted with our set up. My body will probably complain this evening, but I’m happily making mulch!

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October 22, 2016 · 5:46 pm

Garden Harvest 2016-10-22

gardening-rainforestinn-typepad-com

rainforestinn.typepad.com

Well, I certainly got my exercise today! I had the perfect day for it. I went back out to take the fabric shade off the top of the garden and hauled it to the burn barrel. I cut it into thirds, put one section in the burn barrel and put the other two sections beside the burn barrel. Then I took down the old neon colored tape, which was really faded and brittle, and replaced it with new. I spread cedar chips under all the new planters.

 

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This is a pretty awful photo, but I wanted to show you the garden with the shade fabric off and the new tape on.

 

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This is taken from the north side so that you can see the new spring planters and the fall garden planters behind them.

 

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This is taken from the south so you can see the abundance of ‘leaves of the garden…

 

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This is the ‘salad blend’ I harvested this afternoon.

 

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This is the head lettuce.

 

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And this is the broccoli.

No sign of anything but leaves on the cauliflower so far…

I’ll try to plant radishes tomorrow and get a pic of the sweet, little bitty celery plant that is still with us.

Hope your day was wonderful.

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October 22, 2016 · 1:33 pm

Fall Garden Progress 10-22-2016

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This is a planter with broccoli and cauliflower. The plants are looking healthy, but I have no clue how much actual FOOD we’ll get…

 

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On the far right and the far left, toward the top of this picture, you can see some broccoli florets! Woo Hoo!!!! :0)

 

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This planter is mainly two kinds of lettuce: head lettuce and ‘salad blend’. There is a teeny tiny celery plant that is very green and still alive, and I’m going to plant a 2nd batch of radishes today.

The next pictures you see won’t have the fabric shade at the top. I’m about to go out now, spread the cedar chips under the new planters, and start snipping wire tires that hold the fabric shade in place all the way around the garden.

Wish me luck?

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October 22, 2016 · 1:22 pm

Raised Bed Planter Photos

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This gives you an idea of what our raised bed square foot garden looks like now. You can see the three planters on the left (south side of the garden) where I’ve planted my fall garden. On the right side of the picture (north side of the garden, you can see the three new raised bed planters we’ve installed. We’ll start using these in the spring.

 

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Later today we’ll remove the fabric shade from the top of the garden and spread cedar chips under the new planters.

 

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I just came in from working out there. I put the Mel’s Mix into the last planter. I’ll top these three off before I plant in the spring. I also measured off 1 foot measures all around the top of the three planters and put in screws. We’ll use these when we stretch string in both directions to mark the squares for planting.

 

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We’ll run some 1 x 2 strips down the center of the planters so that we can add a sprinkler in the middle of each square, then tie them together with hose cut to length, and finally attach these three planters to the garden irrigation system.

 

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I’ll weed whack again around the garden and sprinkle Sevin to try to keep the grasshoppers away. I’ll also replace the pink ribbon that runs around the garden and down the guy wires to detour deer from running into it.

 

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October 21, 2016 · 8:21 pm

We Did It!

BuzzFeed

BuzzFeed

To say we’re exhausted just doesn’t cut it.

We spent all afternoon putting up the last of the six raised bed planters. Part of the process went well. My husband had made the stakes come to a point on the lathe. The drilling on three of the four holes went well and the stakes went in pretty easily. It went down hill from there, though.

We had trouble getting the 4×4 template up off the stakes, bringing two of them back up in the process. We managed to pound them back in, and then brought out the metal legs and square box frame. We had trouble getting the frame at the right height, having to move vice grips one at a time and moving the legs from the inside of the frame to the outside, trying to get all to fit and be level.

We discovered that one part of the frame didn’t have a hole drilled in like it was supposed to. We had to rig to bring the drill out and do it in the garden. We got the legs cut off and the extra hole drilled and finally got the bolts in.

The last step was bringing the wooden box out and placing it into the frame. Except this time it was too big to go into the frame! My husband said he thought this frame was the first one he made. After this one, he decided to give an extra 1/8th of an inch or so on the frame dimensions to give us more slack. This time we had to use a chisel, pry bar, and a sledge-hammer to move down the edges and force the wooden box into the frame.

We finally prevailed, but the installation of this last box took us about four hours and completely exhausted us.  The next step is to install the sprinklers in the three planters on the north side of the garden and unite them with lengths of hoses, attaching them to the irrigation system for the garden.

Tomorrow I’ll put the Mel’s Mix into the planter. We also plan to remove the fabric shade from the garden now that the 90 degree + weather seems to be behind us. (The first year we had the garden, we had an ice storm. The weight of the ice pulled down one half of the garden completely. Usually we roll up the fabric shade and attach it to one side of the garden. This year we’ll take it down and dispose of it, putting up a new one for the spring planting.

Tomorrow I also plan to harvest lettuce and maybe some broccoli! I’ll take some pics of both the planters and the fall garden to share with you.

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October 16, 2016 · 5:48 pm

Raised Bed Planter # 5 is UP!

 

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Late yesterday afternoon my husband and I tackled putting up raised bed planter # 5 in our square foot garden. It took us 3-1/2 hours and we were exhausted by the time we finished, but we’re delighted it’s up!

Today I put the Mel’s Mix I dug out into the finished planter.

 

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I then dug the Mel’s Mix out of the remaining square on the ground, putting it into three trash barrels. I put the barrels under the newly finished planter in case it rains before we can get the last planter up.  We’ll actually put the last planter closer to the perimeter fence, giving me plenty of room to walk all the way around each planter.

I took the old, rotted wood out to the burn barrel.

The new planters should last a good while. The wood isn’t on the ground as it was before, so it shouldn’t deteriorate nearly as fast.

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I took some pics of the south side of the garden so you can see how the fall garden is doing –

 

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You can see the sides of two of the three planters on the south side of the garden. Mostly, you’re seeing broccoli and cauliflower plants, but there’s a head lettuce (light green), too.

 

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This is a picture taken at my eye level of the two kinds of lettuce. Isn’t it wonderful!

 

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The first sign I’m actually growing broccoli, instead of just great leaves!

 

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No sign of actual cauliflower heads yet. I’ll need to harvest lettuce and plant another batch of radishes soon.

 

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I’m rich in lettuce!

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October 9, 2016 · 6:12 pm

Fall Garden – 10/9/2016

I enjoyed harvesting some lettuce and a batch of radishes today.

lettuce

 

 

radishes

We put up another raised bed planter recently. It’s the first of three on the north side of the garden.

 

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You can see that I’ll need to make more Mel’s Mix to fill this planter up. You can also see the template we use to figure out where to drill the holes for the planter legs standing up against the back fence of the garden.

 

rbp2

This picture shows the spot between the raised bed planter and the last on-the-ground square foot planter. I dug the Mel’s Mix out of the one in the middle, putting it into three trash cans, waiting for us to install the 2nd planter. That will leave just one more planter and our project will be finished and ready for next spring’s planting.

 

rbp3-southside

Meanwhile, we’re really enjoying the fall garden in the raised bed planters on the south side of the garden. Here you can see the empty square where I harvested the batch of radishes. I’ll plant some more in the next day or two. The empty looking square next to the corner one has a piece of celery trying to grow.

 

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The other two planters have a bunch of healthy looking greenery from cauliflower and broccoli plants, but nothing that looks like veggies yet.

 

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This is a close up of the lettuce plants. Some are called ‘salad blend,’ and the bright green are head lettuce. (Please pretend you DON’T see the little weed in the bottom right hand corner…)  :0)

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September 28, 2016 · 1:48 pm

Fall Garden Update – 9/28/2016

garden-northside

This picture shows you the north side of our square foot garden. We finally got the last vertical pole out, so we can now start installing the three raised bed garden boxes and the irrigation system that will go with it. We’re not going to plant in these until next spring, so we’re not in a hurry. I’m emptying out each 4 foot x 4 foot square into trash cans, saving as much of the Mel’s Mix as possible. Then we fill the planter box and then move to the next one.

 

rbg4

This is the first of the three raised bed planters we’re using for our fall garden. The plants have at least doubled in size now. We have a broccoli plant, some celery, and two different kinds of lettuce planted in this one: salad blend and head lettuce.

 

rbg5

This is the second raised bed planter. We have head lettuce (the light green plants close to you) and the rest is broccoli and cauliflower plants. I have no clue whether I’m just going to get a lot of green, or actually get broccoli and cauliflower. Fingers are crossed.

 

rbg6This is the third raised bed planter, filled with broccoli and cauliflower. I really love the way I can walk around each raised bed, can reach all the squares easily for planting, weeding, and harvesting.

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September 27, 2016 · 11:07 am

Fall Garden Harvest # 2

lettuceharvest09262016_1

The fall garden is doing really well right now. I harvested lettuce for the 2nd time yesterday. I could have harvested a bunch more, but I want it to last as long as possible. We’re eating a lot of salad now, and enjoying about half of it being from our garden. The plants are really producing, happy with the suddenly cooler weather (high of about 80 degrees F). I think both plants and people are feeling a burst of energy right now. :0)

 

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The celery I tried to grow by cutting off the bottoms of the celery I bought at the store and putting them in water to grow roots, then putting them in the garden didn’t work yet. I have another plant started in the house and will transfer it to the garden as soon as it looks like it might live out there. I love this idea and will keep trying it.

Our cauliflower and broccoli plants have doubled in size in the past few days. I can’t believe how large they are. So far, they’re just leaves, and I’m HOPING we actually get some veggies, instead of just showy plants….

My radishes are looking good, too.

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My husband got antsy to try to get the last large vertical pipe out of the garden yesterday. We haven’t received the replacement pipe puller yet, but he decided yesterday was the day. He MADE a puller out of iron, putting stiffeners on the edges and cutting the hole in it freehand with the torch. It gave a good pull, but no bananas. We put a bunch of water around the concrete, thinking that would make the pulling more effective. We did this twice, to no avail. We took the grinder and a long extension cord out there and he cut the pipe off at ground level.

Now he’s antsy to start installing the last three raised planters we made for the garden, but we have other priorities right now. We have plenty of time. We’re not going to use them until the spring.

Meanwhile, I hope I’m not driving you nuts, telling you how MUCH I loved the raised planters. I walk out, stand there calmly pulling out weeds and adding them to the bucket I brought out, or snipping lettuce leaves in comfort, putting them in the special harvesting basket. I’m STANDING there, doing my gardening, not down on my hands and knees, getting up and down, up and down, over and over until I’m exhausted; or bending over double in order to reach the weeds or plants. I’m thoroughly spoiled already!!!!

 

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September 20, 2016 · 12:02 pm

Fall Garden 2016

fallgarden2

Here is one of our fall raised bed planters. I’ve planted radishes, celery, salad blend lettuce, and head lettuce in this one.

 

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The second planter has some head lettuce, cauliflower, and broccoli.

 

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And the third planter has broccoli and cauliflower.

I can’t tell you how wonderful it is that this old broad can walk out to the garden and plant, weed, and harvest while standing up comfortably!  I have no clue whether the plants will be successful or not, but I have some good, healthy plants at this point and lots of enthusiasm.

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September 18, 2016 · 3:10 pm

First Fall Lettuce Harvest!

firstfalllettuce

I went out to the shop to finish repainting the Catbert mailbox message, plus put another coat of polyurethane on the ceiling fan blades, and went on around to check our garden plants. I discovered that the lettuce plants were twice as large as when I planted them!

 

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I was able to find two different kinds of lettuce to plant this fall: “Salad Blend,” and “Head Lettuce.”

 

 

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I washed it and filled a gallon sized ziplock bag with the first fall harvest. We’ll enjoy a bunch of it with our baked chicken this evening. YUM!

The very best part of the harvest was that I did it standing up! I simply moved from one square to the next, happily snipping off the longest leaves of each plant, not having to bend over double, strain to reach things, or get down on my hands and knees. WHOOPEEEEEEE!

(We’re waiting for a pipe puller tool to arrive in the mail. As soon as that arrives, we’ll tackle getting out the three (I think) lengths of pipe in the ground, clearing the way for us to install the first raised bed square foot planter on the north side of the garden!)

 

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September 10, 2016 · 6:16 pm

Garden Pictures

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This is today’s last harvest of the spring/summer garden.  The cucumbers are weirdly-shaped, but tasty. I’m really sad to see the last of the fresh tomatoes, but one can’t get TOOOOOO greedy….

 

clearedgroundgardensquares

After three hours of work, the old square foot planters are cleared and ready to dig out. We’ll replace these with the last three raised bed square foot planters to use this coming spring.  ( I pulled out all the plants and disposed of them, pulled up the irrigation system and disconnected this side, pulled up the dividers and put them in the burn barrel, and unhooked and rolled up the fencing for the climbing plants.)

The next step is to dig up the Mel’s Mix and put it in trash cans to await transfer to the new raised planters.

The next pics show you the fall garden in the new raised bed planters on the south side of the garden –

 

rbp1

This box has radishes, carrots, celery, head lettuce, broccoli, and salad blend lettuce.

 

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The 2nd raised bed has cauliflower, broccoli, and some head lettuce.

 

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The third raised bed has cauliflower and broccoli.

 

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This picture shows you the 3 fall raised bed planters.  I’m hopeful that we can enjoy our veggies until January or February.

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September 10, 2016 · 2:37 pm

Planted and UnPlanted

gardeningkiwi.wordpress.com

gardeningkiwi.wordpress.com

We had a good storm overnight. We awoke to low 80’s and MUCH less humidity!  Hooray!!!

I had gotten two 6-packs of head lettuce yesterday, so I got those planted today, finishing up my fall garden planting in my new raised bed planters. I have broccoli, cauliflower, celery, carrots, radishes, and two kinds of lettuce: ‘salad blend’ and ‘head lettuce.’

I used this opportunity to go ahead and dismantle the north side of the garden. I harvested what I could – one small tomato and some cucumbers – and then laboriously pulled out all the plants, small tomato cages, large tomato cages, etc. Since we’re replacing the ground square foot planters with three more raised bed planters, I also dismantled that side of the irrigation system, then unscrewed the wooden and pvc pipe dividers. I had to work hard to get the small fence down that we had put up for climbing plants, but I got it unhooked and rolled it up and took it out of the garden.

The next step – NOT TODAY! – will be to start carefully digging up the Mel’s Mix from the planting squares so we can use it as part of the filling for the new planters once we get them up.

I’ll take pics as we go. We don’t need the new planters up until spring, so we’ll try to choose the nicest days we can find. Meanwhile, I’ll try to get some pics of the fall garden to show you.

I worked outside for over 3 hours today, so this old lady is more than ready for some lunch, another bottle of water, and some serious relaxing!

Hope your day is going well, too!

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September 2, 2016 · 3:14 pm

Eureka!

GreenlaneGardens

GreenlaneGardens

I was starting to lose hope on finding salad plants for my fall garden. My husband said he wanted to go to north Fort Smith after Lunch Bunch today, so suggested I call Neumeier Nursery & Florist to see if they had lettuce. (I had gone to, or called everyone else, including Sutherlands in Fort Smith, who said they MIGHT get some in the next few weeks, but they didn’t know for sure.)

We got the supplies my husband wanted and then made our way to the far side of Fort Smith to Neumeier’s. This is such a wonderful place. I’m very thankful we don’t live close to them, or my husband would be VERY upset at all the money I would spend. Not only did they have lettuce plants for me, they also have a wonderful shop with all KINDS of wonderful, useless things I WANT. Even my husband saw a ceramic painted and glazed tree frog on the wall he wanted. When we discovered the price, we decided we could live without him…

I got ten ‘salad blend’ plants. The lady told me to wait a week before planting them to give them time to grow better roots. My husband suggested that I put the whole flat of plants on top of the free raised bed planter. This way they’ll get sun and be watered each day while they continue growing their roots.

I’ll try to get them planted Thursday or Friday of next week. When I get these in the ground, my fall garden will be complete, except that I’ll start another square of radishes, and have one remaining square to try to grow celery from the bottoms I’m cutting and sprouting from my grocery store celery. I’m excited. Last fall was the first time I’ve ever tried to have a fall garden. We had fresh lettuce and spinach through January!

I also harvested yesterday. Here’s a picture –

 

cucumbers

I think these are the weirdest cucumbers I’ve ever had. The dark green one in the middle MIGHT be Zucchini, but I’m not sure. Things are really winding down in the main garden now, even though we still have a lot of greenery. I’m going to start pulling things up and cleaning things out in preparation for transitioning the north side of the garden into the rest of the raised bed garden. We have three 4’x4′ boxes and the metal support supplies ready whenever the garden is over and I get things cleaned out. Happy gardening!

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August 31, 2016 · 11:54 am

Fall Garden Begun!

fallgarden8

It was super hot and muggy here yesterday afternoon (heat index 100 degrees +), but we had found cauliflower and broccoli plants at Sutherlands. I got two 9 packs of each. The picture above shows our new raised bed planters for the fall garden. There are three 4 foot x 4 foot raised planters in a row with sprinklers attached for irrigation. This is a picture of what they looked like when we started.

 

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We used really stretchy nylon string to mark the squares, anchoring the string on short screws I put in a 1 foot intervals around the planter edge.

 

 

 

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In a square foot garden, broccoli and cauliflower plants are planted one per square foot. You can see the markers in this picture. I was careful to plant broccoli in every other square so no two broccoli plants were planted side by side in either direction. According to Mel, this helps keep diseases down. I’ll take careful pictures of where things were planted in each raised bed so that I plant different kinds of plants in each square next time. This is for crop rotation.

 

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The plants I had filled two of the planters. Today I’ll plant some celery I started from ends of stalks bought at the grocery store, putting the ends in water and letting them sprout, plus carrots and radishes. I’m waiting for lettuce and spinach to be available at the co-op or Sutherlands to complete the fall garden.

  • Note 1: My moniker “Serial Seed Killer” is still sadly intact.  The broccoli was sprouting, and some of the lettuce. My husband thought the tray needed more sun, so we took it out and put it on the porch. A storm suddenly blew up and blew the top off the tray. We replaced it, but the damage was done. The sweet little sprouts lay dead the next morning. :0(
  • Note 2: Even though it took me two sessions to get things planted – due to my getting over-heated and needing to drink water, cool off, and rest after the first session, the raised planters we installed are WONDERFUL. We made sure that I can get in-between each planter easily, so I’m not having to do a balancing act to reach each of the squares. I didn’t have to bend over double or get up and down on my knees over and over to get the planting done!
  • Note 3: I harvested a few tomatoes yesterday, but the north side of the garden is almost done – even though we still have a lot of greenery. When things are finished for the year, I’ll carefully pull the plants and we’ll dismantle the planters on the ground, one at a time, replacing them with the remaining three raised bed planters. They are ready to install. We’ll wait until the weather cools off, too, so we’ll have an easier time with the install than we did with the south side.

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August 21, 2016 · 6:00 pm

Lewis Harvest, August 21, 2016

LewisHarvest

My husband and I just took a break and walked out to the garden, where we harvested these, plus around the yard, where we found a rose in bloom. Mostly, things have shut down with the excessive heat, despite the irrigation system.  I still have all kinds of leaves in the main square foot garden for things like melons. We have a few more cucumbers and some green tomatoes. The plants in the nook planter on the side of the house we think are finished. I’ll probably take them down this week. My husband wants to take out the asparagus I transplanted and use the planter for more tomatoes, since they seem to be happier on the east side of the house. We’re going to figure out something to make a wind break and we’ll cover the plants with netting.

We have a hydrangea that bit the dust this summer. It was in a blue half-barrel to the side of the walkway to the shop. I’m thinking about dumping that out, replacing the dirt in the planter with Mel’s Mix, and transplanting my asparagus there. The roots would have a lot of room in there…

I’m about to stretch string in the raised bed planters. I want to get carrot and radish seeds going, as well as get the planters ready for fall plants, whether they come as transplants from the seeds I’ve started in the house, or plants bought from local sources.

I’ll give the original square foot planters longer before I clean things up out there, in preparation for replacing the ground garden with the other three raised bed planters we have ready to install.

I may have little clue what I’m doing, but I’m having a GREAT time doing it!!!! :0)

 

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August 18, 2016 · 2:11 pm

The Serial Seed Killer Strikes Again!

I got antsy about trying to get my fall garden going. One of my friends said she’d already planted her seeds for her fall garden, so my “antsies’ increased.

Today I’ve gotten out a seed starter and I’m in the process of soaking the little peat pot pellets in preparation for planting some seeds. Since our cats look at anything planted in a pot they can reach a ‘bed,’ I’m going to put the seed starter tray with its transparent plastic lid on the dining area table where a fourth person would sit, along with two glasses with celery bottoms in them.

I would like to have the following in my fall garden:

  • carrots
  • radishes
  • several different leaf lettuces
  • broccoli
  • cauliflower
  • celery
  • spinach

I’ll still be on the lookout for actual fall plants from my usual sources, but I thought I would give starting from seed another try….

My sweet sister-in-law aptly dubbed my the ‘serial seed killer’ after I’ve shown her time after time how inept I am at this. MAYBE THIS TIME

I’ll surprise everyone – including myself!

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August 9, 2016 · 12:03 pm

One More

onemorecoatneeded

I painted the two tomato supports today with a nice blue exterior paint. I think I need to do one more coat to be sure we have protected the metal as much as possible from rust. Then we’ll store the supports for use in the nook planter in the spring.

My husband is trying to persuade me to plant tomatoes in the brick planter on the east side of the house next spring. Since we’ll be converted completely to raised bed planters in the main garden for the spring, this is a good idea. I’ll have to dig up my transplanted asparagus, though, to do this. I’m torn, but if we can come up with a wind break for the planter, I’ll probably go with his suggestion, since we NEVER get enough fresh tomatoes.

 

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Only one tomato to harvest today. I have a few more green ones, but I think we’re basically to the end of the season, shortened this year due to the intense heat we’ve been having. If you’re only going to have ONE tomato, isn’t this a beauty?

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August 7, 2016 · 2:04 pm

Cold Wave!

Zen to Zany via Cathy Ruggiero

Zen to Zany via Cathy Ruggiero

Since our heat index is only 104 this afternoon, I’ll get out and prune our rose bushes.

The heat has really gotten to our plants this summer. With heat indices of 133+ for about 2 weeks now, it doesn’t matter that the plants get water on a daily schedule. The leaves are actually burning up. :0(

I’m really amazed that anything is still going. I’m doing everything I can to help the poor plants, but the only thing that will REALLY help is cooler weather. That should happen in about a month.

I checked with our local Co-op about when they would be getting fall plants. It made me laugh when all of them put their hands up in the air in a helpless gesture and told me that my guess was as good as theirs. The suppliers simply ‘showed up’ and delivered the plants on their own schedule. They didn’t even get a heads up. The truck just pulled into the driveway and they had plants.

Now that we have the three raised beds on the south side of the garden ready, I can simply relax and enjoy not having so much to do, waiting for the new plants to arrive.

 

raisedbed5

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