Planting Done!

I finished planting today, I got my Tiger's eye beans in the ground, the cucumbers, the summer squash, and three types of inedible gourds. I am hoping to make a few things if they grow well. What surprised me when I started planting my Tiger's eye beans was that I had many more than I thought I did. I think I planted 4 rows in a 8 ft long bed.

I also had a few flowering shrubs to plant that one of the neighbor's sent my way. My son is going to be working for her and her husband on and off this summer and she figured if she was having my son thin the bushes out she may as well send a few my way. They produce a small yellow flower, and she said they were eating her driveway. So I put them where they can grow as much as they want.

My strawberries are starting to set fruit, and I am hoping they produce a lot as I am looking forward to making jam, drying some and maybe make a few syrups with them. I'll have to look around for a few other ways to use them, maybe some chocolate covered strawberries!

That is about it for now as we are still on tentative hold on house building as we need the kids out of school and a ladder to continue.

Be Well, Be Safe, and Blessed Be...

First major kid work day!

Since the kids have been off of school since the afternoon of the 14th they have been going to ... bible school ... the last week.  Well now they are officially on our work time now, and today they are getting their first full day of work since they started school.  We are also putting them on a "withdrawal diet", as they'd been eating food from the school which of course is all prepackaged.. and then I learn as par for the course they'd get soda's from teachers.  They'd come home very crabby from this and so we are taking the processed crud out of their diets  this whole week.

We started the morning off with some pond digging, the one good thing about the dry weather we've had is it's making it much easier to dig the pond.  Our pick is cutting through the dirt much faster now, the only thing holding us up now is my eldest daughter who takes 10 minutes to shovel the dirt that we cut out in a couple of minutes.  We only got 5 wheel barrows full done before the time allotted for that chore ran out.

After our lunch break we are going to dig out the chicken yard some more, this will be assisted by my youngest as my son helped with the pond.  So the older 2 kids will be on puppy watch while me and my youngest works on the chicken yard.  Silver's been out clearing more with the weedeater, and I'm hoping this fall we'll get all the brush out of our clearing and we can start setting up for  new garden beds in late fall.

I have some pictures to show you now that I had to take with our phone as our camera still has no batteries, so if the quality isn't that great sorry:

This is one of the buckets we are going to use for our tomato plants, as you can see the bottom has a big crack in it.  We got 5 of these about 2 years ago from the MFA here for $5 each.  They had contained some kind of feed for livestock, they sell the broken ones for a song to anyone who wants them.

This is one of the buckets after I have put in three of my tomato plants and a dill plant.  I read last year that dill will keep horn worms off of tomatoes, so we will try it.  The soil for these pots is, chicken manure, our clay soil, perlite, and oyster shell.

This tire pot has 2 basil plants and a stevia in it.  Yes, I'm using tires; they are our old tires from the van.  I am hoping that it works out well for growing things in, I've heard recently a large amount of people using used tires for all kinds of things so; I figured what the hay.

This one has marjoram, oregano, thyme, and peppermint in it. Now these pots have the same mix as the tomato one, except I did not put in any oyster shell.  As I am using the oyster shell to prevent blossom end rot on the tomatoes.  TI worked last year when placed on top of the soil, so I'm trying it mixed into it.

This is one of the volunteer squash plants, if you can see it; they are getting ready to flower.  I am guessing it's a summer squash type, but I am not sure which kind of summer squash it is.

This is one of the four wintergreen plants that I bought and planted.  As you can see it has new growth on it, I am hoping they all take well to the ground.

This is part of our bush beans that I planted, they seem to love the space they are in as they are growing very fast and lush.  I am hoping that they flower out soon, and I'm hoping to get lots of beans as my favorite thing in the garden is to go out and pick beans right from the plant and snack on them.

This is the Darkstar summer squash that I planted, every single seed had sprouted, I am hoping they grow well past this point, as I'm looking forward to having some nice squash stir fry's for lunch in mid summer.

This is the one lonely sweet pepper that we got from the ones I started, all the rest of our peppers are hot ones.  So I put the sweet out into the garden and when I get more soil set up I am going to be potting the hot peppers.

This is 3 of our now 5 Brussel sprouts, they are having some minor cabbage worm issues but otherwise they seem to be fine.

This is one little bit of the wild blackberry plants growing in  our clearing.  I wanted to show everyone how many berries are appearing on the plants this year, which is like double that there were last year.  I just hope they get good sized by picking time.

I'm hoping this is an actual wild grape, I need to locate the book I have that shows the difference in the leaves between the grape and the other plant (I can't recall if it's moon berry, or moon weed).  They seem to be producing a lot so far.

This is the wild rose that I have been "training" into a piece of fence.  It is going to have a ton of flowers this year!  I can't wait to see them.

Well I need to get off here and heat up lunch, we're having beef soup from last night.  Then I get to go out and drag my girls to help me muck out the chicken yard, so we can mix up more soil later.

Be Well, Be Safe, and Blessed Be...

Hot Humid Friday!

We were suppose to have rain today, well it's not raining; but it is hot and humid. I went out to do my early morning check on the garden and I got to shake my head at the fact that the peas finally have flowers on them. I guess they heard me commenting that I would pull them up and feed them to the chickens if they didn't produce. All of my beans have come up, so pretty soon that will be another bed that will be teaming with plants that want to reach out and grab you... like the peas.

As the peas actually are producing now I am considering trying to plant the summer squash on the outer edge of where the peas are to get an early start on them. Seeing as how I have 4 unknown squash types already growing in another bed. My volunteer cucumbers are coming along good as well, I am hoping within the next month they will start producing flowers. Tink is going to be giving me some Tigger melon starts that I am thinking of planting near my onions, as I am running out of available space thanks to my mom's kind donation for our plants this year. I will get them in though... somewhere.

I went outside this morning to hang laundry and apparently I stepped into a tick nest, they were climbing up my leg. So many that my legs were both covered. Because of this we are considering using the tick killer we bought last year but did not use. I don't like chemical answers to natural problems, but in this case it might be warranted. I have put seeds for bushel gourd and luffa sponge gourds into the peat pots that didn't make it I am hoping they will grow quickly.

Oh, thanks Lane for being our first Donater!

Would you believe it took me 2 hours to write this? The heat has been making me drowsy, and I decided to give up and go with it briefly.

BE Well, Be Safe and Blessed Be...

Weedy Wensday

I got a nice harvest this morning of some of our lettuce, a lot more than I thought I would get anyway. I also harvested more lambs quarters and I'm thinking of having a salad of them right before dinner as I tend to only get enough for a small serving for two people, but that is alright. Due to all the rain we got over the last week, everything that I didn't want growing in our garden is getting huge. So, I also grabbed the 5 gallon bucket and stuffed it full of greens for the chickens.

While out there I discovered that we have one flower on our giant pea plants... and of course I was thinking of just giving up on them and pulling them so I can plant the squashes. So of course we are starting to get flowers now. So I'm not sure if I should go ahead and pull them, tossing them to the chickens then; and planting my squash or give it another week?

I am thinking of putting my eggplants out in the garden, and I am hoping they get bigger than they are right now. They have not gotten very big yet and I worry about if they will get bigger or if it's just too restrictive in the little pot. Some of the wintergreen plants are doing better than the others are, one has tons of new growth; while the others have a lot less new growth.. but they do have new growth.

I still have to wade through the potato patch and get rid of the extraneous plants, and I am going to pull out the weed eater tomorrow afternoon and do some cutting in the front as like I said, the rain made everything grow big time.

Our beans are coming up, which is good. One bad however is I'm not sure we'll be able to get our goat, as we have to still pick up Silver's medications, some are going to be very helpful as his new doctor has prescribed some high dose and low dosed pain killers for depending on how bad his RA is acting up. We are also trying out a new (for him) anti-inflammatory, that so far seems to be helping; but he has only taken it one day so far. So we will see.

Oh, I'd be taking pictures; but for some reason I seem to need new batteries again. I had been taking pictures of me making bread again, and before I got the picture of my finished multi-grain one the batteries had died. Well I hope I get to take a picture of that one sometime soon as it came out wonderfully. It was oatmeal,flax, and sunflower oil; all mixed into the standard sourdough recipe that I use.

Well that's it for now,

Be Well, Be Safe, and Blessed Be...

Earthday in the garden

Well it was such a pretty morning this morning when we got up we sat outside to enjoy the morning sunshine, before the kids went off to church. We also went out to see what our screening trees were doing, and right now the ones doing the best seems to be the poplar's and I was concerned about those ones. I had thought those weren't going to grow well, but they are “leafing out” the best right now. My willows are getting leaves, but very slowly.

I went out and finished “weeding” the garden bed that the green cabbage, lettuce, chard, onions, corn salad, and chrysanthemums are in, and then planted my bush bean seeds. I did pole beans last year, but they did not produce as well as the bush beans I have used for years. I do want to make a very good effort to grow Tiger's eyes next year, provided I can find a place that will sell me about a pound of them at a reasonable price.

While I was planting the beans I noticed that the soil is looking wonderful there, and the chicken manure is composting down well in the soil. The funny thing is, the area the most of our volunteers are coming up in that bed is on the end that had the worst soil last year. Seems I got the soil right in that section now. I did fin another volunteer today a bit farther down than the others. I have almost ½ a pound of my blue lake bush beans planted. I will be planting more once the other plants there are done growing and have been fully harvested. I did discover that right now I didn't need a full pound, but next year I will have a “bed” big enough for it.

I also went and set out the sprouted potatoes we have discovered in our potato bin. While out there I did discover that my seed potatoes are growing, and I had to do a quick check and make sure I did not step on any of them. Also I had to recover a couple I saw that were uncovered, as well as move a little of the straw away from one that was struggling a little.

The puppies my girls have been taking care of are supposedly leaving this week, we'll see if they do or not. I am hoping that we can do some training on the pups Paris had and maybe raise their value a little, maybe we can get a little money for them. Though Tink.. I'll save one if the little guy can have it yet.

That's it for now,

Be Well Be Safe, and Blessed Be....

HOT weather... is there a break?

I think it's a very good question to ask... will we have a break soon in all this "gawd awful" heat? We did get some rain yesterday, it rained about 20 minutes in a downpour and I don't think it did much. Aside from letting in a rather lovely wind with the wet. This morning while out watering my garden I heard thunder, maybe we will get more rain; I do hope so as we need it. However, Kansas needs it more than we do.

I picked a couple of days ago about 6 red noodle beans for us to eat, loved them. I did pick about the same on the Black Seeded, but as they were very "buggy" the chickens got them. I made a stir fry with the red noodle beans and 2 squashes we had left from our last grocery day. A little bit of onion, fresh basil, and some chicken thighs and we had a nice lunch.

I do finally have some tomatoes ripening:

As you can tell this is on our "boxed" tomatoes, this is the Italian variety:

A Grappoli D' Inverno

They haven't gotten as big as I would have hoped but I'm very happy to see some ripening going on. The paste tomatoes are right next to this one and it's covered with green paste tomatoes and I hope they will ripen soon. I might even let Silver eat one before I start freezing them. One more thing about this tomato plant that has ripening on it... it's the one that was half eaten by bugs. So it's amazing that there is ripening tomatoes on it.

Now for those of you who saw my other garden vid:

Yes, there isn't all that much to "see" on this side, but we are still experimenting with the varieties this year. Next year if we still use this plot I will be adding one or two more "beds". I do have some good space still available to dig, and I might start it this fall when we get some decent rains again so the ground will be softer.

Oh, I have a semi cute moment for you as well this is Houdini in the tree he sleeps in:

Isn't he adorable?

We did get some work done on the root cellar yesterday morning, and got 8 wheelbarrows full of dirt out and spread on our walk way. We are going to start piling clay again starting tomorrow. We haven't worked out there this morning with the threat of the rain; we did not want to risk getting the electric cords wet. Back to digging again tomorrow.

Well that's it for now.

Be Well, Be Safe, and Blessed Be...

The Long awaited Update!

I do hope Blogger lets me put in pictures today I tried about 2 days ago and it wouldn't let me. WE had a lovely rain storm last night with lightning and thunder and .. dogs whining... We found out the why on that one this morning. Seems Paris had gotten herself wound up around one of the few roots that we can't get out, by them and so she was drenched. If it weren't for the fact it was a lightning storm I would have run out and unwound her so she could have gotten into her dog house. You know... it's weird seeing a cloundy rainy morning with a tiny bit of sun peeking through...

Oh well here we go with our update starting with your favorite and mine (I hope) Potatoes!

This is about 6 Cups of potatoes out of my own potato plot!We had dug up the half of the plot that had died back and this is what we got. Now remember that, the "front" half of my plot were sprouters and store bought seed potatoes. So they were of unknown variety.

But, as you can see it seems we had a good deal of the "yukon gold" type and a few russets. Now I did plant 2-3 fingerlings that had sprouted, and I did get some fingerlings out of this... but not where I had planted them. Also considering I had planted them just barely into the goat manure they potatoes did grow down into the dirt. Only barely growing in the straw, Silver says next year no burying them at all just lay them out with the straw over them and see.

Doesn't this look pretty? This is the dirt under all the straw, and it is pretty! So if you want to turn clay into good soil? Drop a (until it's "Aged down") 3ft layer of straw where you want your good soil and let it sit a year.. watering it at random.

The straw has started composting down, the lower half of it was black and changing. So it has been "turned" as I put it back in the space after my "treasure hunt". Once the rest of the plot is "dug out" (yeah late august treasure hunt!) I will add my "official" compost pile to it. I will "stir it" well then we will get a tarp and put it over it and let it sit till spring and if it's not ready then, I'll stir it again and recover it.

OK, unfortunalty (sp?) that is all my pictures for now but more updates...

I managed to pick some of the beans all but the long beans which have just started getting flowers. I really like the flavor of the rice beans as a green bean and am glad I planted more of them, and they have come up. Considering they are a "bush" bean I have planted many in a small space. I will get some pics of them when I get more next and hold them in my hand to show the small size. The Tiger's eye were a tad bit on the bitter side, but I was planning if they are good to have them as a dry bean; so I already know they are not that tasty as a green. I thought the one pole bean I got was ok, but after that rice been it was not as sweet tasting. So next time I might try the pole bean(s) first. Oh, while on the bean subject... anyone guess why my beans (not the longs or the rice ones...) are yellowing at the bottom? Phalen mentioned in her blog (correct me if I'm wrong) that her beans weren't making it in the heat.. so could that be it?

I still do not have any squashes growing other than male flowers. The bitter melon plant is still growing though a tad on the slow side to me, no flowers on it as yet and it is starting to put out the "tendrils" that like cucumbers have to hold on to things. I think even the bought pepper isn't going to make it this year, as it's pitiful... speaking of pitiful my grapes are dieing back again, I hope they come back again. My lemon cucumbers have TONS of flowers, I hope they produce soon, the late start ones in my front door pot it growing well they have secondary leaves now.

The replanted cukes have sprouted, those are "Dragon's egg" and (I hope I spell this right) "Humong giant". Now I have put like I did with the lemon cukes a tomato cage over the Dragon's egg ones thinking they might be small enough that it won't rip the plant while climbing. The giant is a Chinese variety and I think it is one of the ones you use in stir fries. We will try it raw like standard cukes and we'll know quickly I bet if it's a cooking one.

Now I have a tomato issue... my tomato plants are covered in tomatoes, all different kinds/shapes. Now the problem is the tomatoes in my box have been covered in bugs, hornworms and aphids... not to mention stink bugs. One of the plants in the box has gotten half eaten. Now aside from being boxed and having "made soil" which is just peat and the local topsoil and a tad bit of ash. The only difference is that when we got a packet of free fertilizer in the mail I thought what the heck and put it on the boxed tomatoes. Could that be causing the bug attractant? Also we have a "new" problem in my box.. I have had to pull and toss about 10 green young tomatoes as they were rotting from the bottom up on the plant...????? what causes that?

I have does some new plantings one as a trial and a few to see if I can get something out of them before it's too cold. I planted some Amaranth, they have sprouted and once they start getting a bit bigger we will try the "greens" (red plants "greens " hahahahahaha), and see if they will produce seed heads if started in the beginning of July. We had gotten some free carrot seeds when we were buying at Baker Creek short variety and I planted them and they have started sprouting. I got some edible Chrysanthymums (sp?) and some Nastrums that I thought were pretty (all varieties are edible right?) the chrys's are sprouting as are the nastrums.

We have just gotten a replacement drill bit for the root cellar so once the rain stops and our... "pond" dries up it's back to digging. On a side note we have come up with a wonderful solution to all the clay we are digging up. We are going to build a cob-ish oven, and rebuild our "stove" for outdoor cooking that we had last year as well. Right now we have been "tearing" through youtube looking up rocket stove and cob oven vids to see the best way to combine the 2, to make a suitable oven. My biggest issue with cob ovens is it seems you NEED to build a cover for them... I think if it's an outdoor oven it should be weather proof so Silver is working that out.

Well that is all for now.

Be Well, Be Safe and Blessed Be...

Simple Pleasures: Window Version

Back to talking about simple pleasures, and how somethings we don't notice how wonderful they are until we don't have them. In this case it is a window, which as I write this i am sitting here listening to rain fall through, my open window. Yes, an open window; we finally got the danged thing up.

This is the wall the window is now in when we started cutting. We started the cutting on the inside as we had to cut through one stud to fit the window in place.

As you can see Silver is using a (electric) chainsaw.

*Disclaimer* I DO NOT RECOMMEND USING A CHAIN SAW FOR BUILDING PROJECTS.

Our saber saw had a blade mishap and I discovered that no, we did not have a spare blade and the circular saw wouldn't work in that spot. so as we were at the either we have wet bedding or we keep going point we brought our our electric chain saw, and used it to finish the hole. Which by the way, needed to be bigger than he originally thought it needed to be; as the roof came down lower than he thought it did.

Here is Stormy checking out the cat door we made him, because of course you know that we always do what our cats think we are doing. Funniest thing was after we moved the ladder and finished the window he tried to figure out how to get into it again.

And here is the finished window:

The screen came from a section of the tent from last year, a section with only one minor cat claw mark on it. We put it on, stapled it in place, then put the 2X3 pieces over it then cut off the extra. This was to keep the screen well secured.

So now I get to enjoy my new window even on this semi-rainy late afternoon. I did manage to do something in the garden:

These are "Tiger's Eye" beans that I bought from Seeds of Change, I misplaced them somewhere in the house and when I was looking for the replacement saw blade that wasn't there I found them buried in the back of the drawer. I also did not remember that they were bush beans, but I am happy they are so I did not have to cut some new poles for them. I planted them in the space between the groupings of the poles beans kinda like a "boarder" planting. I think they are very pretty seeds and one I had was purple with the orangy striping instead of the other way around. They are an heirloom that is suppose to be a good dual purpose bean.

Wow! Two posts in one day, and on both blogs!

Be Well and Blessed Be...

How did you spend Mother's Day?

I spent mine building half a chicken coop, and digging my bean bed where my peppers grew last year. Had a nice hot bath, and got the kids to do some outside cleaning without the use of a sweet bribe.

Either later today or tomorrow we should be finishing the chicken coop and I have a vining plant bed to dig out. Here is the coop as we worked on it:

This is the first part of it the shortest side of the coop as we are going to give it a big angled roof.

Here is the same side attached to the landscape timber that will be against the ground, also in the spot it will be when finished. Incidentally these aside from the timbers are 2X3X8's

Here is the "tall" side it is a little taller than me and Silver, it will "butt" the end of the yard and the top will all be screened windows for air and light. During the winter we are planning to just put plastic over it to still allow for natural light but without the bad wind.

Same side now laying on the ground so we can put the leftover paneling on the outside, we are leaving a pretty good sized gap for the door as we want to make sure the turkeys can get in and out as well.

Here, we have connected the two sides with the roof rafters and small pieces of the timbers at the bottom. The paneling is up on the front and most of the back. Eventually we are going to build external nest boxes that we are going to accatch to the back of the coop and give them a top opening so we don't have to reach into the nest from the front to check them.

Paneling added to the short side, where I took the picture is going to have some kind of door eventually. We are not putting in a floor as what my plan is, is to use straw on the ground and put new down once a month then after a year completely clear it out and put it on the compost pile and start again. Silver suggested adding wood shavings in the middle of the month.

Here is a shot from the back.

Now like I said I also dug out a bed for my bean plants, and that it was where my peppers were last year. Well, I did have a nice surprise when I went out and started digging. First I noticed since this was one of the spots I used the goat manure last year that there was tons of clover growing. Now, there is no clover growing any where else; but where I put the goat manure. Second is that the ground was a lot nicer looking when I dug it up, and I did not hit clay as soon as I did last year. That must mean that I am slowly making the soil there better. It was also much easier to turn the soil over than it was last year.

Here is what I have done so far:

Silver set up the upright for this and I am hunting up saplings to use for the beans. This is my first time growing pole beans so I'm not sure exactly the best route for this. I am going to try some heavy twine on the one end with them attached in the ground with the tent stakes from last year. If you look carefully at this picture in the upper left corner you can tell what the soil color normally looks like this year this bed is much, much darker and better looking. It also have a lot more worms in it than I saw last year. You'll see my little path on the right and then next to that is where my vining plants are going to go. pumpkins, squashes, and watermelons. I have already put out cucumbers in a flower bed I started as it has a "cow panel" (heavy wire panel), I do hope they do well there.

Well I am planning hopefully to get out and dig out that vine bed in a couple hours so I'm going to get back to my house work now.

Be Well and Blessed Be...