Greenhouse groundbreaking.

We decided to break ground on our greenhouse project today.

For those of you who don't know, or more because I probably have been REALLY bad about updating my LJ lately, Lee and I have decided to tackle to project of building a greenhouse form mostly recycled materials. The inspiration for this project was our friend Jola, who has such a greenhouse attached to her little shed. We figured if they could do it, so could we.

Anyways, we purchased our 10' 4x4 posts this weekend and today we got started digging the holes for said posts. These five posts will be our support for the frame of the greenhouse, which will also be attached to a thus support by the existing shed.

So, Lee went out with the post hole digger and started digging... and hit concrete! I shit you not.... there was a sidewalk completely buried... and partially under my vegtable garden. This explains why my cucumbers did so poorly this season.

After much digging, prying and lifting.... we had quite the large stash of concrete panels and even somecurved pieces that were used as a drain next to the sidewalk. This was some old school concrete pouring.

We removed three sidewalk panels and 4 pieces of "drain" as well as two old bricks and one random large rock. UGH. After all this was taken out of the way, we tooksome bamboo pieces we have and some twine and found our line for the first side of the greenhouse. We measured out where our first two posts on that side should be located and then marked those places with some spray paint. Then it was all "hurricane Lee" from that point on. He dug a 24" hole with the post hole digger,injuring his knee and nose in the process. No worries, just bruises and small lacerations... no sprains or breaks.

Doesn't look like much huh? Well, one two foot hole dug.... only 4 more to go. Then we are on to placing and Quickcreting in posts. It's the first step anyways.

Cosmos!

I have and always will adore cosmos.  They are such a delight to grow.  The tall fern like plants, the delicate daisy like flowers and the bright colors make them such a wonderful addition to my garden.  They attract butterflies and honey bees and lots of different beetles.  They alaos distract grasshoppers from eating any nearby vegtables.  Grasshoppers love to eat cosmos, flower petal and all.  While some people might find that distressing, I don't mind.  I have several eggplant and tomatoe plants nearby that appreciate the bug distraction.

These cosmos reseeded themselves all over my lawn this year.  I had to literally dig up the small seedlings and place them inside the garden liner to save them form the lawn mower.  And while it took FOREVER for them to bud and blossom, now look at them. 

Nelly, our resident monarch

One morning about 6 weeks ago, I went out to the garden with my camera to capture some photos or our morning glories.  I saw a monarch butterfly sitting on a leaf of the grapevine airing out its wings.  I could tell that she was damp because she had probably just hatched out.  Pretty little thing.

Well, apparently she likes our yard.  She has been sleeping in out elm tree at night and I find her and several of her butterfly friends on the zinnias, sunflowers and cosmos in the yard everyday. 
I named her Nelly.  It's a good butterfly name.

Flowers in my garden

I realize I haven't really shown any pictures of the flowers in my garden this season as of late.  And there really are some lovely ones.  I have a glorious hibiscus plant in a pot on my porch.  It is a new hybrid from Burpee called Cranberry crush and it is amazing.  This is it's second round of blossoms in the first year of growth.

I also planted some Scarlet O'Hara morning glories in the back yard alongside the vegtable garden.  They are a fushcia color which mimics red in the right light.  I adore them.

And the zinnias.... oh the zinnias.  I plant zinnias every year but this year they have been particularily lovely.  I have plans to plants more colors of zinnia next season and in more places.  The butterflies we have had because of them is astounding.









Garden update

Well.... let's see if I can summarize this without being too longwinded about it.
Lee backed over the peas with my car.  They didn't look very good anyways.
We have had over 40 days this summer of over 100 degrees so the broccoli bolted and then died.  We did get two good harvests and it was delish. 

We had plenty of good spinach and lettuce in June and then that went to seed.  The excessive heat really does take out alot of vegtables.
So far this summer though, the slowest vegtable to produce has been the tomatoes.  Don't get me wrong, I've been watering them to keep them growing and alive and I have tons of tomatoe plants.  They just reserved the right to flower and produce until these past couple of weeks.

In stark contrast, the pumpkins this year grew and fruited FAST.  I have 4 pie pumpkins already harvested and cured.  And there are a few more starting.  It's insane.  I wasn't expecting them for a couple more weeks.
Everything else seems to be sort of on time and if not then only delayed by a few weeks.  And that is only because I ran the sprinkler a LOT this summer.

Back after a hiatus again.

I just can not seem to motiate myself during the summer to blog about anything.  And so much has traspired over this particular summer that I am almost uncertain about how to compose this "I'm back" blog post.  Perhaps a list with select details will be best.

1.) The garden looks phenominal though as usual some things grew better than others.  I have lots of pictures about that to post at a later date.  We had some hellish weather this summer which made my watering of the garden more of an obsession than a passing chore.  Because of that, the plants grew big but haven't really officially started producing vegtables until these past few weeks. It's bizarre.  We had pumpkins ready to pick and cook before we had ripe tomatoes.  Positively strange.

2.) My friends have some serious drama going on.  One married couple split up the same day as another married couple... each of the dumpers leaving their respective spouses for the other. So.... it's been an odd social season for us.  We can no longer just call couple #1 and couple #2 for dinner or drinks because... well.... they are now single #1 and single #2 and couple #3.  It's a big, fat mess and we are all forced to deal with it. *sigh*  Doesn't make a god case for marriage does it?

3.) I have been busy doing Farmer's Market things once again this summer.  Since we've had 40 traight days of 100+ degree weather, produce has been slim and thus we have almost all resorted to making some kind of baked goods and crafts to sell in the mean time.  I discovered that Dodge City is comprised of a number of dog lovers.  So, I began making and selling homemae dog biscuts.  People and dogs love them. I've also been making homemade english muffins and scones which are becoming a big hit as well.  I've done quite well this summer.

4.) Lee, my boyfriend, moved into my home in January of 2011. Things have been going well for us.  So well, he got a promotion at work.  He is no longer an assistant manager of customer service at the car dealership but has been transfered to a different section and made a proper manager of customer service.  In other words, when your car breaks down or has the oil changed or is making that weird noise, he's the guy you talk to to schedule an apointment with the technicians.  And he's damn good at his job too.

5.) On the jewelry front, not much has been happening in the way of sales.  However, a lot has been happening in the way of PR for my jewelry studio on Artfire as well as my designs in general.  I've had pieces featured in Bead Trends magazine in the past and have pieces that were selected to be featured in the November and December issues for 2011 as well.  This July I received an email from the editor asking if they could use me as the Designer Highlight for the February 2012 edition.  It's a full 10 page spread along with a head shot of myself and bio page.  I am SUPER excited about this opportunity and will therefore be getting pieces put together and shipped off in the next 2 weeks.  How cool is that?

That's a good update thus far.  More to come later.... including pictures.

Another garden update

Things are continuing to pop up out of the ground in our garden.  We finally did get the pumpkin garden planted with pumpkins, watermelon and cantalope as well as flowers to fil in the space.  Things are popping up in that garden though I haven't photographed it yet.

Our other gardens are just zooming along.  We have brocolli heads beginning to form.  The onions are growing taller.  There are cucumber and yellow melon sprouts and last night the zuccinni came up as well. The carrots are sprouting and the peas are growing larger everyday.  I've had to this the radishes and beets as well as the lettuce and spinach. 

See how my garden is growing!

Things are growing in my gardens and how!  Check it out.

The onions are coming up like gang busters.  We have planted yellow and red onions. 

The peas I planted in the tire are doing well.  There are 4 shoots so far and I put some more pea seeds in there not long ago.  Can't wait to have fresh peas.

And look how big the potatoes have gotten!  WOW! 

This evening we are planning to tackle the pumpkin garden and maybe pull some weeds in the herb garden.

Garden season is upon us!

I have the spring fever bug bad.  I have been itching to get started on my garden work for almost 6 weeks now.  So much so that I had started many of my herb and veggie and even some of my flower plants inside.

Anyways, this past week the winds were too high to get a proper start on the garden.  However, this past weekend was the PERFECT time to start.  And with highs in the 60s-80s for the next week and a half, I am so ready.

I started with my 4'x8' garden box.  I have brocolli, cauliflower, tomatoe and pepper starters inside already, as well as some garlic starters.  Those went in the box.  Then I started lettuce, spinach, nasturtiums, and beets from seed.  Top it of with some marigold plants to help with pest control and voila!  My garden box is in and growing.

Lee and I had heard that planting potatoes in old tires worked realy well.  Since Lee knows the tire guys in town, he inquired about getting some old beat up tires for this purpose.  I planted two kinds of potatoes in tires as well as one tire of peas.  All are coming up like gang busters now.

I also dug out the old dead foliage from last season from one of my flower beds.  I put in some new dirt and peat moss and planted African daisies, black petunias and snapdragons.

And this is just the start of my gardens.  Wait till you see the new herb garden addition, the pumpkin patch and the veggie bed.  There's so much more to do yet.  I'll keep you all updated.  SQUEE!