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Spring garden progress

Posted on April 16, 2023 | 3 comments

We’ve had an absolutely gorgeous week this spring. Clear, sunny days, temps in the mid 70s. All the dogwoods, redbuds, and other spring flowers and bushes have been putting on a display. And the birds are making nests in every nook and cranny. I have been very busy outside preparing the garden.

I finished assembling the second raised bed kit. Then we prepared the ground for the beds. This is in the location of the former spring garden so the ground has been worked before. After tilling it to loosen the soil, we added peat, manure, and some topsoil. Beneath each mound, I added a layer of cardboard as I’ve heard that this keeps down the weeds. Then I shoveled on the dirt, added the raised bed frames, and leveled everything.

I couldn’t resist buying a few plants although it’s really too early here. We can expect to get a late frost as far as May 10^th. And have some years. But I went ahead and added some ground cloth and planted through them.

One raised bed will be dedicated to tomatoes and peppers. The second will have more variety with sugar peas, lettuces, spinach. Later beans, squash and whatever. I only bought a few tomatoes and herbs so far. I won’t fib and say this was easy. It was actually a lot of crawling around but now that it’s done, it looks pretty neat.

Although the tomatoes are a little closer than I would normally plant them, we’ll see if this system works better. It should be easier to maintain. I will buy some more tomatoes later this week. Still too early for peppers. And we set up the solar-powered motion detector lights which we’ve used in the past. This helps to keep some of the critters out of the vegetable patch.

Last year our garden was miserable due to a drought and other issues. But the year before we had produce in abundance. I was trying to remember which were our favorite tomatoes and remembered a posting that I made in August of 2021 where I made comparisons of the variety of tomatoes. If you’re just getting ready to plant, you may wish to check it out at this link.

Anyway, I’ve got a head start on this part of the garden but there’s plenty more to do. I don’t think a farmer’s work is ever done.

For more information about tomato varieties, check out this post. Tomatoes! Tomatoes! Tomatoes!

Tomato samples, bottoms. L-R bottom: Pink Brandywine, Red Beefsteak, San Marzano. Top: Celebrity, Better Boy, Park Whoppers, Goliath, Romas.

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Posted in country living, garden, Uncategorized

Tagged country living, gardening, raised bed, spring planting, tomatoes

New beginnings

Posted on April 9, 2023 | Comments Off

Raised Bed – Electricity – Baby Chainsaw

Our spring weather has been all over the place. Several weeks ago, we had exceedingly warm weather. Then some cold, frost, rain and storms. Finally, the beautiful weather rolled in and I could tackle some tasks that were waiting.

One thing was to assemble a raised bed kit. I received two for Christmas but haven’t had time to put them together. We decided to cut back on our huge garden this year so we’ll see how this goes. I’m usually pretty good at following directions so it wasn’t really difficult to assemble. The hardest part was bending, stooping and squatting to put all the nuts and bolts in. My knees paid for it the next day. And I have one more to assemble. I’ll file progress reports on how it works.

First raised bed assembled. Steel, 8′ x 4′ x 1′. Of course, it will need to be set in place and filled with mulch and dirt.

Then, I had a lamp switch go out a couple of weeks ago. This is my main reading lamp. Frankly, I’m a little skeptical about working on electricity but thought I’d give it a go. After watching four videos online, I thought, How hard can it be? It actually wasn’t. I decided to repair another lamp while I was at it and had both done in about twenty minutes. And they work!

Finally, I took the plunge with another Christmas gift. This is a mini-chainsaw! Yes, really! If you’ve followed this blog for awhile, then you know that we process a good bit of firewood here on the homestead so we’re not strangers to some big, noisy equipment. But I have never operated a chainsaw and didn’t want to learn. (They’re big, noisy, and pretty dangerous.) Anyway, I got tired of asking for someone to cut some brush and small branches for me. So I requested my own mini-chainsaw.

Of course, I read every word of the instruction book. Purchased some safety equipment. And gave it a try yesterday. My husband glanced at it (without laughing) and said, you do this and this and this and you’re good to go. Please repeat that, thank you very much.

But I had my first foray into trimming some brush and fruit trees. It worked great but my muscles were sure sore today. However, this ought to help when I trim the drive later this spring.

So, these were my adventures in new beginnings this week. There is so much to do around here in the spring that I’m sure I’ll have plenty more challenges. Don’t forget those helpful videos online if you want to try something new.