Chasing a toad

While doing yardwork this afternoon, I apparently annoyed a toad, so then I chased him for a little while.

Disclaimer: please bear with the commercial above, how can I resist possibly making some change off a toad movie...


I'm attempting to eradicate the crabgrass and grow new "turf." We'll see. I made a makeshift aerator to assist in this task:





It's made out of a messed up garden tool, a board, drilled in bolts and stuff.





Sorry to realize just now I forgot to move this little green guy before aerating. Maybe he escaped?

Meanwhile, flowers are doing bloomingly:


Poppy


Lily of the Valley


Strawberry flowers

raised beds & lil' asparagi

Last year I bought some asparagus... and now this little lone baby spear popped up. If that's the only one that grows, I can't imagine eating it... there will have to be some sort of sacrificial ceremony involved.



I like seeing who else is sprouting... or blooming.



The big news is:

This weekend I constructed my last two raised garden beds...



The wood is cedar. Contents include: soil, lime, peatmoss, "homemade" compost, etc. Still need to prep a little, start seedlings, and then it's on. I'm really hoping I can have some eggplant-related success.



I finally found a use for these old sun and moon metal pieces (hose guides on the corners)...

Look who survived the winter

Carrots & potatoes



I've come to the understanding that carrots can turn into monsters if left to their own devices.



Lettuce



Mint

I have some more exciting gardening news to share... but in an attempt to give this blog a spring rebirth, I'll save that for next time. Stay tuned.

Garden Makeover - Part 1

So, finally after much hemming and hawing and investigating and considering, I decided to go ahead and try to make raised garden beds.

That's instead of 1) keeping the unruly garden as is. and 2) purchasing the beds or a kit.

Supposedly cedar will last 5+ years, and it seems it's the most common material besides composite. I couldn't find anything affordable in terms 2-inch width planks, so I went ahead with 1-inch wide.

I got two 12-ft boards and had one cut in half and the other cut in 4ths. (Thanks to my brother for giving me the wood, already cut, for my birthday). So the beds will be 3 ft by 6. I've only made one so far, but now that the garden makeover has started, I really want to go ahead and do more. I'm thinking three would be good.



I sort of followed some directions I found online, and more or less just built a wooden frame. I used wood screws, some (pine?) wood blocks for reinforcement. Tools included the power drill. Oh yeah, and the level. I'm so prone to do things haphazardly but I figured it's better to start it out level than deal with a slope down the road.




I bought 2 bags of 3-cu ft of garden soil and 2 bags of 40 lb top soil and a big cube of sphagnum moss (which was not at all the texture I expected). I also lined the bed with newspaper and included some compost and other additives. I have a general idea of the cost of the materials for all this... and it's not cheap... though certainly less expensive than purchasing the beds ready made. I had been putting this off for a while now, so I figured I'd just go with it.

This was all very labor intensive so I'm very achy now, but still want to do more ASAP.

The other thing about the garden makeover is the idea to do twice as well, with half as much. That should be my general life goal... maybe? At any rate, I "disassembled" an entire half of the garden, took away the landscaping timbers, weeded, gathered up what mulch was left. I transplanted a bunch of carrots out of the retired garden area and into the mostly full-of soil-and goodies raised bed. I hope they'll do OK. We shall see.

And then I planted grass seed in that space. For some reason planting grass seems like some overly important deal to me. I'm not sure why. But I'm hoping it grows! I didn't have any hay to put on top... but I followed the directions on the bag, used lawn fertilizer and watered it.

I'm looking forward to the garden being smaller, more manageable, more attractive and hopefully the raised beds will make watering easier and more efficient (that's supposed to be one of their advantages).

Now I'm thinking I should have taken a "before" photo to show off the "after" when this makeover is complete. Let me just say the garden had really gone wrong in so many ways, this has to be a vast improvement.

Just Flowers

The poppies are already gone.


Lilies of the Valley (and Lilacs) always remind me of my grandmother.



Johnny Jump Up



I think this is Dianthus.



Coral Bells?

Our spring weekend

garlic stalk!

This weekend I ventured out to check on the garden, did some tidying up (=2 garbage bags of leaves). The garlic I planted in the fall is well on its way... supposedly it will be ready in June.



Daffodils are out of course, and there are plenty of hidden things under the leaves, getting ready to sprout up.



I found a dead black bird and buried it.



Patches was enjoying the fresh air with the window open.

Despite my previous decision not to bother this time (based on the last two years of failures) I again have over purchased seed packs and started some things indoors. This year I'm trying some seeds planted in egg cartons. We'll see how the seedlings fare. I'll try to do some photographic documentation as well.

* * *

In non-gardeny news, I went out today and did some embroidery while lounging out of doors. Nearly finished Jack and the Beanstalk. I'd really like to get this to be a habit long enough to finish the "project."

The time and weather are throwing me for a loop. I'm trying to use it to my advantage to get some stuff done. Did some cleaning: mopped the floor, vacuumed, organized a little, put some things up for sale, added to some goodwill bags, made split pea soup.

Outside, lately

swallowtail caterpillar on carrot tops

these finally bloomed...

someone can tell me what they are, perhaps.

morningglory

(chrysanthe)mum

forget-me-nots

forget-me-nots with ant

I'm Not Outside Enough

The other day I spent a while doing various "chores" outside, mainly digging to make holes for some potted plants. Oh, I still need to mow the lawn, I just remembered.
Anyway, I've often lamented to myself after forgetting to write down or otherwise remember what I've planted where. With vegetables, it's kind of ridiculous not to know, but with flowers, it's almost fun. For example, I can't recall what the above plant is going to be, but I can see it's getting ready to bloom so it's exciting to wait and see. When I looked closely I saw that little bug on there just hanging out.

Seed packets, purse, projects to pick

Today, courtesy of stumple upon, I present:

Weird horse quartet
Dirty Car Art Gallery
Hidden Airplane Factory

What are my updates?

Bizarre Market was nice. J. from Monkeydogstudio had saved some tape dispenser rolls for me, that was awfully sweet of her.



I met K., who found a great use for the seed packet books I made. They go wonderfully with the cool mini flower presses she made with kids at the William Byrd Community House. If only I had as many successful vegetable results as I have seed packets.



Now what? I still need to make the purse for the LINC project, but of course I got sidetracked. And then I have til 11:59 pm EST to enter Etsy's Handmade Kids Challenge. I guess that means I should get off the computer and make something now. I had cut out some squares to make blocks, but now I'm not sure where I put them. Maybe I'll see if I can get it together in the next 21 hours.

Photos hosted by flickr.

Goodbye Cilantro, Hello Coriander... (plus custom flipcats)

I'm not sure when and how I learned that cilantro and coriander are the same thing... well, from the same plant anyway. So all the green cilantro dried up and I attempted to harvest the seeds. I think it's pretty straightforward, I got them off the stems and sorted and washed them. I tried some crushed with mortar and pestle and mixed in with rice and they were quite nice.



In other news, I completed two custom flip cats for an etsy customer.
Patches said she doesn't mind. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and all.



I have some other post topics at the ready, so stay tuned.