Oh my, I haven't posted in ages. Thought I'd come and post and update because it is just way too hot to do much else around here! It's near 100 today, and should break 100 the next 3 days or so. It never gets this hot around here, so we are really not used to it at all. It's also very humid, which just makes it so much worse.
ANYWAY. The garden is booming! We have harvested 5 gallon sized bags of raspberries in the freezer, and eaten our fair share fresh as well. We also have about 3 gallon size bags of blueberries in the freezer. Those are much harder to get in the freezer as my girls wolf them down as soon as they are picked!
Zuccini is coming in like crazy. We've had our first baby potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, beets, turnips, onions and lots of peas, and lettuce although those two are are just about gone now. We should be getting our first beans, cukes and carrots anytime now. Our corn, watermelon, canteloupes, pumpkins and winter squash look to be doing really well. For the first time our apple trees look like we will have a nice harvest and we are excited about that. Next year or maybe even this fall, the kids have requested that we put in some grapes and more plum trees. We have some very old Italian style plums here which are still producing, but they are very small, so I'd like to try and find some type of plum that produces the bigger plums. If you have recommendations, please let me know what has worked for you!
Hope you are all staying cool and sipping some lemonade while you enjoy watching your gardens grow!
Hot Hot HOT!!!!!
We've been busy!
My how time flies! Last week was just gorgeous weather wise, including the entire weekend, and we got a lot accomplished around here. Our older chicks moved into the new coop about a week and a half ago. I'll post some pics on my chicken blog in a bit. I'm also pretty darn sure at least one of our chicks is a rooster, which is fairly disappointing. No one else sees it, but I'm waiting for it to start crowing any day now to prove my point!
Last week I got my first row of potatoes in and TWO rows of strawberries! I had thought the strawberries I ordered from Gurney's would fill one row, so having two rows full, plus two more small containers on the back deck filled with them, just thrilled me to pieces!
My husband also helped me dig lots of holes this weekend around the property to get a bunch of miscellaneous plants in and we also transplanted a few perennials. We got our 6 blueberry bushes in to replace the 6 our puppy managed to chew up. Although when digging them up, 5 of them had the faintest signs of life, so I stuck them in a garden bed to see if any of them pull through.
Then Monday, we were expecting a huge wind/rain storm to come in, so I frantically got all my onions planted which filled another row. BTW, each row is approximately
25'-30' long. Right after finishing planting them, I had a bit of an incident. The wind was starting to pick up, and it managed to catch our big heavy door in the mud room to the garage, and it slammed really good on two of my fingers. It was not a pleasant experience to say the least. I really thought one finger was broken for sure. I went into shock, blacked out, threw up, the whole nine yards. Luckily, it does not seem to be broken now. In fact, it doesn't hurt much now at all. But man did it hurt when it happened!!! Thankfully, I think it's just going to turn lots of different colors as it heals over the next week. I'm very thankful it won't keep me out of the garden!
Since Monday, it's been raining non-stop, so I've been busy playing catch up with things around the inside of the house. I have a few pictures to get posted and will try and get them up tomorrow. Gotta go catch American Idol....go Danny!!!!
Happy Earth Day!
I hope everyone pitched in and did something kind for the Earth today. My DH and I actually loaded up our SUV and took part in a recycle event at his work. I'm almost ashamed to say we brought in 3 monitors, 2 CPU's, an old TV, a printer, a scanner, and old broken X-Box and 3 old cell phones. It's amazing how much stuff you can accumulate! I'm glad all of it went to an organization that will recycle what they can, and it reminded me again to really think twice about our future purchases. Is that something we really need, or will it just fall into the more "stuff" category? Good things to think about.
Gurney's box of goodies and more!
Look what came in the mail on Friday? 
It includes 5 bags of onion sets, 3 yellow Ebenezer, and one bag each of red onions and white onions.
52 bare root Whopper Strawberry plants
And last, 2 bags each of potato starts, in the Red Pontiac, Yukon Gold and Kennibeck varieties
I had hoped to start getting these planted this weekend, but we were too busy trying to finish the new chicken coop. Check out our progress at my Keeping Backyard Chickens blog. We're almost done!!! I'll have to hope my husband can get the rototiller out tomorrow after work so I can get these in in the next few days.
My seeds I started inside over Easter have been doing well also. Here's a peek at them as well! These include red & green cabbage, broccoli, watermelon, cantaloupe, cukes, zuccini, butternut squash, acorn squash and Burgess Buttercup squash.
I am feeling slightly overwhelmed as all I have to get done in the garden in the next few weeks. I love this time of year, but it sure keeps me busy! Hope you are all checking things off your to do list and making progress on your things to do.
Productive Week and Asparagus is up!
Well for the most part the weather was great this week. Supposed to be even nicer this weekend, which will be perfect for finishing the new chicken coop. Over the last few days, I got quite a bit done. I planted alot outside, including 3 packs of peas, two Early Frosty and one Lincoln Homesteader. I also planted two packages of Shallots and half a packet of spinach, and three types of lettuces, red romaine, green romaine and buttercrunch. I also got all my Sweet Peas planted. Most of the seeds I planted inside last weekend are up too. What I'm most excited about though is I have some asparagus coming up! I planted a 30' row last year, and had almost given up hope! But the first spears are starting to peak through! YEAH!!! Now I just have to resist harvesting them this year so they can grow stronger for the years to come. I imagine I'll have to pinch a few though, just to have a taste!
Happy Easter!
I hope you all had a wonderful Easter! We had a quiet day at home. We cooked a big ham dinner last night for some friends, and the family has been munching on ham leftovers all day. The girls woke early to see what the Easter Bunny had brought and have been eating more sugar than they should be. It's our last day of Spring Break with everyone home, and we are basically having a veg day, with lots of heavy rain outside.
We didn't quite finish the new coop yet which was the plan. The weather wasn't cooperating. Hoping to finish it next weekend as it is very very close to being done. Just have to finish the run and put in the pop door for the birds.
I did manage to get some seeds planted today and now have them under my new grow lights on heated seed mats. I planted 3 types of cukes, 2 types of zucchini, 3 types of winter squash, red and green cabbage, broccoli, watermelon and cantaloupe. I'm very excited about the last two as I have never planted them before. Our growing season here is rather cool and short, but I found a short season variety of each so I'm giving them a go. Whatever I can do to grow more fruit is a good thing as my kids go through it so fast!
I'll be watching the mail this week as I got my shipping notice from Gurneys.com that my potato starts, onion sets and my strawberries are on their way. I couldn't resist these Whopper Strawberries!
First week in April
Just an update on things around here at the end of the first week in April. Did I mention we are refinancing? We locked in a 5.0% rate. If you haven't looked into it yet, you really should! We will be saving a nice bundle each month at this new rate. We should close in the next two weeks. Make sure you also consider changing the term of your loan. If you have had your mortage for awhile and started with a 30 yr, it may be worth it to refi and go with a 15 yr or 20 yr term. Those shorter term loans will often give you an even better interest rate!
This week is spring break for the kids, and my husband took it off as well. Our primary focus for the week will be building a new coop (our third...yikes!). We are using recycled wood pallets that we got off of Freecycle. You can check out our progress on that on my Keeping Backyard Chickens blog.
The weather has been absolutely perfect the last few days, and it is well deserved! We have had such miserable weather. March was one of the coldest March's on record here, and it seemed more like January. February was actually warmer overall! I had planted some peas and swiss chard in February, and there has been no sign of them whatsoever. I think the seeds just rotted away in the cold wet weather. Today I planted two packs of Alaska Bush peas, as well as half a packet of spinach and two bags of shallots. I am hoping to get my husband to till the rest of the veggie beds by the end of the week. I also need to get my indoor seeds going as I haven't started them yet! I will only be doing easy to grow things inside like my squashes, cukes and melons. I will by tomato and pepper starts later in May.
Last week I got all my apple trees and raspberries pruned. I have 6 new blueberry bushes that need to get planted this week. I think that sum's up what's happening here lately. What's new with you?
