Garden Escapades + Upcycling

Need... To....Be... Outside!  Need....More...Sun...

Thankfully, today is supposed to be a beautiful 70 degrees.  My plan is to be outside in the yard as much as possible.  I need vitamin D like you would not believe.  I've been cranky from this long winter and of course, we're supposed to get snow again on Monday. Boo. I'm still glad I don't live up north right now because I would be in jail by now.  I would have assaulted someone out of winter crankiness.  Anyway, today will be a super busy and exciting day.  I have plans to set up my new raised beds and yesterday, I scored some cheap goodies to add to the garden madness!

First though, on the windowsill....

I have onion sets soaking.  I wanted to make sure they were still good.  I was going to put them in this weekend, but with impending snow again, I plan to wait until after Monday. I'm using sets since my yellow onion seeds seem to be duds right now.  I so want to support Southern Exposure but the germination rates for their seeds are always a bit sketchy.

I also have giant sunflowers growing in the smaller yogurt containers...

Ginger + Turmeric= A Bit O Spring

It's BEAUTIFUL outside!!  I've been so out of wack during this long winter and now with the sun and warmer weather this weekend, I feel like I'm getting back to my old self!  So what's been up??  A lot of seed starting. That's what!  And in addition to the usual suspects, I decided to try growing my own ginger and turmeric. :-)  On my windowsill, I have organic turmeric and ginger rhizomes ready to plant.

Feb 2014: Winter Garden Update

Winter SUCKS!  This winter especially!!  My raised beds have had it rough. :-(  As a warmer day today, I just had to go out!!  I was very curious as to who survived, what I needed to do better, etc.  There were some serious surprises, which makes me even more enthusiastic about growing and the mysteries and resilience of plants!!  Sometimes, some plants scare the living crap out of me!!

This guy!! This guy is my rogue cilantro in Bed #1!!  This guy has been under maybe 5 to 8 inches of snow up until yesterday. If you recall, I didn't replant these seeds.  They just started growing in Sept.-ish. Just showed up! So I didn't bother to use extenders or anything since I was planning to rest the bed and just grow a cover crop (vetch).  I thought for sure the cilantro would die from freezing, snow, and wind, but NOPE!!  A true survivor.  This is guy wins the award this year!

The Weekend: Final Winter Prep + Bachelor Radish Kimchi!

This weekend has been a busy one so far.  Winter is upon us now and the temps. have been dipping in the evenings to somewhere around 35 to 40 degrees for the past couple of nights.  Most of my veggies can withstand a bit of cold but I still wanted to get ready for the freeze.  Earlier on, I had built hoops out of PVC pipes.  They seem to be o.k. but wobbly.  I'm going to see how they do this winter and if it turns out the hoops aren't stable enough, I'll clamp them down to the sides of the beds. The "sand worms" were a total FAIL!!  They tended to leak sand if it rained and weren't heavy enough to hold the plastic sheeting down.  The good thing was that putting up the plastic when I did was premature anyway; it got really warm again, which gave me a chance to rethink the whole plastic situation.  In the meantime, the sand worms that I had made, I've been using to secure my tulle netting.

Battle Royale: Me vs Spring!

I spent the weekend battling slugs, spider mites, ants, pollen, squirrels, rabbits and whatever else Mother Nature decided to throw my way. The fight is ON!! It's SOOO ON!!! OMG.... I just noticed that I've been bitten by a mosquito! Grrrrr.... I definitely have a love/hate relationship with Spring. I planted lupines out front and noticed that the seedlings were getting chewed up by slugs. Ants are EVERYWHERE! We have rabbits who apparently live across the street but love to hang out in our backyard at night- I think they know something. And the squirrels are digging up my yard! 'sigh'

This weekend, we were supposed to cut the grass (weeds really) and it rained all weekend. So now, the weeds and crab grass have overgrown (glad I don't have to cut the grass! :-))  But I did have a few happy moments this weekend....

My seedlings are doing really well... except the impatiens.  Can't win them all. This morning, I dumped the rest of the impatiens seeds in the front bed- probably when I got bit by the stupid mosquito.

Spring is Here!!

SPRING!!  It's early but I'm hoping it's sticks around.  My biggest fear is that at the end of this month after I've planted my cool weather veggies, a freak blizzard will hit us- knock on wood! Well, at this point, I just want to enjoy the weather and watch mother nature in action. This past week, we were in the 80s for half of the week and with the warm weather, my yard exploded with plant life almost overnight!

When we first moved in to our current abode, the front of the house was a little drab.  There were a couple of sad looking rose bushes and some trees and lots of weeds! I planted tulips in the fall last year to the right of the house and crossed my fingers.....

Gardening Weekend + Surprises!

Sometimes, I'm real nervous about starting plants from seeds.  REAL nervous.  A lot of times, you just don't know if the seeds are good or bad, but I hate the wait most of all.  What I do love is how some plants just pop up over night!  I started my kale and collards about 2 weeks ago and one day there was nothing happening but the next morning, these cute little sprouts were busting out! Once they really started to grow, I moved them into my greenhouse for some good blast of sun.  I wanted to make sure they didn't get too leggy.  I also moved my chamomile and columbine into the greenhouse as well.

kale on the left and collards on the right

On my windowsill, I started more mint and wanted to try growing more rosemary...

Happy Post-Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone had a decent Thanksgiving.  Besides burning myself (it's healing fairly quickly) and wanting just one more day off, the holiday was pretty good. The turkey turned out to be pretty fabulous. I think next time, I will try brining first and then cook it using the 500 degree oven method.  Right now, my after T-day tradition is to make turkey soup. The house smells like rosemary and thyme right now!

I also had to use my one blue egg this weekend to make more Japanese milk bread. I was really holding out. It was such a pretty blue egg.  I even kept the shell. How sad is that?

My Weekend Project: Sewing Room... Again

Sigh.  The one thing I hate about moving is setting everything back up again. The one thing I am very glad about is that the space is much bigger and I'll actually be able to set up my books.  I really hope I can get it done today!! This is my weekend goal. I was also hoping to mow the lawn this weekend but with the rain, well, I'm not sure it's going to happen.  We're the house with the ugly lawn right now. :-(

Home Sweet Home ... For Now

This weekend has been exhausting!  The boyfriend and I moved from our current apartment to a rental home. Yay!  But once again, we decided to move all of our junk ourselves.  Now it wouldn't be so bad if I was 6 ft. tall, 200 lbs and as strong as an ox but I am not.  I'm barely 5' 3 1/4'' and on a good day, may weigh in at a whopping 105 lbs. (that is if I had a Big Mac for breakfast).  BUT I am surprisingly strong for my size and this ain't the first time I've had to move all of our junk.  Our previous abode had a killer flight of stairs that we climbed to get our junk into the apartment.  So for a couple of people nearing our 40s and actually the boy is the big 4-0. We still got some spunk. We're definitely hurting right now, I'm not going to lie, but we got it DONE SON!

So, this is the new place:

Breakfast: Eggsellent Eggs!

Look at these eggs!! I was making scrambled eggs for breakfast the other day and of course used the eggs that I had bought from the farmer's market; I was so surprised that each egg produced a different colored yolk!  This is why I want my own chickens!  I was sad that I broke the yolk on the right, it was such a beautiful tangerine orange!  My big gripe with RVA is that they have anti-chicken laws. BOOOOO!!!

Weekend Highlights

It's been a good weekend!  No rain, lots of sunshine and cooler temperatures.  The trees here are just starting to turn and you can smell autumn in the air!  Here are some highlights:
Visit to the Farmer's Market:
I love farmer's markets.  It's one of the things besides friends that I miss about Los Angeles.  We went to the local farmer's market yesterday (second time for me and first for the boyfriend) and got our Mrs. Yoder's donuts (see previous post), which I have to say was pretty damn amazing. The boyfriend and I definitely fell off the diet train and got caught under the wheels and dragged along the tracks yesterday. That's how good those donuts were! I think our only real meal yesterday was at dinner when the donuts ran out. :-P

I also bought eggs at the farmer's market and got a nice surprise..... a blue egg with my dozen! God, I want chickens so badly!