Just checking in, kind of like WIP Wednesday.

We've been busy little bees as always. My parents came to visit and I had some much needed help, I was pretty productive while they played with he kids. The fence around the garden is finished! Sucks to be you chickens and rabbits! I finally went shopping alone and bought myself some new clothes, not too exciting but I so rarely do anything for myself. I haven't bought new shorts since before Mr. Lovebug was born. He'll be 5 in December if that tells you anything. I didn't get Mr. Lovebug's room painted but thats ok, I still need samples and all that jazz. Another day.

It is officially summer vacation! The weather has been crummy to say the least. It's been almost 90 and now this week barely into the 60s and rainy. This dreary weather is so draining! The kids don't want to go outside, there's no sun, it's just... bleck! Oh well.

We've been eating lots of strawberries form the yard but they're almost done for the season. Pretty soon it'll  be black and blueberries. Can't wait! The berry fields have their sound machines on, which isn't as bad as last year. They have moved the alien abduction sounds to the other side, I'm guessing out of courtesy.

Naturebaby is being especially nature-y. She's learning about bugs as per usual, which means I'm learning about bugs and when inside she's big into jigsaw puzzles. Mr. Lovebug wants to play video games all day. Obviously that's not happening. My parents brought him a learning book to learn letters and things, we bought him special super-hero pencils to use and I'm hoping we'll put a big dent in it by the end of summer. He really isn't into writing or drawing so getting him to try is a challenge. I'm hoping the special pencils and 1 letter a day helps.

And I bought an ice cream maker. Goodbye egg sales! I made strawberry ice cream the other day with berries from our patch and the chicken's eggs. I've only had a spoonful, I'm worried the eggs will make me sick. Did I mention I can't eat eggs without feeling like I wish I was dead. Yeah, there's that.  Anyways it's delicious! Next up will be an eggless base so I can eat until I wish I was dead for a completely different reason. I'm starting to think perhaps I need a dairy producing animal.

How is your summer going? I know I haven't been around but you know, life.

Strawberry plants

One of our neighbors brought over some strawberry starters a few days ago! We are definitely enjoying the friendly-neighborly life out in the sticks! The strawberries are planted where our compost dune used to be. It was about 20'x6' (at its widest)x3'. As you can see it was huge! Almost all of the compost has been added to the garden (what's left instead ready yet) and is now a wet, fertile strip just waiting for something. Why not strawberries?

This is only a some of the starters she brought over! We have the nicest neighbors! I'll definitely have to bring her some eggs once the flock starts laying.

I started the planting process by transplanting dirt from other beds to build up mounds for the strawberries. What's left of the compost is wet and doesn't drain well, as you can see by the puddles. Each plant has it's own little hill of dirt and compost. Each hill is about 2' apart. Once they are all planted I will be covering everything with mulch to help with drainage, weeds and pests. I planted 21 plants and still have more to give away! The little mounds are doing great, they dry out after the rain and morning dew while the ground is wet or have puddles. A few even have tiny little flowers starting!

It's too bad we won't get any berries this year. Gardening isn't a sprint, it's a marathon. 

I had a great idea for mulch, using the shavings from the chickens. Why not? It goes into the compost anyways, strawberries do well with pine and I've got a never ending supply. 

Are you planting this year? I know it seems like winter is never ending for much of the country, but hang in there. Spring is coming!

Mary, Mary quite contrary how does your garden grow?

This is our first spring on our farm and we are diving right in! We plowed (tilled? I don't know the difference!) our garden this weekend. We have the luxury of having a lot of space and a blank slate. Trying to determine which vegetables, plants, trees and flowers to grow is daunting! Where to start? Where should we put everything? How big should we make the vegetable garden? How big is manageable? So many questions!

Here's what we did

A few weeks ago we marked out our area. We used steaks and string, very high-tech I know! Scribs sprayed grass and weed killer on the inside of our fancy string square and we waited. After a few days, nothing happened! I was starting to think that it wasn't going to work. I'm impatient, can you tell? Then slowly, slowly the whole square started turning brown. Except where we missed. Oops!

Next came fertilizing, we laid some… whatever we had in the barn. We were told to use 16-16-16, but what we had on hand would work.

Spreading the compost was the next step. Holy Moly this was HARD work. It took me a week of nap times to get it done, probably close to 8 hours total. Shoveling the compost from the pile into the wheelbarrow, move it to the garden, dump and spread. Repeat nine thousand times. I used almost all the compost we had and it's a little light in spots, but once it all gets mixed in I think it'll be just fine!

This weekend we rented a Dingo to get everything mixed and tilled. Let me tell you, this thing is a beast! And it turned out of be a disaster on the first day. The ground was wet, the compost was went and the treads just dug in. I'm talking 8" deep dug in. We had such high hopes after watching videos about how well this guy worked. Its our fault for using it while it was wet, but when you rent it and it rains, what else are you going to do? There's no refund for bad weather. Day 2 the disaster continued. We tried for about 5 minutes, took 2 hours getting it unstuck and called it a day. If it hadn't been raining and we had nice dry ground I think it would have worked wonders!

As you can see, what a mess. A few hundred pounds of wet stuck mud, no wonder it sunk! 2 more hours of cleaning the mess and Scribs called someone from Craigslist. No more than $100, sounds good to me. Well worth it to not have to deal with this mess! I will say he did a great job and only charged us $75!

Back by the wheelbarrow is whats left of the compost dune. It was piled high from the wheelbarrow to the grass pile. I'll be moving whats left and planting strawberries in that space. Just above the tumbler in the picture is where the new compost pile will be.

Looks great, doesn't it? The freshly cut grass definitely helps! Am I the only one who finds cutting the grass relaxing and very satisfying?

Up next, making our rows, planting our plants and tending to our garden! I'm glad I'll have two little helpers!