Drawing with Thread

Last fall, while on a camping trip, I visited a small-town quilt shop and, to make a long story short, came out with a used short-arm quilting machine and frame.  It came with a bunch of pantographs - or is it pantograms?  I never remember -  a laser pointer, a "Cruise Control" thing, and a DVD showing how to thread the machine.  It was just too good a deal to pass up.

I could not wait to get home and try it out.

I loaded a "sandwich" of old bed sheets and left-over batting into the frame and started practicing.  It didn't take long to figure out that pantographs (?) and laser pointers are not for me.  It makes me nervous not to watch the needle as it moves across the fabric.  I pulled up a chair, sat down in front of the machine, and soon realized that I could "draw" with thread.  My pantograph shelf is now a "stuff" shelf. 

The picture to the right is a shot of an "iris garden" quilt I'm working on.  The quilting machine did all of this.  It is a mish-mash of trial and error, but it's much more forgiving of the errors than one might think.  This is just the top; it has batting and backing behind it, but I intend to cut most of that away before making the final "quilt sandwich" for the quilting process.  (I'm hoping for a trapunto effect.  We'll see.)   Batting and backing are not necessary, as I learned while doing the borders without them.  Here are some other things I learned in the process:

1.  Stabilize the fabric you're about to embroider.  I did not stabilize mine, and am noticing some pulling around the design.  (Hopefully, this will "quilt out.")  Next time, I'll try something like iron-on interfacing or embroidery stabilizer. 

2.  Water-soluable stabilizer is great for transferring patterns to the fabric.  Draw/trace right onto the stabilizer and then pin it to the fabric.  It stays put very well.  Glad "Press & Seal" wrap also works well, though there'll be some debris to remove.  Paper patterns can be pinned or taped to the fabric and sewn over, too.  One word of caution:  if you intend to re-trace the design, whether on paper or Press & Seal, pull the paper off after the first stitching, as re-tracing the design will most certainly create tiny "bobble pockets" which won't want to give up the paper. 

3.  If your frame has any bumps - bolt heads, or seams in the metal - fix them before you start.

4.  Try the foot pedal rather than a speed controller for delicate or tight areas.

5.  Keep good tension on the sides of the fabric. 

6.  While "painting" the design, keep in mind the direction/shape of the object you're painting, and move the machine in that direction; when filling a circle, move the machine in circles.

7.  You don't have to fill every speck.  In fact, you can use empty spaces for highlights, just as you can when drawing with a pencil. 

8.  Create shading by putting down more thread on the dark side of objects, or by switching to a darker thread.  If a dark thread seems too dark, sew a lighter shade on top of it. 

9.  Vary your "filling" patterns for different objects.  Use long straight lines, meandering lines, tiny circles, cross-hatching.  You get the idea.

10.  Use whatever kind of top thread you want, but fill your bobbins with embroidery bobbin thread.  You won't have to change bobbins nearly as often.

11.  Do an internet search for "thread painting."  There are technique videos out there.  Some of them are done with machines that have a zig-zag stitch (my quilting machine does only a straight stitch), but you can still get ideas for filler patterns, etc.

Post-Season Analysis

It's raining here today.  Rain always makes me think about gardening, especially when there's been a long, dry spell, as there has been this year.

This year's garden was a flop.  It started well.  The garden plots were tilled and ready when planting time came, and most of what we planted thrived for a little while.  But we lost many of our tomato plants, first to rain, then to blight, then to heat.  We had a nice first picking of squash, then the vines - all of them, simultaneously - up and died on us.  The green beans came up, looked great, ran up their poles, and then didn't do squat all summer.  I never even got the butter beans planted.  Our only successes this year were with okra and purple hull peas.

I planted broad beans (should've planted them earlier than I did).  I had two packs of seeds; there were (maybe) 12 seeds in each pack.  About half of them came up, and some of those withered and died.  When it was all said and done, I had one or two massive bean plants.  They produced big old pods, and I figured I'd let them dry on the plant and at least have some seeds for next year.  The pods turned black and fell off before the beans matured. 

I planted black crowder peas and purple crowder peas.  There were precious few of those seeds, too, slightly less than enough for two half-rows each.  They struggled, but made peas.  Those peas dried up on the vines.  Pop-Pop may have picked them dry and saved them for seeds.  I hope he did.

The problem with all of these things was mostly neglect.  I worked more than usual at the office, traveled a little more than usual, had more than the usual number of things demand my attention.  And the heat...mercy, it was hot - weeks of temperatures near (and over) 100. 

But I intend to do better next year.

------------

Tomato Canning

I gave up on getting enough tomatoes from my own garden to make salsa, spaghetti sauce, and canned tomatoes, so Tuesday I stopped by a vegetable stand and bought a box of "seconds" tomatoes.  These are tomatoes that aren't quite perfect enough to be sold to the grocery stores but are fine for cooking/canning.  The box yielded 4 quarts of canned tomatoes and 8 pints of salsa.  Not bad.  I'm going back for more next week. 

And, next year, I'm taking a vacation from growing tomatoes.

Garden Bum

I was dreadfully lazy this morning, and so it was around noon before I summoned the gumption to get dressed and poke my head outside.  It was humid, but not as mercilessly hot as it has been for the past few days.  Thinking a walk to the big garden might help me shake the fuzzies out of my brain, I put on my gardening shoes and set off down Nanny's driveway.

As I walked, I noted the sound of a lawnmower running.  It was hard to tell which direction the sound was coming from.  I glanced around, but didn't see any of the neighbors mowing.  A few yards farther down the driveway, I realized that I was heading in the direction of the sound.  The lawnmower sounded stationary, as if it was just idling.  I figured that Pop-Pop was mechanicing on something in his shed, until I got close enough to realize that the noise was coming from behind the shed. 

Sure enough, it was a lawnmower, an old riding model that Pop-Pop has been trying to resuscitate, just sitting there idling.  Good job! I thought, and strode on toward the garden, wondering where Pop-Pop was. 

Then I noticed that there was a tautly-stretched rope tied to the back of the lawnmower.  I followed the rope with my eyes.  It disappeared over the little hill behind the shed.  Wondering what was going on, I veered toward the hill, just in time to see Pop-Pop's head poke up.  As I got closer, I could see that the other end of the rope was tied to the front axle of another lawnmower, the one Pop-Pop uses all the time, that was stranded just under the hill. 

"Need some help?" I called.

"Grass was slick," he replied.  He hitched up his britches and asked me to come give a little push while he gave a little pull.  I stationed myself at the back of the lawnmower while he limped over to climb onto the other one.  With his little pull and my little push, we brought the mower over the hill.  I un-tied the ropes for him, trying not to snicker.

Parts of the big garden are looking rough.  We've had a lot of rain this week, and the tomatoes in the low spot look pitiful.  The green beans, butterbeans, and crowder peas seem to be enjoying the water, though.  The second crop of squash plants are coming along. but no blooms yet.  On the two original zucchini plants, which have surved drought, floods, and grandchildren, I found five squash, each one a foot long and as big around as a baseball bat.  I saw some squash bugs scurrying around, though.  Note to self:  those new squash plants will need bug poison this late in the season.

Pop-Pop has mowed down the purple hull pea vines from the first crop, and says he's going to plow that spot for me to re-plant, once the ground dries up enough. I'm not sure we'll have enough time to make another crop, but it can't hurt to try, I reckon.


I pulled grass from between the green beans, checked the okra (it needs cutting), and inspected the tomatoes more closely.  My guess is that they're succombing to both rain and blight.  The only plants that look healthy are the mini-Roma tomatoes; they are dripping with fruit.  Tomorrow, if this lazy mood passes, I'm going to pick them and make spaghetti sauce with them.

4th of July

It's been alternately blistering hot and rainy for the past couple of weeks, and although I've kept up with the picking in the vegetable garden, I haven't done any weeding.  The grass is about to get out of control.  Yesterday morning, though, was lovely, and I decided to crank up the tiller and plow up some grass before the weekend festivities started.

While I was in Pop-Pop's shed gassing up the tiller, I heard a commotion - banging noises, and Nanny's high-pitched voice - on the back porch.  I stepped out to have a look.  Both Nanny and Pop-Pop were on the porch.  She was holding a butcher knife in one hand, and wiping her brow with a paper towel with the other.  Pop-Pop was staring at something on the floor.  I called to them, "Is everything OK up there?"

Nanny hollered back, "SNAKE!"

"Do you want me to bring a hoe?"

"No, I've done killed it three times," Nanny said, wiping her brow again. 

I went up to have a look. 

Snake, indeed.  It was hard to tell what kind it was, or how long it was, as Nanny had chopped it into so many pieces that it looked like Benjamin Franklin's "JOIN OR DIE" cartoon, but its individual pieces had impressive girth.  By this time, Nanny had raked all the pieces onto some newspaper.  She was insisting that it was a copperhead or a water moccasin; Pop-Pop said it was probably a chicken snake.  As I stood there listening to Nanny tell the sequence of events, I couldn't help but be amazed at her plucky courage.  Having seen the snake lying along the floor near the back wall, she'd grabbed a hoe that she'd left propped against the porch rail.  Her first blow had shortened the snake's back-end by about 1/3.  The remainder of the snake had crawled into a crack between a support post and the wall.  She'd grabbed its oozing stub and had tried to pull it out of the crack ("You did what?!").  She'd managed to drag it out a little - enough to cut another few inches off its tail - but it had somehow expanded the remaining section of its body so that she could not pull it free.  She'd run in the house to get a butcher knife, and had jabbed behind the support post until the snake surrendered, at which point she'd finished it off.  The banging I'd heard was the combat finale, as Nanny sectioned it a few more times for good measure.

As she and Pop-Pop stood there, fussing about who was going to dispose of the snake pieces, and where, I quietly sneaked back to the shed.  I do not do snakes, live or dead.  Some time later, The Husband came riding up on the lawnmower, and they made him do the dirty work.

The little black tiller was especially contrary about cranking, and so I was already tired and the day was growing hot by the time I got to the garden.  I'd purposefully not worked around the tomato plants very much, thinking that the less I disturbed the soil, the less blight fungus I'd stir up.  Thus, the grass was fairly tall, and firmly rooted, and it took a lot of digging to uproot it.  Three hours later, I gave out and headed for the shade of the back porch and a tall glass of water, without having even finished the tomato rows.  The grass I'd intended to rake up and dispose of (so that it wouldn't take hold again) still lay in the dirt, and the rest of the garden was still un-touched.  But the last of the purple-hull peas needed to be picked, the okra and eggplants needed to be cut, and I had a ton of other things to do besides gardening.  After cooling off a bit, I went back to the garden with a sack and a knife to get the okra and eggplants.  The Husband came out to pick the peas.  The rest of the tilling and raking would have to wait.  I put the tiller back in the shed, came home for a shower and a change of clothes, and climbed into my Jeep to drive into town.

Nanny had given me a short list of things she needed from the grocery store.  I shopped for her and for myself and started home.  The Jeep's top was down, and the wind felt wonderful after the heat of the garden, but about 2 miles from the house, a few big drops of rain plopped onto my windshield.  I kept driving, thinking I'd make it home before the downpour started.  Wrong.  By the time I reached my driveway, I was drenched.  The Husband came out to help with the groceries and the Jeep top, then we went to deliver Nanny's things.

She and Mama Jewell were sitting on the back porch, shelling peas.  "Good heavens, you're sopping wet!" Nanny exclaimed.  I took the groceries in, then came back out to sit with them.

"This rain came out of nowhere!" I said, explaining that I'd been caught in the rain with the top down.

"A piece of that snake must have landed belly-up,"* Nanny surmised.

* * * * * *

* There's an old wive's tale that, to bring rain, one should lay a snake belly-up on a fence.

Rain!

It rained here yesterday afternoon, thank goodness.  The garden needed it something fierce.  I've been watering it, but somehow a watering is never as good as a rain. 

I scalded and peeled the first batch of tomatoes last night.  By the time I finished, it was a little too late to start cooking and canning them, so I put them in the refrigerator and will finish them tonight. 

Culinary Complications

Today is Nanny's birthday (not saying which one).  All of her young'uns decided to fix a birthday supper for her.  My assigned dishes were baked beans and a birthday cake.  I decided on a home-made coconut cake. 

Since most of my kitchen disasters have involved desserts, I figured I'd best get an early start so that I'd have time for a run to the grocery store bakery, if necessary.  While Nanny way to church, I was on my way to the store for cake ingredients.  I came home and went right to work, using an old-time recipe from a cookbook older than I am. 

The cake layers turned out great.  Substitution queen that I am, I used creme de coconut for part of the milk to add a little coconut flavor to the batter.  I was worried that this would screw up the recipe - make it too gummy, or something - but the layers came right out of their pans without mishap.  At that stage, I figured I was home free.

The frosting recipe called for making a sugar syrup to be drizzled into beaten egg whites.  I'd done this a time or two.  No biggie, I thought.  I mixed up the sugar and water and brought them to the recommended "gentle boil."  I set the timer, and turned my attention to chopping some tomatoes and peppers for some guacamole I intended to make.  A few minutes later, I smelled something burning and glanced over my shoulder to see smoke rising from my pan.  A glance at the timer revealed that, although I'd dialed in the correct number of minutes, I'd forgotten to push "start."  The syrup was - well, brown glass.  I hacked it into a tin can, filled the pan with water, and set it on another burner to try to cook the hardened syrup out of it while I started another batch.

This time, I gave my full attention to the syrup.  I let it boil without stirring it for the recommended time, then began to "stir frequently" as the recipe demanded.  It looked great for a minute, then, suddenly, as I stood there stirring it, the stuff seized up and turned back into granulated sugar.  Damn it!  I scooped it out of the pan into the trash can, filled that pan with water so soak out the clumps, scrubbed out the other pan that had been soaking.

As I stood there with the pan in my hand, I thought, Screw this recipe.  I got out another cookbook and my double-boiler and whipped up a seven minute frosting that I've made many times.  It turned out perfectly.  I slapped some coconut on it, et voila!

Finally, a cake!

Purple Hull Peas

We did our first purple hull pea-picking this evening and got a 5-gallon bucket full of peas.  The Grandmother has been complaining that she has nothing to do.  This ought to keep her occupied for at least part of the day tomorrow. 

I watered the butterbeans and was about to water the green beans when I noticed how grassy the green bean rows were.  While The Husband hammered metal posts in the ground for stringing support wires, I ran the tiller and tidied up those rows.  Hopefully, I can string the wire and set the bamboo canes this weekend.

The second crop of squash is beginning to sprout.  I hope these plants fare better than the first crop, which has collapsed in stringy heaps.

The tomato worms have hatched and have been munching away.  Boy, they can trim up a tomato plant in nothing flat.  Pop-Pop sprayed insecticide on the tomato plants in the big garden to keep the worms at bay, but I have been pulling the worms off the tomato plants in the early garden and squishing them in the dirt.  It TOTALLY grosses me out to touch those worms, and it's even worse the way they pop and squirt green goo when I step on them, but I'd rather pick and squish them than spray poison everywhere.

Phloxing

When I first started trying to grow flowers in my yard, we could not afford to spend money on store-bought plants, so I gratefully accepted cuttings from friends and scoured the fields and woods for wildflowers.  One day, as I was on my way home from work, I spied some tall phlox growing along the banks of a creek not far from my house.  I drove home, grabbed a shovel, went back to the creek to dig up a clump of the phlox, and planted it near my patio. 

I was over-joyed when that clump re-appeared the following spring.  Over the next few years I divided it, and moved the divisions to other places in my yard.

My flower beds are now choked with phlox.  They are everywhere.

In the front...

in the back...

...on the side.

At times, they almost seem menacing, as if they would choke ME if I would stand still long enough.  About the only plants that have withstood the phlox are the daylilies, and even some of those have succombed to the crowding.

For the past few years, just before the phlox bloom, when they're six feet tall and thick as a forest, I have threatened to get rid of them.  The deal is that I'm always too busy in the vegetable garden in the early spring and summer to fool with the flowers in the yard, and then the phlox begin to bloom, and I think, "I might as well wait until after they've bloomed...."  Of course, by then, something in the vegetable garden needs picking and preserving, and while I'm inside peeling and canning, the phlox are spewing their seeds all over the property.  And so the cycle begins again, with even more soldiers in the ranks the next year.

Resolution:  I'm going to do it next year.  No more pussy-footing around.  I'll pull them up by the roots, mow them down, shoot them with Round-Up, if necessary....

Except I might save a clump or two, for old time's sake.  ;)

* * * * *

As I was out taking pictures this morning, I saw something I've never seen before:  figs, on my fig tree!

This is one of two fig trees that I planted about 15 years ago.  Not knowing much about gardening, I planted them where there was too much shade, and they just sat there.  After about 10 years, when the plants were still only a foot tall and so scrawny that they were in constant danger of being lost in the grass, it occurred to me (duh!) that maybe I should move them to a place where there was more light.  I dug them up, and re-set them in the only sunny spot in the yard.  It was about three more years before they began to grow.  They're still only waist high, but they're beginning to bush out.  And now one has figs on it - maybe a dozen!  How lucky that, just last week, I saw a TV chef poaching figs in a syrup of port wine and sugar, and then slicing them on top of puff pastry rounds smeared with goat cheese.  I'll be trying that recipe, assuming I beat the raccoons to the fig tree when the figs ripen.

* * * * *

The vegetable garden is one sad-looking parcel of ground right now.

Temperatures for the past few days have neared 100.  It appears that the tomatoes may survive the blight and leaf spot and the squirrels (thanks to Pop-Pop's electric fence), but some of the fruit is scalding.  I'm hoping the later-planted tomatoes (which haven't even bloomed yet) will do better if the heat wave passes.  The squash plants that looked wonderful two weeks ago have now almost collapsed.  I've been watering them, but I'm not confident they'll pull through.  The garden, in general, needs weeding, but, jeez, it's so hot!  I hoed the beans last week, and even as late as 8 p.m., sweat poured off of me. 

Those crazy broad beans that I planted early in the spring have done strange things.  Since only a few of the plants survived, I decided to let the pods dry on the vines to make seeds for next year.  Something must have eaten them, for they are gone.  I found more seeds online and ordered enough to try a second planting, come August, with some left for next spring.  I'm on a mission to figure out how to grow these things! 

Second Squash

This evening, immediately after supper, I "suited up" in my gardening armour and went down to the big garden to do some maintenance.  I chopped the morning glories out of the beans and did a second planting of squash, this one on the back side of the garden.  The squash I planted two months ago is bearing, but a couple of the vines have wilted, and I'm worried that the rest will poop out.  Though I thought I had planted enough squash to feed the county, the kin-folks on (and off) the hill are keeping it picked clean.  I've never planted a second crop of squash, so I don't know how it will do.  There is plenty of summer left for it to mature, but there will be a bigger problem with bugs later in the season.  Wish me luck.

After planting the new squash seeds, I dragged out the waterhose and dampened the hills, hoping to encourage the seeds to sprout fast.  While I had the hose out, I watered the beans, the tomatoes, the peppers and eggplants, and the old squash vines.  Peppers of all descriptions love this soil for some reason.  We've been getting jalapenos for a few weeks now, and the bell pepper plants are loaded with baby peppers.  Tonight, when I watered the bell peppers, one was so heavy with fruit that it began to slowly keel over.  I'll have to prop it up with stakes tomorrow.

The tomatoes are beginning to ripen.  We're getting enough for sandwiches and salads, but not enough to put up in jars, yet.

I cut the first little batch of okra yesterday.

Black-eyed peas are blooming. 

Corn is a couple of inches tall.  The crows haven't discovered it, yet (knock on wood), but the raccoons are probably already planning their attack.

Plum Crazy

A Brother-in-Law called Wednesday night and asked if I wanted some plums from his tree.  As plum jelly is my hands-down favorite, I said, "Yes!"  He said he'd leave them in a bucket on his porch for me to pick up on my way to work the next morning.  On Thursday morning, I got in my Jeep and drove straight to work without even thinking about plums.  It was late in the day when I left work on Thursday, and I still didn't think about the plums.  They didn't cross my mind again until last night, when he showed up at my back door with the bucket.  He set it under the patio table, and then we all went out to dinner.  I had a couple of margaritas at dinner, and when we came home, all I thought about was putting on my jammies and crawling into bed.

This morning after The Husband came inside from feeding the cat, he said, "There was a party on our patio last night."  I gave him a perplexed look.  "'Coons or 'possums, most likely.  There are plum pits all over the patio."  I ran to the back door to see for myself.  Sure enough, the patio was littered with pits, and there were a bunch of half-eated plums in the bucket. 

I brought them inside, washed them, and tossed out the half-eaten ones.  Just as I was about to drag out a cookbook to see what to do with them, Nanny knocked on the front door.  "How do I do these plums?  Just cut them up, cook them, and juice them out?"  Nanny said she doesn't even cut them up.  "Just reach in the pan and squish them."  Easy enough.  I added a little water to get them going.  They're cooking right now.

Today will be a busy day.  By the time the plums finish cooking, we'll be leaving for the first of two birthday parties, so I won't have time to make the jelly today.  Besides that, I don't have enough sugar in the house to make jelly.  It looks like the juicing and jellying will have to wait until tomorrow.

* * * * *

As promised, Pop-Pop rigged up an electric fence around part of the big garden.  He strung two wires, low to the ground, to keep out the squirrels, raccoons, and rabbits.  He says he'll put up a third wire, higher on the posts, to keep out the deer when the peas and beans start to bloom.  I asked him if he'd electrocuted anything, yet.  He said a rabbit had run up to the wires, but the jolt sent it hopping back to the woods. 

Heh...way to go, Pop-Pop.  :)

Corn

It's been a long week of long days at work, and so I haven't done any work in the garden since Monday night, when I spayed some liquid copper fungicide on the tomatoes.  But this even when I came home, I needed a stretch and a breath of air, and so I walked across the road to check on the things in the early garden. 

I did not spray the tomatoes in the early garden with the copper fungicide.  I sprayed them with baking soda last Saturday and removed the diseased leaves.  There are more diseased leaves today, but there's nothing I can do about it, as more rain is coming over the hill.  It's supposed to rain for two more days.  I'll just have to wait until the rain stops to break out the fungicide for these plants.

The corn I planted last Friday is coming up!

Terrible Tomatoes

After work yesterday, I checked on the tomato plants in both gardens and was disappointed to find that the leaf spot had progressed in the big garden.  I cut off more leaves and then soaked the plants with liquid copper fungicide, but it was probably wasted effort.  We're supposed to get more rain this week, which will wash off the fungicide and encourage new fungus growth. 

I fear this year's tomato crop may be as dismal as last year's crop.

For the record, it appears that blight/leaf spot treatments should begin before the first signs of disease appear.  Evidently, the stuff doesn't kill fungus that's already inside the leaves.  The web sites I've visited unanimously advise removal of infected leaves before spraying.  I did that last year, to the point that my plants were left with only a few tufts of leaves at the tops.  This resulted in sun-scalded fruit, and still the fungus raged, despite repeated sprayings of fungicide.

I'm about ready to give up on growing tomatoes.  :(

We have gathered a handful of ripe Juliette tomatoes in the past few days and have been watching one big, fat Rutgers tomato begin to ripen.  Yesterday, I found the big one on the ground, half eaten, with tiny claw marks on it.  Mr. Squirrell is the culprit, I expect.  Pop-Pop says he's putting an electric fence around the garden today.  I wonder who'll get electrocuted first - me, or the beasties.

The beans and peas I planted around Memorial Day have sprouted nicely.  The purple hull peas are beginning to send out runners.  No sign, yet, of the gourds or cucumbers. 

Gloom, Despair, and Agony on me....

The dreaded leaf spot has found the tomato plants.

Having fought (and lost) the battle with that stuff last year, I know that it is imperative to jump right on the problem.  Yesterday morning after breakfast, I "suited up" for this year's first skirmish.

While I was gathering up my supplies and grousing to The Husband about how much I hate to spray fungicides on our food, he grabbed the laptop, did an internet search, and discovered a baking soda remedy for blight and leaf spot.  I did not think twice about trying it, figuring that it can fail to work just as well as the official store-bought garden chemicals failed to work last year, and without making me feel like I've poisoned the world. 

I grabbed the ancient box of baking soda from the depths of the refrigerator and went to work, spraying the plants in both gardens.  While doing so, I could not shake the feeling that I was spreading the fungus from the few infected plants to the rest of the plants.  But what's a person to do?

I was not very careful about the soda-to-water ratio recommended by the article.  The Husband and I converted the metric measurements and concluded, correctly or incorrectly, that the ratio was about 1/3 cup of baking soda to about 3-1/2 gallons of water.  My mixture was probably a bit stronger.  When I finished spraying, I came in and did my own internet search for ""leaf spot" and "baking soda,"" and found that some people mix the soda with milk (and a tad of oil) instead of water, and that the mixture ought to be sprayed roughly once a week throughout the season. 

On a happier note, we harvested our first yellow squash yesterday.  About half of the broccoli was also ready to cut.  I gave one head away, blanched and froze the rest.  I pinched the basil back, and washed, chopped, and froze the leaves in a Ziploc bag.  It was kind of nice that the house smelled like basil for a couple of hours afterward.

Oh, and I planted corn (two rows) Friday afternoon.  The ground in the early garden was damp, but not nearly as wet as I had expected - didn't lose my shoes to the mud even once. 

Bon appetit, crows.

Fit for Gardening

The other day, as I was coming up Nanny's driveway, red-faced and sweaty, and plumb near worn out from a hard-won wrestling match with the big red tiller, I met Gus, my brother-in-law, hoofing it down Nanny's driveway, full speed ahead.  "S'up, Gus?" I called as we got within earshot of one another.  "Where's the fire?"

"Aw, I'm just walking for exercise," he said, "since I didn't have time to go to the gym this evening."

"Well, carry on," I told him, rolling past him.

I saw him again last night on Nanny's back porch.  "You know, Gus, I need to apologize to you," I told him.

"What for?"

"Well, the other night, when you were out walking because you didn't have time to go to the gym, I should have offered you a turn behind the big red tiller any time you want it."

"Aw, now -  "

"Yep.  You could be doing cardio and strength training, for free, right here on the hill, instead of driving all the way to the gym and paying your hard-earned money for exercise.  It was just plain rude and thoughtless of me not to offer."

"Hey, I appreciate that," he said with spurious sincerity.  "Mighty nice of you.  I'll sure keep it in mind."

Heh...I expect it'll be a cold day, somewhere, before I catch him behind the tiller.

* * * *

I bought corn seeds this week, thinking I'd plant it in the empty rows in the early garden.  The package says it matures in 75 days.  There should be plenty growing season left for it to make.  Nevertheless, I'm not very confident that we'll actually eat any corn from these seeds. 

First, I've never grown corn,  except for that time, a couple of years ago, when I planted some old popcorn seeds that Pop-Pop had found in his cabinet.  I planted it on the back side of the garden, where there's more shade, because that's where I had an empty spot.  The corn came up, but it looked sickly.  It made skinny ears.  The raccoons promptly pushed over the stalks and ate the corn right off the cobs.  One couldn't really call that a successful crop.

Secondly, it will be a miracle if I get to it before the varmints (including the afore-mentioned raccoons) do.  Uncle B, across the road, grows corn every year.  He said that he's planted his corn three times, already - once because the crows pulled it up to get at the seed, and once because the rabbits ate it to the ground.  He's got a scarecrow; I think he uses the same one every year, so the crows may feel friendly toward it by now.  I could probably help him come up with a new one to deal with the crows, but, aside from staking out a double of Dobermans between the rows, I have no clue how to keep out the rabbits and 'coons.

Nanny said she saw a rabbit that she'd bet was "two foot tall, not counting his ears," sitting up on his haunches behind Pop-Pop's truck.  She said she ran in the house to look for the shotgun, but couldn't find it.  It's probably just as well; the blast would probably have knocked her out of her tiny little shoes, and it wouldn't have been so great for Pop-Pop's tail lights, either.  I hope the rabbit stays at her house, and doesn't venture up the driveway as far as the early garden.

Anyway, I haven't planted the corn, yet.  On the way home from the garden center, I picked up my grandson and brought him home with me.  When I asked him if he wanted to go to the garden, he jumped at the chance.  We walked across the road, but as we neared the gate, he said, "Grandmama, it's hot."  And it was.  I asked, "Do you want to go back to the house?"  "Um-hmmm!" he said, and did an immediate about-face.  We spent the rest of the day inside, where it was cool.  I was intending to plant the corn yesterday, but the bottom fell out of the sky on the way home from work.  The ground is too wet to dig, but my empty rows have just been tilled, and the dirt is loose enough for me to simply poke the seeds into the mud.  If you don't hear from me in a day or two, I'll be marred up in the early garden, so please call a tractor to come pull me out!  ;)

Butterbeans and Gourds

Yesterday in the big garden, I planted butterbeans and re-planted the skips in the okra row.  I also planted some dinosaur gourds along the fence near the early garden.  We still have a couple of empty rows in each garden.  Somewhere around here is a pack of butternut squash seeds that I could plant, but I can't decide where to put them, or whether I want to deal with the inevitable late-season rush of pumpkin bugs. 

Over the weekend, I noticed blight-like symptoms on two of the tomato plants in the big garden.  Logic tells me that I ought to go ahead and spray all of the tomato plants with fungicide, but, geez, I hate spraying that stuff on our food. 

None of the nine tomato plants in the early garden show signs of fungus (yet).  All of these plants received the "Miss Evelyn" treatment of (1) lime worked into the soil and (2) newspaper on the ground around the plants, pinned in place with wire tomato cages.  The recently-planted tomatoes in the big garden got the same treatment, but they were planted only a week ago, so it's too early to tell how they'll fare. 

Crowder Peas

Just logging for the record that we planted black crowder peas and purple crowder peas today.  Also fertilized the tomatoes and squash.

The Husband got the tire back onto the tiller and put some fix-a-flat in it.  Maybe that'll hold it for a while.

The Grandson picked several green tomatoes when we weren't looking.  What the heck, we fried 'em up and munched on them while the burgers and hot dogs were on the grill.  But I did have a serious discussion with Mr. Three-Year-Old about not picking the tomatoes until they're big and red.

Memorial Day Weekend

It's been a busy weekend around here, both in and out of the garden.  My son and his family, who have been living over an hour away from here, moved back home this weekend.  While we were not to be directly involved with the move, we had committed ourselves to some babysitting, and so Saturday morning, we got busy with our errands before the young'uns arrived.  The first thing we had to do was retrieve the big red tiller and the push mower from the repair shop.  The minute we unloaded it, I gave the cord a yank, and it fired right off.  YES! 

Later in the afternoon, I took a grandson across the road to visit Nanny and Pop-Pop.  We found Pop-Pop on the tractor, disking the back section of the big garden, where the rain and the trenching and the grass had impeded our bean planting.  Seeing that he had the disk hooked up to the tractor, I asked The Husband if he would please run the disk across the un-planted, un-tilled area of the early garden so that I could plant some cucumbers.  He said he would, and this morning, after the grandsons went home, he kept his word.  While he did the disking, I picked the rest of the sweet peas and pulled up their support stakes, intending to till the vines into the soil and plant something else in their place. 

When the disking was finished, The Husband brought the big red tiller up to the early garden.  As it was high noon by this time, I suggested we wait until later in the day to to the tilling.  The Husband readily agreed.  Then, about 4 p.m., he vacated the premises, entirely, to go to a skeet shoot (the nerve of him, eh?).  I decided that I would surprise him by going ahead and tilling the early garden before he came home.

The tiller cranked up easily, but it kept quitting.  Remembering from last year that the tiller appreciated a full tank of gas, I hoofed it back to my house to get the gas can.  Naturally, the gas can was empty.  I tossed it in my Jeep and went to the store to fill it.  Topping off the gas made the tiller run without quitting, and I made pretty quick work of tilling the area that The Husband had disked.  I then steered the tiller over to the sweet pea rows.  I hadn't gone 10 feet before the left tire came off the rim. 

I pushed the tiller back to Pop-Pop's house.  With the tire half off the rim, the tiller kept wanting to go left when I wanted to go straight.  I probably ruined the tire trying to wrestle the tiller down the long driveway to the workshop.

I am so tired of ragged-assed, second-hand, piece-of-sh*t garden equipment that has to be worked on TWICE before any job is completed.

At least the cucumbers got planted.  Tomorrow, we plant green beans and black crowder peas, if we can get the tire back on the rim.

Pea Pickin'

I told you I was going to have sweet peas this year.  Feast your eyes on my first little harvest. 
They'll need picking again in a few days, and then they will probably have "done their do," as my mother says.

It'll be interesting to see how many shelled peas I get.  ;)

Nanny and I planted 18 more tomatoes today, replacing most of the ones that drowned in the rain a few weeks ago.  We have tennis-ball sized tomatoes on a few of the older vines, a couple of which are beginning to ripen.

The broccoli and cabbage are making heads.  I expect to harvest broccoli in a week.

Well, I tried....

True to yesterday's resolution (about tending the garden), as soon as breakfast was done, The Husband and I got busy trying to crank the big red tiller.  We huffed it full of starter fluid until the can was empty, and it would fire off, time after time, but would not continue to run once it had burned up the starter fluid.  When we ran out of starter fluid, we used gas, instead; same deal.  We finally gave up and pushed it down Pop-Pop's l-o-n-g driveway, thinking he might have some ideas.  He didn't.

Standing in his workshop, I looked around at the various lawnmowers, tillers, and weedeaters that he'd taken apart, and thought to myself, He'll never get all this stuff fixed.  I talked The Husband into going back to our house for the truck, and, using Pop-Pop's hydraulic lifting thing (a come-along?), we loaded the big tiller and our push mower (which Pop-Pop has been tinkering on for two weeks) into the truck and hauled them to a repair shop. 

While waiting for the truck, I noticed the four unfinished cabinets that I'd bought last year and stored in Pop-Pop's shed until I could get time to paint them.  They've been sitting there, collecting dust and spare parts, taking up precious floor space in the shed.  When we came back from the repair shop, we loaded the cabinets into the truck and brought them to our patio.  "What are you going to do if it rains?" The Husband asked me.  I looked at him as if he'd lost his mind.  The sun was shining, the sky was blue.  "It's not going to rain!" I told him. 

We finished up a little yardwork - some weed-eating and sawing off some low tree limbs - and started to work on the cabinets.  Before I'd finished sanding the first one, it rained.  We grabbed the cabinets and rushed into the kitchen with them.  By the time we'd gotten them all indoors, the rain stopped.  We hauled them back out again, finished the sanding, and slapped two coats of paint on them.  Two down, two to go.  I have some plywood to use for the tops.  It'll need to be cut to size, but Pop-Pop has a saw for that.   Tomorrow, we'll go to the home repair store, buy some tile to lay atop the plywood, and (hopefully) find a book or internet instructions on how to lay tile.

Mid-Season Resolution

I feel so bad. 

Last night, Nanny popped in for a minute, and in the course of the conversation, she mentioned that she had tilled the big garden, the terribly grassy one, the one that had been too wet to till only two days ago. 

I feel bad, because Nanny has no business running the tiller.  She's a little Smurf of a woman (except that she's not blue).  She had major surgery this time last year.  She does not need to be dragged and shaken. 

So I'm going to have to do a better job at tending the garden, to beat her to the tiller. 

While I was out and about yesterday, I picked up 18 more tomato plants for the big garden.  Today, I need to find some green bean seeds so that we can re-plant, as our first planting was under-water too long and did not come up.  Also, there are black crowder pea seeds coming; we'll need to fix rows for those, as soon as Pop-Pop gets through with his earthwork.  We still haven't planted any butterbeans.  And I have a package of "dinosaur gourd" seeds to plant.

I'd best get busy.

Mid-May Maintenance

We've been away on a trip for a few days, and the first thing I did yesterday afternoon when we got home was to walk across the road and check on the early garden.  During the few days that I was gone, everything grew like crazy, including the grass in the middles.  Some of the tomatoes plants have small green tomatoes on them.  AND - [sound the fanfare] - the sweet peas that were blooming when I left now have fat pods on them.  Wahoooooo!  Sweet peas!  But the worms are after my cabbages, broccoli, and brussels sprouts. 

I decided that I'd better drag out the little black plow and do some weeding today.  Thinking that I ought to assess both gardens to see how much work was in store, I went down to Nanny's to check out the big garden before I left for work.

The squash is doing fine, and the flowers we planted in the front row are growing nicely.  But we've lost all but about a dozen of the tomato plants to the rain, and the purple hull peas are thinking they've had about all the water they want for a while.  The grass is loving it, though; the middles are solid green and desperately need weeding, but it's too wet to work the soil.  I'm not even going to show a picture of this garden until it looks a little better.

In my absence, Pop-Pop put a blade on the tractor and dug a ditch from the center of the big garden to the edge of the woods to create a drain for the water.  (I bet Nanny about had a fit when he dug that trench across their back yard.)  He also pushed some dirt around from the high spots to the low ones.  Thank goodness we hadn't planted anything in that part of the garden, yet. 

After work today, I fired up the tiller and did the weeding, then I put cages around the 9 tomato plants in the early garden.  I smashed some worms on the cruciferous veggies, and planted a couple of hills of yellow squash and one hill of cantaloupes.  The squash and cantaloupe seeds I found are about 10 years old; let's see if a gardening miracle will happen.  If not, I'll be looking for fresh seeds in about a week.

As I was tilling, I noticed that one of the tines was not rotating.  I shut off the engine and tipped it over to un-wind the grass from around it, and discovered that the pin is missing from the tine.  I looked around for it, but didn't find it, so after I finished my gardening chores, I took the tiller to Pop-Pop.  He said that he has a pin, and will get around to fixing the tine in a day or two.  Maybe by then the big garden will be dry enough to work.

While I was shooting the bull with Pop-Pop, Nanny came out of the house and joined us in the shed.  She asked if there was any gas for the lawn-mower.  Pop-Pop said he was just about to fill the tank and start mowing. 

"Oh, not TODAY," she said.  "It'll be all grown up again by Saturday."

"What's Saturday?" he asked.

"Just Saturday," she said, meaning there was no special event, no reason why the yard needed to look particularly nice that day.  "But it'll be all grown up again by then."

"Well, if I wait until Saturday to mow, the grass will be knee deep."  He climbed onto the lawn-mower and reached down to crank it.  I decided it was time for me to make my exit.

"Don't you want to hang around for the rest of the argument?" Nanny asked me as I started toward the driveway.

"No, ma'am, I know how it'll end."

About that time, the lawn-mower engine fired up.  Just as I had expected.  ;)

My Garden Needs Waders

After supper last night, I rode my bike down to the garden to see how it was faring. 

Ugh.  It's not pretty.

Most of the tomatoes are yellow and limp, victims of the standing water in the garden.  I don't know whether I should yank them out and re-plant or wait to see what these will do when the ground dries.  One or two of the poor, sickly things even have small tomatoes on them.

The squash, okra, and purple-hull peas are up.  Two of the squash hills may need replanting.  It's odd to me that I planted all of the hills on the same day, with the same package of seeds, five seeds to a hill, and some of the hills have four to five plants in them, and some have none at all.  Maybe it's Mother Nature's way of telling me, "Dont plant everything at once, dingbat."  I had thought about transplanting from the crowded hills to the empty ones, but, on second thought, it might be interesting to plant new seeds and see whether they make a later crop or catch up with the old ones planted several weeks ago.

On the front row of the garden, we planted sunflowers (both giant and dwarf), zinnas, and marigolds.  Those seeds have sprouted well all the way down the row and should be very pretty this summer, if we can keep the grass out.

In the early garden, some of the broad beans are acting weird (the leaves are turning a funny color, and the tops look withered); others are fine, so far.  The sweet peas are beginning to bloom. 

Oh, and I found some larkspur seedlings yesterday!  There might have been more had I not given up on them and trampled that row.

I finally got around to setting out the pale, leggy stevia plant that spent a week in my car then a week on my kitchen counter.  My sister thinks we should use it to invent a sugar-free margarita.  I think any idea with the word "margarita" in it is worthy of investigation.  ;)

Rain and more rain

Boy, howdy, has it ever rained!

The rain started some time after I went to bed last night.  When I looked out of my kitchen window this morning, water was streaming across my patio.  A little while later, my brother-in-law stopped by and reported that the creek between our two houses was out of its banks and had swept away things in his yard, including a 4-wheeler.  (As I am uphill of the creek and had not been outside, I had not seen the flood.)  Before long, other family members were calling to warn us about flooded roads, and friends were sending pictures of flooded neighborhoods.  Tonight, the local news reported that we'd received about 10" of rain since yesterday, and that many homes in the area had been evacuated because of flooding.  There have been several flood-related deaths across the state.  More rain is predicted for tomorrow.  My heart goes out to those families who are grieving and displaced.  I pray that no more damage occurs.

About 5 p.m., during a break in the rain, I went to the early garden to pull up a few green onions and some parsley for a salad.  Since the early garden is on a hill, it was not terribly muddy, and nothing looked drowned.  I managed to get to the onions and parsley without losing my shoes in the mud.  The big garden, however, is on a flat spot, and I am worried that it is standing in water.  When I checked it a couple of days ago, the squash seeds were beginning to sprout.  I am keeping my fingers crossed that we will not lose them to the rain, as we did last year.

Weeding & Feeding

I'd planned on rest and relax on Sunday. 

But Sunday morning was gloriously beautiful, and when I stepped outside with my coffee, my thought was that I ought to plant the tomatoes I'd bought on Friday before I started relaxing.  I came inside to put on my shoes, collect my gardening gear, and mix up some fertilizer.  While doing this, I remembered other little jobs that needed doing, and so instead of walking across the road with a trowel and a pack of tomatoes as I'd envisioned over the coffee, I drove across the road on the lawnmower, pulling a wagon-load of tools and supplies. 

I planted the tomatoes, ran the tiller, fertilized, staked the sweet peas, mowed the grass around the garden.  As I was doing this, Nephew Bradley - the same Nephew Bradley who had enjoyed planting tomatoes two days ago - showed up on his bicycle.  He stopped at the fence.  "S'up, Bradley?" I asked him. 

He shrugged. 

"Sunday afternoon?"

"Yeah," he said.  He lingered on his bike, toeing the gravel with his shoe.  I just knew he was going to ask if I needed help, and I was already making a mental list of things for him to do.  "Well, I'll see you later," he said abruptly, and rode on down the driveway to Nanny's house.  Phooey. I kept working, thinking there was a chance I'd snag him on his way back.

A few minutes later, he rode past me again.  "Bye!" he called, without even stopping.

A little while later he was back at the fence, straddling his bike.  "I'm bored," he said when I looked up.

Hah!  I had him!  I stood up, shaded my eyes with my hand, and gave him a thoughtful look, as if I was trying to come up with a good idea for him.  "Well, do you want some work?" I asked, expecting him to jump at the chance.

"NO!" he said without hesitation. 

I laughed, thinking he was just teasing.  I looked down to adjust the velcro straps on my gardening gloves, planning to offer to "let" him run the tiller, but when I looked up again, he was GONE.  I looked down the road and saw him sailing down the hill on his bike, standing on the pedals as if he'd been pumping hell for leather to get away.  Hmph.  I went back to work. 

Nearly five hours later, I gave out, without even having finished everything I wanted to do. 

Squash and Peppers

I made a run to the greenhouse today for squash seeds.  I ended up buying all sorts of seeds - greens for this fall, giant pumpkins, and such - some of which may never get planted.  Pepper plants, a few herbs, and another pack of tomatoes - "Super Fantastic," or so they say - hitched a ride home with me.  I wanted to buy tomato cages, but the good ones were nearly $10 apiece, and I need about 50.  Do the math.  I could hire somebody to stand out there and hold them up for that.

The early garden needs plowing/weeding.  If I can get the little black tiller cranked, we may have a go at it this afternoon.   

First Tomato Planting

Nanny bought tomato plants yesterday, and per the almanac's recommendation, we set them - about 40 plants - in the ground today.  Nephew Bradley had the bad fortune of showing up just as we were preparing to dig the holes, and we drafted him on sight.  It turned out that, once we got the holes dug and starting the planting phase, Bradley liked the work. We may make a gardener of him, yet.

I prepared hills for squash, but when we dug through the seed supply, we couldn't find any yellow squash seeds, so I'll have to make a run to the seed store tomorrow. 

We sowed the first row of the garden in flower seeds - sunflowers (big and dwarf), zinnias, and marigolds. 

Nanny got out Pop-Pop's "bicycle-on-a-stick" planter and put down two rows of green pole beans.  Tomorrow, we're planting peas and okra.

I'm stiff as a poker, already.

Gardening for Real

I've already had a few turns around the garden this year, but the season officially opened today, for today I broke out the red straw gardening hat. 

The cabbages, broccoli, and brussels sprouts that I planted last month have just been sitting there, doing nothing.  I've been intending to fertilize them for days, but never had my supplies and tools handy.  Today, when I got home from work, I rode my bike to Pop-Pop's, both to air up the bike tires and to look in the shed for the fertilizer.  Going down the driveway, I noticed freshly-tilled soil in the big garden; Mr. Charles had been there today with his tractor, and it's ready for planting.  "Looks like I need to buy some tomatoes tomorrow," I said to Pop-Pop as I rode up to the shed, where he was working on a lawnmower. 

Nanny was there, too, handing him some tools.  "The almanac says to plant above-ground crops on - shoot, what day was that?"  She grabbed the almanac and handed it to me.  I didn't have my glasses and couldn't see the tiny print without laying the book on the floor and standing on a chair to read it.  Pop-Pop handed me his glasses, but they made me dizzy.  Nanny handed me hers; they worked fairly well when I held the book 3 inches from my nose.  "It says the 15th through the 17th," I told them.  "I'll get the plants and some seeds tomorrow, and we'll poke them in the ground the day after."

I aired up the bike tires, found the fertilizer, and pedaled back up the driveway to my house to find a bucket and some water.  I mixed up the fertilizer in the bucket and hauled it to the garden.  The ground around the plants was pretty hard, so I came back to the house for a hoe, my gloves, and my hat.  Now, it's gardening time. 

Peas Are Up

The sugar snap peas and the broad beans I planted a couple of weeks ago are up.  It's about danged time - seems like I planted them ages ago.  We went out of town from the 23rd to the 31st, and the first thing I did when we got home was run to the early garden to see what had happened while I was gone.  Thankfully, the cabbage, onions, broccoli and brussels sprouts were still standing (no rabbits, yet - knock on wood), but only 2 of the bean seeds had sprouted, and none of the peas.  I was beginning to worry.  It looks like only  half of the broad beans are up.  Tonight's rain may encourage the stragglers.

The radishes are coming along, and I thinned them a little more today.  The lettuce is showing itself, but isn't nearly big enough to eat.  There's no sign of the larkspur, evil stuff.

I was pleased to find that the rosemary has over-wintered.  I intentionally left last year's fall leaves and dried weed stems around it, hoping they'd protect it.  Before we left on our trip, I pulled back the weeds and leaves and found dry rosemary stems, but no sign of life.  Today, it has new green needles.  I was also pleasantly surprised to find a very nice clump of green parsley among the dead weeds.  I should've picked some to use for supper.  Just now, as I have the thought to go back for some, the rain begins.

High-Tech Gardening

Pop-Pop bought himself a trail camera - you know, one of those motion-detecting things that hunters use to spy on their hunting spots when they're not around. He had my brother-in-law strap it to a tree near the south end of the big garden. He said he's going to use it to find out what all is eating our garden, once we have stuff in it to eat. He said the flash might even run off some animals before they make it to the garden. It's been out there for two or three days, already.

Yesterday, while we were at his house, he said he was having trouble viewing the pictures. The camera doesn't have a viewing screen. It stores the pictures on an SD card, but neither his computer nor his printer has an SD card slot. My husband came home and got our laptop, which does have an SD card slot, and took it back to Pop-Pop's so we could view the pictures.

The camera had taken pictures of my brother-in-law as he was affixing it to the tree. It had taken pictures of a cat, one rabbit, then three rabbits, and a whole bunch of distant, unidentifiable glow-in-the-dark eyes. It had taken pictures of me and Nanny as we were raking up the last of the debris from last year's garden.

Nanny and I have made mental notes not to point our rear ends to the south as we're bending over in the garden this year.

Possums

I haven’t seen “Sam,” our resident opossum, for a few weeks, and am beginning to worry about him. It’s fun to watch him nose around the patio on his nocturnal cat-food raids. And, of course, I never see Sam without thinking about Great Uncle Albert and his ‘possum breeding tale.

One Sunday, when we’d all retired to the living room after a big family dinner at Mama Jewell’s, somebody said something about an opossum, and that was all it took.

Uncle Albert elbowed me and asked, “You know how ‘possums breed, don’t you?”

I figured it was a trick question. (With Uncle Albert, it almost always was.) “Well, I’ve never actually seen one in action, but my guess is that - “

”They do it in the nose,” Uncle Albert said, impatient to get on with the story.

“NNNuh-uhhhhh,” I replied.

“Yeah, they do,” he insisted, “don’t they, Jerry?” He looked to my father-in-law to back him up.

Pop-Pop gave an emphatic l nod. “Yep. Shore do.”

“No way,” I said.

“It’s the truth.” He raised his voice a notch. “Ain’t it, Liz?”

Aunt Liz, his sister-in-law, was sitting beside me on the sofa. Aunt Liz was half deaf and couldn’t hear thunder, and she’d missed the whole ‘possum discussion to that point. “What?” she asked, cupping one ear with her hand.

“Do you know how ‘possums breed?” Uncle Albert asked her.

“Why, through their noses, I reckon,” she said. Uncle Albert was about to fall back in his chair in victory until she added, “...like everything else does. Everything breathes through its nose, doesn’t it?”

Uncle Albert leaned forward again and shouted, “No, no, Liz...not breathe: BREED!”

Aunt Liz looked shocked. “BREED? Well, I wouldn’t know anything about that!”

“Well, that’s how they do it, for sure” Uncle Albert said to me. “Looky here,” he said, "a ‘possum’s thang is forked....” He held up two fingers, like a “Peace” sign, and waggled them a couple of times.

“NNuh-uhhhhh!”

I looked at Pop-Pop. He was nodding.

“It is!” Uncle Albert said. “And when he gets ready to breed, he bends his head down between his legs, and puts one fork in each nostril...”

“No way... stop it,” waving him off.

“Yeah, he does,” Uncle Albert continued. “And he snuffs it up in his nose.”

“He shore does,” Pop-Pop said.

"So how does that get the girl ‘possum pregnant?” I demanded.

“Well, listen, and I’ll tell you,” Uncle Albert said. He was fully committed to this now, his eyes twinkling with excitement. “After he snuffs it up his nose, he walks up behind the female and sneezes it into her.”

My mouth dropped open.  I looked at Pop-Pop again. He, too, was holding up two fingers, and when I caught his eye, he turned his hand, palm toward his face, and aimed his fingertips toward his own nostrils. This was more than I could stand. Amidst Pop-Pop’s and Uncle Albert’s assurances that I had been told the 100% God’s Honest Truth, I got up and left the room.

At Nanny’s & Pop-Pop’s house later that evening, I asked my husband, “Did you hear that mess Uncle Albert told me about ‘possums?”

Pop-Pop piped up to swear it was not "mess" but was, in fact, the God's honest truth.

I still wasn’t buying it.

My husband was sitting next to Nanny’s bookcase where a set of out-dated encyclopedias was shelved. Seeing them gave me an idea. “Anything that unique ought to be on the books!” I said.  I asked The Husband to hand me the 'P' volume.

“Don’t you mean the ‘O’?”

“Smart*ss. Hand it here.”

I looked up “Opossum” in the encyclopedia. It said not one word about snuffing or sneezing or forked thangs.

The next day I told a co-worker the story that Uncle Albert had told me. She had a brilliant suggestion to put the matter to rest, once and for all: “Call the zoo.”

I called the zoo, and asked for the ‘possum expert. When he came to the phone, I said, “I have a question about ‘possum breeding habits. My uncle - ”

“Ma’am,” he said, interrupting me, “they don’t do it in the nose.”
“You’ve had this question before,” I observed.
“Yes, ma’am, at least once a day,” he said.
“Well, how DO they do it?”
“They mount, like other animals.”
“But my uncle said they have forked - um - units,” I said.
“That would be true.”
“Why is it forked?”
“Ma’am, you’ll have to ask God that question.”

I could sense he was a bit bored, so I let him off the hook, and I turned right around and dialed Uncle Albert’s number. Aunt Joy answered. I could hear a bunch of chattering in the background; all of her sisters had come for lunch.

“Aunt Joy, this is Susan. May I speak with Uncle Albert, please? I'm calling to straighten out this ‘possum mess, once and for all.”

Having heard the conversation the day before, she giggled at my mention of 'possum. “He’s not here right now, sweetie. Do you want me to tell him to call you when he gets back?”

“No, ma’am, just give him this message: tell him I called the zoo - “

Aunt Joy chuckled. “You called the zoo?”

“Yes, ma’am, and asked to speak to the ‘possum expert. He said. - “

”Possum expert!” She snickered.

“Yes, ma’am, and tell Uncle Albert that the zoo man said that possums DO NOT ‘DO IT’ WITH THEIR NOSES.”

Aunt Joy began to laugh so hard that when she tried to speak, it came out as a wheeze: “Child, he’s been spreading that malarky for years! I can't wait until he gets home!” She was still laughing when we hung up.

Some time later, when Uncle Albert was in the hospital in Intensive Care, I took Mama Jewell to the hospital to see him. As I passed by the hospital gift shop, what do I see in the window but a stuffed opossum, hanging from a limb by his curly tail. Nothing could have stopped me from buying that possum. I took him up to the ICU waiting room, and when the visiting time arrived and Aunt Joy and Mama Jewell stood up to go see him, I took the possum out of my purse and handed him to Aunt Joy. “Take this to Uncle Albert from me.”

“You take it to him,” she insisted. She told Mama Jewell she’d just have to wait her turn.

I followed Aunt Joy back to the ICU. She gently woke Uncle Albert. “Somebody’s here to see you,” she told him.

He opened his eyes.

“I brought you something,” I said, and, lifting the possum by its tail, I held it up high enough for Uncle Albert to see it. He gave me one of his crooked grins.

Some time later, Aunt Joy gave that possum back to me. I still find it around the house from time to time. And it still makes me smile every time I see it.

Journal: 1st Beans/Peas

I planted broad beans and snap peas today. I'd never even seen a "broad bean," much less eaten one, so I have no idea what I'm getting. But if the new beans turn out to be as big as the seeds, we'll only need two or three apiece to make dinner. ;)

The tweleve cruciferous plants have survived two nights without even a nibble from a rabbit (knock on wood). The onions - well, I guess I'll find where I put those when they come up.

Rumor has it that Mr. Charles may come with his tractor to break up the other garden today. I just called Nanny and told her not to let him in the little garden. Though she probably won't repeat this part of the conversation to him, I threatened him with bodily harm if he plows up my stuff. You are my witness.

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Cruciferosity

Sunday afternoon I spotted a few early garden plants outside a store, and I grabbed up 9-packs of broccoli, red cabbage, and brussels sprouts, and a small bag of onion sets. I really didn't want nine of everything, but it seems that's how they're being packaged these days. I brought them home and set them on the patio table, hoping to keep them alive until I could get them in the ground.

Yesterday on my way home from work, I briefly considered planting everything that afternoon. It was easy to talk myself out of the notion, especially when I remembered that rabbits ate last year's first planting of cabbage and broccoli. We put wire cages around the few plants that they missed, but I don't have 27 (9 x 3) cages. My sister suggested that I buy some garden nets to spread over the rows. Good idea!

Naturally, I forgot to shop for garden nets before I came home today - thought about it as I was about 10 miles out of town. And it's supposed to rain tomorrow, and again Saturday, dang-it.

I argued with myself all the way home about whether or not I should plant everything today. If I plant those things today, without covering them up, the rabbits will eat them - probably tonight. Well, maybe there aren't any rabbit dens close by the early garden. (Last year's plants were in the big garden, near the woods.) If I don't plant them today, it'll be too wet for several days. If I don't plant them SOON, they'll probably die in the packages....

So I compromised, and planted 4 of each plant, daring the bunnies.

And now that I've cleaned the mud off my shoes and out from under my fingernails, I've remembered that I didn't plant the onions. So back to the garden I go.

"Wish in One Hand, S*it in the Other...."

This morning, when The Husband came looking for our ritual "leaving-for-work" kiss, he found me at my computer, staring longingly at a picture and product description of the Craftsman Rear Mount Tiller.

I heard him snicker. He's caught me staring at this same picture for about four years now. I glanced at him over my shoulder. "They're on sale!"

"Um-hmmmm," he said, bending down for the smooch.

"'No Payments, No Interest' for a year," I told him.

"Um-hmmmm," he said again as he turned to leave the room. He wasn't worried; he thinks I'm all talk and no action.

"You know, other women would be wishing for jewelry, or furs, or...."

"Yeah, yeah. 'Wish in one hand....'"

It drives me crazy when he says that thing to me, as the part that he left unsaid goes, "...and s*it in the other, and see which hand fills up faster."

Hmph.

"I'LL HAVE THE TRUCK FRIDAY," I called, reminding him that we are supposed to swap vehicles at the end of this week when I'm scheduled to pick up our grandson. (The car seat is strapped in the back seat of The Husband's truck, and it's easier to swap vehicles than to move the car seat.) "I could bring home a Craftsman Rear Mount Tiller in a truck!"

"Um-hmmmm," he said, closing the front door behind him.

Hmph.

I may just show him a thing or two, come Friday.

Sprouts!

The radishes are up.

At least, I think they're radishes.

You see, I did not mark the rows when I planted seeds two weeks ago, thinking that everything would pop right out of the ground before I forgot what I planted where. Right.

To be honest, I thought I planted larkspur where these seedlings are growing. It would have made sense to plant them there, along the edge of the garden, out of the way of the tiller when the time comes to plant summer vegetables, but, as you may have guessed, I do not always behave sensibly in the garden. I'll be able to tell what they are, for sure, when the next set of leaves emerges; if it's larkspur, the next set of leaves will be fern-y. For now, though, seeing that these babies have reddish stems, I'm betting they're radishes.

The sweet peas need to be planted. I'm torn between wading into the mud to punch them into the wet ground and waiting until it's dry enough to run the tiller down the rows one more time. The sensible thing would probably be to wait....


In my yard, the first wave of daffodil blooming is in progress. Most of what is blooming now are old varieties that I dug up from cow pastures where old houses used to sit. While the fancy, store-bought bulbs are only just thinking about blooming, the "old faithfuls" are already in full swing. The exception to the "store-bought" rule is my "mini-daffodils." These little guys are early bloomers, and are too cute for words. They're not much taller than crocus, but their visual impact is surprisingly big. They multiply well. They need dividing, but I'm always too busy with vegetables when the time comes.

First Planting of 2010

It was beautiful here today, and although I've heard rumors of more snow, I tore open some seed packets and scattered them on raked ground in the early garden. Two kinds of lettuce, some radishes, some onions, and some larkspur. I've never grown onions from seed and have no idea what to expect of them, but I suppose that the learning experience is half the fun of gardening.

It will be nice if these seeds actually produce edible vegetables (though I'll probably have to battle the animals for them), but if nothing else survives, I hope the larkspur does. I love larkspur. For many of my gardening friends, larkspur is nearly invasive, yet I can't get it to survive even one season in my yard. Once, I tried to start some inside, in windowsill greenhouses. I watered and pampered the seeds, but they never sprouted. After weeks of hopeful watching, I gave up and dumped the dirt into my compost heap. Several weeks later, after a cold snap, I found baby larkspur plants growing on the pile, but they did not survive transplanting. So I'm leaving this larkspur where it sprouts, if it sprouts, and I won't be one bit disappointed if it ends up taking over the whole pasture between here and the creek.

Not AGAIN!

Friends and relatives northeast of here who are still contending with Snowmageddon 2010 doubtlessly won't feel a grain of sympathy for me, but I am sick, sick, SICK of snow. This is our third snowfall in a month. Having just thawed out from last week's massive (for us) storm, we awoke this morning to another 3" of snow on the ground, with more to come. The worst part is that nobody told me this one was coming, so I could not even make the obligatory run to the grocery store for milk, bread, and junk food!

The weatherman may have predicted this, but I missed it. You see, The Grandson (age 2) was here for the whole weekend, which meant that the TV was tuned to NickJr for the duration of his visit. NickJr does not do weather forecasts. (One can, however, get tips on sensible winter attire from Moose A. Moose.)

The Grandson must be itching to get in the garden, himself. Yesterday, he discovered the several packs of vegetable seeds that I'd left laying on the kitchen table. I caught him happily stabbing the onion seed package with an ink pen. "What's that noise?" he said, picking up the seed package and shaking it, sowing onion seeds all over the table.

An Early Garden

On Friday of last week, I picked up four 40# bags of pelletized lime from the garden center and came home and spread them - three bags for the big garden behind Pop-Pop's house, and one bag for the little "early garden" (formerly known as "the tomato patch"). I hope I used enough, and not too much. Aside from the chart on the bag (which recommended anywhere from a little lime to a whole lot of lime, depending on the type of soil), my guide is Miss Evelyn, who says she limes her soil "real good." I'm not sure I limed my soil "real good," but I think I limed it at least tolerably well.

Of course, Miss Evelyn does this chore in the fall, and she immediately follows up with a "real good plowing." My liming has come a bit late, and the big garden plot is still far too wet to plow or till. I'm hoping that since the big garden is in a bit of a "bowl," the lime will stay where I put it until the ground is dry enough to work. But the little early garden is on a hillside, and I was afraid that if I did not till it immediately, the lime would end up in the creek at the bottom of the hill with the next rain. According to the weatherman, the rain was to happen the next day.

On Saturday morning, I uncovered the big red tiller. Miraculously, after several months of storage, it cranked. No, it didn't crank on the first pull. Or the second. Or the 54th. And it didn't crank without a good huff (or twelve) of starter fluid. But it cranked. And it ran for long enough for me to till the lime into the early garden.

As I was putting away the tiller, I spied my poor, neglected compost barrell sitting near the edge of the woods and decided to check if there was any compost in it. My sister gave me this composter several years ago. To date, I've had about a handful of compost from it. Admittedly, I haven't been very diligent about tumbling it, nor diligent about adding the proper ratio of green and brown material. But last year and the year before, I did stuff it with leaves, grass clippings, coffee grounds, vegetable peelings, and eggshells. And every time I'd add something to it, I'd give it a good whirl or two. By the end of last summer, the thing was so heavy I could barely tumble it. Today, when I removed the lid and peered down into the barrell, I saw rich, black compost, apparently several inches deep. Wooo-hoooo! I ran to find a container for it so that I could transfer it to the early garden.

When I'd set the barrell in place several years ago, I'd set it near a spot where I'd planted some English ivy. Approaching it is a little bit creepy (there are several mysterious burrows nearby).
I wanted to pull it away from the ivy so that I could see where I was stepping, but the ivy had tethered it firmly to the ground. I broke the vines away from the base, and dragged it into the yard.

It was when I tried to dump out the compost that I discovered the consequences of my negligence in tumbling the barrell. Instead of having loose, crumbly compost, I had a 6" thick compost patty, harder than concrete, and it would not come out of the barrell. I got a shovel, hacked the compost brick apart enough to get it out, and dumped the chunks onto a tarp. It seems that someone else has been feeding the composter, for when I crumbled the chunks, I found a crushed soda can, several bits of thick cellophane, and a pair of neon green 3-D sidewalk chalk eyeglasses. (I'd been wondering what happened to those glasses!)

As I was transferring the compost from the tarp to a plastic bin, the predicted rain began to fall. It was just as well, for after all the cranking, yanking, tilling, dragging, and hacking, I was out of energy. The Husband helped me heave the plastic bin onto the garden wagon. We covered it with the tarp, and left it where it was.


And here it is, Saturday morning again. I should be out there spreading that compost. But the ground is probably still very wet. And one more cup of coffee surely would hit the spot....