From the back porch - April 19, 2021

 

Now that we have the fence posts up, I'm thinking about what material we're going to use for the mesh for the climbing beans and the tomatoes.  Lots of options, and of course the sturdier and easier to use options don't come cheap.

I would really like enough cattle panels to do four 70-ft. rows.  They are sturdy and re-usable.  They are also fairly expensive - about $500 to do what I need.  Nix that one for now.  

We have some old hog wire - probably not enough to do four 70-ft. rows, but it might do the tomato rows.  It's rolled up and tossed onto a trailer that is probably infested with wasps and snakes.  Assuming I can get it out of the tangled heap of tomato cages and fence posts, I'll probably need a tetanus shot after I mess with it.  

After work today, I stopped by Home Depot to see what they had for the climbing beans.  I saw some 50-ft rolls of orange plastic mesh fencing, but couldn't tell how much they cost, and they only had two.  Not enough.

We could do a Florida weave for both the beans and the tomatoes.  I've done it with tomatoes.  Hint: use something that doesn't stretch or your weave will sag.  Ask me how I know this.  But I'm not wild about the Florida weave idea for the climbing beans.  

I just did some web surfing to see what I could find to use for the beans, and I settled on some green plastic fencing from Walmart.  $50+ bucks for enough to do two rows.  It doesn't look all that sturdy, but it is taller than it needs to be, so we might be able to fold the excess down for a little extra support.  

We plan on raising all of this fencing about 18" or so from the ground - enough to get a hoe between the ground and the bottom of the fence so that we can chop out the weeds.

I'm anxious to do more planting, but the cold snap we're having will probably delay the seeds from sprouting, so we might as well work on our fencing, eh?

Kudos to The Husband - April 18, 2021

 

The Four Granddaughters came to visit today.  After they left, I said to The Husband, "I'm going down to the garden to water the stuff we planted yesterday."  He said he'd go, too.

We mixed up five gallons of Miracle-Gro water in the big yard wagon and hauled it down the rows, dipping it out with plastic cups, pouring it directly onto the ground around the plants.  When we finished that, we stood at the end of the garden and discussed support systems for the beans and tomatoes.

We have a collection of metal fence posts and some old, rusted hog wire.  Getting those fence posts in and out of the ground is a pain.  The post driver must weigh 30 pounds and is a monster to use.  I can barely lift the thing high enough to slide it over a post and slam it down hard enough to drive the post in the ground.  Then, of course, come fall, they all have to be pulled up with a post puller, and that's not too easy, either.  (This is why I often resist growing climbing beans.)  

Standing there, The Husband wondered if we could drive the metal fence posts into the ground with the bucket on the tractor.  

Such a thing would never, ever have crossed my mind.  

I said, "Well, get the tractor, and let's try one."

I got a fence post, and he got the tractor and drove it down to the far end of the garden.  I held the post, and he lowered the back side of the bucket onto it, and drove that sucker right into the ground with the greatest of ease.  My jaw dropped over how easy it was.

We still had plenty of daylight and time to work, so we decided to keep going.  I was going to tote the fence posts to the garden, two at a time, but The Husband had a better idea.  He drove the tractor to where the fence posts were stored, and we loaded them all into the bucket at once.  

We had to do the job backwards, since he couldn't drive forward once we'd set a post in front of the tractor.  Backing the tractor down the rows was a little tricky, but he managed not to smash any of the plants.

We now have the posts up for all four rows that will need fencing.  In less than an hour.  Without throwing out our backs.  Winner!

So far, I am extremely pleased with how the gardening is going.  We have nice rows.  The tractor tires have packed the ground between the rows so hard that the middles might not be so soft and muddy.  Dare I hope that the hard packing will suppress weeds and grass?  

Tomatoes, Peppers, and Purple-Hull Peas - April 17, 2021

 

Not too long after this morning's post, The Husband came out to the porch and said he was about ready to go to Uncle Jack's and pick up the hiller.  The timing was perfect for us to pick up our grocery order after loading the hiller, and then we went out and found some landscape fabric.

While we were loading the hiller, I told Uncle Jack that the PTO tiller had not tilled as deeply as I wanted, and he told me that we needed to lower the front end of the tiller.  So when we got home, we adjusted the angle of the tiller and ran it over the garden a few more times.  Then we hooked up the hiller and made some rows.  That thing did a great job making rows.

We then planted 39 tomato plants, nine pepper plants of various types, and three rows of purple hull peas.  We covered the tomato rows with landscape fabric, and then I went down the rows, cutting Xs, making planting holes, and dropping a little Epsom salt into them.  The Husband came behind me, planting the plants.  Then we mulched the shit out of the rows with the pine needles I'd collected.

Thirty-nine tomato plants may be a few more than I intended.  A dozen of them were store-bought plants, much bigger (and of a different type) than the ones I sprouted.  The other 27 plants were the ones I grew from seeds.  They have been living on my front porch, which gets bright afternoon sun, for two weeks.  Some of them are a bit puny, so we may not end up with 39 tomatoes, after all.

We forgot to water-in all that stuff, but I'll do that tomorrow, assuming I'm not too "stove up" to get out of bed.

I planted zucchini, squash, and dill in the seed trays that had held the tomatoes.  Most of the time, I plant those kinds of seeds directly in the ground, but whatever - maybe they'll come up and live.  If they don't, I have more seeds.

The butterbean seeds should be here in a couple of days.  

From the back porch - April 17, 2021

 

Today is, hopefully, the Big Day, when the garden will be readied to plant.  We need to run the tiller over it again, and then we're going to Uncle Jack's to borrow his hiller (or maybe it's called a "hipper"), which is a contraption that piles the dirt into raised rows.  If it works well, we will probably buy our own hiller for next year, though it seems a bit wasteful to spend $500 on a thing you use one day a year to pile dirt into rows when you could do it with a hoe if you had the time and the energy.

It's 7 a.m., already, and The Husband is still in bed, and I'm anxious to get the show on the road.  We REALLY need to run the tiller over the garden again to make it go deeper before we start with the hiller/hipper, for I worry that there's currently not enough loose dirt to make good rows.  I tried to talk The Husband into cranking up the tractor yesterday after work, but he just gave me The (You've-Lost-Your-Mind) Look and made us a margarita, instead.  After about 30 minutes, I was okay with not running the tiller, but now the tilling still has to be done before we can do the hipping.  It will be another hour before The Husband gets up, and another hour after that before he drinks his coffee and wakes up enough to contemplate getting dressed.  But I guess Nanny might shoot us in the driveway if we were to go down there now and crank up the tractor at this time of day.

But I am ready.  Yesterday afternoon I dragged the big yard wagon from our back yard to the garden to have it handy when it's time to mulch the tomatoes we'll plant once we have proper rows.  I won't have the mulch from the band fund-raiser until next week (assuming the mulch truck doesn't wreck again), but I have a buttload of pine needles that I gathered up a month or more ago and I can at least get started once the tomatoes are in the ground.  I really would like to put down some landscape fabric under the pine needles.  Yesterday I stopped at the dollar store up the road to buy some, but they were sold out.  Sometime today, I'll have to go on a landscape-fabric-hunting mission.  

On my way down Nanny's driveway yesterday, I spied another pile of pine needles that she'd raked up, and I stopped and put them in the wagon.  Nanny saw/heard me as I passed by her living room window, and she came out on the porch and yelled, "Are you going to spread pine needles?"  I thought this was a silly question, considering that she knew nothing had been planted in the garden yet.  I stopped, and looked over my shoulder, and said, "Eventually," which she probably thought was a totally bitch-y response, and I guess it was, but I'm blaming it on the steroids making me meaner than usual.  I shall have to be careful with my mouth today, because not only am I steroid mean, I have a headache from last night's margarita.

* * * * * * * * 

The next-door neighbor and I are worried about the baby owls in the tree behind our houses.  We're only seeing one baby in the nest.  We think we've been hearing the other baby squawking in the distance while the remaining owl sits in the nest squawking its head off.  I wonder what's going on.  Is the mama owl flight-training just one baby at a time?  Is the remaining owl too under-developed or weak to leave the nest?  Has the mama owl abandoned it?  These are questions that keep me up at night.

Since I had the camera out to take the owl's picture . . . . 

These narcissus don't usually bloom until Mother's Day.

Wonder what critter will eat the plums before they're ripe enough for me to eat them?

I dug these up out of the woods and call them "wild geraniums," though that may not be what they are.

Polonia blossom

 

When I left for work yesterday morning, I expected to have a very long workday.  And this was a problem, because before I found out that it would be a long day, I had booked myself for a couple of afternoon and evening things to do.

Granddaughter #1 is in her high school band, and they had been selling mulch (I know, crazy thing for a band to sell) for a fund-raiser.  I'd put in an order for 5 bags.  The mulch was supposed to arrive some time between 9 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. and had to be picked up by 6 p.m.  Also at 6 p.m., Granddaughter #2 had a softball game.  I figured I would not even be finished at work by 6 p.m., so I asked The Husband to pick up the mulch, which meant that he would have to leave work early to beat the deadline.  I'd probably have to skip the ballgame.

I picked up The Boss at 8:15 a.m. and we headed to another county to work.  We'd no sooner arrived than my Daughter-in-Law texted me that Granddaughter #3 was puking her guts out, and Granddaughter #4, who is only 3 months old, had a bad cough and she was taking them both to the doctor.  

As it turned out, the work-day was not nearly as long as we had expected, and we were able to leave a little after lunch.  When we got back to town an hour later, The Boss said I could go home if I wanted to, and I did want to, because I had other things I needed to do besides the mulch and the ballgame.  I texted The Husband and told him that I'd get the mulch, but I needed to clean out my car in order to make room for it.  

On a good day, my car is basically a rolling junk heap, full of stuff that I might need:  a kid car seat, folding chairs for ballgames, a couple of rolls of paper towels, hand sanitizer bottles, a can of Lysol spray, and bags of miscellaneous other things that I don't know what to do with.  Cleaning it out took a while.  My sister-in-law needed to borrow the kid car seat, so I took it to her house before heading out to get the mulch.

I'd been checking the band's web site to see if there was an update on the mulch arrival, but there wasn't any update, so I drove to the school.  There was no obvious mulch distribution point in sight.  There were groups of kids in the parking lot - xylophone players and drummers and flag girls - but they all looked stumped when I asked where to pick up the mulch.  I drove all the way around the school a couple of times, looking for a likely spot.  Finally, I found an adult working with one of the drum groups.  He, too, looked stumped for a moment, then he remembered that he'd heard a rumor that the mulch truck had been in a wreck, and the delivery was cancelled until next week.

It was 4:30 p.m. by this time.  Granddaughter #2 would need to be at the ball field in an hour.  With two sick babies, I figured the Daughter-in-Law would need some help, so I went to her house to check on the kids and see if I could help.  Granddaughters 3 and 4 had been diagnosed with a virus, but they seemed to be feeling fairly well by the time I arrived, and their mother was planning on taking them to the game.  I fed and entertained the baby while her mother ram-rodded Granddaughter #2 into getting her ball stuff together.  We made it to the ball park in time.

But everybody was hungry, including me.  I am taking steroids for a pinched nerve in my arm and have been ravenous for two days, and I did not want to sit through the ballgame un-fed, only to have to come home and cook afterward.  Solution:  phone in an order for pizza.

The Husband arrived at the ball field in time to pick up the pizza.  He came back with pizza and a sack of drinks.  We spread it out on the tailgate of his truck and fed us all right there at the ball field while we watched the game.

The paper towels and sanitizers I'd left in my car came in handy.

Tilling - April 14, 2021

 

I said to The Husband Monday night, "We really need to get the garden ready to plant this weekend."  He agreed, and said he would come home a little early Tuesday afternoon to get started.  By the time I got home, he was dressed for gardening and ready to get to work.

Although he had watched some instructional videos, we had not attempted to hook up the new pull-behind-the-tractor tiller.  I did not expect it to be that big of a deal.  I was wrong.  That's all I'm saying about that.  

As soon as we got there, Nanny came out to "help."  That's all I'm saying about that, too.  ;)

Eventually, The Husband said, "Call Matt."

Matt knows how to do everything, and he knows a lot about tractors and farm machinery (he's a farmer, himself.).  We needed both his muscle and his expertise.  I called him, but he didn't answer.  I figured he was on a tractor, tilling up his own garden.

Then, across the road, I heard Cousin Roger outside.  I knew he'd had a little bit of experience hitching things to tractors back in the day.  I made him come help us, and with his extra muscle we were able to get the tiller hitched to the tractor.

About that time, my phone rang.  Matt.  The Husband (whom Matt calls "Pa") told Matt he hoped we had the thing hitched up right.  Matt said he was in the vicinity - he'd been to get a load of rabbit poop from somebody - I'd had no clue there was that much rabbit poop in our vicinity - and he'd come take a look.  He helped us fine-tune the placement of the tiller in relation to the rear of the tractor, and hung around a while to watch as The Husband began the tilling process.  

I told Matt it sure is good to have a spare son.  ;)  

The Husband tilled the garden until dark.  It needs more tilling, but it rained today, so it'll be a few more days before we can tackle it again.  

I may plant these tomatoes and peppers in mud if the garden doesn't dry up by the end of the weekend.

My running butterbean seeds should be here by the weekend, but I'm not planting them until the soil is perfect.  

 

The Boss turned me loose from work a little early yesterday.  I was grateful, for I'd not slept well the night before and had a headache.  My plan was to come home, pop a couple of aspirin, and do something I rarely do - take a nap - until time to go to The Granddaughter's softball game.  

I'd no sooner stretched out on the couch than I heard a lawnmower approaching the back yard.  I got up and looked out the window.  Sure enough, it was Cousin Roger, come to borrow back the sandpaper he'd brought me last week to replace the sandpaper he'd borrowed over the prior weeks.  

He said, "I won't take the new ones I got you; I'll just use the old ones," which he'd returned along with the sander. 

When I found out that he was working on something for Nanny, I told him to just take some of the new ones.  

As we were talking, I showed him the birdhouse that The Husband had built over the weekend.  This was a cheap birdhouse to begin with - one that I bought at the dollar store for the grandchildren to paint.  It's been hanging out in the weather for several years.  At one point, we duct-taped the thing together and kept using it, but last summer the bottom fell off, and we just left it hanging.  I don't quite know what got into The Husband, but he decided to refurbish it.  He re-used the roof pieces and one side, and cut new pieces to replace the rotted wood.  He glued it together and left it to dry on the patio table.  As I was showing it to Cousin Roger, I took a notion to paint it.  It's peach and Caribbean blue.  (I intend to paint some flowers on it once it's dry.)

And there went my nap time.

At 5:30, it was time to leave for the ball field.  Lou-Lou (age 10) was scheduled to pitch for the first time EVER.  The coach put her on the mound in the second inning.  On the very first pitch, the batter connected with the ball and, partly due to the out-fielding, scored a home run.  She pitched the rest of the game, threw a few strikes, but also walked a good many (as did all the pitchers).  Bless her heart, she was so down on herself by the end of the game that she was physically sick to her stomach.  

I don't even know who won.

This morning, I loaded into my car an old pitch-back that we found in the shed; it probably belonged to Lou-Lou's father.  The net may be dry-rotted, but it might boost the kid's confidence to hurl a ball  right through the net.  ;)

* * * * * * * *

The coming weekend is my target date for planting the garden.  I am hoping we can finish preparing the soil this afternoon.  There's a small chance of rain today, and a bigger chance of rain tomorrow, but if we can get the ground tilled, maybe we can at least plant the tomatoes and peppers. 

I was not able to find any pole lima bean seeds locally, so I ordered some online.  I hope they come soon, for I am determined to get lima beans in in the ground earlier than I did last year.