May Update

Well, late as usual. At least the garden is roto-tilled as of a few weeks ago.

I have expanded the size of it a little bit. I added about 8 feet to the left side and a little over 2 feet to the other end.

Now I’m getting the fence back in place and will reinforce it with chicken wire. I am actually a little apprehensive to plant until I have the fence fixed. Although it’s almost done, I really need to start getting stuff into the ground. Time is fleeting as it always does. I should have the fence done today. It rained yesterday so it might be too wet to plant right now anyway but maybe not. We’ll see. Right now I’m still having my morning coffee.

The grass is already starting to come up. Funny how it was so patchy as a lawn but now that grass isn’t welcome, it wants to take over (and often succeeds). But definitely this season, mulch to the rescue! I have lots and lots of leaves I plan to shred with the lawn mower and cardboard to put under them between the rows, etc. Pizza boxes, etc. to the rescue!

I do have some things growing in the greenhouse, some not doing well, some doing just ok. Nothing doing really great. I guess I need to improve my greenhouse/seed starting skills. The tomato plants are looking healthy but are growing a bit slowly and are still only a few inches tall. The peppers are doing horribly and I might end up buying some, unfortunately.

The rabbits are having a blast frolicking in the yard – life is good for them – and a woodchuck (or more than “a”?) has been seen roaming around. Chipmunks too. Just a lovely frikkin wildlife refuge out there.

My step-sister who lives next door was telling me how she saw a rabbit and it looked so beautiful and healthy and I said ‘of course! I feed them well!”.

Speaking of wildlife, while I’ve been very careful, I still have had five ticks on me in the past several weeks…three embedded and I know one of those was a deer tick. the other two I’m not sure of but they were larger than the first. I asked my doctor for a Lyme test. For some reason they are reluctant to test until/unless you’re experiencing symptoms. Seems to me it isn’t good to wait that long. Anyway, I looked up the symptoms and I have most of them most of the time anyway, plus I just started a new medicine that can cause some of the same symptoms. So I figure better safe than sorry. Haven’t gotten the results yet.

We’ve had some scallions for our salads, and a few meals of asparagus so far. Yum. The garlic is growing but I’m not sure it’s growing as strongly as it should be. I just weeded it yesterday so maybe that will help.

I just harvested a bunch of Rhubarb so I can make my annual batch(es) of strawberry rhubarb jam. I might make plain strawberry jam this year too….hmm what about plain rhubarb jam? I will have to buy the strawberries though. The strawberry bed needs an overhaul!

We got two more rain barrels. I need to link one to the original one and put one in out front for my mother’s flower garden and watering the hanging plants. So…I have to clean and repair the associated gutter for that. On my long list.

We also got a pre-made compost bin that is set up closer to the house so “we” are not so reluctant to walk all the way out to the big one. The big one will still be used for the majority of stuff, especially bulky stuff. The small one has a bag of leaves next to it, to add to it once in awhile.

Well, I think that’s it for this update. I plan to post much more often than in the past, hopefully once, maybe even twice, a week. Wish me luck. haha.

Happy Gardening!