Happy Birthday #1 Son!

Word of the Day

Smuffy - Used to describe weather that is foggy, cloudy, smoggy, and other forms all combined yet with no precipitation despite the fact that it looks like it will rain at any moment. Often this weather form makes it hard to breath.

Annual Woodtick Count - 3


I spent the morning spading the kennel garden. Normally, I don't even attempt to spade all the seven raised beds in one day, but things have been delayed this year due to weather and grandchildren. I HAD to get the beds dug because the wild raspberries were getting bigger and bigger. Bigger is harder to remove. Today, I decided to psych myself into it by starting on the most difficult beds, the ones where the wild raspberries keep trying to invade. Lots of roots. There are four of my raised beds that have this problem. Then, there were only three beds remaining. Note the key word, only. So, after spading one of the remaining three, I told myself that there were only two left. And then, there was one. And with only one left, I had enough energy to get that last one spaded.

So, after getting all the raised beds spaded, of course, I was psyched enough to plant them with my seed potatoes. I decided to plant potatoes because I've read that they're really easy and this summer I need easy. I'm pleased to report that my kennel garden is now planted with Yukon Gold potatoes and Red potatoes. Done and did.

I still need to plant my pole beans....tomorrow? And my lettuce...tomorrow? Maybe. Actually, I may wait on the beans for a bit and tackle my raspberry plants tomorrow. They really need pruning before they start to flower.

As for what I've planted so far in my Earthboxes and containers, I planted 25 tomato plants...twelve different varieties. I decided that I shouldn't depend on only one variety of tomato plant. I've had good luck with First Lady tomatoes until last year. The variety is only available in our area at one nursery and last year the plants had a problem with blight from the get go. I decided not to depend on that nursery from now on. This year I'm trying several varieties to see which ones will work the best here. I'm sure that I'll still have blight problems but I'd rather not start out battling it from the beginning. The varieties I'm trying this year are: Rutgers, Jet Star, Super Fantastic, Burpee Big Boy, Wisconsin 55, Sir Speedy, Whopper, Independence Day, Husky Red Cherry, Orange Oxheart, Bradley, and Mountain Pride. I wasn't able to find Italian frying peppers this year so I went with bell peppers...three varieties: Big Red, California Wonder, and Big Bertha. I also decided to diversify with my eggplant varieties. I planted, Whopper, Fairy Tale, and Classic. I planted both yellow and green zucchini, some basil, and flat-leaf and curly parsley. On the plus side, I was able to buy all my bedding plants cheaply...a lot cheaper than if I'd bought them at the nursery. They were on sale and if they don't work out I won't be crying in my soup. Our grocery store in the city has a seasonal nursery/garden area where they sell annual and perennial flowers, herbs and vegetable bedding plants at REALLY reasonable prices...and obviously, quite a variety of almost everything.

#1 Son and #1 DIL took me out to see the new Star Trek movie today. I loved it. This was the second time for them but they NEEDED me to see it too. Thank you #1 Son and #1 DIL for a special day. This will be another movie that I'll need to purchase to watch again.

Random Quote of the Day


Every poem can be considered in two ways--as what the poet has to say, and as a thing which he makes.

C. S. Lewis (1898 - 1963), A preface to "Paradise Lost"