Arugula and Chicken

Have you ever tasted Arugula? Sailor planted some seed in August and now it is a foot high. I saw it next to the peppers I was harvesting and asked him what it was. So I cut some off and used it in my salad.
I am hooked. It has a nutty flavor, if that is possible. I added pinion nuts, sunflower seeds, onions, tomatoes, mandarin orange slices and an orange sauce from Panda Express for dressing.

Then I made a Basil Chicken curry with Coconut sauce to go with it. I felt like we had gone to an expensive restaurant to eat. It was so good. I would add a sweetener to that sauce and I added some more coconut to make it taste more like Coconut. Plus I would not use more than a half if that of the jalapeno pepper if that. But it was so delicious.

It was so delicious and memorable I had to write a post on my about it.
I hope you are having a wonderful day.

~a

Creepy Crawly Things

I've been working on a new knitting project. I am learning to knit socks with a Magic Loop cast on process. This means you knit both socks at once. To me that makes sense because they will match, and when they are finished, you can wear them, not set one aside and start the second.
After lots of learning and knitting practically the whole way to Lake Powell and home, I had gotten to the cuffs. As I looked at these socks, I felt nothing but boredom. So I snapped a picture and frogged (ripped) them out. I have started a new pattern called Mojo (by Donyale Grant), that has some fancy knitting and purling, which gives it ribs and a pattern. I will snap a picture when I get far enough along to be able to see anything.

We got three frosts, three nights in a row, which virtually killed all of the garden. A few hardy garden huckleberries and some peppers are still hanging on, plus I noticed one zucchini plant still looking perky.

Sailor spent a lot of time on Saturday pulling all the tomatoes up and harvesting them, plus all the volunteer huckleberries and tomatillos. Sunday, he made up a very good jam of all that goodness. We had a Green River watermelon which he used to add a few really ripe chunks into the jam, plus the huckleberries, and a huge zucchini. He peeled the zucchini, then cut into long chunks which he sent through the food processor grater. Then he added sugar and Sure Jell and stirred until it got thick. He got over a gallon of jam which he processed in smaller jars. We also harvested some tiny honeydew. This is our first success of melons. Hopefully if we plant them earlier than mid June, we might have better success. We bought these when they were closing them out at .25 for four plants. But it gives us hope.

I brought in all the house plants. In the spring after danger of frost is gone, all the houseplants are taken outside under the mulberry tree. There they camp all summer and into the fall. They come back into the house revived. In fact, I haven't seen the fern look happier than when it has been watered daily with the sprinkler, (something I must do for it is spritz it daily.) The cyclamin are all so happy each fall, blooming. My Christmas cactus always are ready to bloom after their summer camping under the tree. They are easy to take outside in the spring. I just start hauling them all outside, arranging them so they all get a shot at the rain-bird sprinkler, and removing their saucers.

Bringing the plants back inside in the fall, however, is a much harder ordeal. Usually I have time to spray them for spiders and all other insects that have taken to camping out in their folds while they are still outdoors, but this past week I didn't have time. We were gone all last week on a boating Mess-about at Lake Powell, which is a whole different post. By the time we got home, the cold front was upon us. We barely had time unload the boat, back it into it's place, cover it with tarp and unpack all the gear. I gathered all the plants onto the porch and Sailor brought them in the house.

I should clean the saucers in the spring and put them away, but I was lazy and just stacked them outside. Which meant, now when bringing them in, I had to fill the laundry room sink with soapy water and wash and dry them before I could replace all the plants to their spot in the house. It is a big process, which includes vacuuming the spot where they will sit and arranging rugs and tables by the windows. I also washed those same windows because they are hard to reach when all those plants are in the way. By the way, I have learned a really neat trick. Rain-x was introduced to me by my son who lived in Mississippi, where they get lots of rain. By rubbing this into the windshield, the rain just beads off. Then my sister took it one step further. She rubs it into Mom's windows. They shed the raindrops as well, and they seem to last for at least 6 months without having to redo. So I rubbed it into three of my windows.

I've also been watering them with Miraclegro-laced water, dusting the plants for bugs and spraying for spiders before I place them in their new home. Spiders give me the creeps. In fact any creepy crawly thing that somehow gets into the house is eliminated. I have been brushing all the dirt and cobwebs away from the bottoms of the plants, and have found several unwanted residents still hanging around them.

It reminds me of a story. Several years back we were having a family get-together here at our house. As we gathered around the table to eat, a HUGE spider was calmly making its way past the table toward the corner. I couldn't figure out where it had come from, because before company, my house gets a thorough cleaning. I was embarrassed and creeped out. I asked Sailor to get rid of it, and he calmly picked it up on a paper plate to take it outside! This meant lifting it over the table, people's heads and the pizza in order to get past everyone and take it to the door. I just wanted him to dispatch, not escort it. Of course it dropped off the plate, and onto the floor and caused several to shriek and move aside. But instead of stomping it, he picked it up again. Well, that was enough to get me to feeling like there were spiders everywhere and I was itching and shuddering.

We got back to the food at hand, and I was telling some sort of story, when my niece, Nina got a creepy look on her face while looking at my shoulder and said, "What's that thing on your shoulder?" Of course I reacted by brushing my shoulder and jumping sideways off my chair. That sent Nina into hysterics. She had been teasing me, and her timing was perfect. She had waited until things had calmed down enough to sort of forget the spider, but also short enough for me to still be on the alert. When I realized she was teasing, at first I felt really mad, yet seeing her lay down on the rug on her back, kicking her feet in the air as she gasped with laughter also made me laugh and see the humor in her very mean prank.

Nina has been my sister's foster daughter for many years, even after she married and had children, we all considered her part of the family. Recently things changed so she is legally part of our family now. Welcome Nina, you rascal you. I love you to pieces, even though you have a practical joking side to you. You are charming and I love you and your darling family.

Back to the task at hand, I still have thirsty plants that need to be placed in their new home. I hope everyone reading this is having a wonderful day.

~a

This and That

I stole this title from my sweet friend, Mostly Risible. Her blog sometimes just covers several topics, and similarly, mine does as well.

• This video on You Tube just made me laugh till I cried.

• Today Sailor changed the oil on all three vehicles. While he did that, I vacuumed, washed windows and detailed the insides. He then gave them a quick wash and we have three shiny, newly cleaned and oiled machines out front.

• Well, we actually have four. We inherited Charles De Mar*. That is the name of the little white Neon we purchased and gave to Katie while she was in college. We purchased it back from her later (I know, her dad is a real softy) and gave it to Daniel after his mission.

*A character from the movie, Better Off Dead

Now Daniel and Ashley are expecting their second baby. They were able to purchase his older brother's mini van and no longer need Charles.

Charles is not trained. In fact, poor Charles never needs an oil change because he leaks it all the time. The driver needs to put in more oil than gas, I think. You can see the trail of oil coming all the way down from Main Street to where he was parked. We picked him up on Friday and drove him home. We are not too sure what will happen next, but for now, Charles languishes by the front curb. Plans are to dig into his innards to see just what makes him leak sometime when Dan can come down to help.

• I made a new desert. After vacuuming and washing windows, and spending time out in the hot sunshine, we were both a bit too warm and tired. A Leo's shake came to mind, but then we have to suffer from that serving of steaming hot guilt that comes with it, so I offered to make something that is more healthy. Here's the recipe:

freshly frozen apricots, freshly frozen bananas+ Champion Juicer= ice cream. The juicer is an amazing machine that takes frozen things and grinds them up into really good ice cream. It was sweet enough, but if desired you can add some stevia. It comes in sugar-like form and is called Truvia.

• We have been eating zucchini from the garden for a week now. Our favorite way is to stir fry in olive oil or butter with an onion, add a bit of Parmesan cheese, sour cream, sesame sea salt and garlic salt. yum.

• We have also been harvesting some tomatoes. It is always nice to have some cherry tomatoes. I have some that when ripe are yellow. They are so sweet. I like to graze outside while I am watering. We also got a variety called grape tomatoes. They grow all together, almost like grapes and are the same shape.
  

• We also have eaten all the broccoli already. If you chop off the heads, then they will try to grow more flowerettes, so we just let it grow and harvest more later.

• I went to Mom's Crafts today. They were having a 15% off sale. I purchased some really pretty fabric that I intend to make into the double wedding ring pattern. That one is a challenge but I intend to have one of these for myself. More pictures later.

I guess that is all for now. Have a nice Sabbath, time for bed for me.

~a
I guess that is all for now. It has been a nice day.

Our Garden

I found two of these solar lights at Target when my sister bought some for Mom. And I had to have more than the only two they had left. She offered to look up in all the Targets in Salt Lake to see if any other store had any left and they didn't.
Then I spent a good deal of time looking for them on the internet. I found some and ordered three. Then decided I wanted another one.
When I put them outside to charge the first day, I realized one rattled. Sure enough, it was broken. The website was so great. I registered that it was broken and they sent me a return label over the internet. I printed it, put it back in the original boxes and shipped it back, applied for a refund and ordered two more.
Now I have six. They glow seven different colors. I had Sailor take some night shots. He fiddled around with the settings on my camera and figured out how to get some great shots.
The first one shows that they are crackle balls, the second shot shows the colors.
I love them. In the middle of the night, when I get up to get a drink, there are my happy solar lights smiling at me. They are so nice.
The other thing I love in our backyard is the wind chimes.

Garden 2009 First Harvest

The weather today is really beautiful. Still a bit chilly, but nice enough if you start moving, you shed your coat.
We spent some time today working in the garden.
Sailor worked on the patio planters, grouting in the seats he made from concrete last year.
I spaded the soil in the planters and raked in the flower gardens, which is still pretty frozen in some places.
I got rid of all the old marigolds and hollyhocks, saving the seed and scattering them back into the soil after I raked and spaded and raked some more.
As I worked the old carrot garden, I was surprised to find many bright orange carrots being uprooted. Some were pretty soft and rotten, some were as crisp as they were last fall! I was so surprised.
So here is the first harvest of 2009. I love carrots. Too bad they aren't allowed in this phase of the South Beach diet. . . I forgot and sampled one. It was the first one I harvested from the ground, I just brushed off the dirt and crunched. It was delicious and sweet.
I hope you are having a wonderful weekend.
~a

garden update

Yesterday we put the garden to bed. We gathered all the tomatoes from the vines and pulled up the vines. We gathered all the squash and everything. All that is left are two tomato plants which will be brought indoors, and the bed with carrots, kale, and spinach. I will cover that box for a while, trying to save those crops. They are a bit more hardy.
From the box of tomatillos, the one on the closest corner, Sailor made four pints of green salsa. From the huckleberries, jam will be made. We are also drying a bunch of the tomatoes with a bit of garlic salt sprinkled on top. They are delicious that way. We call them "moon dried tomatoes." Next year we are going to try another plant from the tomato family, called ground cherries. Huckleberries are related to the tomato.

The first photo shows the garden before the frost, the last two show it now and the huckleberries in a bowl. In one you can see me sitting on a bench in the background. I am saving the flower seeds. It was a busy day. Look at that amazing wheelbarrow of squash!

We had a fruitful year, and we really feel blessed.
~a

I love our fireplace

We have furnace trouble. Some sort of computer board is dead and a new one is ordered. It has been doing weird things and of course we forgot to call the repairman until this latest cold spell. It would come on and then blow cold air and not turn off. YIKES! When you are already cold, having cold air blowing on you is not fun.
But about a year ago, Sailor decided to put an insert into our fireplace. I wanted a gas log. I wanted to sit on the couch, snuggled up in a blanket, with a good book and some hot chocolate and pick up my remote and punch a button and FOOMPF a beautiful fire would spring to life in my gas log fireplace. That was always my dream. Sailor reasoned that if we didn't have any way of heating the house, for some reason, it would be good not to be dependent on the utilities, but to be able to light a real fire.
I was not a happy camper when we put in this wood-burning fireplace. Not only did I not get my gas log fireplace, we had to pay a hefty price for this insert. He purchased one of the best, most efficient inserts, a Jøtul . It is so efficient, you cannot tell that we are burning anything when you go outside and look at our chimney. Because this insert burns the smoke that would normally go up. It makes an eerie flame at the top of the box when it is burning the smoke.

Wood-burning fireplaces have their disadvantages. They are a LOT of work. They are messy, they require going out to the back and gathering kindling and logs. They require cleaning the ashes. My rug and hearth get messy with ashes, and wood chips. A wood-burning fireplace was NOT what I had in mind when we began talking about an insert.
But as we wait for the part for our furnace, I have come to appreciate this wood-burning fireplace. It is warm. I really don't mind getting the wood that Sailor has worked so hard to cut and chop. Cleaning up the dust and wood chips has become part of the routine.
We are using our Chinese elm tree we cut down several years ago. A locust tree in our back yard is acting like it is dying and we can cut it down. We cut down a branch from the poplar tree this year and we bundled all the sticks into kindling then Sailor cut it up into logs and we carted them back behind the shed. The church trimmed the elms that surround the girls baseball fields next door. We asked the custodian if we could have the logs and they said yes. So we basically have free heat. It is a very practical thing to do and I am grateful for Sailor's insight.

Speaking of cold, we covered the tomatoes just before the frost and I am glad we did. The rest of the garden, all the squash, pumpkins etc got frozen, but the covered tomatoes are still under quilts, just snug until this cold spell passes. We have been grateful recipients of an abundantly producing garden. We have harvested several bushels of tomatoes, along with many carrots, peppers, ears of corn, zucchini squash, spaghetti squash, cucumbers, huckleberries and tomatillos. It is supposed to warm back up this week so the quilts will come off, but once the frost hits, we have to be cautious and watch for any future frosts.






I feel blessed and grateful for what we have produced from our tiny corner of the earth. Life is good.
I have such a sweet husband who is my friend and hero. I have such a sweet family, 6 kids, 6 in law kids and 12 grand kids. How much luckier can I be? I feel blessed.
thanks, Sailor for such a sweet life.
~a

ooo Adam, that must have hurt

Saturday morning I took a spill. I stepped on some boards awaiting to be used in our new fence that were lying on the back patio. Something slipped and I did a face-plant on the concrete. It was NOT fun, but no skin was broken, no blood spilled, nothing was even scraped. Eventually I gathered what was left of my dignity and with Sailor's help got uprighted again. But I noticed soon after that my rib hurt. I have a bruise under my right breast, and it hurts to breathe deeply, laugh, cough, sigh or sneeze. Hiccups are bad too. It also hurts to lie down. This does not contribute towards good rest.
I cannot help but think of how Adam must have felt when he awoke to find a missing rib and a pesky woman by his side. But I am glad God created woman. I sure love being by my husband's side and sharing this life with him.

In other news, I would like to talk about our amazing tomato crop. We are enjoying many bowlfuls of tomatoes every day. We have had many BLT's, tomato salads and other tomato dishes. Our latest recipe uses our Champion juicer. I send about 6 large tomatoes, 3 stalks of celery, 3 anaheim peppers, a tiny piece of jalapeno pepper, parsley, garlic and 6 carrots through the juicer, and after Sailor adds some good spices, we have a pretty delicious V-7 drink. We have plenty of canned tomatoes, so we are using them fresh and loving all the delicious fresh food from the garden!

Finally, I noticed the neighbor dog barking more than usual lately. He had pretty much shut up since we installed that fence. We were enjoying much more privacy, since he didn't announce our every move. But lately, no matter what I did, he barked. What's with that? I finally looked over to see two eyes and a nose peeking under the fence! Upon closer examination, I discovered the stinker had dug a grand canyon on his side of the fence and under the fence and now had a snake's eye view of our yard. This dog is really bored. I picked up my weapon of choice, the spray hose, and gave him a good face wash, but that didn't stop him. I plugged it up with pieces of rock and concrete, thinking the problem was temporarily solved until Sailor could do something more permanent.
Later that day, I went outside to gather carrots and found a neighbor cat running away and barking coming from the fence. I picked up the spray hose to chase the cat off. I saw what I thought was our orange cat chasing him, but when I looked around the tree, it was a cocker spaniel! Did I mention the neighbor has 8 dogs? I sprayed him and he scampered to the fence to a second hole! Stupid Golden Retriever had dug a second hole a little to the east of the first! It wasn't big enough for GR to fit, but the cocker could fit under and was enjoying his new-found playground. I waited until Cocker was half way through, struggling to fit and gave his butt a good long wash while he scampered to safety on the other side.
The second hole was larger than the first! But worse, the rock pile under the first had some noticeable gaps. Upon closer examination, I realized some of the rocks I had placed in the hole were gone. I placed another piece of concrete in the gap and watched as GR carefully pawed it until it came to his side of the fence, then I peeked through the cracks to see him pick it up with his mouth and move it a yard from the fence.
::eye roll:: I have a formidable contender here!
Sailor saved the day that night when he dug a trench on our side and poured concrete, then built it up to almost meet the fence. Upon talking to the neighbor, he told us that he had seen the hole and had filled it up twice, thinking it was fixed. They had also noticed GR standing on the picnic table on his hind legs and leaning on the fence so he could see us. Neighbor moved the picnic table away from the fence to the middle of his yard, but that didn't stop this bored dog. The next time Neighbor looked out, he saw GR balancing on his hind legs on the picnic table, now in the middle of the yard and barking. He couldn't stay in that position long without losing balance, but he was still trying to see us. I think the neighbors are frustrated by him, but also mildly amused. It is a bit funny, if you think about it. That is ONE.DETERMINED.DOG! The Neighbor's daughter says "he is so smart, he is stupid!" That makes sense to me. I think I even made that comment.
What next? I cannot grow bushes fast enough to cover the gap 6 feet above ground, so I am not sure. But Sailor says he will lay concrete under the existing fence and in the future will put that down before he builds the rest of the fence. More expense and work. Yikes!


::shallow sigh:: ouch, ouch, ow

have a nice day
~a

If ya can't beat 'em, eat 'em!

Lately I have taken to harvesting the dandelion greens from my lawn and making green smoothies. I wash them, mix them in the blender with a cup of water, fresh carrots from my garden, a whole ripe banana, six large frozen strawberries and a third cup of frozen blueberries, some type of sweetener like agave and sometimes protein powder. It makes a delicious, healthy and filling shake.
Yard Snacker got me to thinking about harvesting them from my own back yard.

I never thought I would ever hear myself say anything like that last paragraph, let alone write it. I find myself no longer craving chocolate or anything sweet when I have had one of these. So many vitamins and minerals involved. And I have started to lose weight! What a fun side effect! But it is true. How weird is that?

And what a great way to combat dandelions in the yard? Eat them!

Golden Snitch and King Tut

Last August I posted about the outrageous hummingbirds who frequented our humble feeders.

They can be really feisty birds. I wondered if the regulars from last year would return. Sure enough. Golden Snitch has made several rare appearances. He was very hard to catch on a photo, so I am cheating and using last year's photo. It really shows his beautiful golden feathers and red face. He is really quite spectacular, and makes a much lower buzzing sound with his wings.


But I didn't see King Tut. Not that I missed him. He was a selfish little brat who hogged a whole feeder, and sometimes two if they hung too close together, for himself. He expends his energy chasing away would-be contenders. He is clever. He hides on the rope, or sits below the feeder on the bicycle. Sometimes he sits clear at the top of the string, near the rafters, then he chases away anyone who thinks it is safe to come partake. Then hurries back to his throne.

I wondered if this year they might have been feisty enough that he couldn't rule, there being strength in numbers. Or maybe he had found someone else's feeder to rule. But I didn't see him reigning on his usual Knot Throne.

Until yesterday.

I got up early and while getting ready for my run I noticed the feeders were totally dry. So before I headed out, I filled them.

Several hours later, upon hearing lots of scolding, I looked out to see that HIS MAJESTY had returned. There he sat upon the Knot Throne chasing everyone away who dared to come to within a few feet of the two feeders. All the sugar water was exactly where I had left it a few hours ago, completely full. I knew he was effective, because lately I have been appalled by the amount of juice consumed, having to fill these feeders twice a day.

Always being the one who tries to Keep the Peace by not allowing fights, and being very intolerant of bullies and selfishness, I felt it my duty to dethrone the King. I went outside and watched, spray hose in hand. When he landed, I sprayed him. He sat in the trees and scolded me, several times attempting to reclaim what he thought was his, several times I sprayed him. I stood there ready to defend for about 5 minutes, but knew I had better things to do than protect the sugar water, so I moved one of the feeders about 20 feet away onto another hook.

No sooner had I gotten inside when I looked out to see about 7 hungry birds all sharing the separated feeder, and sure enough, King Tut had reclaimed his feeder. All day I watched as the one feeder stayed exactly as full as I had left it in the morning, he taking a few sips when he pleased, while the other was drained dry. When it was time to fill the dry one, I just exchanged them, leaving the King about an inch of precious juice. He doesn't require much juice since he is sitting on his lazy feet and not expending much energy, except to defend, so the juice stays quite full.

Today he continues to defend his throne and I continue to refill the other one. What a little PIGGY he is.

My children have all moved out, gotten married and have homes of their own. Why is it I feel the need to continue to settle fights? I don't know. What's a Mudda to do?


~a

Garden Update

The garden has taken off like crazy. You can see the size and abundance of tomatoes. Because Sailor was working on the patio planters and the fence, we didn't get everything we wanted planted. The zucchini is late, just starting, but the spaghetti squash is really doing great.
The tomato plants are out of control and so heavy that the tomato cages just don't hold them. I put one back upright and propped it up with a stick. The corn is tasseling. yea!
I cannot believe the hummingbirds. Yesterday before bed, we refilled the feeders so they would be there at dawn for them to eat. By 2 this afternoon, they were sucked dry. empty. I just now refilled them again. Those little guys are going crazy.
'tis the season, I guess.

Raised Patio Garden

I LOVE Iris! I want a bunch of purple ones. I have to find some of those dark purple ones.


Now we are talking about making a waterfall that immediately drains into the ground because I don't want any water features that end up drowning my grandchildren. I took some pictures of a neighbor's little rock garden. This is sort of what I have in mind. We are still thinking about this.

When it stops raining (I LOVE THE RAIN) thunder and all, I will take pictures of the back yard raised beds as well.

(later update)Here they are:
We are getting along with our back yard raised beds. Sailor has completed three now, two rectangles and one triangle. We have tomatoes, peppers and flowers planted.
This shows the raised beds Sailor built. We have surrounded each tomato plant with cages and grass clippings. This serves as a mulch which keeps in the water and protects from weeds growing. We still have two more triangles to build later this summer. The cinder block is just laid out where they will be. They will be ready for next spring. Another neat thing about these raised beds is that we can take PVC pipe and arch it over the beds and lay plastic tarp over to form a greenhouse in the fall to protect the tomatoes from frost and make the season last a bit longer. We could also use them in the spring to start the seedlings earlier than normal.




This third one, the triangle one is just for flowers. I love these orange poppies. They grow wild in Eureka along the roadside. They are great when you have fields of them. I just have a few so far.


Two of these pictures show my rock garden and my house plants. They love camping out in the summer. They get better sun, better watering (with the automatic sprinkler) and better drainage. I also planted a bunch of hanging plants that are on the rocks. I will hang them later when Sailor gets the sprinkling system strung for them.

We already had these two triangle beds on the patio with benches.

So there is our progress so far. . .
~a

No Dig Instant Garden

I just got this new issue of Mother Earth News with an amazing article on how to make instant No-Dig Garden using potting soil, bag and all. Punch holes in the bottom of the bag for drainage, then carefully cut a window around the top, plant your garden inside that and cover with straw. How easy is that? Anyone can do this, no matter how small the size of your yard. At the end of the season, just throw away the bag and leave the potting soil there on the garden. (unless you had it on your deck or something.
I just thought it was so amazing. We are making raised beds and I just got back from ACE with 8 bags of manure, and 6 bags of compost that we will mix with peat moss into some of our garden soil. Since the raised beds are two cinder blocks high, we need lots of dirt, but the bottom dirt doesn't have to be so great, just a filler.
We are also thinking about making a waterfall somewhere in our yard. Today I was on my bike (getting exercise) and I saw several neat yards with things like this. I took some pictures so we can figure out what to do.
Otherwise, not too much else to say. Happy weekend. It starts tonight for us, since my hubby gets Friday off this week! YEA. Please no more tube leaks out at the plant, please, please. . . .


~a

Some 4-day Weekend

Poor Hubby. He worked so hard last week, 10-hour days and had Friday off. He was really looking forward to this relaxing 4-day weekend. Well, it was really not-so-relaxing, but it was practically unscheduled. He had all sorts of things planned, including tinkering with his hyper-milage commuter car and finishing the raised patio garden beds. We had one obligation, and the rest was OUR time, which so rarely happens.

He worked all day Friday, laying the cinder block for the second garden bed.

I worked outside too, pulling 4 trash cans of terrible invasive vine weeds. I don't know the name of these. Does anyone have any clue what this is? You can click on any of these pictures and see a larger view.









They grow really fast, (should I say like weeds?) and if you don't watch, they can take over the yard, like they did in my neighbor's yard. They are growing in his grass.

Or the other neighbor's fence! Look how thick they are! They are literally knocking the fence down!I worked all afternoon pulling those things and the end result was great! I actually found some flowers growing there! Surprise!
Anyway we came in at sunset, having found some muscles we never knew we had and were really feeling exhausted, but happy for all we accomplished. As you can see, he laid the second raised bed and planted the first in tomatoes. The background near the fence is where I worked pulling the weeds out.
I haven't planted my flowers yet. That will be tomorrow, I guess.

Like I said before we had NO plans for all four days except for working in our yard and on the car. We did have one commitment on Saturday helping the youth plant flowers around the Manti Temple. The rest of the weekend was OURS, and we had great plans. But the familiar phone number registered on call waiting around 9:30 pm. It was his boss. It seems the Power Plant had developed a tube leak.

So instead of a relaxing 4-day weekend, my poor hubby had to get up at 4:30 am Saturday, and head into work. He worked until 8:30 pm got home by 9, ate, showered and dropped into bed by 11:30. The phone rang this morning at 5 am. The welders had worked all night and were ready for inspection, so away he went. You can read about this tube leak and see pictures here: Sailor's Blogspot.
I went out after Church today and took these pictures. Here is one for YardSnacker
He said we should know what edible plants we have in our yard. Actually I pulled a BUNCH Of these out with the unidentified invasive weed. This is White Top. I heard that the Anasazi Indians used to grind up the seeds into flower. So if I get desperate Sam, this will be growing in my back yard. I will have some sort of . . . bread, I guess. I also have PLENTY of dandelion, but I HATE THEM. They are so bitter. I digress, that is another post.

I have a couple of other pictures, but I think I will save those for another post as well.

I hope you, dear reader, have a wonderful Sabbath day.

~a

Sore Muscles

Friday and yesterday Sailor and I worked on the yard. We are making planters on our huge concrete back yard patio. It used to be a basketball court "back in the day" when we had some interested kids, but it hasn't been for a very long time. Ever since S2 was jumping on the new trampoline and decided to slam dunk a pretend basket ball and broke the hoop. It hung there for years, and no one played again. You can see the basketball pole (sans backboard) on the very left of the picture.

Anyway the very vast, reflective mass of concrete always got most of the sun in the summertime, and for what? It collected dirt, leaves, junk and reflected brightness into my window, along with the backboard and would give me migraine headaches. This year we decided to make raised beds there.
Earlier this spring we purchased 4 pallets decorative cinder block and laid them out on the patio in somewhat of a plan.

If you look at the picture, you will see three benches (the fourth to the right of the edge of the picture) and two planters. The planter and two right benches were there when we moved here and to the left of the patio was a huge sacrificial alter. Well, it really was an abandoned barbecue thing which had been turned into a trash incinerator by the last owners. We tore it down and Sailor fashioned another planter and two more benches to mirror the existing ones.

Anyway, in his spare time, Sailor has been mortaring this first planter, and yesterday he spent his day tilling the back garden and hauling dirt to this planter. For the top 6 inches we then used the principles prescribed in the Square Foot Gardening Site to make Mel's special soil mix: 1/3 blended compost, 1/3 peat moss, and 1/3 coarse vermiculite.

Now this planter is ready to plant. I have planted three flats of petunias along the edges of the triangle planters. I got a marigold plant from church for mother's day which is planted there, and a bunch of marigold seeds. I also did a bunch of cleaning in the front yard. Clean-up day is next Saturday where the city will haul away anything you put on the curb. So I started a pile. Yea.

The last two nights we have found muscles we didn't know existed. It is a great thing to spring clean!

Today a very large bird landed on our hummingbird feeder. He sat there and sipped the nectar for a while. We got a picture.