Tag Archives: Garden

Monday

01 Monday Apr 2013

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It’s Monday!

Back to school.

Back to reality.

We had a great weekend with friends and I actually got the boys to school on time!

Spring Break week marked the start to our garden season.  I have expanded my garden spot this year and we got it all ready!

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Perfect spot with lots of sun ( if we get any this year!).

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Got a load of organic composted manure… wahoo!  Had some help from my helpers too!

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I just took photos while everyone worked!  Ha!  Just kidding…  :)

It was really fun to get out there together and work on our garden.  I can’t wait to see if I can make veggies grow again this year…  it is always a big question, but I will try my best!

Have you gotten started on your garden yet this year?  

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Here Comes the Sun(flowers)!

25 Wednesday Jul 2012

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I thought after my outdoor inspiration post yesterday, I would share our outdoor progress.

I have really found joy in having a garden that actually has produced lettuce and veggies for our family.

Given that I am not typically a “green thumb”, I spent several hours reading and researching and planning our garden this year.

What I have realized is that having a garden is a lot of work! 

I have learned how to weed, prune, and care for a growing garden ( as well as with plants in the yard) for the first time in my life.

Even though it was a lot more work than I expected, I am loving it!  I have big plans to expand the garden for next year and maybe even experiment with some winter crops…  we’ll see on that one :)

Without further babble, here is the photo update on our progress:

Maddox’s sunflowers are now MUCH taller than he is!  Can you tell how stoked he was to come outside for a photo this morning??

Brayden’s brussel sprouts, the sprouts are coming!!

Our volunteer pumpkins… we didn’t plant those, but they popped up!  I think they are pumpkins??

Squash and what’s left of the lettuce

Tomatoes!!

And more tomatoes!

Another crazy volunteer pumpkin (?) that I am just letting grow… kinda purdy next to my patio :)

You see the sun shining??  It’s going to be a beautiful day!

How is your garden growing??  

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Building Community with veggies!

20 Wednesday Jun 2012

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I have always been into nutrition and health and read and inquired about different nutritional topics.

English: vegetables

English: vegetables (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Recently with my research on how to garden ( since some of us don’t naturally have a green thumb!) I have really come to appreciate the beauty of veggies and gardens and the work that goes into making them thrive.  I feel like such a dork sometimes!

I will look at my garden and just be so excited to see the growth.  When I harvest my lettuce, I feel exhilarated that I grew it!  When I see other gardens or walk through the produce section at Whole Foods, I marvel at the beauty in the colors… I know… I have gone totally woo woo… ( Is that a word?).

Whole foods

Whole foods (Photo credit: parislemon)

When I heard that an amazing mom at Brayden’s school had applied for, and received, a $5000.00 grant to build and grow a garden at his school I wanted in!I went to our first meeting the other day and I am so thrilled to be on the ground floor of this important project for our kids.  The build-out will be in September and I will be in charge of bringing the community and kids in with events and activities.  I will keep you posted on our progress :)

We are going to construct a garden for and with the school community, compost food scraps from the cafeteria to use in the garden, and eventually use the food grown in the garden to feed the children in the cafeteria.

How cool is that?

For experiential learners ( like Brayden) the garden will be used to teach lessons to meet learning targets for each grade and the kids and community will have the opportunity to work in the garden to make it something beautiful for us all to share…

I am selfishly hoping to gain some gardening tips along the way too!

Take a girl out of California and put her in Oregon and she becomes a hippie!

What are your garden tips for building a community garden?

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Flying by…

15 Friday Jun 2012

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My, how time is flying!

Hard to believe I haven’t posted in a week!  Seemed like just yesterday that I wrote my last post…

Hard to believe that my baby is done with Kindergarten and will move onto the first grade!

Brayden on his last day of Kindergarten.

Brayden on his last day of kindergarten

Hard to believe that the rose bushes that were just thorny stems are now beautifully in bloom…

Hard to believe that my youngest cutie turned 4 and is now wanting to be a black belt in Taikwondo…

Just like the last week has gone by in a blink, the last 6 years seemed to have flown by.

Just like that, my kids are becoming more and more wonderful as they move through life.

I am just trying to enjoy everyday and live in the now so that I don’t miss it… although even with this consciousness I still feel like it is going way too fast.

How do we really enjoy this time without it getting away from us?

Happy Friday!!  Enjoy every moment!!

The (yellow flowery) garden mystery!

08 Friday Jun 2012

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Yesterday I shared my garden…

Today, I need help!

As I was pulling a TON of weeds the other day in the garden, I saw this very interesting sprout…

I was sure it wasn’t a weed…

What is this???

Does anyone know what this is?? Could it be a veggie or plant or something?

Is it a weed?

My how her garden grows!

07 Thursday Jun 2012

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Do you remember my empty garden beds??

And my little baby sprouts?

I am such a proud mama right now!!  We just ate our first salad with lettuce and spinach from our very own garden!  Yes, it’s true!!  Can you believe it??

I am so excited that our garden efforts actually are starting to look like we will have veggies!  Wahoo!!

Look at this!  drumroll pleeeeease…..

Brussel Sprouts are sprouting!

Lettuce and Kale and zucchini!

It totally makes me want to be a farmer!  I am currently batting my eyelashes and very sweetly trying to convince my hubby that we need to have farm fresh eggs… yes, I want to be a chicken lady :)

It’s not going over too well… but a girl can dream right?

How are your gardens growing?

Little Sprouts

27 Friday Apr 2012

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It has been about two weeks (maybe three??) since the big seed planting in our (hopefully) soon-to-be garden.

I want to report that we have sprouts!!!  Not the technical term, I am sure, but you get the idea.

My “crew” finally finished the second of the covers to keep the “destroyer” out.

Look at this beauty!!

I am a proud plant mama :)

We started some Celery seed inside (Brayden just HAD to plant celery) and we are sprouting inside too!!

Yipee!!

 If I go outside everyday and talk nice to the sprouts, do you think I can get them to grow into some veggies? (maybe a little water too?)

Happy Friday!!

Spring has Sprung

05 Thursday Apr 2012

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It’s time to get the garden going!

I say that as if I have a clue how to garden…

I really aspire to be one of those amazing people who have a beautiful bounty of fresh veggies all summer long that taste amazing right out of the garden.  This year I hit the books.  I read and researched and we will see how it all grows…

I read Square Food Gardening by Mel Bartholomew (at the urging of one of my friends, thanks Kim- I know I have to give it back to you!) and used the invaluable resource, Sunset Western Garden Book (there is a much more recent version than the one I have!).

I commissioned my favorite “honey do’ers” to build a couple covers for the garden beds to protect them from “Duke the garden destroyer”…

Even “the destroyer” is helping out and posing for the camera…

 Then I laid out my garden plans based on my books…

You know what they say about the ”best laid plans”… 

Here is what the garden looks like now…

We will see if I can transform it into a wonderful harvest!  Stay tuned!

I am really hoping that I can grow our veggies for the summer.  This is one of my strategies to save some money on produce and help support our lifestyle of eating organic, and “everything free”.

Have you been a successful green thumb in the garden?  I would love tips!!

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