Garden Update

I finally planted all of my starts today!!!!!!!!! It took a lot longer than I thought, with most of the time being spent by weeding and planning things out. Even with so much more garden space than I'm used to, I still filled it up quickly! All together I planted:

• 27 tomato plants (9 varieties)
• Roma
• Black Krim
• Cherry Delight
• Cherokee Purple
• Beefsteak
• Brandywine
• Cherry Sun Gold
• Green Zebra
• Speckled Roman
• 4 eggplants
• 19 peppers (6 varieties)
• 10 broccolis (3 varieties)
• 4 basils
• 5 melons (2 varieties)

These were all from start, and do not include everything I've planted from seeds over the last several weeks!  I have so many tomatoes that I couldn't give them each the room I would like to give them, so I gave 1 of each variety (and 2 of each of the cherry varieties) 4 whole square feet, each with it's own cage. The others I planted in a staggered manner that are probably 1-1.5 feet apart.....probably going to be pretty crowded but we'll see. I'm still deciding how I want to trellis them......Carter wants to do a big crazy matrix of tomato stakes and twine, but I think I might do the same trellissing method my CSA does. I'm not sure what its' called, but think one line with stakes at the end, and twine at 1 ft intervals.

Anyways, here are some photos! Garden To Do list for the near future includes planting pumpkin patch (Carter's area) and summer and winter squash patch (both down near the back fence, I don't know how I'm going to get water down there.....!), levelling and mulching the walkways, and eventually the fence. I hope to have the planting done by the end of this coming weekend, then the walkways as soon as possible after that. Wish me luck!

A hot air balloon landed in the horse pasture this morning! (that's our shed in the foreground, and that's the canal between the shed and the balloon)

Can't tell from here, but that's one full garden!

garden view looking west (next four pics all looking west)

Joe and Steph's garden.

my cool season veggies--seriously the arugula is going CRAZY! I can't keep up with it, it's already starting to bolt!

This bed has all of the "big" tomatoes (the ones I'm giving more room each, and each with it's own cage), as well as other random stuff.

This bed has all peppers, some broccoli, some flowers from seeds, and the rest of the tomatoes.

broccoli close up!

this is about how big all of my tomato plants are. They were bigger in their pots but I buried them a bit to increase root  vs. leafy ratio. Hope that turns out to be a good decision!

My biggest fear is that they all grow slowly, but nothing ever puts on fruit (ie never 'catches up' with the 3 storebought plants I purchased (1 tomato, 1 pepper, 1 eggplant). I'd be fine if even every other plant DIES (I have 3 of each variety I think, that's plenty!) as long as the ones that live produce fruits!!

Emma posing by the hanging plant. Watching me work in the garden must have made her hungry!

I held a photoshoot in front of our peony--this is definitely my FAVORITE shot!!! It's just so Emma!

looking regal and normal

they are almost done, most are fading but a few are still in bud. I picked some for a vase today finally.

I wish it would just stay like this all year long, so pretty!

more funny things to youtube

I just can't keep this to myself, it's so hilarious! Have you guys seen Ellen's Dance Dare? Just type that into google, or watch this one and watch related videos:


.

another thing Ellen posted today is videos of baby's squirting dogs with hoses. HILARIOUS!! try this video, but you have to go to minute 2:40 to see the baby (the other videos are funny too)


 

Happy Memorial Day!

Bolder boulder then ultimate college championship . Maybe garden later.

more George and Peyton

Peyton and George are Broad-tailed hummingbirds. Apparently they are fairly common around here (compared to the other few species, which mostly just migrate through.) and they are also the only ones who make noise with their wings as they fly by. I really appreciate it because they announce themselves and I get really excited when they fly by! They are around the house all day, we hear them mostly in morning and evening but today we even heard them in the middle of the day. I really hope they are nesting here!

this feeder is by the big window in living room, so we always get a show! This is George.

This one has a much redder throat, this is Peyton.

this is the front porch feeder, I think Peyton again.

can't tell in the pictures, but they have LONG tongues, and after they drink they lick their beaks!

George and other photos from this weekend

we made crepes yesterday morning, my favoritte!!

my first one was a savory crepe--pesto, mozz, and green onions. not too bad!

Then I did a dessert crepe--PB, walnuts, and choc chips

same dessert crepe, rolled up and topped with dark chocolate syrup and powdered sugar! mmmmmm

Guess who made this one? Yes, that's an entire KitKat.

Finally, here's some photos of the birds! I know Carter took lots of better photos but I can't find them now.

George.

he's pretty cute

I think this is George's boyfriend, Peyton.

We love George and Peyton, and accept them as a gay hummingbird couple!  Hopefully they can adopt so we can see some babies around here soon.

On an unrelated note, this is what our house looks like when I can't do dishes (mallet finger). Carter prefers to wait until every single dish is dirty before washing anything. Not the way I would choose to do things.

Carter taking pictures of George, our hummingbird.

 

 

Mallet finger

so there's good news and there's bad news from yesterday's ultimate tournament:

good news: my team won!!! we got truckers hats and coozies (very Boulder! ahhaah)

bad news: i tore a tendon in my right ring finger!! darn!

it was in the final game, and I didn't even catch the disc! adding insult to injury! it was a short throw so I had to go back to get it and I dove and my girl dove too, and she d-ed me! (it was really a great play for her) anyways I don't know if I hit her or the disc, but my finger just felt a tad big jammed. After that point ended, I went back to the line and looked down and found this:

my last segment of my ring finger was just limp and I couldn't straighted it out at all! The funny thing was it didn't hurt at all, and I continued playing (EVERY point, as we were savage (no subs!)!!

an ultimate friend of mine used to be a trainer and she knew what it was right away. she helped me splint it with popsicle sticks (mmmmm I got to eat 2 popsicles!). Today I went to urgent care and it was confirmed as tendon only and no bone. Thats both good and bad--bad because tendons take longer to heal, but good because it required no surgery! 

Click here to learn more about mallet finger:http://orthoinfo.aaos.org/topic.cfm?topic=A00018

the doctor gave me this cool splint and told me Im lucky enough to get to wear it for 6-8 weeks STRAIGHT with not even a momentary lapse (if my finger bends at all, all healing will be broke again and I'd have to start over.) Obviously Im really excited about this. No volleyball, no ultimate, work's gonna be really hard, I'll have to rely on others much more often. Not sure how much Ill be able to garden, and we're gonna be putting in a fence in a couple weeks, complete with auger, concrete, etc. The good news is I don't have to do dishes for 6-8 weeks, yay!

The urgent care doc wants me to see an orthopedic doctor for follow up, I'll let you know if anytihng changes. If it doesn't heal on its own I may need surgery, but that sounds not very likely.

Also, I'll have to to PT after it's all healed, as I'll lose all muscle ability in that finger, so that will be fun. Life is always exciting!!

first week of CSA!

lots of yummy veggies came today, I'm sooooooooo excited! Only problem is our fridge isnt big enough....!

this year our CSA is using a blog format to communicate with members, and of course I LOVE that!!! check it out! http://redwagoncsa.wordpress.com/

what's blooming in Longmont-ish, Colorado

Now it's my turn to show you all what's blooming here! I'm hardening off my veggies now, hope to plant them next Tuesday on my day off.

i bought myself this fushia for the front porch as a bday gift to myself

big healthy coral bells by the front door! the gnome is happy.

volunteer violets everywhere in this area! (and some weeds--oops!)

big peony! I love it, I've never had a peony before!

pretty hot pink

do these make good cut flowers? I vaguely remember bringing Mom something like this as a kid and it was infested with ants!

love the globe-like buds!

veggie garden is not that exciting, Im way behind! Joe and Steph are kicking my butt!

what is this tree/shrub? TONS of these pink pea flowers. locust?

very hairy and a little thorny

Carter bought me this big hanging basket for Mothers' Day!  It's from the Flower Bin, an awesome nursery in Longmont!

wave petunias and others should grow down

i approve!

Emma finally got some new "clothes"! I got this set off etsy, way cheaper than the fancy boutique dog stores in Boulder!

her old one was broken where the tags hook onto, so we rigged it with a carabiner!  so ghetto, poor Emma! Now she's styling!