Tree Trimming

We have a small backyard.  I'm actually love it, because it's so much easier to manage than our former backyard.  To be so small though, we have quite a lot of trees. The men in the family tackled the overgrown beast in the corner last week, turning our backyard into a temporary jungle.

My fledgling hydrangeas got a bit trampled in the process, but at least the tree is under control.



And it's amazing how much that corner of the yard has opened up.  We still have 7 hackberry (I think) trees to trim, thus the dappled shade you see here.

Sometimes I think the way I talk about our landscape makes it sound way more glamorous than it is.  I guess that's because it feels glamorous to me.  I find so much peace sitting on our porches, or toodling around the yard watching my plants grow by miniscule degrees, or watching the kids play.  Especially as I think about all the people on the East Coast today struggling to piece their lives back together after that horrible storm, I'm very grateful for my little peaceful patch of land.

Winter is coming

It's been a busy few weeks for me, both in the garden and in our house.  At the moment, we're enjoying a true day of rest.  I'm sitting on our porch swing listening to the breezes and reveling in the chillier weather.  I love colder weather, so the larger part of me is rejoicing.  But the other part is glancing around worriedly at my plants wondering what will survive the coming winter months.  I've heard rumors that our complete lack of winter last year is leading towards an especially icy one this year.  I'll believe it when I see it.

I had a friend over to watch one of the presidential debates last week.  We ended up drinking a bottle of wine and talking permaculture, which was so much better than talking politics.  We stood around my yard long after the debate was over, tossing around ideas for my land.  As in most things, a fresh set of eyes is so helpful.  She glanced over at the retaining wall dividing our house from the neighbors' and suggested that I try putting tomatoes beside it.  In the spring. 

I was too excited at the idea of another edible-friendly growing place in my limited landscape to wait for spring.  So I went out the next day and bought a raspberry and a blackberry bush at a 75% discount and made a berry bed.  I told my friend later that I felt like she'd told me where to dig for gold.  The grass hadn't grown well in that particular spot, which made me so happy.  The fewer battles I have to fight with bermuda the better.  Instead, the ground was covered with a natural layer of leafy mulch and clover, and the soil was full of earthworms. 

I've always wanted to grow berries, and I didn't think I'd ever have a place for them on my own land.  And let's be honest, they still might not grow.  We have several beautiful (and annoying) crepe myrtles that provide so much wonderful (and super annoying) shade.  The unfortunate placement of a sprinkler head forced me to move the bed down further into the occasional shade of the house.  And on top of all that, I have no experience growing berries, and they may not survive my learning curve.  But it makes me happy that I have a place to try.

I removed what ground cover was there, put down a good bit of peat moss, mushroom compost and regular compost.  I mulched around the plants and watered in some liquid humus in an attempt to further improve the soil. (As good as it was in comparison to the rest of my soil, it still needs some help.)  Then I decided to plant some arugula and lettuce in the wide open spaces around the berries.  Gideon helped me plant this arugula (in a very haphazard fashion), and it's required a lot of thinning.  I took some bites of the seed leaves during thinning... mmm, spicy and delicious.  There's really nothing like eating what you've grown yourself, even if it's barely a mouthful.

I dug up these two huge rocks while I was preparing the bed.  I'm not sure what Gideon and his stick were trying to accomplish with them, but he was working hard and happy.

Pea planting

I'm really focusing on peas these days. They're supposed to be easy to grow, and it's the season for them. So I'm shamelessly trying to boost my gardening ego with a bumper crop of snow peas and shell peas. In the meantime, I'm thoroughly enjoying the look of the bamboo tepees in our flower beds. Thank you Garden ridge clearance.

Ants are still fighting to occupy my east-side porch planter. I planted in spite of them and managed to avoid any bites. I'm trying cornmeal again as an organic control, but my confidence is shaky that it will work. I've heard coffee grounds, baby powder and diatomaceous earth are also effective ant controls, all of which I have easy access to. We have a pretty huge ant problem throughout our landscape, so I may have robust organic experiment on my hands.

Daily tasks

I try not to think about all the things I want to accomplish with our landscape too often. It's overwhelming. Instead, I try to do one, maybe two things everyday toward those goals. And it might be something as little as cleaning out one container, thinning out seedlings, or succession planting one pot. Gardening is such a constant and evolving process, but I still think I take more steps forward than back.  

Gideon is my gardening buddy. As long as he can carry a shovel, he's ready to go. Today, he helped me say goodbye to my brandywine tomato vine. I had high hopes for it, which didn't pan out. In spite of how pitiful it looks now, especially after an incredibly hot summer of neglect, it represents my first season as a gardener.  Call me cheesy, but I'll always remember it with special fondness.  I harvested the remainders of basil and emptied out the pot completely. Now to decide what to grow next...

My peas are coming up beautifully. The growth from one day to the next is amazing to watch. Mulching them is on my to do list for the next day or two. 

Wednesday

Sunday

The carrots that I'm still pretty sure I'm growing out of season and in too much shade, all came up.  They need to be thinned out, which is a quick task. I'm hoping if I keep Gideon involved in their progress, he'll want to eat them. Assuming they grow to an edible size.

The lettuce patch looks pathetic. Here I'm trying to grow Black Seeded Simpson, loose leaf lettuce and bib lettuce... and swiss chard, kale and broccoli.  It may be hard to see, but all the seeds came up except for one planting. So I get to sow more seeds - score.  :) I love planting. In the grand scheme of gardening, planting seeds is such a small task and also one of my favorites. Nothing happens without the actual planting! I'm really hoping I'll have an amazing progress picture in a few weeks to remind me not to give up on the little things.

This is the only tomato vine that I actively kept alive through the summer (see Shady Seconds). And it still has a handful of tomatoes growing and ripening. I'm going to enlist the husband in moving this whole wonky arrangement to the front yard where a little more sun might help the harvest.  He just loves it when I say, "I need your help with something..."  It almost always means heavy or awkward lifting of some kind, and three times more time commitment than I originally guarantee.  Because once he helps me with this, there's always something else to do.  :)

And the best task of all for today, harvesting something we can actually eat! Everyone's been waiting for me to finish blogging so that I can fix breakfast.  Arugula, I'm coming to get you.
 

Harvestable size. And succession planting success! If you look really close.

Here goes nothin!

I have planted a lot of seeds! My peas are already peeking out, and I'm crossing my fingers that I start seeing kale, spinach and lettuce in the next day or two. And I'll be honest, I planted several things that may be totally out of season, and I just decided what the heck. Let's find for ourselves why you don't plant carrots and sunflowers in the fall.

I'm checking out gardening and landscape books from the library again by the score. I see these beautiful containers overflowing with colorful veggies and herbs, and it's hard to imagine I could ever produce something like that.

One step at a time. Today my only steps:

1) trying to eradicate fire ants from our flower beds and the big container I want to put more snow peas in.

2) finding a way to raise my other large container off the ground so that it might actually drain.