Unlike most of my life when I don’t use my camera, I remembered that I had a firework setting on the fourth and actually used it. It’s pretty fun to take photos of fireworks because it is very easy to get a good picture.
We had a family reunion for my Dad’s parents on the fourth. It was a lot of fun with swimming, food, cousins I haven’t seen in years, and the great firework display. The next day we went to Seven Peaks and did even more swimming. It doesn’t get old when it is over 90 outside.
This park strip bed is mostly on my neighbor’s yard. My neighbors are getting old, and most of their landscape is taken care of by a variety of relatives and professionals. One such person tilled up the bed, and I knew I had to take immediate action. I went out and talked to them and volunteered to take over the bed, explaining some of what I had envisioned. It was readily agreed to, and I promptly mulched it in wood chips. I then took out my design hat and and brainstormed several directions the bed could take.
I took a trip to the garden center and ended up with a currently simple, but effective design. There are three grasses Calamagrostis ‘Avalanche'(Variegated Feather Reed Grass), Deschampsia ‘Schottland'(Scottish Tufted Hair Grass), and Helictotrichon ‘Sapphaire’ (Blue Oats), and a ground cover Oenothera “Shimmer” (Evening Primrose). I want to plant more in the bed, but decided I would start with a basic foundation and add more later after I see how these plants did. (It’s cheaper that way too.)
The garden is super easy to maintain–I hand water it twice a week right now, and it will need even less water later on. The only other task is weeding, which I do once a week with a winged weeder. The weeds were coming up pretty good because of all the tilling at first, but now its hardly any work at all. (I wouldn’t have tilled the bed first if I was in charge–I would have just done a light hoeing to get rid of the weeds.)
I like the bed mostly because it is the only part of my garden that isn’t a tree, something I don’t want, or an annual. Right now it’s a bit underdeveloped, but it’ll just keeping getting better as the plants grow in.
Sometimes I get discouraged with being a stay at home mom. The only person I am really accountable for what I do is myself…and God and my husband and children, but they tend to be more forgiving. I’m not very gentle or forgiving with myself, and sometimes I hold myself so accountable I spend the whole day beating myself down for not being perfect. Sometimes, I am a much worse mother than I ever thought I’d be. Motherhood brought more stress, lack of sleep and responsibility then I have ever dealt with before in my life, and it also brought coping/reactive mechanisms that are less than desirable.
Sometimes I am super happy I’m a stay at home. I get to choose what I do with more freedom than I ever have in my life. I can read books, go hiking, and garden and I get to share what I love with two very moldable people. I have more opportunities to go after what I love doing, improve myself, and serve other people. I have developed new interests, found friends, and most of all I get to be loved and love others more deeply than ever. I get to engage in a work that I know is meaningful every day, by nurturing and raising children.
Just a matter of perspective. I read in an article that a stay at home mother desired a child inclusive life, instead of a child centered one. If I constantly focus on my children, and our inadequacies, life isn’t grand. But if I’m focusing on a variety of interests, and I’m including my children in them, that’s when life is most beautiful. A good life is sitting outside and reading a new book while occasionally helping children move tires or acknowledging their latest sand building. It is going on a tiny hike and playing bear hunt on the way back down. 
I can choose to focus on what I’m supposed to be doing, on making life productive and perfect…or I can find playfulness and happiness in engaging in what my children and I love to do.
Apparently I was meant to mother boys. We have another one coming in December. The doctor was doing the ultrasound, and he stopped at one point and I looked at it and knew before he said anything that it was a boy. I was hoping a bit for a girl, but I’m not disappointing over another boy either. I love the ones I currently have so much, I don’t mind another.
These pictures are from a recent trip to Bear Lake that was a lot of fun. And my boys love sand. They are out playing in the sandbox for hours, and still adore beaches.
I decided to kill the grass again because giant volcanoes are fun.
The great idea of the day was to use baking soda and a tiny amount of water to make a moldable dough. The kids played with it for a while, and they we formed a volcano with it and added an entire contained of vinegar and killed off all the dinosaurs. And the grass underneath since plants don’t like concentrated vinegar. (It does grow back.)
We have an unexpected rooster. Legally, we are not allowed to have roosters, nor did we ever plan on keeping one. But now that he’s here…he beautiful, and actually one of the friendliest of the flock. It’s been fun seeing his crow change from what I first thought was my toddler crying to a pretty nice cockle-doodle-do. He actually has great timing to be our alarm clock in the morning. His fate is still undecided: butchering or giving away are both still options. But for now he can stay.
The chickens feeder and water got updated to this homemade version made out of 3″ PVC pipe. It’s been very easy to use and keep clean, and cost us about $20 in supplies.
Finally in chicken news: we got new chicks. They are are a fun batch that love to eat right out my hand.
The veggies are doing just fine. At the end of the cool season crops, I had some expected surprises.
Flowers. The yellow is broccoli raab and the purple is radish. Radish has a surprising pretty flower, and its nearly three feet tall. These particular plants never really bulbed up well, so the flowers were a good consolation prize.
That was a bit over a a week ago, and with increasing temperatures, my front garden is in need of a makeover. The heat is punishing the cool-season crops and aphids have moved in. But I want to get some seeds before I change it to a warm season garden, so it’ll look a bit bad for a while
The tomatoes are doing better than hoped for, and my zucchini was yet to die. The asparagus transplants that were almost dead when I planted them are bouncing back. And I’m now enjoying snap peas. I never pick enough to actually get them inside, they just make a delicious snack out in the garden.
Here are the tomatoes:
And just a week later:
I’ve use the cheap tomato cages before, and I’m always less then impressed. Tomatoes get too big for the cages quickly and I don’t find them extremely easy to use. Other tomato staking devices require too much money or too much work, like having to actually prune a tomato plant.
I grow 15+ tomato plants a year, and it requires an easy inexpensive staking solution. I’ve been doing this system for several years after seeing it on organic farm, and I love it. It’s easy and inexpensive. Here’s a look at my tomatoes, all staked up.
It’s simple. There are six foot tall t-posts on the end, with tape in between. I used two t-post for about 6-8 plants. After pounding in the t-posts, I tied off the tape and weaved it in between the tomatoes. In the past, I used twine but I’m liking the flexibility of the marking tape this year. (It’s not actually sticky tape and is found in the hardware story with other supplies like marking flags.) It does stretch a bit, so when the kiddie pool fell on top of my tomatoes I had to re-tighten the tape but it wasn’t a big deal.
As the season progresses, I’ll continue to add more levels of tape. If any tomato is especially floppy, I can use a small section of tape to tie it directly on to the bigger tape section. Since the tape is stretchy and soft, it’s not going to girdle my plants. I will have to monitor it because if it isn’t kept tight the tomatoes start to flop.
Material cost is very low, and the main materials (t-posts) will last for a long time. This year I had to upgrade/re-do the system, and the entire cost to stake 14 tomatoes was under $20. It’s easy to put in initially. It does take some work during the growing season, but I don’t find it excessive.
Shared in the HomeAcre hop.
This is Mr. C’s demolition of his breakfast.
Our brother-in-law gave us these blocks when they moved. PB loves them. One of many towers, this is a window tower according to the architect.
This kids are out in the sandbox all the time. I have sand all over my house, but I don’t mind too much.
