Saturday 9-10-11

Spent an hour at the garden, did a little weeding. Its amazing how quickly weeds grow- hopefully our vegetables will experience the same miraclous growth next season. The peas have sprouted- not all the seeds germinated. The plants are about two inches high and I pulled the three inch high weeds that surrounded them.

Helped the Plot 21 ladies look for some lost keys. We laughed when they discovered that the lady with no teeth and no English had inadvertantly hung the keys (with a dark blue lanyard) on the dark green fence post in the front corner of our garden. How they found them, I don't know but the three of us had a good laugh.
The weather last week was miserable. Heavy rains from Hurrican Lee lasted for days.A twelve year old boy who lived 1/2 mile away was a fatality of the flooding. He lived on Marcliff Court- the same street as the Kane family and was last seen in his back yard- apparently swept up in a tributary of Difficult Run. Hard to believe- his body washed up on Lawyers Road.

 I was supposed to sub on Friday (going to use the money for fencing for the garden) but school was cancelled because of the flooding. I'll work tomorrow so I'll have some fence money.

Tuesday August 30th

Busy day; purchased landscape timbers at Home Depot by Rte 29 and West Ox. They had a large choice and people to help with not only decisions but also carrying the "stuff". I may have gone over board but purchased 6 4 by 4 by 8 feet timbers and had them cut two of the timbers in half. Eight feet is longest that will fit in the car (Ed's car). I left the stuff in the garden and admired Ginny's progress.
Ginny excavated the middle path- she does nice work. It looks great.
Ireturned in the afternoon, about 4pm with some more wood chips and some cardboard. I worked on the Bob and Noel side bed where I planted the peas. I cleaned up the edging by using two of the long timbers fromLeslie. I redistributed the soil a little so it looks like a garden bed. Some of the peas leaves are shooting up thru the soil- quiet excitement.
Met Craig- Leslie's husband. We chatted a little and he told me that Leslie is in San Diego b/c her mother is ill. He said they have really enjoyed the garden this year and what a pleasure it is to eat produce from their garden. He gave me a Hablano pepper- almost afraid to touch it b/c I know how hot they are. However, the unbelievable taste of Vivian and Fernando's spring onions yesterday helped me be excited about the gift of the papper. Last night's dinner was so good- potatoes, parsley  from our garden, the onion from Nottoway and the spicy chicken sausages in oil and vinegar were excellent. I adapted a recipe from Silver Palate- French Potatoe Salad.
Am going to Pennsylvania tomorrow to visit my mother so won't be able to go to the garden. Am eager to work on the fence and the beds. Also interested in looking at the peas. I think that as they get bigger we'll need to fence in the area.

August 26th

Yesterday I hurried over to the garden beyween the rain storms. I gathered up the tarps because we decided to pull them in advance of the impending Hurricane Irene. I had soaked a packet of pea seeds and planted them along the border of Bob and Noel's garden. I decided that, while the timing is not optimal, I'd have to discard the seeds if I did not plant them so I went ahead and pulled some little weeds and planted a double row of peas. I placed the little green screening over the row to keep the squirrels out. I bought two packs of peas in the spring and planted the first pack in my yard in April .  Wednesday I started to soak the second pack in hopes of a sunny Thursday.

Amazing how muddy one can get in a very short time.

 I hung the tarps in my back yard  to dry out so I can pack them away until they are needed again. I went to Home Depot on Wednesday to purchase wood for the raised beds  but could only see pressure treated wood. Have to consult with Ginny.

August 25th
Yesterday, celebrated my birthday at the Garden with Ginny. We had a wonderful time; she brought her oriental rug from her living room, a table with a vase of flowers from her garden and we dined in luxury. We rolled back the tarps and sat on beach chairs facing the woods and watched the clouds sail across the blue sky. No one was gardening so it was as if we were alone in the garden. The afternoon will be a cherished memory. 

August 23th

Tuesday
Arrived a little after 7:30 am. Pulled up the tarps and draped them over the fence to dry them out. The plot looks GREAT. Worked on the final perimeter path for a bit and then Ginny arrived. We worked together and finished the path- Ginny is getting more wood chips to finish up the path. It looks like a garden without the tarps. We walked around the gardens to get an idea of how big/small to make the raised beds. I think that we are going to build one 4 feet by 8 feet raised bed  and then place it around the space to see how many we want. At this point, it seems that we need 8 of the 4 by 8 feet beds with 2 smalled raised beds set on the diagonal in the center of the plot (or wherever our chairs go) We also sketched out the placement of the gate. We replaced the tarps and left about 10 am. Time goes by so fast- I thought it was about 9 am.
Returned with Anne about noon for a a walk- met the next door neighbor "Bob and Noel" with their son Landon- he looks about 18 months old. Bob said they've had the plot about 3 years and their plot looked as bad as ours did when they started. He said they have yet to harvest anything this year because of the deer and the fact that they are expecting anew baby.  Bob said they had tons of stuff last year. He likes the black tape woven into the top of their fence. He says its permeated with Deer Liquid Fence and repels deer. He sugested that we put up a 6 foot high fence rather than the 3 foot fence they have.I asked him about their neighbor Plot 18 and he said she has the plot rototilled at the beginning of each season but doesn't plant anything and the plot is overgrown. Anne and I walked around and looked for pumpkins.
As I arrived home and was about to put the  key in to open the front door, the house started to shake- sort of vibrate- I looked up and could see the windows shivering. Poor Charlie was inside barking and I could hear glass shaking. I turned around and ran down to the sidewalk as soon as I realized it was an earthquake.

Saturday August 20th

Ginny finished the path adjacent to plot 23: looks great. Cleared off the remaining dried up weeds from the plot and worked on the final border path. It is a bit more difficult to get the lines straight- Ed helped dig and made a few trips to get wood chips. I think that I rushed in laying out the path guide lines because I did not want him to wait. I am eager to finish the border paths so we can begin the raised beds and fence but might have to redo some of the stuff I did today because it isn't right. The lines were crooked because of the humps of dirt and still living ( although almost dead) stuff  growing on the plot 23 side. I think that plot 23 is part of the Plot 21 ladies because when they cleaned up stuff along the plot fence, I saw that plot 23 is FILLED with peppers- a trade mark of the plot 21 ladies.
Worked about 90 minutes in the afternoon- it was very humid and I was muddy and sweaty because of all of the rain from last night's deluge. The rain collects on the tarps and picking up the dried up weeds was a smelly and dirty job.
While I enjoyed visiting with my sister and helping Carly get ready for school, I have missed working in the garden and was happy to be working again..

Rain

Saturday August 12th

Cool but humid this morning with rain in the air; perfect day for work in the garden. Arrived about 10 am and met Fernando and Vivian of the Blueberry bush gardens. They also have another garden and both are in great shape. Vivian told me that she is glad we are working the garden ---that it has been years that our plot has been empty--- the one that is catty cormer from ours - the one full of weeds- Vivian said has been unworked for over a year. They showed me their plots and we discussed fences and deer and stink bugs. They said they lost a lot of veg b/c of the stink bugs. 

Vivian suggested that we look at garden #5 which belongs to an architect. She likes the fence and thought we might want to look at it for ideas. As I was spreading wood chips along the path that Ginny dug , Ginny arrived and we trotted off to look at garden #5. The fence has   aluminum poles about 6 or 7 feet high and wire tied to the posts. The fence door was a anchor fence type of metal door. While it was nice, it did have a Stalag 15 feel about it. Ginny mentioned lattice gates and an arbor over the entranceway and I think that I prefer her idea that is, a less institutional look to the fence. Deer got into the next door plot and ate the sunflower plants.  Vivian said we’ll need to build a high fence not only in the outside edges but also on the interior edge since our adjoining neighbor has 3 feet high fences.

Ginny and I chatted awhile about how being negative and judgmental are habits and how understanding that is a drag because one can’t blame one’s personality for being judgmental and critical. Unfortunately, its all under one’s control…so much easier to be able to attribute being judgmental to a genetic flaw. Despite the resolve to be less judgmental, I did wire the composter to the wire fence. Just am afraid that someone will be tempted to take it.

Made a second wood chip run and dug up some pink coneflower plants. Dumped the chips, replnted the plants and met Leslie (Lindsey?) who has a garden adjacent to the Plot 21 ladies. She is very nice and told me she is the source of the  wood boards. She said she got them from the dump and thought we might be able to use them. They were from a deck that was being discarded. She said while they don’t like people trash picking at the Fairfax County dump, if one is quick , it’s possible to get stuff that is usable for the garden.

She is a first year gardener and told me that someone came in during April  and stripped  her plot of the fence and a  row of rose bushes that were left from the prior owner. I suggested that perhaps it was the former owner and she said “no, the prior owner had died”. She said she thought it was another gardener and she shrugged and said “what are you going to do about that stuff?” 
All of my judgmental reflexes sprung into action and I was glad I wired the composter.

Leslie said she laid down landscape cloth and used a lot of leaf mulch and has not had to water much at all. She has beautiful eggplants and said she just planted some brussel sprouts.  She was so excited about her tomoato harvest and said “Here, take this” and gave me a huge tomato- it looks as if it weighs 3 lbs! At that point, we heard thunder and scurried off to pick up our stuff. I finished the wood chips and loaded up the car and left- she said she was going to see it she could wait it out. The rain will be good for the coneflowers I just planted around the composter.   Left about 1pm.

August 11th

On Tuesday, Anne and Carly came with me and Ed to see the garden. They were surprised at the size of it and we walked around and looked at the other gardens (especially the Plot 21 ladies' gardens). Went over this afternoon because it was so nice outside- in the 80's and low humidity.

Today, worked on the path a little bit-about 90 minutes - have rounded the corner with the wood chips and used the twine to mark the rest of the path along the length of the plot.  It was so pretty, there was a little breeze and some shade it the corner where I worked. 

Hopefully, I will be able to go over tomorrow morning and put the composter in the corner with the tree stump.

August 5th

Worked on the garden for a bit today; took a few bins of woodchips for a path. The weather was great, not too hot or humid.Just as I was thinking about leaving, Ginny arrived so we worked together a little bit longer. The path is about two feet wide and a foot in from the front fence. I dug down about six inches and pulled out all the mint roots and a load of little quartz rocks. Its interesting only quartz rocks....makes me wonder if someone used quartz to line a flower bed.
I'll have to consult with Giinny but I think that we should name our paths. This first one could be "Mint Path" or taking a leaf from the novel Elizabeth and her German garden:"August Path".
 We tossed the pile of weeds on to the the tarps. Hopfully, they will dry out because they're pretty soggy and slimey. One of the Plot 21 ladies (formerly known as the Korean ladies) stopped by and said "nice".   Since their  gardens look great I was very happy with the comment.

August 4th

Got off to a relatively late start and arrived at the Garden about 9 am. Ginny was already there. We worked for about 90 minutes. Met the gardener with the beautiful rose trellis gateway- a man named Dustka (?sp) He stopped his car and came over to chat- at first it was a little odd b/c neither Ginny nor I knew that he had a garden- He was very pleasant, said he had been at Nottoway about three years. He stayed and chatted for a while. At one point, when we mentioned that the garden had poison ivy, he mentioned that he didn't know what poison ivy looked like,  that he was from another country. I asked what country and he said Iraq- but that he was from Northern Iraq and that he was a Kurd. He asked if we knew what a Kurd was and luckily we did know. He noted that he regretted that he put so much stuff in this year- hard to walk around the garden. He believes that the best way to figure out what to do is to walk around and look at successful gardens; he said he just got tomato seeds from another gardener who has beautful  tomato plants.
Another gardener (plot 15) Melissa stopped by and said hello. She's been there about 5 years. She said the stink bugs were bad this year and she thinks that her beans were lousy on account of them. When we mentioned the weeds, Melissa said that she was glad that our plot was cleaned up. She said she knew that there was a long wait list and it was good that someone was taking care of the garden. I asked her how long it had been untended- on account of the height of the weeds- and she said that she saw a woman working on the garden at the beginning of last year.
The front of the garden is almost  fenced---looks a bit more finished with a fence up. Dustka said the fence should be more than 6 feet on account of the deer. At this point ours is three feet high. He said most people have higher fences than the maximum detailed in the rules- he said rabbits are an issue, too. I guess we'll have to put in a bottom barrier to prevent rabbits and a higher border to prevent deer. Saw a little black mouse when I moved the tarps ( I wanted to get rid of the standing water---it was getting stinky).
Ginny is getting more fence poles and wire. The green wire from the back yard was not long enough for the 20 foot front.

8 -2-11

Ginny and I planned our next step- putting up a fence and using the boards that someone left on our plot. Since we don't know their origin ( whether or not they have chemical preservatives), we decided to use them for the flower beds around the front of the garden. Decided to put in high raised beds and planned out the paths and the gate placement.
We also met today at 7:45 pm to put up the front fence.  There are lots of rocks along the front edge but we pounded in three stakes for the fence. Unfortunately, the stakes are not lined up with the stake that marks the front corner.
Put the extra stakes behind the roll of weeds and called it a night after about 75 minutes. It was very humid and it was getting dark. Next time, I'll bring some of the leftover spray paint to draw a line for the fence, the presence of the rocks and lack of a line caused us to extend the fience beyond the plot line.
The Farm  looks so much better than it did 10 days ago. Hopefully, we'll be able to put some plants and veg in for the Fall.
Fun doing the planning with Ginny; we had a good laugh about where the adirondack chairs will go. I like her priorities.

Monday August 1st

Arrived at the garden about 7:30 am. It faces north east but the line of tall trees block the sunlight and the garden is in light shade at that time in the morning. SeveralKorean ladies were buslting about...all in long pants and long sleeve shirts and caps.They were not working in the plot across from ours but in two of the ones they have across from plot 21. We chatted and they asked me how our plot was going.I admired their work and the number of hot peppers they have. The taller one with the shower cap on her head, told me that they make Kim Chi with the peppers and wanted to know if I knew what Kim Chi was. I told her I knew Kim Chi but had to admit when she then asked thatI did not enjoy it because it is too hot for my taste. I told her that my husband liked it and she said that she guessed that some people eat store bought Kim Chi.
Worked for 90 minutes, raking up stuff and moving the tarps so they now cover almost the entire plot. Some of the area I raked had been under the tarp for almost a week and it looked great...almost completely cleared of vegetation. I "rolled" the dried up weeds into an area facing the driveway...it almost looks like a big bale of hay. The roll is probably up to my shoulder. I restrung the twine in a fence type thing around the outer boundaries of the "farm" . I think it looks better with some sort of outline around the tarps.
As I was packing up stuff, another Korean Lady came by and told me it looked good but I need to get rid of the tarps and water the ground so I can pull up the remaining weeds. I agreed and said next time.
I have decided that gardeners love to give advice and I am just going to agree with everyone. I think it will improve my Agreeability index and decrease my propensity to give advice and be bossy. Ginny brought over several long pieces of wood that look beautiful for fencing in the "farm". 
I left after 9am and the plot was in full sunlight.

Saturday July 29th

Worked on the garden a little today…almost finished clearing the plot which I found surprisingly satisfying. At first, cutting the weeds down seemed overwhelming but then  I discovered, there aren’t a lot of weeds as one moves toward the far edge of the garden, just big ones. It became easier. That is, I’d cut the base of a big weed and pull it up and all the little weeds that had twined around the bigger weed would come up too. Didn’t bring the camera today –will take a picture before I start to work next time to document my efforts. Am enjoying working outside.   The plot is almost cleared and looks smaller than it did when full of weeds. I think one or two more work sessions will finish up the inital weeding. I guess the next step will be bagging all the dried up weeds. Filled another large bag with dried weeds I pulled earlier in the week. The ones I pulled on Thursday were still green and fresh despite yesterday's high heat. I spread them around a bit so that the sun and heat will dry them out faster. So far I've bagged two 30 gallon bags with pulled weeds and think that I'll have another three or four bags worth once the just pulled weeds dry out. Keep expecting to find a snake or some dead scarey thing under all the brush.

Thursday July 28th
Decided to work on the garden today because it is supposed to be hot and humid tomorrow. I took pictures of the work I did yesterday and today. The plastic tarps I bought are 10 feet by 25 feet and I estimate that I covered 20 feet by 20 feet based on the tarps although it looks as if the remaining uncleared lot is more than 10 feet.
 After I finish clearing the rest of the weeds, I'll re-orient the tarps so that the newest cleared ground will be covered. Then   we can decide on the fence etc. In working today, I found several rusted tomato cages and sensed that the prior renters had used mounded earth to plant rather than either flat or raised beds. Will be interesting to see what the ground actually looks like under all that stuff.

Wednesday

It is a beautiful day; sunny but low humidity and when my plans for the day were cancelled I decided to continue the weed attack. After today's effort,  I estimate that about 1/3 of the Farm is denuded of weeds and covered with thick black plastic. I used landscape "staples" to anchor the plastic tarp, so much easier then finding bits of rocks and bricks. I just piled up the pulled weeds on top of the plastic- not an attractive look but it will be easier to dispose of the weeds when they wilt.
Met the owner/renter of the next plot over. She was difficult to understand because at first I thought she was speaking Korean but then I understood some words. Her plot looks GREAT- she said it was her first year with that plot  but she has SIX  plots at Nottoway. She told me that I was wasting my time and I should wait until the spring to clean up. I laughed and said I was so happy to have the plot that I didn't want to wait. Then she asked me what I could plant this late in the year and shrugged when I told her I wanted to clean up the plot, build raised beds and put up a fence so I would be ready for next year. She nodded so I guess my explanation met her approval.
A little later, a man about my age (or a little older) introduced himself as "Mark". He showed me his plot- also his first year- it is around the corner away from the Hunter House. He also showed me the "trick" with the spigot. (You have to wedge a piece of wood or something into the lever device to keep the water running) He said he couldn't figure it out  and had to ask someone...definitely not obvious and I was happy that he volunteered the information. He also filled me in on the adjacent plot that looks abandoned. The owner/renter is pregnant and not up to working in the hot weather. She has some tomatoes but nothing else. While there are weeds, her weeds are nothing compared to those on our plot. So far, we are Queen of the Weeds- no one else even comes close to our weeds.
Mark was a fount of information about what rules are not enforced (dumping garden debris into the nearby woods) and what a pain it is to get water for the gardens. He has a rain barrel and fills it with water when he uses the hose. Next time he waters, Mark uses the water from the rain barrel. He said most people do that b/c the water is such a hassle.I asked about mosquitoes with open water and he said most people put screens on top of the sitting water. Mark also told me that the Korean lady with the six gardens has at least twenty pepper plants and he was ticked that he had to wait 4 years for a garden and she has six gardens. Mark said she brings groups of people to work her plots and probably uses other peoples' names to get around the restriction of one plot per person. Hmmm, always a scandal even in paradise. Had a great day and enjoyed myself with the work.

July 22, 2011

July 20, 2011

Spent an hour with Ginny working on the garden. We measured it- about 20 feet by 30 feet and full of weeds. Took some before pictures because the space is so overgrown with weeds.I think it is good to have a record of what it looked like before we began our work. Some of the weeds are over our heads. The heat and humidity were such that after an hour we packed up. Before we left we took some pictures to record our efforts. Fairly depressing but we estimate that we "did" about 1/10 of the width. Loaded up the Subbie with a bag of sweet smelling mint and weeds. We left the other bag on the plot b/c there wasn't room in the car. Poison ivy is in the plot so we have to be careful. Who knows what else we'll find when we go back. My face hurt from sweating so much because of the humidity.