April 12 2019

Today I planted the first seeds at home. After raking the side garden and reassembling the composter, I planted arugula seeds in the garden on the property line with Tammy. The garden looks better after pulling out the oak leaves that accumulated there over the winter. Since the composter is empty, I dumped quite a few of the oak leaves in the composter. I also set up the tomato boxes in the area near the Holly tree on the property line with Tammy. She did an monster trim on her formerly huge GoldSpot bush and azaleas along the fence line so I hope that the tomatoes will do well there. Should be at least 6 hours of sun there.
I emptied the flower boxes in the front of the house and replaced the coconut mat liners; I bought some potting soil from Merrifield garden center because I didn't feel like treking up to Costco . The bag I bought (32 quarts ) looks itty bitty compared with the Miracle Grow potting soil I normally get at Costco...the Merrifield brand was also way more expensive. While at Merrifield, i bought seed potatoes, shallots bulbs and onion sets as well as some more seeds...sunflower and peas. I am soaking the peas in order to plant them tomorrow. Hope to transplant the Fig tree (I think it's in a bad spot- not enough sun) . I did transplant a little bush from under the variegated holly tree by the garage and moved it along the property line with Tammy and put in a rhubarb plant I bought at Whole Foods this week to the bed close to the garage.
Tomorrow, I'll dig the hole for the fig and amend the soil with some perlite that I bought at Merrifield.  I hope that the tree will eventually fruit. Its been raining a nice gentle rain so I am hoping the transplants will do well.
Am going to stop at Nottoway tomorrow...the problem will be that there will be so much work there that I know I will focus on Nottoway to the detriment of  the herb and veg garden at home. I think the peas will go in here on Verdict Drive since the birds at Nottoway are masters at eating the pea seeds.  the last two years I have not had one successful pea plant at Nottoway. The birds perch in the trees and watch every move the gardeners make a la "The Birds"!

August 28

Amazed at the size of the sunflower-must be at least nine feet tall with the blossom about a foot across

The bees love it!

June 20th first day of summer

I watered today, and replenished the depleted rain barrel. The rain barrel holds 55 gallons. 

Our new next-door neighbor, Juanita , did a beautiful job enclosing plot 17 with a wire fence. The garden looks so much better than it had last week – the weeds are mostly gone and she has actually put in some plants!  I am so impressed – I think back on how long it took Ginny and Me to put up the fence around our plot, and the fence doesn't look so great! Oh well, so it goes.

 I sprayed for whitefly last week with the insecticidal soap I got fromMary-field  Garden center. The Man I asked for advice told me it would kill on contact, and he was right. I don't see any evidence of any eggs or nasty White stuff. Hopefully this will improve the-yield on the tomatoes and brussels sprouts. I guess I need to keep a supply of the insecticidal soap on hand in the event that I get re-infested.

I did harvest some garlic on Sunday, it is drying out in our garage.

Beautiful day, blue skies and white fluffy clouds. The day started out nice and cool but by the afternoon was in the 90s.

First fruits....what a surprise!

I was removing my cold weather covers on the potato seeds and discovered Mr Potato Head! What a surprise. 

Wednesday is for weeding

Popped over to Nottoway late this afternoon just to get away. The basement  floor was not installed  properly... They glued it rather than "clicked" it in and then ran out of tiles. The issue is that the flooring was ordered properly but  not  delivered properly Ed compared what we ordered to what was delivered and there was a one letter difference 

The plumber had to be cancelled    as well the tv  delivery because of the flooring usage. There is a huge box in our dining room with a toilet in it.

I weeded and de cluttered the  garden box....the weather is going to be cold this weekend so I don't want to plant stuff yet although many gardeners have planted cabbages and lettuces  

Potato day 3/28

Beautiful day- dug up the area to the left of the gate and set two cinder blocks from George Baker. I placed the rain barrel on the blocks and then poured about 4 gallons of water in the rain barrel

A slow start but at least a start

The water is turned on so tomorrow I will connect a hose and fill the barrel...the water will have a chance to warm up a bit 

I also dug a sort of trench for potatoes ---the directions said the trench should be a foot deep---and planted 8 Yukon gold and then covered the potatoes with leaf mulch and the miracle grow plant dirt

I covered the trench with plastic and the fabric from the hoop covers

The last frost is supposed to be April 10th so I'm being a bit hasty but I think that potatoes are early 

I didn't put in the shallots even though  I was tempted....I felt that the potatoes were enough of a risk.

The straw bales are still dormant....I need to really soak the bales to get the fertilizer into the interior of the bales

Perhaps I'll wet them down tomorrow and set up the soaker hose all will depend on the hose - such a pain in the neck to have to connect 120 or so  feet of hose 

Will take some pictures tomorrow

Hard to believe that its the end of our 4th year at Nottoway

Time does fly; we began the garden in July of 2011 and now its time to close things up for the 2015 summer. This year's close up is earlier than normal because of our impending Camino jaunt.
Have already stripped down some of the beans. This year the bean harvest was wonderful. So delicious and plentiful, hate to take the vines down.
My favorite recipe is to blanch the beans, sautee them and toss them with a lemon, toasted pine nuts, parsley, and freshly grated Parmesan cheese. I've been pleased with the tomato harvest, too. I have roasted the Roma and the grape/little ones at 200 degrees for 4 hours. The tomatoes taste like candy when warm. Have used them as a "condiment", too. Actually, I prefer to scoop up handfuls for a snack. The giant heirloom tomatoes were great- some yellow and dark red ones that were yummy with fresh mozzarella. For some reason I planted dark brown sunflowers rather than the traditional yellow ones. I think I wanted "short" ones and those were the only seeds available when I bought seeds.
I have been harvesting the sunflowers, too. They are pretty even though not as dramatic as the yellow ones. Last year I put in cone-flowers for the gold finches as well as some Stella D'oro day lilies for color and they had flourished. The rest of the harvest is problematic- lots of carrots and radishes at the beginning of the season. I loved the garlic and onions that were planted in the fall of 2014. However, I planted a bunch of beets but have yet to harvest them- just don't know what to do with them.   Last time I did beets, I swore I wouldn't plant them again but had delicious beets at the Greek restaurant in Tysons "Nostos" last winter and thought I'd try again- the issue isn't with planting the beets, its with cooking them.
Will head  over to Nottoway tomorrow  after dropping Carly off at the Metro to do some more clean up- it was very hot today. Did an almost 8 mile hike to Meadowlark gardens this morning- with a full pack. It was so humid and hot that I haven't done much since arriving home at noon. We were walking for 3 hours but ran into a couple from church ....Peggy and ? Thopmpson while walking on Meadowlark Drive. We ending up chatting for about 20 minutes about the WOD trail and the easement to Meadowlark. Apparently, there is going to be a path to Wolftrap so that one could walk to see concerts if one was a maniac. I guess we could drive to Meadowlark and park in a neighborhood and then walk.
This afternoon, I did spray paint the greek column I trash picked for my huge plant. It looks better with the sandstone spray paint finish than the gold with black antique finish. Ran out of spray paint at the same time I ran out of steam.