Money's worth - updates

Amazoy update: Back in May I got some Amazoy grass plugs to help crowd out the crabgrass and sundry other things I didn't really want in my front lawn. Someone left a comment wanting an update on it. There on the left you will see, well kind of, a plug that was planted. I don't see much of an difference in the yard, but "they" say that it could take up to 3 seasons to fill in and do its job. I am not a patient person, well mostly I am not. If I don't see SOMETHING happening then I get a bit frustrated. When the other grass and such grows up I can't tell where the plugs are, therefore, I assume it isn't growing. I am trying to give it the benefit of the doubt and assume as well that it will do what they praise it to do. Personally, I would prefer for them to outline the "bad" stuff so I know what to expect. Like, there is a lot of manual labor required and it can take up to 3 seasons (years) to grow in. Oh, well......

When you vegetable garden you will get your money's worth. I planted a 6 foot row of beans and have so far, including this mornings reaping, 4 messes of beans. To me a mess is enough to feed my family for one meal. My beans are not perfect, so if you come to my house there will be spots on them. Of course I get the bad spots off but they are imperfect in their appearance and they taste just as good as their insecticide treated counterparts. Also the seeds I planted were from last year if I am not mistaken, or I very well may have paid a whole dime for the packet.

The picture to your left shows my accidental cantaloupes. This morning I rescued the one you can barely see on the inside of the tripod holding the vine. It had grown slightly "into" the metal of the tripod and I had to pry a metal leaf back so to get it out. Hopefully it will be ok and fill out in the dents that had formed due to its placement. But hey, 2 melons for "free" is pretty good. I got my first head of broccoli this morning as well, not huge but it will be good I am sure. The roma tomatoes are coming out our ears and cucumbers out the wazoo. They sure are good. Alan was talking to me yesterday about canning them, lord I remember doing that with my mom as a kid - I do not look forward to it. It would be a shame to not preserve this bountiful harvest, because come January some home grown tomatoes in some home made sauce would be very nice!! And the renegade cherry and grape tomatoes are very good for breakfast when you venture out to check the garden!!

The day calls - Happy gardening to you all!!

What I learned the other day....

Weeding is something not many gardeners actually WANT to do. My mom used to make me weed as a kid, and it was awful. In the hot summer sun when the ground was hard and dry - I HATED IT!!

There are a few things I have learned about weeding since I have become an adult and a gardener. If you are an veteran gardener, thanks for stopping by, but you are gonna say, "duh" to this one. You should always weed after it rains, or after you water. "Why?" you may ask, well the duh answer to that is that the ground is soft and lets you get up all the roots. It is actually kind of fun, that sense of getting it all and how clean and neat things look afterward. Other than weeding right after the rain is the fact that there is a specific time in a weeds life that is best to pull them - seriously. Pulling them too early could take forever, pulling them too late can allow them to mess up some vegetation you actually want.

So, what I learned, or had reinforced was that you can't be lazy in parenting or gardening. You have to weed regularly, in both instances!! I have a small garden that I had last year and just delegated it to a couple of small crops, onions, kale, and taters. The other day I finally decided to go out and pull the waist high weeds from around the onions - unfortunately I had waited too long and there was only 1 onion to be found. The crabgrass and other sorted weeds had weeded them out!! What a shame on my lazy part!! So, weed regularly so you too don't weed out the good stuff.