Just some pics from the garden I thought I would post:

Have a great day!

I thought I would post some pics of stuff here.

Here is my garden since I have pulled out everything that the 116-degree heat killed a few weekends ago. I am still growing lettuce, green beans, various kitchen herbs, and melon (no fruit yet tho):

Here is a pic of a bird taking a break on the patio. I swear he is panting! It was a very warm day:

Finally, here is a pic of my wishing well. I am on a mission to put gnomes in my garden. I love them!

Yesterday I baked my first loaf of yeast-rising bread. I always thought it was this huge deal; somehow more chemistry-like than it really is. It was incredibly easy and made even more simple with my mixer. It is just a plain ol’ loaf of white bread but it was very satsisfying to make. I am going to experiment more and try and make whole wheat bread, etc. To not have to buy bread would be flippin’ sweet! And to know that it is healthy and made with natural ingredients instead of added preservatives to make it shelf stable is a major bonus. There is too much junk in processed foods! I wanted to post pics but my bread was not exactly good looking enough to post pics of. I think it would be like D-rated food porn. Eeeewww. I might want to get a better digital camera so I can take nicer pics as well. I could reinstall Gimp on my pc to edit pics. Or learn Photoshop. As soon as I bake bread again I plan to post pics and directions.

Happy Birthday Lola!! We love you!!

My garden is depressing right now. I had taken pics a month ago but I lost them when my laptop had to be reconfigured. Between last month and the present my garden has gone to hell. It is like I live in the desert or something :). I am pulling out my zucchini plants and starting from seed. I should hopefully get a good harvest from them in the fall. I am pulling out the chinese cabbage as well and possibly the lettuce as it is struggling. The cilantro is biting it hard. I just assumed cilantro would grow well here. Apparently I assume wrong :). I am going to buy more sunflowers and see if that will help too. The basil is doing very well as are the green beans and various herbs.

I just started reading The 4-hour Work Week. So far it is an excellent read and I look forward to reviewing it here soon.

I thought I would post a pic of how the garden looks a month after I planted seeds. I have zucchini, various breeds of sunflowers to eventually shade the veggies, green beans, lettuce, chinese cabbage, and basil growing. The red leaf basil is not doing great but I am hoping as the temps even out it will flourish. The lavender I planted was a dud so I planted melon in its place and they are just starting to pop up.

 I also have several clay pots on the patio growing basil, chives, oregano, pattypan squash, carrots, and I forget what else. They are starting to sprout - yay!

Next week I hope to be back at work as Peanut is getting better. I have been sick all week as well so I am looking forward to feeling better here soon. Tomorrow we are having a community-wide yard sale so we are hoping to get rid of some stuff and make extra cash as well. The cool thing about our HOA is when they plan this biannual event, they do the advertising and, BONUS, we also have bins placed within our neighborhood so we can dump any trash, large bulky items, etc., without having to haul them to the dump ourselves.

Since yesterday was the first day of Spring, I decided to finally plant seeds in the garden. I was trying to wait for the last winter storm to blow through earlier this week- I hope I am not too late. I planted various types of sunflowers including Double Dandy, Tangina, Bashful, and a cutting mix blend. I can’t wait to see the Tangina as they are orange; I should be growing red sunflowers too. I also planted zucchini, bush beans, lavender, Chinese cabbage, lettuce, and a red basil. I can’t wait to see it all in bloom! Last week I bought over 15 planters at a garage sale and plan to grow flowers and succulents in those as well. A couple of weekends ago I scored at a garage sale and bought all the flagstone you see in the picture for $20! I am putting in solar lights for the pathway. The garden boxes are 8′ x 4′ each and filled with compost. In between the garden boxes is a path Peanut and I made from various rocks and pebbles. We had fun hauling the wagon back and forth the to the wash to get flat rocks :). I hope to keep adding to the garden and make it a place I enjoy.

It sure does look a lot different from last year, my first garden:

I will post more pictures as the garden grows but here is how it looks now:

This past weekend we started working on the garden. Yay! Slack and I assembled two garden boxes, each one is 8′ x 4′. He sooo ROCKS btw ;). We bought untreated birch and then I used linseed oil to protect them. I hope it works! It will be an experiment to see how well they hold up in the heat and rain. It cost about $40 for the wood and I had linseed oil stored in the garage. I also ordered my seeds yesterday from Burpee and Seeds of Change. That cost another $40. It seems like a lot to pay for seeds but after buying organic and paying for shipping it adds up fast. I also have to get compost to fill the boxes. They are 12″ deep so I will need quite a few bags. I am not going to buy soil as I am going to use the soil underneath that I used last year and sow directly into the compost. I bought seeds for lavender, three types of sunflowers, Chinese cabbage, green beans (bush-type), zucchini, basil, and a lettuce blend. I would like to also buy pepper plants and marigolds. I plan on planting the flowers in with the vegetables to get the benefits of companion planting: pest deterrent, shade for plants that need it, etc.

In order to supplement the small bounty of my future garden, I was thinking that I would like to join a community supported agriculture initiative. Sounds fancy and/or complicated, but it seems to be quite simple. Basically, a person/family can opt in and buy a share from a local farm for a season. This not only supports local agriculture, but a person is also able to get fresh, pesticide-free produce. You are supporting farm workers being paid a fair wage and medical benefits as well. Once a week, I would go downtown and pick up my produce. The only negative is that you have to pay for a season up front, which is a full 12 weeks. However, it is less expensive than buying produce from the grocery stores and a whole heck of a lot more benefits to doing so.

There is a local CSA here in Tucson and I have anxiously joined the waiting list in hopes to get in on the next season.

The link is here if you are interested in this great concept : http://www.tucsoncsa.org

Has anyone ever participated in a CSA? Opinions?

I know it is early in the season, as in it is still winter, but I am already planning my garden for the spring. Step #1 is to get the garden set up as a raised bed. In order to do this, I need to build a container out of non-treated wood (for the garden to remain organic). I was thinking of buying 2″ x 12″ pieces of wood in order to allow for deep root growth of vegetables. I guess I will need brackets, too, on the corners….Help! Anyone have any ideas, suggestions, advice? Oh, I did Google “raised garden beds” and came across this helpful site that has directions: http://gardenstogro.com/raised-beds.php?gclid=CNmOu4yq1JACFQSOFQoddl0UWQ

I plan on buying my seeds from Burpee . I bought some seeds online from them last year and was pleased with their quality. You can buy their seeds from Target as I am sure other local places as well. I would like to grow flowers and vegetables this year. Definitely sweet peppers, basil, sunflowers, and tomatoes. I would like to grow napa cabbage as well. As for flowers, I am not sure exactly what I want to plant yet. I do want them to be hardy and low maintenance. Any ideas, suggestions, advice would be welcome here as well.

Mom H. bought me a great book for my birthday called Extreme Gardening. I know I just need to crack that open and I will get tons of useful advice for gardening in the desert. I think the thing that is intimidating me the most right now is building the container for the garden. Which, of course, is the first thing I need to do to get started on this venture. I think the only thing I have ever made out of wood was a coyote shaped napkin holder in junior high shop class.

Oh, and I would love to make Peanut a sandbox too while I am at it We will see….

Ok, so I have been neglecting my garden as of late due to plain laziness and the fact it is still so flippin’ hot outside! I went out back to do some maintenance on the garden and lo and behold, I found the biggest zuke I have seen outside of any county fair! The thing is at least 15 inches long! I tried to weigh it on my kitchen scale but it gave an error because the zucchini apparently weighs more than the 5 pound scale limit! ROFL! I have a great picture of Peanut holding the zucchini but I am weary to post his face on the good ol’ World Wide Web. So, instead, you will have to look at this pic of my very white leg and foot alongside the zucchini for comparison. Mind you, I do not have small feet!

Right now the zuke is chilling in the fridge taking up all the space in the veggie compartment. I am not sure what I will do with it all. Zucchini does not have a lot of flavor to begin with and I imagine this one will be even less so due to its size. I might shred it all and use it for quick breads….