Springtime

Well, looks like I've reverted to monthly blog updates. Although technically, we manage three blogs, so if you count all of them together, it's a bit more often than that. :)

So here's April's update on this blog...

The weather here has been unusually cool, then warm, then near freezing, then hot, all of which has resulted in our shrubs and plants getting very confused.

Speaking of plants. We went a little nutso this past month. We were already in the middle of building some gigantic bookshelves for our DVDs. But after my generous mother gave us some free tomato plants, we decided rather last minute, "Well, let's just build a planter box and start a garden." I think I naively answered, "Sure, how hard can it be?"

Well let me tell you, gardening is an art. A skill. Heck, it's a major at some universities. But my wonderful husband is a pro at mastering new hobbies and trades. So he learned all about a particular kind of gardening, called square foot gardening, which is exactly what it sounds like: you build a planter box so that you can section off square foot imaginary boxes and plant within those boundaries. Each plant has different space requirements, but usually you can plant one type in one square foot. So, we built a 2-foot x 8-foot planter box that is sub-irrigated so that we don't have to water it ourselves every day. Within that total square footage, we were able to plant: two cucumber plants, yellow squash, two tomato plants, two watermelon plants, red and green bell peppers, basil, thyme, eggplant, and green beans. We've encountered some snares throughout the building process, but we know it will be worth it in the end when we're munching on delicious garden fresh food.

The rest of the updates are included as photo captions. Hope you all are enjoying springtime!

Making sure we were always working hard
















Ginger helping hold down the tarp :)






Fred was a huge help


This is pretty much how we felt at the end of the day


Abby-Mommy time is my favorite


We picked some roses from our front yard for the Easter centerpiece


One day, our drier just plumb stopped heating. The power worked, the tube spun, but it wasn't getting warm at all, which is pretty useless for drying clothes. My handy hubby to the rescue, diagnosing the problem!

Who would have thought that such a small part was so crucial to the heating process?!