Garden for two

This is my garden. It's on the side of my house. It looks dry in the picture, but I'd already watered it. The high today is 93. I should probably water it before I leave for work this morning.

Tomatoes and potatoes are in the back rows. Peppers, broccoli, cucumbers and egg plants are in the next rows. Lettuce, spinach, squash, and brussel sprouts are in the front row.

It's a nice size garden for two people.
Right now, my favorites thing in the garden is the lettuce. I like it because it grows fast, started from seed and tastes yummy. Obviously it's not big enough for salad yet, but I've been able to pick a little leaf here and there to taste.

Everything else that I started from seed moves much slower. The large plants from nurseries are much further along but the "I did that" feeling just isn't there. I mean I guess I could say, "I replanted that," but it's not the same.

I don't want to rush my garden. Good things come with time.

A Summery Memorial Day

It's a beautiful day in Indianapolis. Birds are chirping, bees are buzzing, people are outside mowing their lawns. I've been in my garden on and off all day. My plants are looking better since the weather shaped up and the sun has finally come out again.

I planted some additional plants. My cucumbers never sprouted (from seeds). I replaced them with four starter plants. I also added in a couple of varieties of egg plants and one artichoke. I don't think artichoke grow in Indiana, but they are one of my favorites so I figure it won't hurt to try.

I also planted some herbs in pots in the back yard near the grill so we can not only eat fresh, but season fresh as well.

I picked out some sweet basil, which I also grow year round inside, some spicy round basil, which I've never tried, cap nip for the cats, oregano, parsley and rosemary.

I'm making an effort to take pictures and record my trials and successes so that next year it will be much easier. We'll see.

Happy Memorial Day, and happy summer!

Rain, rain, go away

I'll be honest. I haven't been out to check on my garden in a few days. It's been raining almost all day everyday, especially in the evenings when I'm home. That's not to say no one's peeked at it. Alex goes out every couple of evenings to make sure it's sufficiently watered.

I hope my plants are getting enough sunlight to grow and not so much water they are drowning.

I bet my strawberries are getting big.

One side of me is trying not to look every single day, at least not in the beginning because it's sad to see so little progress. On the same note, I want to look every day to make sure we don't have any over zealous birds or squirrels taking over. We're lucky, I've never seen a rabbit in our neighborhood. I honestly thought maybe they just didn't live in the city, but I saw one at a friend's house on Tuesday. Who new.

A funny story: Once upon a time, I lived in Lubbcok Texas, home of Texas Tech University. The west Texas city, is DRY. In fact, dust storms were a regular occurrence and tumbleweed would blow through my apartment complex (which was on 4th street about one block from the busiest road in town and one block from the sprawling campus). In other words I didn't live in the middle of no where. So one Saturday morning, I decided to take a little run. I headed toward campus and ran by this museum that sat on a few acres of land. You might call it a park I guess. Anyway, at this point in my Texas life other than a few skinny squirrels and an occasional road kills armadillo I hadn't seem much wildlife, but on this particular day, while I was running I was shocked and startled when a pair of GIANT ears lunged toward me. After the initial shock of what I thought I had seen, I realized that it was a rabbit. A tiny sweet bunny with huge ears. It was a jack rabbit. Looking around, there were probably hundreds in this park. They were the most bizarre looking creatures.

On the left, a Texas jackrabbit, on the right, an Indiana bunny rabbit. You can see my concern.
When those GIANT ears popped up at me.

Shaking up the morning routine

Do you have a morning routine? It something that you have been doing for years? Mine is so predictable that even on the weekends when I sleep late it it's virtually the same.

I wake up, stumble into the bathroom and put in my contacts so that I can see more than 20 feet in front of me. Depending on the day, I shower or wash my face and head to the kitchen. I fix breakfast and pour my coffee and sit down in front of the computer to check my e-mail, Google reader and facebook. I normally do a little financial juggling or checkbook balancing. Then I get up, finish getting ready and head out to work, or on the weekends out to get whatever it is I'm doing that day started.

The thing it, I think I want to change my routine. I would like to blog in the mornings, like I'm doing today, but I struggle to find the time. I'd also like to get more cleaning done in the mornings. I used to be able to do that all time and it was so nice to go into work knowing that the floor had been swept and the dishes put away.

It's especially important as the summer rolls in that I get more done in the mornings so that I can spend my evenings in the garden or in the kitchen.

I'll keep you posted.

Surviving the Hail Storm

My garden survived the weekend's hail storm. I'm grateful that there were no tornadoes, and greatful that we didn't lose any giant limbs. Sunday, we had hail. It was large. It was probably only pea-sized, but we had so much of it. I sat out on the front porch for a few minutes and watched it fall.

Down day. Probably the weather.

I'm feeling kind of down today. A little blue. It's probably the weather. It was so nice last week and now it's chilly again and rainy.

I'm reading the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. I'm only about 50 pages in. The author is talking about the loss of plant species due to the agribusiness modification and single plant farms. I was almost in tears. Maybe I'm an emotional person sometimes, but that isn't something that would make me, in a normal state of mind, cry. Maybe we'll see the sun shine again soon. My garden will thrive and I'll help keep some great plants alive.

From HOT to cold

Last week it was hot. I think I mentioned that before. It was so hot that I almost turned on the A/C. This week it's cold. A cold front blew in Saturday night, along with some rain, which I decided to walk through, twice. I got go chilled that I slept in sock on Saturday night. Yesterday, when I was at home, I wore sweatpants and covered up with a blanket on the couch. It shouldn't frost this late in the year, but I'm praying that it won't. Praying and checking the weather channel. My mom recommended covering my beautiful baby plants with a sheet if a frost warning is in effect.

My lettuce has sprung up! I have two beautiful rows of lettuce. I can't wait to make a giant salad. I also have some tiny cucumber sprouts shooting up from the ground. It won't be long until the ground is covered in green again.

Scary Browning Tomoto Plants

Okay. So they aren't brown. They are more a greenish yellow. It's making me nervous.

Hopefully they'll snap out of it, turn back to bright green and grow some giant red tomatoes. Hopefully.

Morning Watering

This morning, I took some time to water my freshly planted garden.It's hard for me to find time in my mornings sometimes, but I'm especially determined to make this garden grow and flourish.

It's hot in Indiana for May. Near record high temperatures. It's 83 degrees outside right now, and will probably get hotter before the days end. Like most of the midwest and south, we've had an unusually wet spring. Around here, though, we experience flash flooding, not steady rainfall. The ground is drying quickly.

In our household, we make the effort to only use the air-conditioner in the months of June, July, August, and September (and only on truly hot days during those months). It's rough sleeping at night right now. We have to keep out windows closed at night. It's a loud side of town, and while I feel pretty safe, I would prefer to limit access by potential home invaders.

Garden Basics

I started my garden yesterday. It's an urban garden. Well I live in the city. Not downtown, but inside the bypass.

My garden is in my side yard. It's technically my front yard based on our address. The garden is three rows. They are 10 feet by 3.5 feet. I started tomatoes, sweet peppers, and hot peppers inside about a month ago. I planted onions, lettuce, spinach, and carrots from seeds. I planted whole potatoes. I picked up big tomato plants, broccoli, brussel sprouts, and zucchini from the nursery. I also planted some strawberries in a hanging pot.

It should be just enough to keep me busy, but not too much to handle.

Wish me luck with my garden!