Well then reality set in and slapped us across the face with below freezing temperatures in the last week and even about 10 minutes worth of snow! We went from shorts and t-shirts in March to winter coats in April. Welcome to Midwestern weather. That being said I’ve got a jump start on the season with my peas, broccoli, and lettuce already in the ground. I’m hoping that the few frosts we’ve seen won’t kill them off, but we shall see. My Asparagus has already come back from last year and is around 3 feet tall right now (I’m still not harvesting this year). Yesterday I even saw some strawberry blossoms coming out. It’s an odd season as I’m out inspecting my garden with a heavy coat on, and can see my breath. Weird, but we’ll see what happens.

Until it’s warm enough to completely open up the garden, I’m focusing my efforts indoors. We’re redoing our kitchen, and dining room right now, with tile in the guest bath planned soon after. All of that combined with a new baby, a million projects to do, and multiple trips to plan and it’s going to be a crazy summer!

The Dad

The Dad

There’s about 50 peppers there give or take. That puts our count for the summer at well over 100 peppers from 12 plants in a 32 square foot area. Not too bad of a use for wasted lawn space in my opinion.

Pumpkin growing is still a guessing game for me, as this is my first year, but we did manage to get these three little guys out of the garden. Each is about the size of a cantaloupe.

I’ve got another 4 pumpkins that just popped up on the vines this last week, and I’m hoping that they keep putting out fruit well into fall. For now, we’ll have some pumpkin bread from our first three guys.

And then there’s this little guy.

That is my honeydew vine. That little fuzzy ball is a honeydew melon. I’ve got about 6 or 7 of those growing on a vine that has completely taken over my backyard and is starting to devour my fence.

And finally, because it’s just so darn pretty…here is a flower that is growing in one of the planters on the deck.

Hope you enjoyed the update.

Until Next Time

The Dad

Onion Flowers, which I just think are awesome…

 

We’ve gotten a few berries out of here, but mostly it’s just flowering. Probably about 16 sq ft of strawberries planted this year.

My asparagus, after a watering, which is way it looks like it’s passing out.

One of about a million garlic plants.

Daughter watering our struggling rasberries on the side of the house.

The pumpkins starting to flower.

the watermelon that I thought was dead, has sprung to life.

The first pumpkin to sprout is now taking over. I’m letting two vines come off of it but trimming the rest.

My box of carrots. Believe it or not there are actually rows in there spaced about a foot apart.

The grape vine is finally starting to climb it’s trellis.

And the pepper box. There’s about two dozen fruit hanging in there right now.

Until Next Time

The Dad

On top of all of this she also goes the extra mile and a half by choosing to make almost everything homemade. She makes bread by hand, makes all of our tomato sauce, somehow makes powdered sugar from scratch (which I still don’t understand), makes homemade noodles, and on and on and on. The amount of things that she makes from scratch (some of which I didn’t know that you could) is staggering, and I have no idea how she finds time for it. I think that maybe she has a secret staff that comes to the house when I’m not there, but the neighbors deny their existence. I’m still looking for more evidence on that one.

Mother’s day is a good excuse to give her some extra credit, maybe pamper her a bit, lavish her with some gifts! But no, all she wanted to do was hang out around the house, get some yardwork done, and work on the garden. If there’s an election or something to make her a saint, let me know. I need to nominate her. Oh, she did request an extremely outlandish dinner and the upscale, and very swanky White Castle. Yes, as in the greasiest cheapest burger joint on the planet.

So we got to work on the garden, we’re actually expanding it out this year. Me and my handsome assistant starting building yet another raised bed in the yard.

These bad boys were itching to get into their new home.

I don’t know why, but I get so relaxed when my hands hit the dirt. I guess you can’t take the farm boy out of me.

You can see three of our boxes here, and our trellis that our baby grape vine is hopefully going to take over.

Baby girl helping get peppers in the ground.

Everybody got into the action.

Here are a couple of shots of the drip irrigation that I put in to help automate the garden. This is going to be a lifesaver!

Finally, a picnic at the park to round out the weekend.

Hope everyone had a great mother’s day.

Until Next Time
The Dad

So what else would you want to do after a long day of raking, seeding, and strawing (is that the proper term)? You go to the pond and throw stale crackers at starving overpopulated fish of course!!!

Here’s where our dog tried stealing a cracker from the starving fish. We found out only seconds later that she had gotten a fish in her mouth. It jumped out and landed back in the water. You really can’t make this stuff up.

And then there’s pure delight.

And here’s the daily challenge…keep 2 year old from diving head first into the pond, while letting him splash to his heart’s content, and take pictures left-handed with only one hand free.

And the day is over…

Ah, not quite…I still had an experiment to run. I had to see if I could get the dog to pull the wagon, with our little man in it. I don’t know why I had to do this, but I did. She made it about 4 feet and then gave up. Yes, these are the things I spend my time doing.

Until Next Time

The Dad

So when asked what she wanted for her birthday, all she said was “I want to get out of this town.” Simple enough. She decided on heading down to Indianapolis and hanging out there. They’ve got some pretty cool malls, a decent downtown, etc. Perfect place for a girl who likes to shop. We stayed at a hotel that was right downtown, and our suite was on the top floor so it was a pretty awesome view. Grabbed some dinner, checked out the zoo, hit up White Castle for lunch. Not too shabby.

For whatever reason, it didn’t occur to either of us to be taking pictures on our little adventure so we only got a few but here they are.

Until Next Time

The Dad

What’s that you ask? That’s our empty living room. The trash company came to pick up our disgusting old living room set a couple of days ago so this large very reverberant room is what we’ve been living with. We’ve got 1 soccer ball, 1 dog, and an end table left. Those white patches on the wall are where our old couch scraped the paint off so we’re repainting that tonight. Tomorrow the new furniture, we’re calling it “The Browns” from here on out, will move in and life will be grand once again.

Tomorrow also begins the planting season. Unfortunately it’s not vegetable time, it’s grass time. My beloved dogs have completely destroyed the back yard, so I’m reseeding it tomorrow to transform my mud pit. If only I had pet pigs, then it would all make sense and I could just spend the day lying on my new couch.

Oh yeah, I was informed that I can’t raise chickens. I thought it would be good practice for when we’re out on the farm, but my wife has reminded me that we’re in town, not on a farm, and no chickens shall grace our back yard. I was only thinking of like two or three, but she said no. Guess I’ll have to keep getting gouged on farm fresh eggs.

Happy spring time everyone!
The Dad

The daughter already got a new spring outfit as well.

And the little man already broke out the overalls and his spring time smile.

Yes, our family literally becomes itself again when the ground thaws. Soon enough the garden is going to be rocking along and life will be back to normal. Ah winter, you shall not be missed.

The Dad