I Love To Go A Gardening
Growing Our Life in Northern Michigan
Memorial Day Weekend
It is Memorial Day today in the USA, a day when we remember those who have given their lives in defense of our country. This Memorial feels deeply meaningful to me this year.
Yesterday started out cloudy, but the clouds cleared away and it was a beautiful day. This morning started out sunny, but then big fluffy clouds rolled in–sometimes they were fluffy white, sometimes they were fluffy dark, and sometimes the sky was a cloudless blue. We had a period of heavy rain in the afternoon, and I think more rain could come in. Maybe a storm or two. It’s really hot and humid today. If feels as if we jumped from cool Spring right into hot August. I alternated working outside with coming in to cool down in front of the fan.
Last year I planted sunflowers. In the autumn, I cut off their heads and hung them from the curtain rods in the kitchen to dry. A couple days ago, I took them down and removed the seeds from the heads. Yesterday I planted the seeds. I wasn’t sure where to plant them, but after some thought I decided to put them outside the fence around the chicken area. I tried to plant them close enough to the fence for the sunflowers to lean on when they grow bigger, but far enough away that the chickens couldn’t poke their heads through the fence and eat them.
I was afraid that I had accidentally mowed some of the elderberry bushes we had planted. I had tried to be careful but some of the bushes were very small and I couldn’t see them. I suggested to Eric that maybe we could dig up the roots and plant them somewhere where they weren’t in danger of being mowed. We went out to dig them up, but we actually found all five of them growing. Some were tiny but, hey, they had growth. So we left them and EJ pounded in wooden stakes to mark where they are.
Earlier in the spring our Governor banned plant nurseries so we bought some of our seeds online. Individual packets were out of stock, but we got packages with several different kinds of seeds in them. One of the packages had several different types of salad greens. Many of them were types that I had never before heard of so I think it will be fun to try them. They were Buttercrunch Lettuce, Red Oakleaf Lettuce, Bibb Lettuce, Prizehead Lettuce, Iceberg lettuce, Parris Island Romaine, Noble Giant Spinach, and Dwarf Siberian Kale. They sound interesting, don’t they?
EJ planted the salad greens in the old hot tub. The broken hot tub had been left behind by the previous owners. We didn’t know how to get rid of it, so EJ dragged it to the back yard, filled it with dirt, and it became one of our raised garden beds.
This morning EJ went to the Forbidden Zone (meaning the stores). He got some bags of garden dirt at Meijers but they didn’t have seeds–and neither did the nursery. He got a couple plants at the nursery. I think he spent less than $2.
While Eric was gone, I put the thingy that holds our garden hose in the ground so I could keep things tidy–and so we would be less likely to trip over the hose.
After lunch EJ went out to plant some corn. I went out to help him because I knew it was going to rain soon. It started to rain as we planted. I planted all my corn and then ran in the house to close the windows. It rained harder and harder as Eric covered up the corn. He was soaked by the time he finished. Before he could change into dry clothes, the rain stopped.
One of the raised garden beds didn’t yet have any dirt in it. I asked EJ what he was planning to plant in it. He pointed to the box and said….Cats. LOL. The cats have been hunting rodents. I’ve found several dead bodies of mice, chipmunks, and moles. It’s good that the cats kill them because I’ve read that mice will even eat the toes off the chickens when they sleep at night. Yuck!
The lilacs are now beginning to bloom. We had a beautiful lilac bush at our old house and I was sad at the thought of not having any lilacs to enjoy at our new house. But I was so surprised when I discovered that we had FOUR lilac bushes of three different colors growing on our property. So that is another thing I have so much better at our new house. I called it our “new house” but on June 1st we will have lived here FIVE YEARS already! It went by really fast. We are so happy here.
Hannah Joy always gets on the bed in the morning while I take my shower. She likes to get under the blankets. If I make the bed before my shower, she burrows under the blankets and messes it all up so I usually make the bed later. This was Hannah Joy this morning. She is so very loved and spoiled.
I Love To Go A Gardening 