Pink Blooms & Frugal Accomplishments

Hello, friends.  On Monday, I harvested stinging nettles, lambs quarter and lettuce.  Now that the garden is getting very weedy, I'm finding more lambs quarter.  J is going to mow and weed eat the garden soon, and I intend to harvest more purslane and lambs quarter before he does.  I began a batch of medicinal tincture with the nettles.  A batch of yogurt was made.  I helped J set up the posts, rebar and string for the beans, and set up a wire trellis for the cucumbers.  He replanted the squash that had died.  The lambs quarter was blanched and frozen.  I added some of the purslane to our salad, and like in the burritos, it mixes right in with the lettuce, and is not noticeable.  A great way to get some omega 3's.  I had a jar of poppy seeds that were getting old.  I started to give them to the chickens, but decided to see if any might germinate, and sowed them in a couple of places.  One of my tasks while working last week was to keep several flower pots watered.  Two of them had Oregon grape shrubs in them.  There were a number of fruits that had fallen off, so I grabbed a few and put them in a pot, to see if the seeds might germinate.  The plant has edible and medicinal benefits, so I hope they will grow.

After work on Tuesday, I ran errands.  I stopped at Lowes for marigolds, as mine didn't come back from reseeding this year.  There was a pack of 8 for $10.98, which I thought was rather pricey, so I headed to the mark down area, and found lots more.  In addition to a full price German thyme, I bought 3 dianthus @ $1 ea.  They looked great, so I'm not sure why they were there, unless it was because they were finishing blooming.  I also got 7 celosia for $2, and 16 marigolds for $3.  There were 3 colors of marigolds altogether, so I was happy I had looked.  I ran into someone I knew, and we caught up as we rummaged through the plants.  I'm loving all the different pink blooms right now.

Tuesday night, a friend and I went to see this movie.  The cinematography was beautiful, and it was a realistic look at the challenges of growing food.  Wednesday morning, I went into my studio to meditate and found parts of a bag of rat poison.  Apparently, while I was out Tuesday night, McNibs got into a kitchen closet, and moved the recycling out to get to it.  J found the recycling a mess when he came in from dealing with a customer, but didn't go into my studio, so hadn't realized.  I got McNibs into the vet first thing Weds. morning, and got Vit. K started.  The poison is not usually anywhere the pups can get to, but this one somehow ended up there.  He's acting fine so far, but it can take a few days for the effect to kick in.  We're not sure how much was left in the bag.  He's a big boy, so we're praying he'll remain healthy.  I spent most of the rest of the day in the garden, weeding and harvesting a good amount of lambs quarter and purslane.  I got some things accomplished, and it helped me de-stress from the morning.  J weed-eated the garden after I was done harvesting.

The Carolina wrens have been busy building nests.  We noticed the first one on top of a porch post, but, for some reason, a couple of days later, I found all the nesting material on the porch floor.  J thinks another bird did it.  I next found one in a pot with soil in it neat the outdoor spigot, with mama and eggs inside.  Then, I saw one of the wrens flying into one of the houseplants that is spending the warm months outdoors.  Sure enough, when I looked a bit later, there's a nest there too.  The tomatoes we had planted in our new containers weeks ago are not thriving. I helped J add compost to the containers, then replant them.  He planted more volunteers in the containers that had died.  I weeded the tomatoes in the ground, and put cages around most of them.  The new round of tromboncino squash are coming up.  Let's hope the squash bugs ignore them.

I was asked to be a vendor at a show the local arts guild put on Friday.  I've said I wouldn't do any more outdoor shows, but with lovely weather, with highs in the 70's, I said yes.  People came for the music, and I only made 2 sales.  But it paid for my gas, I was able to catch up with a friend, and got to talk with a favorite Dr. I used to work for.  I was also contacted by the local microbrewery, wanting to know if they could carry my beer soap, which is created with their beer.  I'm pretty excited about that.  I used a $10 promo code and went through swagbucks for 5% back for a small order on Vitacost.  Two loads of laundry were hung on the line.  I picked bouquets for the house.  As I was finishing gathering the flowers, there were 6 bees and hummingbird moths on the flowers in the vase.  I've begun gathering japanese beetles, which the chickens are relishing.  I'm squishing squash bugs and doing a bit of weeding every day.  Since we've had more rain,  I noticed more lambs quarter that needs harvesting. That will be on my to do list next week.  McNibs seems to be doing well, thank goodness. Wishing you a lovely last week of spring!