The Green Side of Life: We have plants babies!

My Chinese Money Plant has babies! I took it out to the cottage to stay with Hubby for a while and when I went out for a visit I found babies! Click HERE.

I was worried that the abrupt change from my old place to the cottage would put the plant into shock, especially as we moved them on a really chilly day. I did lose the cutting from the Hoya plant (I really thought it would take), and I am sad, but that means I will have to go out and buy one!

I have one more move at the end of the month, and it’ll be warm enough to move the plants from the cottage. The main window in the new place is south facing, so it should be okay, but I may put some sheer curtains in to create difused light.

Because I moved, I couldn’t put in a veggie garden like I did last year. There are a few things out at the cottage, but sadly, I have no herbs. They didn’t survive the winter in the containers anyway. Apart from the usual, we planted watermelon. I’m not sure how that will take, but we’ll see. You can watch a short video HERE.

Are you doing a garden this year? What did you plant?

The Green Side of Life: Veggie Garden August 2022.

I posted pictures and a video of the garden HERE. There’s a bit of commentary, but basically, I kinda rock when it comes to growing tomatoes. I thought I had four kinds, normal, grape, Roma, and cherry. Turns out I didn’t. What I thought were Roma tomatoes turned out to be grape. If they all ripen at once I’ll have more than I can use, so people at work will get some. Hubby also said I should give some to the food kitchen in town. I like that idea better.

Squash are doing wonderful. I was worried for a while because the first fruit was turning yellow and falling off the vine. I read up about it and it said that the fruit wasn’t being pollinated. Okay, the problem with that is, that there were no flower blooms on them. I have four vines growing off each plant and now they’re doing wonderful now. I thought one plant was a pumpkin, but nope. Both butternut squash.

Cucumbers are doing good, despite what the video showed. I just forgot to water them that morning. I don’t mind the peppers being that small either. They have more flavour and I use the whole pepper instead of just part of it. I had one that turned orange, but it went soft very quickly.

The only herb I lost was sage, and my carrots went too. I’m not sure about the leeks or lettuce. Those were more of ‘let’s see if I can grow it’, deal.

Pictures of the garden are HERE.

Video is HERE.

State of the Garden; August 28, 2014 [with pictures!]

The season is over. At least for some of the garden.

This year wasn’t bad. We had a lot of rain and very little sun, so everything grew like mad, but hardly ripened. Case in point, our tomatoes. As you can see, there’s a pile of tomatoes, and after I prune the bushes, they’re starting to ripen. This picture was taken a few days ago.

Tomates

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Zucchini and Cucumber

 

Everything is taking longer this year, well not the zucchini. It did really well even though we only got about half a dozen fruit off it. I gave a couple to my mother, and we had about four. Then the plant just started to die off. Squash bugs. Not impressed. We got about four cucumbers this year too.

 

 

 

Overcrowding

Another problem was crowding. With the cabbage and Brussel sprouts, half the garden was taken. Husband put in an extra tomato plant and it went wild, covering half the onions and a pepper plant. Speaking of peppers, they did well, once they got a little bigger. The green pepper plant isn’t as big as others we’ve had, again, it must be because of the short amount of sun. Hot peppers aren’t that hot, according to Husband and he hasn’t tried the jalapenos yet. Onions did well, but were stepped on several times. Mainly to get around the cabbage.

 

Butternut squash

Pumpkin!

The barrel experiment did really well, until Sithboy mowed over the vines, and then we got powdery mildew on the leaves, and that was that. We lost two squash and a couple melons, but managed to grow a pumpkin!

 

 

 

 

Front Flower Garden August 2014

Flower garden? It kinda took on a life of its own. I gave up on it when the tall multi-coloured flowers started falling over. My glads did not produce a flower stalk and the fucias and petunias didn’t get a lot of sun so they didn’t spread.

 

We’re thinking about expanding the garden to a 10×10 lot more in the middle of the lawn for next year.

State of the Garden; May 8, 2014 [with pictures!]

Wow, what a difference two weeks can make!

Front Garden

 

Our front garden is looking good and there are some sprouts popping out from the ground. Husband bought me some shears last week and I went to work trimming up the apple tree and rose bush. I did a couple other trees on the property, but it was the apple and rose that really needed it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Side Garden

 

Tulips still haven’t flowered, but I checked them this morning and there are flower buds on some.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well Garden

 

The brown leaves on this one and the floppy leaves makes me wonder if the late spring isn’t doing some damage.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Apple Tree

 

Buds on the apple tree. I took a bunch of suckers from the lower branches and trunk. I’m only so tall so I couldn’t get them all. I’d love to know what kind of apples grow on this tree.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lilac Tree

 

Lilac tree is budding nicely. I have some Facebook friends who have posted pictures of their lilacs already in bloom. This makes me anxious for ours.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sedum

 

My sedum. I need to remove the old growth. I don’t know why but I always leave it until I see new growth.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Backyard Trees

 

The three other trees in our backyard. And look at that grass. I mentioned to Sithboy that he might need to get out this weekend and mow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shade Trees

 

These are our shade trees. That branch has been broke since the December ice storm. It took out my clothes line too. The whole thing is coming down but the one behind it stays.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Peonies

 

My peonies. I’ll mess with this as it grows. I may need to re-align the tomato cage. This is an old plant. We originally got about six peonies from my husband’s grandmother. That was about fifteen years ago, and they were close to thirty years old at that point.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So far, I’ve seen only three perennials return. I don’t know if it was the hard winter or what. I have a feeling Husband killed the daisy-looking one when he trampled on it. It tried to kill him so no love lost there.

Bachelor Buttons

 

Bachelor Buttons. Such a pretty blue/purple coloured flower. These things are indestructible.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fern-like plant.

 

This is a fern-type plant. I can’t remember the name. I think the flowers are pretty. We’ll have to wait and find out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Phlox

 

This is some kind of phlox. I got it from my MIL garden when she was getting ride of her flowers. I’m hoping it flowers before the peonies gets too bushy. This is an old plant too, but I don’t think it’s as old as the peonies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

No pictures of the veggie garden. It still looks like crap.

This time of year things start to grow like crazy. I bet in another two-weeks there will be flowers! That is, if the snow stays away. Seriously Mother Nature, enough all ready.

Gardens? Hello gardens? Are you there?

It’s coming up to that time of the year, folks. My gardens are SCREAMING for some attention. We have plans for all the gardens this year, but whether or not we do them is another matter. Husband has been doing a lot of side jobs this last year and he can’t seem to shake the habit. I took these pictures yesterday.

This is my veggie garden, but right now, it’s a mass of weeds, dead crops from last season and a couple buckets of ash from the woodstove. That white thing you see is part of a clothes rack we had for drying clothes by the woodstove. I can’t remember what reason Husband put it in there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the front garden. That big green blob are Bachelor Buttons. They’re a nice purple/blue and I planted a few of them, but this is the only one that survived. That other green blob farther up and to the left is a ferny kind of perennial and I think one of the two we have to relocate. There are two that get so tall they crowd out everything else. My peonies, that light brown blob at the top of the picture, haven’t bothered to poke their buds out yet. I don’t blame them.

 

 

 

 

 

This is the side garden. For years I would get down on my hands and knees and dig up the grass and other stuff. I’m not going to bother anymore. I think I’ll plant spring bulbs in here and let them go wild. The former owner dug up all the bulbs before she moved (bitch), but she missed a few and they multiplied. We tried planting some evergreen shrubs but because the dryer vent is right there, they died off. The plant that’s there is called a spirea and has beautiful white flowers all over it.

 

 

 

 

 

This is the well. I planted tulips on three sides one year and they still keep coming up. I was going to have a whole slew of spring bulbs around it, I still may too.

Hopefully in the next couple of weeks we can get out and make them look a little better. Husband has a great idea for the barrels this year and I’m excited about experimenting!

Are you gardening this year?

Come on flowers! BLOOM!

Husband put in the flower garden at the front of the house. So far it looks really good.

We went to MIL to get some of Husbands grandmothers flowers, only to discover that BIL g/f took just about every, single one. Left us with three of the scraggliest looking lupines. Ask me if I’m impressed. I got over it. This is typical. I should be used to this by now. Anyway, I’m getting off topic.

Lupines and Bachelor Buttons are in the back. My mother gave me the white and blue flowers, and I found a small Lily of the Valley poking out through the weeds. Got one other plant from MIL but I don’t know what kind it is. Husband said we could go out this weekend and get some more.

It’s now time to pay attention to my climbing roses. You’re supposed to plant them, then leave them alone for a few seasons to get the tall canes. I think they’re tall enough.

There are flower buds too. When we first got them, one was white and the other was red. A few years later we noticed they were both red. Didn’t see flowers after that but I dumped some woodstove ashes at the base and now they full of buds!

My mother also brought over some hostas. Only place I could put them was in front (behind?) the rose bushes. She gave me some ground cover too. Hopefully, they’ll be able to choke out the weeds.

They really took too. They get the morning sun and they’re shaded from the hot afternoon sun by the thick canes of the rose bush.

The flowers on our lilac bush aren’t that big this year. I think the weird winter caused smaller than normal flower buds

Our neighbours snowball bush is looking good this year. There were a few years where it looked like crap. I don’t know if he did anything to it, but the flowers are numerous this year.

We extended the veggie garden this year, but it’s still unsure if we’re going to plant veggies. Our roto-tiller is acting up and the ground is too hard to do it by hand. Yeah, already told Husband that already.

Oh, and this bird has been driving me nuts. It pecks at our wood stove chimny, then flies off and starts pecking on our front door. You can barely see him, but he’s there.

Anyone doing a garden this year?

It’s that time of year again, folks! [pictures]

I’ve been away from blogging for a while, but Icouldn’t WAIT to show you what my MIL got me;

Castor Bean seeds! She mentioned them a few years back, about how big they got and I was intrigued. Husband’s grandmother use to plant them every year.

They look like little grub beetles. I was surprised to see how big they were

I can feel the pain in my back already. MIL is going to dig up the flower garden that’s in their backyard and I’m taking plants home with me. She always said once her mother died she was going to sod the whole thing down. Neither her nor my FIL are healthy enough to keep it up. There’s also a big Spruce tree coming down too. Husband wasn’t impressed with that because they planted that when he was a little boy.

Speaking of trees coming down, we’re taking down two on our property. One is by our shed. The other is the apple tree next to it. I like apples, but you have to prune the tree every spring and to be honest, I can’t be bothered. We have another apple tree on the property, but it’s staying up because I have my clothes line nailed to it. We’re hoping that with the first tree gone, the second won’t produce apples. The second tree is weird anyway. One year only half of it bloomed, and a few years after that it didn’t bloom at all.

The plants from MIL’s are going here.

Husband dug up a small patch at the front of the house and we got those border stones on sale. I’ll tackle the other side next year.

I’ve got a pile of tulips coming up too. They were left over from the previous owner. She tried to dig them all up, but missed a few.

And this is my peony. I’m doing an experiment this year. I’ve encased it in a tomato plant cage because the stalks get very heavy with the bloom on the end. I can thread the stalks through the wires so it will look bushy. At least that’s what I’m hoping for.

Do you garden? Any you’re experimenting with this season?

They Survived!

First, I want to thank everyone who sent me ideas on how to get rid of the ash from the woodstove. I’ve dumped more in the veggie garden and put some on my climbing roses. I still have a whole burn barrel full of it. I wonder what flowering plants and bushes like it.

Second, and very important—my two tropical plants survived the winter! Both my Christmas cactus and my Stag fern survived. This is a very exciting thing! For the last few years my green thumb has been black and just my looking at a houseplant would cause it to wilt and die. Husband has never had a black thumb. I’ve seen him bring back a plant that fell off a balcony and ¾ dead. Mind you, that was a Spider plant and it’s near impossible to kill off one of those.

The weather is staying warm here, and I’m itching to get out and do some gardening. We’re not going to have as many green peppers this year. Just one plant. The four we had last year produced so much that we couldn’t keep up, and everyone around here has gardens so we can’t give the stuff away. I was thinking about a road side stand with fresh veggies for the campers. We have two campgrounds nearby with piles of tourists. Another reason I don’t like to take walks. Some of these people are real city-slickers and seeing cows or sheep for the first time is a driving distraction. If you think I’m joking, then you haven’t lived out in the country.

Whoops, sorry, kinda got off topic there…
Anyway, like I said, with all the warm weather I’m just itching to get out. I wonder what kind of summer we’ll have?