Garden!

I've been really excited to get my garden started this year. I enjoyed the little garden we had last year and have been anxiously waiting to get started again. It was actually pretty relaxing to me to go out and work in the garden for a little bit each night. It didn't really seem like much work as long as I kept up with it. Robert rented a really nice rototiller last weekend, so I promptly got 7 rows planted. I'm actually a bit late for the carrots, peas, lettuce, and beets, but not bad. The rest of the stuff needs another week or so since it's been a pretty cool spring. It snowed a couple days--just a little, but enough. I put a tarp over some of the ground to help warm it up some for the corn and beans and will move it over to the squash patch next. (Yep, probably getting a little carried away since I'll be extremely pregnant when most of this stuff is ready to can--if not already hatched.)

The rows looked so nice once I got them all planted. Naturally the dog (and a cat or two) have already dug up part of my beets. Grrrr! I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Robert will get around to my fence pretty quick. He's been super busy trying to get his corrals finished, so I can't really complain. Last year I had the seeds ordered in March and started quite a few in peat pots in the house, but I didn't have very good results. I may try that again in the future, but for now, I'm really just concentrating on getting the easy stuff to grow. I think I may buy a couple starter tomatoes and peppers, but other wise, I think I have more seeds than I have garden. We'll just have to see. The first year Robert planted pumpkins in our tiny garden in Colorado, he got a bit carried away. I think he planed 10 or 12 pumpkins where we probably had room for 2 or 3. Our neighbors on all three sides had pumpkins coming under and over their fences. (He had also started 12 zucchini plants but I managed to convince him !thankfully! that 2 would more than feed us and the whole neighborhood. )

The wild plums have started blooming. Nothing says spring to me more than the wild plums. It's one of my very favorite flowering trees. They are very much an optimist...one of the first flowers in the spring, which also means that a late frost will hit them pretty hard and you don't get them to fruit every year. (Which is OK too since I haven't figured out my wild plum jam recipe just yet...I invariably add way too much pectin and you have to chop it out of the jar with a knife) They also smell so sweet. I just love driving down past our one neighbor's coulee, which is chock full of wild plums, with my windows down and my car just fills up with that smell. I had to stop and pick a few from one of my dad's pasture as I was driving past.