We stopped by the p-patch on the way home from school this afternoon and discovered that the garlic planted last fall is doing swimmingly. I used some maple leaves in the fall as a mulch, and the garlic now is growing through the leaves. Not just pushing the leaves aside and growing up between them, although there’s plenty of that going on. No, this is garlic greens literally poking holes through the maple leaves and then pushing through and up, so the maple leaf is actually suspended several inches off the ground. I’m sorry I didn’t have a camera with …
Category: Seasons
The sun was out today. I spent the bulk of the day cleaning up the gardens, removing the winter die-back and so forth. And I found some flowers! Gonna get some dirt this week… the garden is waking up! Save
Caitlyn and I walked from school to the Westlake Link station yesterday afternoon. We found cherry trees starting to bloom (one totally covered in buds so that it looked pink from a block away) and daffodils pushing their greens up. Caitlyn nearly burst with joy when we found a camillia in bloom; she’s been waiting to pick up faded camillia flowers for a full year now. And while I don’t mind not being frozen whenever I step outside, I worry that this past record-breaking warm January will have unpleasant side effects later: a cold snap just as the fruit trees …
When I got started on it this morning, the vision for dinner was potato soup. When the garden produces 48 pounds of potatoes, that’s a lot of potatoes to discover/invent ways to eat. Some of them are starting to show their age (perhaps the pantry is slightly warmer than the perfect potato storage temperature), but they still soup nicely. But there was half a sweet potato in the fridge that I threw into the pot with the sautéd onions and the dried bell peppers. I added one of the jars of whey from cheesemaking last month and the whey that …
Tomorrow is Monday, and the vacation is officially over. And, in the department of minor miracles, I might actually be mostly ready. The after-school muffins are made, the mail is processed, the email box sorted. Caitlyn and I harvested the remaining carrots that were still in the garden. Their tops were nasty, but the carrots are in surprisingly good shape, even after the freezing weather of last month. Caitlyn was able/willing to get into the harvesting this time, as well, since the soil just brushed off, unlike last time. I may leave them in the garden longer next winter – …
A note to my future self: when Cliff Mass says it’s going to be cold, get out there and bring in the rest of the root vegetables. I spent about an hour in the p-patch this morning (two pairs of long johns under the jeans, two scarves, hat, two shirts, sweatshirt, jacket, and gardening gloves) using a shovel to pry beets and carrots out of the ground, then chipping frozen soil off them with the digging fork (since maybe the dirt should stay in the p-patch and not get washed down the kitchen sink). I filled a 15 lb butter …