The Growing Challenge - Week One

The Challenge: Grow one additional type of fruit or vegetable than you did last year, and grow it from seed. Post about your gardening experience once each week.

The Goal: To push ourselves to grow a little more food than we have before.

The Challenger: One Green Generation

Week One:

It is good to be alone in a garden at dawn or dark so that all its shy presences may haunt you and possess you in a reverie of suspended thought. 

 ~James Douglas, Down Shoe Lane

Welcome to my newest vegetable and fruit garden. Hubby and I created these rows last spring to add even more to our existing garden. We also added 2 herb gardens and a strawberry/sweet pea garden each for the boys. We will be adding wood edging to the rows this spring to help with keeping the grass out of the soil as much as possible.

The above vegetable garden we put in 2 and a half years ago. We will be adding a wall of lattice on the far north end, framed in, to help with wind gusts and for our climbing vegetables to grow up.

Right now the gardens look rather BORING, and DEPRESSING, but spring is fast approaching and I can NOT wait to start preparing, digging, raking, planting, weeding, watering!!

I am currently waiting for my seed order to arrive from the Cottage Gardener located in Newtonville, Ontario. They have a fantastic selection of certified organic seeds and many heirloom varieties. 

Here are my order details:

• Gypsywort *New addition
  
• Bull's Blood Beets *New addition
  
• Long Island Improved Brussel Sprouts *New addition
  
• Arugula *New addition
  
• The Cottage Gardener's Gourmet Heirloom Leaf Lettuce
  
• Bleu de Solaise Leek *New addition
  
• British Wonder Pea
  
• Red Opal Basil
  
• The Cottage Gardener's Coloured Carrot Mix
  
• New Zealand Spinach
  
• Petit du Rennes - Melon
  
• Blanche du Quebex - Tomato
  

The above garden is part of one of the flower gardens, in the shade today (The best fertilizer is the gardener's shadow). I will order organic seeds next month to prepare, but for now I am focused on the fruits and vegetables.

'Happy Gardening Thoughts', see you here next week :)

God made rainy days so gardeners could get the housework done. 

The 'Other' Kids.

No philosophers so thoroughly comprehend us as dogs and horses.

~Herman Melville, Redburn. His First Voyage, 1849

(Elmo)

I think we are drawn to dogs because they are the uninhibited creatures we might be if we weren't certain we knew better. They fight for honor at the first challenge, make love with no moral restraint, and they do not for all their marvelous instincts appear to know about death. Being such wonderfully uncomplicated beings, they need us to do their worrying.

(Crystal)

Labradors [are] lousy watchdogs. They usually bark when there is a stranger about, but it is an expression of unmitigated joy at the chance to meet somebody new, not a warning.

A Moment Away

Cole and I slipped away for a few hours the other day to enjoy a morning drive, absorb the suns warm rays, and stopped at a quaint little coffee bar in Rockwood. Cole brought along his workbook, scribbled his surroundings down inside with intentions of writing his thoughts and ideas in a way that is supposed to excite and surprise me.
The boys love their alone time with me and I love the time with them. It's special, and they appreciate it so much.

We are looking forward to find where our next journey will take us.

Hot Cocoa's & Mocha Java's

I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it's a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, and that enables you to laugh at life's realities.

This past weekend my parents drove down from North Bay to spend some much needed quality time with the boys, James and myself. Friday night we reserved our table at our favorite Chinese Restaurant in Georgetown and enjoyed a delectable meal together. Lots of food and lots of laughs, good for the soul!

Saturday my sister and my niece and nephew joined us for a day spent in Georgetown, yet again, this time we enjoyed hot chocolates and Mocha Java's at my new favorite cappuccino shop a friend introduced me to on Main Street. We enjoyed some fabulous brownies from the bakery and did some window shopping on one of the first 'warmer' days so far this year.

Saturday evening was spent in front of the fire playing foosball, then we retired to the living room to watch 'Lakeview Terrace', great movie. I don't think I have ever eaten as many munchies as we all consumed that night, crazy!

Sunday morning came too fast. After a few mugs of morning java Mom and Dad were on their way back home. We enjoyed their visit and look forward to the next one, hopefully soon :)

And yes I know, will will try to head up there sometime soon Mom. After foaling season is over and done.

A photograph is usually looked at - seldom looked into. ~Ansel Adams

There are no seven wonders of the world in the eyes of a child. There are seven million. ~Walt Streightiff

There is a garden in every childhood, an enchanted place where colors are brighter, the air softer, and the morning more fragrant than ever again. ~Elizabeth Lawrence

For twas not into my ear you whispered

But into my heart

Twas not my lips you kissed

But my soul

~Judy Garland

A good snapshot stops a moment from running away.

A baby is an angel whose wings decrease as his legs increase.

Families are like fudge - mostly sweet with a few nuts

I am thankful for laughter, except when milk comes out of my nose.

~Woody Allen

Grandfathers are just antique little boys.

Maybe we should develop a Crayola bomb as our next secret weapon. A happiness weapon. A beauty bomb. And every time a crisis developed, we would launch one. It would explode high in the air - explode softly - and send thousands, millions, of little parachutes into the air. Floating down to earth - boxes of Crayolas. And we wouldn't go cheap, either - not little boxes of eight. Boxes of sixty-four, with the sharpener built right in. With silver and gold and copper, magenta and peach and lime, amber and umber and all the rest. And people would smile and get a little funny look on their faces and cover the world with imagination.

My ABC's of Weather Cliches.

(Give or take a letter or two :)

After the rain comes a rainbow. Behind the clouds, the sun is shining. Cold as blue blazes. Drown you sorrows. Face the sun, but turn your back to the storm. Got your head in the clouds. Hot enough for you. It will be a cold day in hell. Just a drop in the bucket. Not a snowball's chance in hell. Once in a blue moon. Pure as the driven snow. The Quiet before the storm. Run like the wind. Snow job. That'll be the day. Under the weather. Weather the storm. You're all wet.

Yesterday and Today.

Yesterday...

And Today.

Every winter,

When the great sun has turned his face away,

The earth goes down into a vale of grief,

And fasts, and weeps, and shrouds herself in sables,

Leaving her wedding-garlands to decay -

Then leaps in spring to his returning kisses.

~Charles Kingsley

I miss my gardens.

My Clematis.

Peaking out of the Fairy Garden.
Scarecrow the boys made.

... the spring, the summer,

The chilling autumn, angry winter, change

Their wonted liveries; and the mazed world

By their increase, now knows not which is which.

- William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream

There is a privacy about it which no other season gives you.... In spring, summer and fall people sort of have an open season on each other; only in the winter, in the country, can you have longer, quiet stretches when you can savor belonging to yourself.

Skating on the Pond

What a fabulous way to spend a beautiful afternoon. Wonderful company, great fun, a game of tag, some hockey, hot chocolate and somewhat of a fire.

Who is wise? He that learns from everyone.

Who is powerful? He that governs his passions.

Who is rich? He that is content.

Who is that? Nobody.

~Benjamin Franklin

Women are always beautiful. ~Ville Valo

We worry about what a child will become tomorrow, yet we forget that he is someone today.

Boy, n.: a noise with dirt on it. ~Not Your Average Dictionary

Kids: they dance before they learn there is anything that isn't music.