Only in Ohio....

...can you have the a/c and heat on in the same week.  I ran the a/c on Saturday morning, just to get some of the humidity out of the house.  I was sticking to the floor!  And now we have a toasty fire in the wood burning insert, because it is once again cold, damp, and gross.  It's 43 outside right now, with a wind chill of 36.  Oh, and it's raining.  Of course it's raining.  The yard is a swamp, the grass is pushing knee high, and it will probably be another week before we can mow. *sigh*

Last year's Contender beans.

Despite the chilly rain yesterday, I managed to get two pounds of onions planted.  Hooray!  They should've been in the ground weeks ago, but we do what we can, ya know? 

The Contender beans are also planted. Well, the first round, anyway.  I'm hoping to plant more in about two weeks, which should space the heaviest harvests nicely.  I prefer the bush variety, which require no staking and very little maintenance.  I do suggest planting two or three seeds in each hole, as the bush stalks can break fairly easily.  You don't really have to worry about overcrowding these guys, either.  They seem pretty happy all bunched in, shoulder to shoulder.  (I'm so glad I'm not a bean!)

I also prefer the Contender variety because they keep producing all summer, as long as you keep the mature beans picked.  This is an heirloom variety, which means I can use the seed that I save.  I let the last growth of beans dry on the bush, then I pick, shell, and bag them up to be used the following year.  Easy peasy, lemon squeezy!! (Did I really just say that?? *shrugs*  It's early, and I'm only on my first cup of coffee.)

Now you are probably wondering just how, with all of the rain, muck, and mud, I can get into my garden? Black plastic, baby!  Woot!! 

Our garden is strictly No Till.   I prefer the Chicken Tractor method, whenever possible.  What, you never heard of it?? You just pen up your chickens in the area you want cleared for garden, and in no time flat, the weeds are gone, the grass is gone, and the whole area is fertilized!  Then, lay down the heaviest black plastic you can find (I use the construction kind from Lowe's), cut holes for the plants (holes are generally about six inches wide), and voila!  a weed free, low maintenance garden, without the compacted subsoil  you get from tilling.  If you don't have chickens, you can still use the plastic.  Just put down the plastic and give it time to cook out the weeds before you cut holes.  Or you can put down the plastic, cut the holes, and dig out sod in only the places you have holes.  Still much easier than tilling, and mud won't even slow you down!!



If you live in a warmer climate, you will most likely want to mulch over the plastic so your plants don't get too hot.  Here in Ohio, I manage to get a head start, as the soil is already warm from the plastic. 

Rumor has it we are in for a very cool summer.  Well, if this spring is any indication, I'd say that rumor is right.  The black plastic will be a life saver in the garden!  A few years ago, when I first started experimenting with different gardening methods, we had an unusually cool summer.  Only the plants in black plastic produced anything worthwhile. 

Now that you know how easy it is to grow all this great stuff, I bet you want to get started.  What are you waiting for?? Go!! Plant!! Grow!!

More random stuff...

It's spring, so that means my blog posts are generally full of random bits about the weather, work, gardening, and how tired I am.  You'll forgive me if my regular posts are a bit choppy;  it takes me at least two weeks to finish a full post, since I can only wrangle a few waking minutes here and there to work on them.

So...more random goodies....

• We hatched our first guinea eggs this week!  So far, four have hatched.  We're hoping to fill the incubator at least once more with guinea eggs.  Little Sis also planted a few of the eggs under our broody bantam hens.  We're still waiting for results.
• This has been the wettest, rainiest, soggiest, grossest, messiest, muddiest, flooding-est, stormiest, and coldest spring I can remember.  Did I mention it's raining almost daily?  Flooding?  Boot sucking muck from one end of the place to the other?  Yep, all of the above.
• We did get a few days of heat and sunshine, highs in the 80's, but we are headed back into the cool temps (highs in the 50's) with mucho rain.
• I'm working every minute of overtime I can get, which has left me mega-exhausted.  I can't complain, when my boss puts in at least twice the hours I do, is older than me (but not much), and never once complains. She's one tough cookie.
• I started planting today.  I got a few beans in the ground before the thunder started.  I'd hoped to have onions in by now, but have been too busy.  I was going to do them today, but a wasp nest is in the way (inside a cold frame that needs to be moved), so I'm waiting for dark so I can spray them, then  hopefully get the onions done tomorrow, weather permitting.  (fat chance)
• I need to re-plant the rutabagas.  The seed must've been old; nothing germinated.
• We have a fabulous slug shortage this year, thanks to our geese and Muscovy ducks now free ranging.

That's about all the random stuff I can think of at the moment.  Now I'm off to eat some freshly baked brownies (recipe here).

Oh...look...a birthday....

*sigh*  Getting older is not all it's cracked up to be.  Then again, it's not all that bad.  I remember when 43 seemed well past retirement and into adult diapers.  Ha.  I'm nowhere near retirement, and I'm hoping to stave off adult diapers until I'm at least 45.


Eöl and the kids worked hard to surprise me with a clean house, dinner, and some wonderful gifts.  The amazing cake was baked by Little Sis and decorated by Big Sis.  The gourd was grown, dried, and decorated by Eöl; he carved the lid from a piece of firewood.  It's one of a kind, because he swears he'll never make another one..it was too much work, not to mention he nearly punctured an artery in the process.  I think I'm a pretty lucky gal to have such great kids, and a husband that would risk death to make my birthday special. :P

Woot!! A gardening cake!!!

The kickass rabbit is supposed to be me.

The girls also got me a much needed new keyboard.  But now I can't blame my typos on sticking keys...darn!