Update...long overdue

I realize that it has been a while since I updated this blog.  I didn't feel like I had much to say other than the plants are doing well.  At this point, we are having some gardening challenges.  I'll go into that another time.

On June 22, I officially finished my picture scanning project.  I sent a packet to some of my family members that contains some hard copy pictures, letters, and other memorabilia along with a thumb drive of pictures.  Whew!  After so many years of on and off work on the project, it is a strange idea to think I'm no longer the only one in my family to have the entire collection in one place.  Now everyone will have the pieces that are relevant to them.  I also decided to include a copy of piano music made my grandmother, Neva Simonsen in 1984.  She was an amazing pianist and these 13 pieces are a treasure.

This past week I have had two triumphs.  I built a pergola, and I put in an air conditioner.

The air conditioner, which I installed today, replaces the swamp-cooler-tower-fan that has been doing a very poor job of keeping the house cool.  With high temps in the 97-100 range, the inside of the house has been pretty toasty.  I'm glad to report that the install was easy-peasy, and plug and play cool air is so welcome!  I'm excited to get a thermometer for the inside of the house and see what temp feels comfortable to me.  I also need to reset my kill-a-watt to see how much electricity it uses.  

It is a 5000 BTU unit that is rated for rooms of 150 square feet, and cost about $130 on Amazon. Heavenly!

THE PERGOLA!

I've been wanting to build some outside shade for a long while and I finally did it.  I got some pallets from my friend Matt at Klein's Custom Countertops (love $free.99 wood), and another project was born.  PS. I also got the wood for my fence there.  This batch of pallets had 2x8, 2x6, 2x4, and 2x3.  I just love 2x3...not sure why.  ANYWAY, plenty of wood for the pergola and about a ton left over, not to mention about 15 lbs of nails.  Side note about these pallets...they are made for carrying stone of countertop size, are 11' long by about 3.5 to 4' wide, and they weigh about a ton a piece.  

They aren't the typical pallets you get from the back of the grocery store.  Also a warning...reclaiming this kind of wood is not for the faint of heart.  I recommend getting a pry bar or two and a rubber mallet. You will be happy you did.  

I spent at least two days taking the pallets apart. I still have quite a few nails to pound out, but I had the pieces I needed to make the pergola so I left the nail pounding for another day.  

Nellie hard at work.

Used 8 feet of the 2x8 and 2x6 for the corner posts, with the leftovers for the supports.

Standing up...

The 2x4's on the sides and over the top.

My neighbor in Ogden, Adele, had given me some really great outdoor fabric that fits almost perfectly. Still needs a little edge work. 

I used screws that I already had from building the house, so in total I spent $20 in gas to go get the pallets. Like I said, I love $free.99!

I'm still going to stain and seal the wood, so I'll spend a few bucks on that, but compared to the cost of purchasing the wood, I feel like I'm getting quite a bargain.  

I'll post again when I have more of the little details completed.  For now, I finally have some shady outdoor living space!  Bring on the garden party!

Growing stuff update

I planted the garden yesterday so I figured it was about time for a little update.  I planted watermelon, beets, chard, zucchini, yellow squash, carrots, and spinach.  I think I'll have to make a little shade for the spinach once it gets going.  

Everything else is doing really well...

Except for the blueberries.  They are struggling.  I think they like to be in the ground better.

We have quite a few strawberries so far, none ready for eating, but a few are starting to pink up.

 

Side note:  I'm so glad that school is out and my job is finished for the summer.  Another adventure awaits.  

More planting...but not so much planning

Strawberry update...all but maybe two strawberry plants are looking fantastic! Even have a flower. See below.

The rhubarb is coming up!  So excited about that!  See below.

The apple trees are starting to leaf out!  See below.

The flower bulbs I planted are coming along nicely...See below.

The blueberries aren't doing so well.  I may lose three out of four.  I'll have to try again on those.  See below.

The cucumbers are getting their true leaves.  Now I need to do some serious garden planning.  On the other hand the  butternut, yellow and zucchini squash haven't sprouted and neither has the watermellon.  Time to get some newer seeds I think and try again.  I may just plant them outside in the garden at this point.

I planted the Mammoth Russian Sunflowers along the fence.  We'll know in 10-14 days if any of those are actually going to grow.  Although it may take longer to see them because I planted the seeds among the grass, which I trimmed first, but now I won't be trimming for a while again.  I also threw out some grass seed in our little yard.  I figured that since it is supposed to rain every other day for the next week, I'd take advantage of the free watering service.

Planning and Planting

Spring has sprung here in Northern Utah, and as usual the weather is like a giant roller coaster.  Last week 70's and sunny (perfect!), this week torrential rain, wind, hail, and lows in the 30's.  So I rely on the saying "April showers bring May flowers" to get me through.  I also enjoy the fact that there is no watering to do because it has already been taken care of.  

On a more garden-y note...I've got some seeds going in the house, zucchini, yellow squash, butternut, cucumbers (pickling and muncher) and watermelon.  So far only the cucumbers have sprouted and I got so excited!

I've also got my columnar apple trees planted in planters outside.  There are four of them that will make a nice little feature at the front end of the yard.  Very excited for them to start leafing out.

The blueberries are ready to go in their own buckets, just needs to be warm enough at night to leave them out.

Then I also have about a billion strawberry plants...well, okay, not a billion, but 75 sure seems like a billion. I'm going to try the strawberries in rain gutter along the top rail of the fence this year and see how that goes.  Got the gutter, put in the drain holes, and put it up.  A little excited about that.

And half ready with dirt

And ta-da! 40 strawberries in their nice new home. 

What to do with the other 35? Put them in with the apples...

And make a centerpiece for the patio table. 

I got some mosquito repelling plants, lavendar, bee balm, and basil.  No marigolds at the store yet so I got some marigold seeds. 

Then I'm such a sucker...garden-in-a-can.  Dill...in a can. That is all.

Question of the week...where to put the rhubarb? 

How about in here?

And I was thinking that today might be the day to plant the sunflowers along the outside of the north side of the fence. :)

Actually, that will have to wait until next weekend. I'm pooped!

A trial-and-error plan.  I'm going to disconnect my kitchen and bath water from the mulch basin and use that water for watering the garden.  I'll keep you posted when that takes place...not quite ready for that yet, but since the title of the post is PLANNING and planting, I figured I'd better mention some future plans.  

Bench cover

It must be spring because the projects are easier to begin. Or maybe my Vitamin D is back to a halfway normal level. Whatever the reason, a long-awaited project finally rose to the top of the list. Yes, the bench cover.  I forgot how much I enjoy projects like this. So here's where we started...a cut up old mattress cover for padding, green outdoor canvas, a zipper that I decided not to use, some Velcro that will only get used if the cover decides to habitually shift, a ruler, and a measuring tape. Let's GO!

Laying out the fabric. 

I love sewing corners😜

I also serged all the edges, but I'm sure your imagination can take care of that picture. 

Done!  Of course there was pressing seams and hems in there somewhere, staying up too late and indecision about the hem stitch, but it got finished. 

Speaking of the hem stitch, I decided to get a little fancy. It is a setting on my little inexpensive IKEA sewing machine. Got about halfway finished with the hem and realized that the stitch reminded me of an old lady tablecloth edge. Oh well,  

I also got some plants planted this weekend.  Started with some bulbs...lillies, gladiolus, and crocusmia (really tall with little red flowers) then moved to some things for the garden. We've got cucumber, zucchini, yellow squash, butternut squash, and watermelon going so far. 

Then I ordered my birthday present...four columnar apple trees, a bunch of strawberries, and four blueberry plants. So excited for them all to come. The columnar apples are super cool and I'll plant them in big pots. They grow straight up on one branch and produce regular sized apples. So excited! Oh I said that already! 

Garden spot

I mentioned in the previous post that on the to do list was a garden spot. I used the 4 - 1x6's from the pallets and the cross pieces are 2x6 also from the pallets. 

And there you have it. 

Still deciding what to plant, but on the list are carrots, zucchini, yellow squash, watermelon, cucumbers, and green beans. Strawberries will go in rain gutter that I'm going to mount on the fence. Now we're just waiting for the average last frost day, so the planting can begin. Going to add a bunch of horse manure to the garden spot, and maybe even plant a couple of blueberries in pots. Getting excited for a bit of gardening!  Also on the to do list is a pergola for some outdoor living space. 

Scanning Project Rule #2, and a new project

Scanning project rule #2 is only make two piles titled "Scan" and "Chuck."  There is no need for a pile called "I'll look at this again later, or "maybe I'll need this someday." After an item goes through the scanner I also have piles called "Mike," Brian," "Ellen" and "Jeff". No, not random names from stories I loved as a child...names of family members who might like to walk down memory lane when they get a surprise little box in the mail one of these days. 

A new project...a Nellie fence. I started a full-time job a week and a half ago and I sure don't like leaving Nellie home all day.  I started on a Wednesday and had to call on my friend Robyn and her family to let Nellie out in the middle of the day because I didn't have a way to keep her from running free, although I'm sure she would have come home when she got hungry. So last weekend we built a little fence. Now Nellie has her very own yard. So here we go. 

I acquired some very large pallets from a friend who does custom countertops. Two 11 ft pallets were enough to complete the entire support system of the fence...well, minus three 2x4s. Lots of wood in those pallets. 

Here's 1 1/2 pallets. I cut the slats in half because I didn't want or need a 6 foot fence. 

Robyn, Pip, and Keith with the first run of fence. 

Another view. 

Turned the corner. 

Complete!

Put a self-closing hinge on the gate. 

So now Nellie can hang out in her yard or inside the house while I'm at work. Yay!

Humongous THANK YOU to Robyn, Keith, Bailee, Andy, and Gwen for your help with the fence and dinner!

I still have a bit of wood leftover from the pallets so planter boxes are the next outside project. We WILL have strawberries this year. 

Nellie sure loved that squeaker pig! Thanks Jason and Wendy!

More fence details if you are interested. The bottom support rail of the fence is 11ft 2x6 from the pallets. The top rail is 3 1/2 ft 2x4 from the pallets with a chunk of 2x4 screwed to the seams for support. 

I used metal fence posts for a couple of reasons, first because they are easy to put in the ground and second because we get strong winds here and the metal posts allow a little give so no snapping off at the ground in 70 mph wind. I did end up purchasing a couple of long 2x4s to finish the top rail of one side mostly because it was easy, and I knew I wouldn't have enough from the pallets to finish.