Three Plus Two

Garden Notes 4/28

So I won't forget... and because something is finally happening out there...

• The peas are coming up! Close observation was required to see the seedlings just pushing up out of the ground, but they're there. It took a little over a week for the seeds to germinate, which is not bad. I think we have the warm temperatures to thank; some other years it has seemed to take forever.
• Over the weekend we noted that Pip's chard and radishes had sprouted. He may also have dumped out some lettuce seeds in that space, too.  Right now the seedlings are indistinguishable, and it's going to require some merciless thinning.
• Gareth planted a long strip of carrots (Red-cored Chatenay, Cosmic Purple, and Thumbelina) and beets (golden) on Saturday.
• One of the Aronia bushes has already been snapped off by someone who isn't telling.  The remaining bush is already starting to leaf out.
• Blackberries, raspberries, and blueberries are all leafing out now.
• Crabapples are beginning to leaf, as is the oak tree.
• Wild strawberries have blossoms!

Something Every Day

Since we got back from our trip, I'm trying to find something to blog about every day. There always is something to blog about, and if I don't carve out a few minutes to reflect on the days, they just rocket past in a blur and I'm left with nothing but week in review posts.  The week in review posts are a great help at the end of the year when I'm writing a narrative report for the school district, but they miss the smaller bits -- the white violets I saw springing up in a carpet beneath the maple tree in the sideyard, for instance, where I don't go much -- the ordinariest bits -- waiting for an hour and a half at the doctor's office yesterday so Katydid could be seen for an ear infection, and me wondering if we were the only large family ever seen at that practice, and why everyone else seemed to need the help of grandmothers and husbands for their one child -- and the fleeting thoughts that spring up occasionally with nowhere to go.  I also have some questions to answer from the combox, I think... and I apologize to anyone who commented just as we were leaving.

"Something every day" starts early this morning: Andy just handed me a dead bumble bee in a Ziploc bag.  He found it on the floor in our bathroom under a towel. Its legs are curled under its body. Up close and still, its wings remind me of a mica shade on a library lamp: dark amber and barely transparent, fragmented by black veins.  I have the urge to lift the bee up to the light and look through its wings as a window -- wondering what new perspectives would be revealed.

Given the state of the economy, the government, public health... finding a bumblebee on the bathroom floor needs to be recorded somewhere.

This is what it feels like to be warm

 

Yesterday temperatures climbed pleasantly into the low 70's, and Andy's big delivery from Miller Nurseries arrived. Puzzling it out this afternoon we had to retrieve the catalog in order to remember what some of the plants were.  Aronia, for instance. Beach plums. Was there a paw-paw tree?  What does a high-bush cranberry look like after it starts to grow?  When the bushes and trees come out of the long, brown paper wrapper, they're all just bare sticks.  It takes some imagination to make them into an 8-10 ft. bush covered in pink blossoms, or a small tree laden with purple or yellow fruit.  I don't think Pop had it in him; when I told him the stick he was standing next to was a cherry tree, he looked at me like I was insane. "It's a baby tree," I told him, but he just giggled and shook his head. Obviously it was a stick his father had shoved into the ground for vague and mysterious purposes, and his mother was a moron.

 (It's a beach plum.)

I made Andy's life harder -- the latest incident in a long line of incidents, I am sure -- by suggesting that we plant some of these exotic fruits in our yard and not way out in the "orchard" on the hill.  (I have to put "orchard" in quotes because right now it is a motley collection of bare sticks shoved in the ground.  Nothing has leafed out yet, and even the 3 and 4 year old trees look pretty pathetic.  Planting an orchard is an act of faith, even more so than planting a garden.)  The Miller catalog suggested that the highbush cranberry would make a lovely specimen plant.

"It grows 8-10 feet tall!" I said. "And, look - the flowers!"

Andy gave me that look that husbands give their wives when they've been moving furniture all day and a place for the couch has still not been decided upon. But, longsuffering husband that he is, he dug up the cranberry bush from where he'd already planted it near the blackberries on the other side of the garden and planted it instead in the sideyard where the big tree fell the summer Chipmunk was born. He and Katydid planted the aronias -- which the Miller catalog suggests as an ornamental that will attract birds to your yard with its fruit 10x higher in vitamin C than... strawberries... I think -- next to the gate to the "little boys' yard" near the deck, and the beach plums along the back of the fence there. Or -- one beach plum was planted.  Somehow the second beach plum necessary for pollination was not ordered.

You may be asking yourself what I was doing while my husband was rearranging shrubs for me. Well, I did run some errands in the morning. I took the 3 older kids to Agway, which was PACKED because it was 80 degrees and everyone was running outside to see the strange yellow ball in the sky, and then, of course, they felt the need to plant something. I bought my seed-starting supplies for melons and okra, and then we hit the library, where I searched in vain for penguin books but happily succumbed to the temptation to check out many spring-related titles:

Well, some spring-related titles anyway.  I couldn't neglect the transportation books, or I'd have gotten a mutiny when I got back home. I did pick up a few botany-related books which I hope the big kids will find (and read):

 

...and I carried Chipmunk around like a baby monkey for most of the afternoon and evening, stopping only for him to help me plant a tray of watermelon seeds, make a quick dinner (salmon patties, broccoli, pineapple), and to eat some ice cream.

And now we are listening to the spring peepers and getting ready for bed.  Life is good.

Inspiration!

Inspiration software, that is. I feel like I'm about to give you a commercial: "Inspiration software makes it easy to get inspired..."

Actually, I was inspired to come over here and blog my moment of inspiration.  It happened this afternoon when I was attempting to write down all my ideas about Gareth's science for next year in loose outline form in Microsoft Word.  Gareth has nixed the idea of standard 7th grade Earth Science for next year, as well as the use of a textbook.  Fine with me.  We've been bandying about "general science"  --  6480 minutes required in some kind of reported science next year, so I might as well give it a title -- because it would allow Gareth to investigate a wide range of topics.  But when you are a non-sequential thinker and you are also attempting to hold a sleeping toddler while you are typing, trying to do an outline in Word can become a little frustrating. Generally I make notes by hand and use lots of circles and arrows, but that has its drawbacks, too.  For one, it's nearly impossible to do while holding a sleeping toddler.  And for another thing, you can't move the little circles and arrows around when you think up a better way to organize them.

So, as I was typing in Word, and getting frustrated that I kept having to scroll back up the page to add in ideas that didn't occur to me until I was farther down the list, and also wondering if I should arrange sciences by alphabetic order or in physical/life science groupings... it occured to me that I had bought some software for the kids that would be just the ticket.

Inspiration software is a visual outlining software designed primarily for students and educators that lets you manipulate circles and arrows to your heart's content. You can add pictures or icons. You can make and delete links all over the place. And when you have your mind-map done, the software will automatically turn it into an outline, if you so choose. It also has about a million templates for all the school subjects as well as teacher planning -- lesson plans, assignment sheets, goal-setting, etc. (And a 30-day free trial, which is how we started out with it.)

So here's where I'm going to sound like a commercial.  My kids love this software.  Gareth depends on it to write.  And me -- like a dolt -- I had never considered using it for myself until today.  But it is wonderful planning software.  I love it.

Now, if only it would help me narrow my ideas down...

Country Diary: Getting Ready to Garden

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Weather: Blustery and cold right now (36 degrees at 8 AM), with rain and snow showers predicted. (A check of the radar reveals pockets of ice all around us, but none here yet.)  The 10 day forecast, however -- wow! Temperatures in the 70's and 80's predicted for the next five days, and sun - sun! - for ten days.  Amazing! I feel like doing a happy dance, but I'm sure the twins would think I was a lunatic.

Out my window: The chickens are staying close to the coop this morning. They still haven't eaten that big butternut squash I put out for them, though. The blue plastic tarps that cover the coop billow and snap in the wind, but the chickens ignore them -- calmly pecking in the straw around the crabapple tree.

What I'm hearing: The twins building a "road" out of wooden blocks, pressing light sabers, swords, and electronic magic wands into service as construction equipment... the muffled ring of windchimes whenever the boys step back to review their work.

From the kitchen: Tea with cream and honey. I'm battling a cold, and a long night with Chipmunk, who has just come down with it, too.  (Fortunately, I have the forecast to keep me happy this morning!) I just ate Raisin Bran for breakfast, but we've been eating a lot of eggs since we got home... we're getting 10-12 a day. I made a quiche the other night for dinner which was really good -- our own eggs, local cream, local raw milk cheese, portobello mushrooms.  It tasted fantastic and puffed up in a way that my quiches don't, usually, when I just make them with milk and regular old Wal-Mart cheddar cheese.  We still have some leftover, which I'll probably eat for lunch with a green salad.

From the learning room(s): Not much planned -- we've been unpacking and cleaning this week, and now -- have I mentioned the forecast? Katydid will be traveling with her father next week, since he has to make a business trip over her birthday.  So schoolish things are going to mostly wait until after next week. And on the other hand, Gareth just finished reading Animal Farm and Katydid has been writing a long story whose main characters are all birds... owls and hawks, I think... and the little boys are playing with penguins and other sea life toys. The big kids have been working on a little math every day, too.

What I'm reading: Hmmm.  That's a tough one.  I'm kind of in the middle and in-between books. I've been paging through the books that come in this "homesteading" package.  We watched the breadmaking video yesterday, and the little boys immediately wanted to make bread.  I was mostly struck with envy for the West's pantry!

Around the house: I'm working on the kitchen.  Andy finished up the painting while we were gone, so when we got home, there was all the painting clutter to clear, stuff to rehang, etc. I'm taking this opportunity also to declutter, to organize the pantry (such as it is), to order some curtains and a bookcase for gardening and cookbooks, and basically to clean.  I've gotten the pantry re-organized, the pots and pans cabinet sorted out, and one of the counters looking a lot better. Progress is a little slow due to sickness.

In the garden: Hurray! We broke ground over the weekend.  Peas, beets, carrots, lettuce, spinach, chard, and radishes are in the ground. (Well, Pip and Pop did the radishes and chard, so who knows how they'll come up.  We'll see.) We'll start on potatoes and onions this weekend, and I expect we will begin to get shipments of berry bushes and strawberry plants next week, too.

A few pictures:

 

 

Trying to keep the chickens from scratching up seeds.

 

I call this one, "Pea Fences at Dusk.  With Trucks."

Family, Friends, Dogwoods, and Azaelas

Dogwood blossoms, Chattanooga Nature Center -- by Katydid

I feel as if I should fling myself into a chair with an anticipatory yet relieved sigh, and say, "We're back! Now let me tell you..."  Well, I'd probably do something of the sort if I was meeting you for coffee, but it's hard to get the same kind of frame with a blog post.  And actually, there aren't so many stories to tell... We were gone for 3 weeks, and yes, we did drive; my mother flew up to make the drive down with the kids and me, roughly 1000 miles, and probably the thing about that trip which was most exciting was the GREEN line -- at that point almost exactly at the Maryland/Pennsylvania border.  It snowed on the hilltops the day we left, which made green grass and roadside daffodils all the more exciting, and when we got to Tennessee and saw redbuds and dogwoods in bloom, the effect was almost delirious.  The weather bounced around while we were there -- up to the low 70's, then plummetting into the 40's with even a few snowflakes -- but for the most part, it was kinder than a New York spring, and the kids had a good time.  I confess I had a little garden envy, because my parents' next door neighbor had already tilled up three large plots of ground and his onions looked as if they were progressing nicely.  Back home, Andy told me glumly, all we had was cold rain, and he was trying to get our new chicken coop built in spite of it, but the garden was far too wet to till.

While we were visiting my parents, we had the pleasure of meeting a few online friends, who are now -- happily -- friends in real life as well.

 

Jennifer graciously invited us to play at her (beautiful) home, and the kids had so much fun I had to carry a kicking and screaming Pip back to the car because I think he wanted to live at her house.  (And just in case anyone is wondering, her learning room is even better in person!)  Unfortunately my kids came down with a cold and so we couldn't get together for a second time as planned, but -- maybe next year!

Right before we left my parents' to visit Andy's family in Memphis, we did manage to meet another online friend, though...

(Does anybody notice that one of my kids is missing in this picture? Was he standing behind someone? I can't remember. I thought I got everybody...)

This is Marjorie's lovely family, whom we met at the Chattanooga Nature Center.  Katydid was most happy to make the acquaintance of several girls on this trip.  Although I think one of the high points of the Chattanooga Nature Center for the kids (girls and boys) was the decidedly ungirly owl-eating-a-white-rat moment.

Katydid had the camera at the nature center, so, predictably, I have lots of pictures of horses, snakes, and flowers, and not very many of children or even one of the nifty tree house they have there.  On our way out, though, we drove through the attached arboretum and I did manage a picture of this:

Now the story goes that a storm carved the image of an Indian warrior into the side of the mountain.  Can you see it?

About a week and a half into our trip, we picked Andy up at the Nashville airport (my parents live in middle Tennessee) and drove over to Memphis to see Andy's family for Easter.  By this time -- predictably -- most of the kids were sick, but not seriously, so we had a chance to go to the zoo (a tradition).

 

 It was a little cold -- we should have been wearing our New York field trip apparel -- but the kids had a good time with their cousins.   And we got to see penguins.  More on penguins later, as they are currently a Big Deal around here with a certain three year old (Pip).

The polar bears were a big hit, too.  Katydid had the camera:

We also went to Dixon Gardens, a garden, art gallery, and a once private home -- all donated and now open to the public.  The gardens are incredible, especially in mid-April with all the azaelas in bloom.  Dixon Gardens deserves its own post (or photo album), but here's a glimpse:

Andy and his family took the big kids to see a Memphis Redbirds game... an outing that resulted in the most memorable and scariest story of the trip, as Farmerboy decided to attempt to get back to the seats on his own and instead, got lost.  Security had to be called.  Mercifully, the first I heard of this was when everyone got home with Farmerboy safe and sound.  Farmerboy is now required to HOLD HANDS under pain of death.  I'm thinking about handcuffs.

He had an early birthday celebration while we were there:

 

at Joe's Crab Shack.  (Today -- April 22 -- is actually his birthday.  We opened presents at 7 AM, but he won't technically be 6 until 9:22 PM. No sense in speeding up time... hard to believe that he's already 6 when it doesn't seem that long ago that I was staring at an ultrasound, counting movements and wondering whether I would be sent home from the hospital or not... and then those midnights dragging myself back into the hospital bed after late visits to the NICU.)

And, of course, there was Easter:

 

Well. After all that, we're taking a week to settle back in, recover from the new colds some of us (me, Katydid) have, clean house, and reacclimate to ordinary life.  As soon as we got home, Andy grabbed the tiller and went to work in the garden, so we have our garden work to keep us busy and to make up for the lack of azaelas.  Sort of. ;-)

Spring Break

In case you're wondering where I am... I'm on spring break in Tennessee, visiting family, enjoying the weather, meeting a few friends for the very first time, observing the twins' new obsession with penguins, carrying around a baby who has suddenly become attached to me like Velcro, reading, and enjoying a bit of Lenten media silence. Blogging will resume at the end of the April, at which point I should have a backlog of stories and photos to share.

May your Holy Week and Easter season be blessed and joyful!