becoming farmers

forgot to post these pictures, but must document. my brother and his wifey came out to the farm to work the garden and i think we'd all agree the garden worked us. we tilled, we made raised rows, we planted corn, and we had some tasty drinks.

uncle will instructs med on the art of raised rows


surprisingly med looks like he's listening, appearances are deceiving


me enjoying the rototiller a bit much


corn planters & 1 week later they sprouted


jen & med bonded that day, a very special day for them both.

and in other news...



don't rototiller your fence



it's as fun as it looks.

the corn has hatched

never knew this is how corn sproutlings looked, one point down for learning something new today. pretty excited about the corn, actually i've never been so excited about corn before. it seems like just the other day my brother and sista were over helping plant the seeds and then the rain came and then the sun and out these babies popped, if only child birth was so easy. oh and it was just two weekends ago, AMAZING, i love this thing they call gardening.

SEEd Update

raised row #1: beans just beginning to push through the dirt.
raised row #2: peas are sprouting up all over the place!
raised row #3: little red and green beet sprouts are a welcoming site to 1/4 of this row, the rest of the row is another type of sweet pea, who likes peas?
raised row #4: no action yet, but i think they are enjoying their new home.

biggest TWO garden challenges:
1) keep getting those clumps to nice fine dirt for those tiny seeds to work their magic.

2) keep the dogs out of the garden! Iggy's hugeness does a number on my rows, why do dogs like to play next to my garden?

saturday sun = raised row #4

saturday forced me to do more gardening, plus tyler spied some sprouts coming up from the beans and peas so i was ecstatic to get some more seeds in the ground, this gardening thing might pay off after all.

first off i tilled the entire garden with a tiller attached to a tractor, just a quick pass to try and declump the soil once again, those clumps don't stand a chance. then i took the tractor over the garden about 10 times where i would do the next raised bed. the dirt looked pretty good, finer particles, less clumps, i guess seeds don't like to try and grow around hard dirt. and i read that if you plant carrots in clumpy soil they will grow all crooked like, hey maybe that'd be kinda fun. so anyway, declumped and then with my handy dandy rake made a large 2 foot high x 2 foot wide mound of dirt. without stepping on the fresh mound i used the flat side of the rake to smooth a foot wide top down to have a nice even planting surface. then my sweet garden gnomes, i mean helpers, my mom and girls planted beets, buttercrunch lettuce, spinach, and fennel. we also sprinkled in radishes throughout since they grow super fast and will help mark the rows and let us have something to nibble on while the rest of the stuff is hopefully growing.

by the way, all these pics are taken with my mom's little point and shoot camera, i like how it fits in her pocket and it is so easy to use.

here is a good way to mark your seeds, just use the seed packet (my mom says they are waterproof), staple it to a stick and poke in the ground, very complicated.






doogie helps with the spinach, well he does look like he's doing something, probably thinking that helping means getting in my rows and taking a nap or quietly observing my every move.






does the barn look different? it's not finished yet, but oooooh so close.


remember it used to be this...