Garden Update

Our Rose Bush came back. We thought it had died. It kind of did. Last year we had Peach colored Roses and Yellow Roses from this same plant. Apparently the nursery had grafted 2 varieties together. In any case, only the Yellow Rose is blooming.

06/03/09 06/30/09

Look how tall our Sunflowers have grown!
This is what our garden looks like today. I need to pick up some additional garden fence stakes this weekend because we did not have enough. The bamboo stakes Anastasia substituted for the stakes we were short are not working out.

First tomato!

Our first grapes!

The weather was wonderful today! I got a chance to begin tying our growing tomatoes to the cages and stakes. (Ok, to be honest I did maybe 1/3 before I cried Uncle. If Anastasia didn't have a chance to finish I'll be back at it again Wednesday.)

The hay has been working out quite well at helping our garden retain moisture. When I went in to tie the tomatoes I was surprised to find the ground soft and wet even though we hadn't watered for more than a day. I was not happily surprised when I discovered that weeds were still popping through the hay. The hay has greatly slowed down the proliferation of weeds, however, it does not prevent them.

I hope to be motivating our kids over the next few days to turn over the other garden plot so that we can get our seedlings planted for pumpkins, butternut squash and acorn squash. We hope to get those planted by the weekend, depending on the weather. The weather service has been promising rain, but so far has not come through.

How is your garden doing?

Lola's Victory Garden
©2009

My Weekend Garden 06/20/09

Look at me! I got a jump on things and took this photo on Friday. Anastasia and our son have been working hard getting the plants in. Wednesday they put the stakes and the fencing in. (This was the fencing we bought on our big shopping trip.) They also put hay to keep the weeds at bay. I had a bit of difficulty finding hay. None of the big box stores had it, but I was able to find it at a local garden center for $6.99 for a large bale.

We are not quite done planting our finds from last week. If the rain stays away this weekend we may be able to finish. All that's left are the peppers: Bell Peppers, Habanero (our son insisted), jalapeno (I use them in canning and in my chili) and yellow banana peppers (hoping to can these because our son and I can't get enough of them).

I also started some seeds this past weekend and they have already begun to sprout. I used my newspaper pot method and mixed seed starting mix with vermiculite.

Lola's Victory Garden
©2009

My Weekend Garden 06/13/09

I just posted the photos from last week, so go check out Weekend Garden 06/06/09. (Looks kind of hillbilly right now, but once we get more mulch we can cover the landscape fabric and it will look better.)

Our Sunflowers we started from seeds are going like gangbusters and almost a foot tall.
The other seeds we started = fail. My initial thoughts about the Self Watering Greenhouses proved to be correct. The tiny peat pots with some sort of mesh covering proved too small and hindered root growth. All we got were short spindle like plants that could not even stand on their own. The San Marzano Plum Tomatoes looked like single blades of grass 4 inches high with a couple of tiny leaves. Very disappointing. We dumped the rejects into the compost bin. I hate to tell Anastasia "I told you so", but she doesn't read this blog, so I can type it here. I told you so. Hehehehe! Sorry hon! Next year we will go with my original plan which was to go with the newspaper pots that I rolled. I used them last year to start seeds and they were very successful.

We admitted defeat and headed out to a garden center today. Hoorah for us! They are closing up for the season (just a little roadside stand really) and everything was clearance priced. Clearance is my middle name, in case you were wondering. All their plants were very healthy and were $9 per flat. Vegetable plants and flowering plants, mix or match. Normally they go for at least $3 per 4 plant cube. Since there are 12 per flat that would have been $36. A savings of $27 per flat. Woo hoo! We bought 3 flats. We bought several varieties of tomatoes, peppers; cucumbers, cauliflower, broccoli, zucchini and tomatillos.
That is the statue we purchased last week after the farmer's market. Anastasia has been wanting one of those since we moved to the burbs.

Lola's Victory Garden
©2009

My Weekend Garden 06/06/09

Yesterday we mowed the front and back lawn. Funny, because Anastasia started and I stopped her part way through the side yard and told her I'd finish. She didn't want to give up playing with the new lawn tractor, so I distracted her and took the keys out of the ignition. Lol! I told her to go garden while I mowed. Hehehehe.

So she gardened. She put out landscaping fabric around our Lilac Bushes and along the side by the Rose Bush and planted Dahlia Bulbs and Yellow Petunias. Right now it doesn't look like much but a few flowers sticking out of the blackness and mounds of mulch, but when it is done, it's going to look nice. Baby steps. It will get there.


Have a great weekend.

Lola's Victory Garden
©2009

Lola's Victory Garden Is Now Google PR2!

Yippee! Last month Lola's Victory Garden was Google Page Ranked 2! The previous month it was Google Page Rank of Zero.

Awesome!

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Lola's Victory Garden
©2009