Gardens!

What can I say besides I think I bit off more than I could chew! I started off a "little" behind (i.e. the weeds had a huge jumpstart since they moved in before I did!) but I am starting to feel like we may be on an even playing field soon! I have however been working 12 hour days since I got here to try to get to that point! We have enjoyed fresh carrots, peas, lettuce, spinach, beets, radishes, turnips(which we decided we didn't like!) thus far. Our red onions from sets were a bust and red potatoes are curing in the basement - should be ready to eat in a week and a half. We have tomatoes, sweet corn, green beans, black beans, okra, watermelon, peppers, pumpkins, summer squash, acorn squash, and cucumbers planted. We have found that our new garden, where all of the tomatoes and warm season crops are does not drain worth a darn. I have lost quite a few tomato plants as we have had a lot of rain this spring and early part of summer. Good thing Daniel's dad and I put in around 225 tomato plants to start with! Live and Learn is our new motto out here!

Our intention was to have enough produce to sell at the farmers market! Hasn't quite happened yet - I thought I was putting in way more than enough, but as this is my first time to grow anything other than tomatoes, I've learned that I really planted enough to feed about 6 people. Hopefully the tomatoes and summers crops will come through and we can still go to the farmers market!

We had a lot of work to do to get the new garden ready for planting so there is a picture of where it started and where it was a few weeks ago.

It's Electric (anyone sliding?!)

Oh the electric - my mom's greatest fear with this house! As I write this all of our lines are officially grounded, which I'm told is a good thing. We had the help of one of Daniel's cousins and his buddy that just happens to be an electrician. That sure did come in handy as it ended up like most projects out here - more than we expected! We replaced all of the poles outside and all of the cords are now in an actual electric box in the basement. It looks really good outside. We still have to change out the lines inside and add some outlets. As like any old farmhouse, we are lucky if a room has one outlet! I keep asking for my one outlet on a kitchen wall so that my TV can be mounted and I can watch GMA as I eat my cereal in the morning - it's the little things that matter! Some of the pictures show where Daniel has taken off the lathe and plaster in the foyer and the upstairs hallway. Once the inside wires are replaced we will put in insulation and hang the drywall! One of the other pictures shows the line outside where the wires leading to the house are also now underground instead of big scary wires hanging from the pole to the house. The jumbled mess of electrical wires in one of the pictures is where all of the wires were instead of being in an electrical box - how scary!

I can see it so clearly now.....

The new windows were a huge improvement to the house this winter. From the few old pictures of the house that we have, it looks like we replaced windows that the house had in the 1920's! It was definitely time - we had a multitude of leaks, vents, and passages for unwelcome insects! The one picture of the house has the one new window compared to all the old ones. I need to take some pictures of the house now, with the new windows so you could see the before and after. I told Daniel one morning after we got the new windows that we had a new cardinal eating at the birdfeeder and that he was the brightest cardinal I had ever seen. He said it wasn't a new cardinal, I could just see it clearly through the new windows!

June - Time sure does fly!

So the official move for me happened at the end of May after the last day of school in Oklahoma. It was a very sad week and I was very sad to leave my friends and family in Oklahoma! Thankfully there is plenty to do up here that keeps my mind off of being sad about not being there! Plus it is my summer vacation, so that is something to be happy about! Yet again I have neglected the blog, but now that I will be staying in one place it should be a little easier to keep it updated (plus I promised numerous people that I would!) A lot of work has been done so it is hard to know where to start! There is the electric, the gardens, the new windows, the constant fight with weeds, and of course the continuous outside clean up effort! My mom showed these pictures to some of her friends and she couldn't believe it was the same couple - one weekend in Jamaica and the next planting our first tomatoes of 2010.