A rainy and nasty Good Friday.
We learned yesterday that today was a holiday for Liz, which was pretty cool. Unfortunately the weather was not at all nice. There wasn’t an opportunity to go on a walk. I was actually the only one who went out – to Kroger. Mainly stocked up on the staples; nothing too fun made it into the cart. I prepared two more crock pot dishes today. The first was our dinner – Lentil curry of some sort, served over Jasmine rice. It turned out okay but I did forget to add coconut milk at the end. Oh well. I will probably make it again. Now the chickpea dish is cooking. I will probably try to make a couple more tomorrow, but that might require another trip to the grocery store. Maybe Wal-Mart this time, as the local Kroger isn’t that great. Although I’m not crazy about the idea of Wal-Mart on a Saturday.
Luke was crawling all over the place today. He loves playing with his toys on the floor. Equally fun is chasing Lily the cat. It is nice to see her on the receiving end of harassment for a change.
I am continuing to plan out the garden. Doing lots of reading and research and making my seed list. I’ve cut a number of things in order to simplify and do a better job on the core things we want to grow. We have just barely managed to keep a child alive for a year, don’t want to push our luck with a bunch of plants. The picture below is of the seed spreadsheet.
Burning, buying, digging, walking, and cooking.
The fire continued today. It has been really nice to get rid of so much stuff. We are pretty close to being totally cleaned up out back. I went to Home Depot in Spring Hill for a few things, and also bought a bundle of railroad ties at a garden center in order to build a retaining wall. I marked off where the wall will go and used the tractor to dig out and level the area. There were a lot more nice rocks mixed in with the dirt.
We went on a nice walk along the greenway early this evening. It was overcast, which is really nice since the sun isn’t shining in Luke’s eyes. I wish the path was longer, but no big deal. I made a vegan chili dish in the slow cooker today. Unfortunately it was much spicier than I would prefer, due to a tablespoon of cayenne pepper. But I do enjoy using the slow cooker, and hope to make more dishes.
Luke is doing pretty well. Some sleeping issues both during the day and at night, but he stays in a pretty good mood. He is crawling like a maniac and loves eating.
Buying stuff.
Mostly at Home Depot. Also at O’Reilly and TSC. Burned a lot more today.
Outside day!
We left the mountain this morning and enjoyed a lovely drive back to the farm. Back home my dad spent a little time mowing the yard on the tractor and I hauled trash to the dump. I spent the rest of the day cleaning up and organizing outside. Also got the chainsaw running and cup up the cherry branch that had fallen.
Fruit trees on the Mountain.
This morning my dad came to pick me up and we headed to McMinnville. We went by a nurshery that we visited with my father-in-law last week and bought some trees. Next we stopped at Co-op for some fertilizer. The weather was lovely and the drive amazing. Pretty much all the trees were green, with the exception of dogwoods and redbuds. At the cottage my dad already had eight holes dug. We just had to expand them and add a couple more. After planting we napped, then went to see the baby goats. They were frisky! Dinner was at the new(ish) Jesse’s Grill in Monteagle.
Little (strong) man.
Going to try to post a couple of videos. Hopefully they will work properly.
Preparing to grow.
Been doing lots of research and reading in order to have a productive garden this year. I hope to order seeds by the end of tomorrow. It looks like we’ll be focusing on pumpkins, carrots, beets, cauliflower, okra, and green beans. And three varieties of watermelon. I have made a big spreadsheet to keep track of everything. I think we will grow some things in containers, so I am also looking for cheap pots, instead of building my own planters. Also need to find a good source of potting soil. Need to build fencing as well, to keep out the deer. Now I know why people just go to the supermarket.
Cleaning up more than expected.
It seems that the strong winds that we’ve been having blew a huge limb off our cherry tree. Either that or a very overweight squirrel broke it off. I moved the branch with the tractor, but still need to cut it up into firewood. Cherry splits and burns very well. I started a burn pile with some other stuff that I need to get rid of, although I’m not sure when I’ll burn, due to incoming rainy weather. I am continuing to organize the yard in preparation for a garden and orchard. It is a bigger undertaking than I realized, but hopefully it will be finished soon. I am getting rid of more would than I would like. Unfortunately the reality is that I just won’t have time to utilize it, and it looks horrible just sitting around.
A day with the Little Man.
Well I rather unexpectedly had to watch after Luke today. We had lots of fun. Reading, playing, eating, and napping. He did the latter two exceptionally well today. Late this afternoon all three of us went on a nice greenway walk. Luke and I will be together again tomorrow, and hopefully things will be back to normal on Friday. I have so much work to do.
