Friday, December 17, 2010

Finally allowed to play!


Holiday traditions are my favorite part of the season. There are small ones, simple ones, and some we don't even realize are traditions until someone has passed. Our popcorn ball tradition started with my Grandpa Wolfe, he made them every year, and we looked forward to our box of popcorn balls arriving every holiday season, it just was not Christmas until we got that special box from Grandpa Wolfe! After his passing my Dad decided to take on the tradition and keep it alive. The men vowed to do it all on their own, so the women in the family are banished from the kitchen and not allowed to help. Being banished works for us since its seriously messy and funny to watch them do this. However, this year, many of the boys were not able to help, so the tradition came to my kitchen. I merely did as they told me to do, and helped for the first time ever with the popcorn balls. It was so much fun!! I had the best time, we popped the corn in batches as we created the sugary mix to hold them together, timing is everything I tell ya! I am not sure which part was my favorite, but simply watching my nephew have fun with his Grandpa was probably the best. However, smearing butter all over my hands and making a huge sticky mess to shape the popcorn balls was fun too. This year the boys decided they had the best colors they've ever done, and I must say the purple and yellow came out awesome! Maybe next year I will get lucky and they will invite me again. :) I only have a few shots since I am without a camera right now, but you get the idea! Another tradition we enjoy is my Aunt Linda's fudge, which arrived here at the shop this week, now, with the tree up, the popcorn balls sent, the fudge has arrived, and family is close, it's finally starting to feel like Christmas! Enjoy your Christmas and Holiday traditions this year, keep your loved ones close. Peace and love to everyone!

Monday, August 30, 2010

Quick photo update of the garden!



Enjoy! More photos and and update coming soon!





Sunday, July 4, 2010

Happy 4th

Here is a shot of the garden with the sun rising yesterday. The corn made it to knee high by the 4th of July. :) Things are growing well, and I am excited for all that is to come with the garden this summer. On a sour note, my aspen tree seems to be weeping sap all over the place, not sure if its got a bug, or what, but its a bummer. :( Hope to get that situation remedied soon.
Have a happy 4th.

Monday, June 28, 2010

Official first garden booty

Yesterday morning I pulled up some delicious spicy radishes from my garden. I am very excited about this since it's the first time I have ever planted these from seed. My micro greens will be ready in a few days, I am very excited that there is going to be a complete meal from my garden very soon! Happy gardening!


This is a shot of a few of the beds in my yard. Squash is coming up nicely, the cilantro needs to be cut back already, the horseradish is out of control, corn is knee high, and the pumpkins are starting to vine out.
This is the very very beginning of my rose garden. I got two bushes of tea roses this spring, a purple and a red. Yesterday I found a beautiful white rose bush and could not resist getting it! Its a little late for planting roses, but, I got it in the ground right away and will have to watch it through this next week of hot weather. Its a small start to what I hope will be a wonderful rose garden. its all still in the planning stages, have 3 new plants already this summer I am a jump ahead of the plan!

Saturday, June 26, 2010

Knee high by the 4th of July






Things are really growing fast in the garden, its so great! Here's a few photos of the progress so far. I still have so much work to do out there, this year is just the beginning. :)

Friday, June 11, 2010

Saturday, May 22, 2010

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Thursday, May 6, 2010

More then Gardening



Getting my house ready to be sustainable, grow my own food, and create a mini farm in the city, is quickly becoming more maintenance then anything else. Fixing the water drainage problem is taking much of my time, considering I am doing all the work myself it is taking a very long time.

I am hoping to have this fixed by this weekend, so I can concentrate on getting all my planting zones ready, and get hope to get all my seedlings & seeds in the ground either by this weekend or the next at the latest! I did get the corn planted last night, so thats exciting, now if I can just keep the squirrels out there!!

It's coming together, slowly but surely!
More pictures coming soon!

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Mom and Jim made quick work of the downed tree in the yard. Jim cut some of it into stumps and some of them into stepping stones. Looks great out there! I also found the problem where water was coming into the house, and am getting that fixed.

On the gardening front, I am going to get the corn planted today, and most of my seeds are up, so hope to get them planted in the next week or so!! pictures of the seedlings coming soon :)



Friday, April 30, 2010

Mother Nature is Awesome!!


Snow, cold, rain and wind, its all par for spring time in Colorado!! I know what I'll be doing this weekend!!!! It sounded like and explosion when the tree came down, and I am grateful it fell away from the house!!!!

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Rained out

Its been raining here since I think Thursday, which of course we love, but it manages to get us all to stay inside for a few days. Colorado has so many sunny days, we tend to really get into these sullen cloudy days, and just relax and enjoy guilt free inside tasks. This week a friend and I made Hulla hoops out of 1" 100 psi flexible pipe, and decorated them with electrical tape. It was so much fun, we listened to music, laughed, got the hoops made then went out in the rain to try them out. I need much more work to be a good hooper, but my friend took right to it. She rocks the hoop!!! Here's some shots of the family enjoying the hoops yesterday when we finally got a sunshiny day, they were a big success, everyone could do it except me, so now I really have my work cut out to get good at it! Theres also a shot of my super talented Dad and Brother doing some serious work to my truck, they are the best! A evening with great family and friends to remind me of what its all about, what a great life I have! Hope your out there ejoying yours too!

Chad and McKenna working the hoops, McKenna is really good!

Maggie gets the hoop going, she actually was doing two hoops at once....awesome
More of Mckenna and her Daddy getting the hoops rolling
Grandp and Chad decide to start walking with the hoops, so funny!
Grandpa and Chad having fun with the freshly minted hoops woohoooo!

Grandma, who, btw, is queen of the hoop, and Mckenna get 'em spinning!!!! it should be noted, this was the first hooping for Mckenna, and Chad, and they both took right to it.

Greg and Dad pulling the transmission among other things out of my truck to work on it! Not only world famous Punkin Chunker, but my very own personal mechanic, I am so lucky!
One last photo, this is my basement and my soaking wet carpet and pad. This old house has so many things that need work, and I finally managed to find the smelly musty spot I could never quite figure out. I had a huge fan in there all day yesterday and it is not drying out, you can tell by the stains on the carpet this has been happening over and over, so its time to rip out the carpet and start over down there. I think I figured out the water problem and will get that fixed too, but for now, the stinky carpet needs to go!! On an up note, checking other floors around my house I discovered wood flooring under the carpet in my spare bedroom upstairs!!! WOOHOOO!!! Exactly what I needed, more projects on the house hehehehehehe. Well, I am off to rip out carpet like a mad woman, more snow and rain are forecast for today, so its good I have so many indoor projects!

Monday, April 19, 2010

Weekend Warrior

This weekend kicked my ass, emotionally, physically, mentally, I was beat! What better way to shake of the blue funk then by heading into the yard with my ipod and my thoughts. I felt like I did not get much done, but looking at the pictures, it seems I did! The flowers were from a friend, I love them. Not sure why, but Pink seems to be a color I have never really cared for, lately however, I am beginning to love it. That's freaking me out a bit, but maybe it's just all the change in my life right now manifesting through colors :).

This house has treasures hidden all over, especially in the yard. This is an old bird house that has been screwed do the fence in the corner for who knows how long. Many times as I sat in the yard, I thought to myself, "I really should go get that off the fence and fix it up." Something always got in the way of me doing it, rushing from here to there, just not having the time for the simplest things that take only minutes. I finally retrieved it this weekend, and to my surprise, its in much better shape than I thought! It has a fun saloon look to it, even used to have a little sallon sign on it, I'll have to fix that and give it a new name :). Other then that, I think the birdhouse will be just great the way it is! It has an old weathered look about it that I love!
I have had many let downs in the last week or so, some very big, some very minor. My seeds not germinating was a let down for sure, but on the bigger scale of things, not so bad once I really thought about it. I used a new seed starter this year, that I just did not trust from the beginning. When I was planting the seeds, the dirt did not feel right, smell right or hold water right. I knew I should not have used it, but did anyway. It's coming to my attention that this spring is quickly turning into the experimental garden, so chalk that one up to a learning experience, and move on. I tossed out all the old dirt and seeds, and started over. I still have a few weeks before the last freeze, so I started a new fresh batch, I'll will just have to wait and see if this works better. I know there are problems with my seed box this year, and keeping my garage warm enough over night has also been a problem. I will have to work on that for next season. Add that to the nasty dirt, and here I am back at square one just a few weeks before the last freeze (hopefully). (I've been researching hydro growing, and am afraid that looks like TO much fun....might have to post more on that soon)Once I got the seed box replanted, I moved on to what is going to be the herb and flower garden in the back yard. I worked out here for about 6 hours on Sunday and felt I did not get much done. After reviewing the photos I took, I feel much better about how much I really did get done. Moving from back to front, removing all grass, weeds, and other debris took a lot of time, I am pleased with the way it is coming out. Last year this was my entire garden, now that I have no big dog in the yard to worry about, I moved things around and will use this space for things that need some shade, herbs, and flowers, and use the rest of the yard for serious growing. I am very excited to see it all taking shape! These two shots are the before and after :) My body is hurting today after all the clearing of this space, but hurting in the best possible way!
This is the after shot. The grass was so long I ended up using my push mower to trim it back so that I could rake the leaves out of it, then I could get to pulling the grass and weeds. It was about a 4 step process, but it worked very well. The other project I worked on that I spaced getting photos of, was the concrete patio removal. I loaded up one very large truck load of broken concrete debris and took that to the dump, that pile is finally getting smaller, but man, was it a lot of work! If you look at some of the older photos you'll see that pile in some of the shots, I will have to go out tomorrow and get a photo of what it looks like now. :) I almost forgot to post a follow up to the sprouting post! They take a little TLC, but they are totally worth it! its fun to watch them grow, to check out the roots, and see them fight for their place in the sun! i think I am going to love sprouting! They also taste super yummy!!!

(note to self, need to work on a new funky gardeny hat!)
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