Not Fishing

Bobby had to finish something up at the jobsite in Big Bear today, and thought it would be nice to make a day of it. He planned for all of us to go up together, he'd take an hour or so to finish up, and then we'd go fishing. Invited his dad to come along too.

We had to make a stop at the Home Depot first - he needed to construct a plan holder using some 3" PVC pipe and fittings. As we were parking, I said I wanted to go to the Garden section, and he could come get me when he'd finished. Emma quickly chimed in that she wanted to go with me. Letting us go in was his first mistake.

We were originally just going to buy some seeds, and I wanted to check out if they had any Meyer Lemon trees - not that I was going to buy one per se, I just wanted to see the size and price. But what did we find? A blueberry bush. Only $10.

Now, as much as I love strawberries (I know, I can hardly shut up about them lately), blueberries are my most favorite berries. I have been wanting a blueberry bush for awhile now, but had yet to find one for sale. Emma, also a lover of blueberries, cheered when I told her to go get a cart.

Oh, and right next to the blueberry? A Zinfindel - $5. In it went.

I had not been too excited about fishing - I much prefer deep sea fishing to lake fishing. I was willing to go along, feeling like I would be a bit of a party pooper if I were to bow out. But as it got closer and closer to when we were supposed to leave, Emma was mentioning a little more that she didn't really want to go fishing. I admitted that I didn't really want to go either. We eventually decided that Bobby and his dad would go fishing, and Emma and I would head home.

Of course, we didn't go straight home... we had to make a small stop at the Home Depot near our house - we now needed potting soil, and a couple pots... and I picked up some Stargazer Lily and Iris bulbs as well.

When we did finally get home, I dutifully started a load of laundry, and then Emma and I set about our gardening. She'd picked out 4 flower seed packets and one potted flower. We planted seeds, bulbs, and plants in the pots and throughout the yard. Starting, of course, with my blueberry.

Hopefully this pot is big enough. I'm running out of space to plant where actual sunlight hits. I suppose I could plant smack in the middle of the yard, but then my gravevines would be shaded.

This is the one potted flower Emma picked out.

As for the Zinfindel, I thought the spot left with the best sun was in the front yard. We have a low chain link fence between our house and the neighbors that it can climb on, and since there are sprinklers in the front I won't have to think about watering it too much. I'm not too fond of the look of chain link, but it should look nice covered in grapevine.

All this potting and planting... I decided I wanted to move some stuff around too. My Thyme wasn't really flourishing where it was (not enough sun, I think), and I hated having to trek to the opposite side of the yard when I needed some. I had a bunch of empty pots hanging around next to the patio, and decided to put them to use. First, I transferred my dill and thyme into pots, and placed them along the edge of the patio where the afternoon sun would hit them.

My tarragon and lemon balm were already in pots, but I moved them so that they too were along the edge of the pato, opposite the dill and thyme. In the little pot there (one of the new ones), I put some garlic cloves.

This little step display thing has been in the yard forever, but until recently it has just held emptly pots. Emma and I planted some seeds in a couple of them, and I decided I will finish it with all flowers. I don't usually plant flowers, often opting for plants that will eventually feed me, but I felt this side of the yard needed some color. To the left, Emma and I also dug up the earth, mixed in some soil and compost, and put in an until now unused trellis/tower thing. In the ground there are Morning Glories. In my experience, they grow pretty fast, and have amazingly beautiful little flowers. I think we can brighten up this wall.

I also moved my parsley out of the "kitchen garden" to just beside it. I already had the pot and the stand, they just weren't being used just yet. My thinking is that I'll reserve the kitchen garden for fruits and vegetables, and keep the herbs in pots - although the basil can stay for this season, and the marjoram and oregano will continue to be a floor covering along the back wall.

And the, because I've been buying (and eating) a lot of onions lately, I've had the inevitable sprouting onions. I tend to avoid chopping them up if they have a sprout, and I'd acquired quite a collection. The one in the front had been in the compost heap, and mangled as it was, it was still fighting for it's life.

Since I'd just moved some of the herbs out, I put these onions into the kitchen garden. Hopefully they will bring me more.

Once we finished potting and planting what we were going to pot and plant and cleaning up after ourselves, we watered down the yard and all our new plants really well, as it was now after six and starting to cool down. Something about watering everything makes everything feel so fresh, and when the water hits all those herbs, the yard smells just lovely.

Now that our watering was finished, and it was approaching evening, we had one step left - releasing the ladybugs. I wasn't going to let the aphids get my tomato plants this year, but I didn't want to buy any pesticides. Emma and I had made sure we picked the pouch with the most live ladybugs, and she made sure they were kept cool throughout the day. We opened the pouch, and gently sprinkled them in the kitchen garden.

We sat on the patio for a few minutes, relaxing, smelling the herbs, and bragging about how much we'd just done, and how nice the yard looked. True, we'd planted mostly seeds, but adding the herbs to the end of the patio, using up some vacant pots, and cleaning up had made it look really nice.

Then it was back inside, to get more laundry going, and clean up inside the house...