Finally!

Finally it seems as though the weather has turned the corner into something we might remember as spring. It's been so cold overnight-with temps in the very low 30s or upper 20s for weeks on end-that we were all pretty discouraged. A few lucky areas have been blessed with warmer micro climates and have their plants out, but most do not. In fact, here it is, May 22nd, and the trees are not yet fully leafed out-and neither are all the shrubs. Typically, we're pretty much leafed out by Mothers' Day so this has been a set back to all gardeners.

But that doesn't mean the preparation work stops. I have a new pile of what passes for topsoil up by the garden-ready to amend and plant. I've delivered more items to the commercial greenhouse, and brought home my own hanging baskets. Yesterday I got peppers, tomatillo's, cucumbers, and melons potted up for the summer. Today I will work on all the annual containers, which will be pitifully small indeed. They've been kept in their cell packs for easily three weeks longer than normal, darn it. I'm still up to my eyeballs in veggie starts, even after setting aside whats needed by friends and family. And I have tomatoes. Lots and lots of tomatoes, haha Which is going to mean lots of big pots and I am so thankful that I had the foresight to purchase a number of those this spring!

We've also come up with a plan to replace the (incredibly ugly!) gravel alongside the long garage wall, hip hip hooray! In about three weeks or so, that gravel will be removed-and carefully spread to alleviate some minor drainage problems elsewhere. Then, lots of dirt gets spread and we'll be seeding it for grass. For this wall, I got a total of five lilac shrubs to plant, they are going to look wonderful! For the back side, I have two Norland apple trees and a Centennial to plant too, woohoo! Of course this means a fence for protection from moose, but I don't mind, I have been wanting apple trees for years. And most exciting of all, I managed to snag onto three honey berry bushes. Very hard to come by, these Zone 2 plants will provide not only scented blooms, but some wonderful berries when mature. The berries look like an elongated blueberry, and taste nearly the same.

Yesterday, I about had a disaster. My wonderful husband removed some fencing at the barn that wasn't needed, and moved the coop over one stall. It freed up quite a bit of barn space, so we're both happy about that. His idea was to fence off the garden from moose (and chickens!) using the fence panels with chicken wire zip tied to it. Sounded really good, but then yesterday I barely managed to snatch up a flat of veggies from being wolfed down by the laying hens.....and, instead of fencing the chickens out of the garden, I now have to fence them in. There is no way I can harden anything off with those birds loose, they'll eat it, lol! So today, one of the first things to tackle is making a secure fence for the girls. They are not going to be happy, poor things.

Another little project is to construct a real raised bed down by the greenhouse. Just has to be done, and hopefully I will have this knocked together by midweek....it should be about 24 by 6 foot wide when completed. That's my pumpkin bed, and this time I will make sure I can easily add my plastic piping hoops over the entire bed, lol Also accomplished last week-thanks to my wonderful husband a couple of friends-the cold frame is up and sheeted. We used the scrap covering from the big greenhouse for it, and set the legs into concrete blocks. That's where the corn and extra tomatoes will be this summer.

I am sure am looking forward to all the new projects being completed-then I can share pictures!