I am calling this garden bed #1 since it’s the one I redid first. 

I am going to keep track of what emerges in each bed, and what’s planted in each bed, from now on.  I have been sort of slack in this regard!

Here’s what I have so far.  Was lucky to find many of the tags from things planted in this bed through the years:

Bed #1 Diagram (this is a large picture!)

I am trying to identify a few more plants, and then I’ll add to this diagram as I figure it out. Some things may be coming out, too. This bed has a lot in it that won’t come out ’til spring.

This is what can happen when you are too zealously digging out buckets full of mulch.

Yes, that is where I pulled my fingernail back.  Ouch.  Is it sore?  Yes.  But is my garden looking good.  YES. 

Lynn

Oh, I was so happy.  Even though it was nearly 5:30 p.m. yesterday evening, I was so happy to see the man from the tree service pull up in front of the house.  He backed his dump truck up into the driveway and left this behind!

I mean, that is a mulch pile!    Any gardener would understand my excitement.  I am going to be out today mulching the beds.  I’ll try to post some pictures when I am done.  I may even have to ride over to Home Depot and see what kind of plants that have that I could work with now.

Lynn

my daughter before I had a daughter.  And you know who you are. 

When I took the picture, Thomas asked what I was doing.  I told him who I was taking the picture for, because I thought she would like the colors.  So there I was, trying to be all elegant and everything, and on the second shot I sensed movement behind me.

I guess he just wanted to say hello too.

Hello, J and K. 

PS — I think I need to go clean the camera lens!

I sure wanted my mulch delivered today, but the tree service got rained out. 

It’s okay, though.  My daughter and I decided that if we can’t plant outside, we’ll plant inside!

I bought a little Jiffy Greenhouse and a packet of shasta daisy seeds. 

We also chose some seeds from a collection that I keep in an old, green McCoy planter.

The seeds are tiny, even next to a sweet little hand.  We planted three seeds into each Peat Pellet.  Fun.

Planting shasta daisy seeds is serious business.  We planted 3 seeds x 72 Peat Pellets, so that’s a lot of potential. 

Thankfully, I had already started supper earlier: a chunky, mostly-homemade spaghetti sauce with lots of bell pepper and onion and mushroom:

Venison Spaghetti Sauce

• 3 lbs ground venison, browned
• 1 large onion cut in chunks
• 1 large bell pepper cut in chunks
• 3 cloves of garlic minced
• 1 jar of whole mushrooms
• 2 jars of Classico 4-cheese pasta sauce
• crushed tomatoes to your preferred thickness and taste
• seasonings such as oregano, thyme, salt, pepper, etc. to your liking

Simmer it all for a couple of hours and serve over Barilla Plus thin spaghetti. 

For dessert, my daughter and I made chocolate chip cookies.  I could have eaten 10, but I only at 3, and they were SMALL!!!

I did swing by Goodwill today on the way to get laundry detergent.  (We’ve been out for two days, so it’s Mt. Laundry at every turn.)  I bought only one thing.  I spent 52 cents.  It was a beautiful Degas print of Dance Class.  It is now on my kitchen cabinet with a bit of sticky-tack.

School Lessons:  Joseph read a lot today (always at least a couple of hours) and wrote a poem today.  He’s been talking about Edgar Allen Poe today.  Oh, he also watched Dances with Wolves as part of our study of early American writing/Native Americans.

Oh, and we have our first worksheet on line.  You’ll see the link at Dragon Speller.  We’ll be adding to this regularly.

Lynn

Sunshine makes me happy!  Does it make you happy?

I went on my walk and I took a picture of the same church steeple that I photographed on Saturday morning.  Here’s the steeple in the clouds.

And here is the same steeple in the bright, beautiful sun!

Ain’t it pretty? 

Lynn

My Breast Cancer/Breast Health page is under way!  I will add to it at every opportunity.  I am also committed to supporting breast cancer research whenever I am able to.

Breast Cancer/Health Information

I’m off for my daily walk.

Lynn

works hard for a living.  And he does work hard for me and his dad.  He’s a good boy and a good son. 

It was so late when I posted last night that the date showed up as today, but it was really last night and now this is today — Saturday.  Today is my son’s birthday — the 23rd, and actually he was born on a Saturday.  It was very cold and it snowed on the day he was born.

Today it’s cloudy, but the temperature is mild.  My daughter and I took our daily walk.  (Think breast health.) 

We walked down a street that has a pretty rock wall.

The walk was very good for us.  We talked about how exercise can reduce your risk of disease.  We challenged ourselves to walk up and down some very hilly streets.

Around the block and she sat down for a rest…

but not for long, as she wants to walk the length of the stone wall and she wants me up there walking with her!  We noticed the beautiful moss-covered, flat stones that top the wall.

Once we reached the end of the walkway, I put my camera in my pocket and climbed carefully down.  No jumping for me due to my still-healing incision.  But, of course, she jumped.  But only after I had the camera back out.

We walked along and talked about the verse I have been thinking about in Proverbs.  Chapter 3 Verse 9:

Honour the Lord with thy substance, and with the firstfruits of all thine increase:  So shall thy barns be filled with plenty, and thy presses shall burst out with new wine.

 We did not get into the second part of that verse, but we talked about what substance is.

Me:  Do you think substance is what you own?  The material things that you have?

Daughter:  Yes.

Me:  Do you think that substance is also what you are?

Daughter:  Yes, because we own ourselves.

Me:  Yes.  God actually owns us, but we have the privilege to make our own choices, so in a big way, we do own ourselves.  And the choices we make and the things we do, we have to own them.  Yes, I think we are part of that “substance” it talks about.

It was a nice walk and talk.  We did have to stop and take a picture of our most serious walking faces.

There were many pretty sights this morning.  I thought this steeple looked striking against the cloudy sky.

My daughter stopped and took a picture of the railroad tracks.

Now we’re off to get Big Joe’s birthday present.  He wants an Ipod.  I’m happy to be able to get him one.  He’s a good boy.

Happy Saturday,
Lynn

I spoke today with the doctor who did my core needle biopsy.  The diagnosis is fibrosis, which is benign.  I am so very, very thankful. 

I have to go back in six months and get this followed up.

This experience has totally broadened my view.  There’s a bigger place in my heart for those dealing with breast cancer.

One of my goals now is to be consistent in walking daily.  I try to exercise, but I know I don’t exercise daily like I should.  Exercise such as walking has been shown in studies to reduce the risk of breast cancer.

When I came home from work tonight, we celebrated my second son’s 17th birthday. 

Isn’t his cake beautiful?

There were special words — just for Joe — written all over the cake!

It sure was good with vanilla and chocolate ice cream!  Believe me, I am still watching my diet and trying to be careful regarding what I eat, but one splurge to celebrate the birth 17 years ago of a spectacular son surely couldn’t hurt anything!  Right?

Thank you so much to everyone who’s been supporting me and thinking of me and praying for me while I waited.

Lynn

Here are the plants that’ll be left in place:

A load of mulch will be delivered next week.  I have dirt in the compost that will be worked in.  It should be beautiful this spring and summer!

Lynn