Living Room re-do

I've given myself the big task of decluttering my apartment and purging any and all of the extras. To make this easier, I have also given myself permission to purchase a few things and update my space.

It is mostly done now, but I am behind in my intentional posts, so here's one nugget with more to come. 

A list of the little changes that made a big difference:

1 - where I was lacking drawer space, I made some. Storage is always a challenge in a small apartment. It grows increasingly difficult at year seven (!) in the same apartment. 

2 - I added more and different storage to my existing storage area. I admit this is my 'junk' corner, but those corners are important and essential and I'm not one to 'hide' things. So instead I tried to make use of every corner of this space. I added a shelf above the existing one up top. That was a lofty 3' high area that has  at least become double story storage now. I also added the hanging closet organizer, perfect for Rob's hats and other odds and ends. A few months ago I added an extra shelf in that black bookcase to start storing shoes it in - to this day I wonder why it took me so long to think of that.

3 - I color coded my books. Which, in my opinion, is a drastic change in making these groups of things look intentional with an element of design. This is my black to white stack. And my blue stack. The other bookcase has the orange and red. 

4 - I removed half of the back panel on this cheapo bookcase exposing the wall behind it. I wasn't going to go crazy with purchases, so things like this had to stay, but I wondered if I could improve them somewhat? Some people paint these instead for a pop of color. I wanted to completely remove it and when I did, I realized they do serve somewhat of a structural purpose and my backless bookcase was suddenly wobbly. I compromised, cut the thing in half and reattached a portion. I love the open, through look and am happy not to look at even MORE faus-wood in my house.

5 - I got rid of a lot of "knick knacks" and what was left I tried to co-ordinate throughout the room. White, silver, and wooden pieces repeat in various nooks. Some of this was by way of spray painting existing pieces. I also made sure to leave space for these decorative bits to breathe... with hope that breathing room prevents them from becoming "knick knacks" again.

These little things have made such a big difference. My shelves feel cleaner and minimal. I see clean surfaces and intentional spaces. 

Garden Update

It's about time for a garden update. Isn't it? Maybe a bit overdue? Maybe I'm boring you already? .... hello?

It turns out the bag of tricks I brought home from Menard's that day didn't work.

The hawk was unsuccessful, though I sorta enjoy his company back there. I still move it around from time to time and it grows comical when I find it pushed over on it's side the next day. They toy with it. Shove it out of their way as they scurry back and forth under the thick growth of marigold.

The plant stand works! And proved my only successful purchase. And it's only been knocked over once...

The chimes? even less useful than the hawk.

The water dish... who knows? I think they may be drinking from it. The bees certainly are, so I can pretend I am helping the bees at least. But it definitely hasn't deterred the varmint from my tomatoes. In fact, I have been losing my zucchinis now too.

To date I have eaten only one tomato from my backyard urban farm. The one tomato that I cut from the vine and let ripen indoors. But man... was it good....

I am getting less sad about the squirrels utter and complete demolition of all that I worked for... cause I have a tomato fairy at work! I gave a few of my baby starters away and have been finding bags of these beauts on my desk from time to time. 

Those suckers are 1 lbs each!

 See, just goes to show you, complain loud enough and someone will hear you. Meanwhile, I've been cooking them up in all different fashions. Tuesday we made our own tomato sauce... from scratch!
 A first for me.

Back in the garden the marigold are big and getting bigger. They are starting to stunt the things that surround them. CORRECTION - that they suround! They have outright consumed the blue herb planter (seriously, it's like Where's Waldo in there... do you see it?). They tower over my kale to the point that the kale is hardly producing any new growth at all, but I suppose that is OK in the hot of summer. The leaves get too bitter in the heat anyway. They are beautiful and lovely and huge and brilliant in color and terribly stinky. The lightest touch wears on the skin for hours. I have to stake and re-stake them after every heavy rain. I've learned that these giants do better in a crowd where they can support each other. A single stalk has a hard time remaining upright.

                  

Lastly, my late season crop of carrots and radishes. 

They are still hard at it. The carrots have a few more weeks to go. I have pulled a few radishes and they all look like this.

 I'm not sure if I'm impatient or incompetent. Maybe a bit of both? But I can't seem to grow a normal looking radish. I don't know how to fix this, but at least they taste normal!

I can also report that the raspberries officially did not flourish. I'm convinced they will do much better next year. I have several long new canes and much more area for them to fruit on in 2015. Now I just have to decide how/if/whether I should weather them over winter? 

Sacrifice

After much heartbreak and loss. I have taken to cutting off my tomatoes early and hoping they will ripen on the vine indoors. These were the last of my first crop nearing full size. The squirrels ate all the rest despite my efforts. 

We have a lot of new baby tomatoes. We'll see if the squirrels forget about us for a while. It's our only hope.

I'll try it all

I've gone through the list. And have tried most of them.

Predator urine. Nada

Marigolds. Nada. Not even three foot tall Marigolds.

Cayenne Pepper. Nada.

Nothing will stop the squirrels from destroying my tomato plants. They have picked all but one of my green fruit. That's eight or nine in the last week. Each time they pick, they break a limb or branch of whichever plant they set out on. They never eat the fruit. One bite and drop it.

The internet says to do the things I already did. So today.. I just started buying things. Trying shit.

Like maybe this plant stand will help?

Or this hawk.... shut up....

Or this peace offering fresh water dish... 

(side note: I read somewhere that they may be munching juicy tomatoes for the water content)

Or maybe this chime hidden behind the branches will startle them...

I don't even fucking know.

Lost

I feel defeated. I feel outsmarted, outwitted and out of ideas. I feel like I don't know what I can do next, or what will help, or how to even try. It's so much more than a lost tomato. Or a broken tomato branch. Or a bunch of dug up carrots. It's failure. It's failure to know what to do to protect these things I grew with my very own hands. It's failure because I should have done it better from the start. It's heartbreak. It's losing things I care about.

But you probably don't understand that.

Radish Round Two

I'm trying the radishes again for a fall crop. Cross your fingers!

And a pot of carrots that I still need to thin out!

Today's tomato

After a sprinkle of cayenne pepper last night, this is how one of my tomatoes looked today...

How did that mouthful of pepper taste Mr. Squirrel? 

Bad enough that you didn't want to pull it down?

That's progress at least. 

Declaring War

... is not something I like to do. But today I am officially declaring war on the squirrels!!! 

The past three days I have lost half of my green tomatoes and a whole limb of one of my plants.

They are not scared of my screaming and shooing. They are not deterred by the fox urine I have been sprinkling around the perimeter of the garden. It's as if they don't even notice the 3' tall marigolds that surround my plants. 

I'm declaring war.

My first move is cayenne pepper. 

My second move is pulling the one tomato in a pot out into the open. Maybe without the help of the garage wall to shimmy up, their little arms won't reach. 

I'm not sure what my next moves will be. But it's on.

Pollination Day

Our female flower finally opened up, so I took the opportunity to pollinate it myself. I stuck a Q-Tip in the neighboring male flower and then swooshed the lifted pollen deep inside the female flower. I sure hope I got this little lady pregnant. 

my marigold problem

I think I have mentioned my marigold problem before, but today I would like to elaborate. 

The books on companion planting and natural pest deterrents suggest planting marigolds alongside certain veggies. When I started from seed the last week of April, I bought some marigold seeds for this reason.

They started out innocently enough. 

But then they just kept growing!

It was around this stage that I started wondering why they weren't flowering. They had two successful months growing and seemed an appropriate height to earn some buds....

But they just kept growing!!! So, I finally checked the seed package. Apparently, the marigolds you see in most gardens are the miniature variety and, apparently, I unknowingly went big then brought them home. My marigolds are to grow to 24" average height. 

This last week or two I have learned the affects of not reading the package. Things are starting to crowd and not work out the way I planned.

Example 1:

Flashback a few weeks ago, I originally wanted the lower portion of my herb planter to have a row of marigolds. You know, to keep the bunnies away. So I planted a few. Six or so along the bottom rim. And they did what my marigolds do, grew and grew...

Last week I realized that if that marigold between the tomato and kale is as big as it is... and still growing... These little guys in the blue pot will soon be towering over the top shelf sage and outright consuming the middle row basil. 

Today I pulled all of the marigold out of the herb planter and dropped them into  the dirt next to it. Today, I also had to do something about this guy. 

The tiny seed in the tiny blue pot is now two feet tall. She is root bound and the pot dries out minutes after a watering. I dropped her into the soil with the others and hope that her transplant shock won't slow down her flowering.

I'm not kidding these things are getting huge. The difference in sizes are due to some starting from seed indoors in April and others starting from seed outdoors when we planted at the end of May.

SERIOUSLY!! See the terracotta pot in the middle? That's all marigold.

And lucky for us, some of them are getting their first buds... 

... or as I am affectionately beginning to call them... My little monsters.

and their heads popped off

Remember those big, beautiful zucchini blossoms? Need a reminder?

Well yesterday, the biggest one broke off and lay in the dirt next to the plant. When I saw, I thought it seemed strange - maybe a critter ran through and snapped it off? It certainly didn't look chewed on. And whoever might have broken it off obviously had no interest in eating the delicious blossom. The stem looked clean cut, not chewed or bent or damaged in anyway. Must be a critter brushing past, right? So I did the only thing I knew how to do and put out some Shake Away (fox urine) on the grass circling my crops to deter the pests.

Then this morning... I see this:

Two more snapped off! Laying in the dirt. That's three stems that look severed at the tip. You can see them in the picture. The weirdness seemed weirder. Now I did the only other thing I could think to do - google it.

Apparently this is a normal thing. A normal thing that my gardening bible didn't mention. When male flowers are finished they just pop right off. I suppose in attempt not to waste energy. The other reason this happens is female flowers will fall when they weren't properly pollinated, presumably for the same reason. So then my question was... Do we have a pollination problem and when do you step in?

I am also turning to google for this one. I watched a vimeo with explanation of male and female flowers and how to help pollinate. I learned that the three flowers we lost were all male flowers, so I guess it's not terrible that we lost them. Zucchinis produce both male and female flowers but the trick is that they have to be open at the same time to have the chance of cross pollination. This might be reason enough to plant multiple zucchini plants, we only did one and maybe multiples would make this process a little easier or greater chances of happening 'the natural way'.

So today and tomorrow.. we will survey the scene. It looks like we have some male and female flowers that are getting close to opening. I'll report if we intervene!

come on little guys

You can do it!

Zucchini

Raspberry

Tomato

Bean

what two weeks looks like

Harvest time

My first harvest. Some basil. A little kale. And a radish that just won't bulb. None of them did, so we pulled them to make room in the trough for the sprawling zucchini. We will try the radishes again for a fall crop. 

My Pinterest planter

I started browsing Pinterest for ideas while I dreamed about this year's garden. In some cases, it has been useful and in others ... not so much. 

Starting my seeds in eggshells... Pinterest.

This planter... Pinterest. 

But the jury is still out on this one. What I like about it is it's vertical nature. I'm always trying to grow up and above the heads of the neighboring bunnies. I also like the aesthetic and it seemed a good use of the spare terracotta pots in the garage. What I don't like about it might be a longer list. 

The tilt on the pots make them pretty difficult to water. Water just runs down and out, away from the very plants that need it. With that water run off comes some soil (hence the constant dirt on the sides of the pots). And WITH that soil, comes whatever seeds you were trying to germinate or mature. The heavy rains over the past few days have washed away my mint seedlings. Yet again. I have resown them three times already.

We will see how this concoction does throughout the growing season. My hope is that as the plants mature, their leaves might create an umbrella of protection and prevent the soil from washing out during heavy rains. Watering is possible with patience and a gentle touch. I simply have to remember the Tender Loving Care part with these herbs.

My advice if you try this - don't bother with seed. Start with mature plants. My basil and sage are doing alright at the moment. Maybe not flourishing, but not withering either. 

Tip - this planter also tends to get waterlogged. So pick appropriate plants that don't mind moist soil.

Raspberry Update

Remember when I bought a raspberry on May 3 and it looked like this:

?

Well, today, it is May 28 and my raspberry bush is looking pretty bushy. I made my first rhubarb crisp of the season last weekend and I eagerly await the day I can make raspberry/rhubarb crisp. Party at my house... hey...

Lots of brand new shoots have been sprouting from the dirt. Little guys like these...

There are little buds on the tips of each branch that might be the start of the actual berries? But I'm not entirely sure and, I suppose, only time will tell.

This plant is probably the most curious to me. Well, this plant, and maybe the radishes since I can't see what they are doing down there, way underground. Today, Rob pulled one up because the greens are getting pretty tall and they were in the ground for about 4 weeks now. It was a stem and no radish bulb. I think that means we have too much nitrogen in the soil? We are going to try to balance the nutrients in the planter to see if it helps. 

But.. then.. it begs the question... are these plants spent then? Can they still develop a bulb? Do I need to start anew? I have no idea. Most of what I have read on radishes is that 'they simply grow'. No rules or regulations. They are just supposed to work. Mine worked sans bulbs. This is what bulb-less radishes look like....