My Glain

Today was a pretty major day with side effects. Ugh. I had that glue-brain thick feeling (Ron was lovingly teasing me and calling it my "Glain" [glue-brain]) and some other icky side effects. When I finally got home, I needed my nap. It's worth it. Every day, it's worth it. I can depend on my brain. You can't imagine the horror of not being able to trust your own mind (I hope you never have that horror), or worse yet, the look on your spouse's face as they realize "Here we go again." Worth it!

I was still productive at work, stocking snacks and sodas and helping Ron. I like to feel like I earn my keep. We ended up riding around a lot on Metrolift so we only got 1.5 hours instead of two, but it worked. I'm glad we went in, the nasty weather ensured a hungry captive audience. They like what we're selling.

After work we went to Wal-mart for lunch. I wanted to get some of the red peppermints, the circular kind with the swirly thing? I only had $5 left but I get paid Wednesday. I was able to get a good tray for my seedlings, a packet of nasturtium seeds, and some more "Hot Hands" packets for us. I put a packet in the mail box for our carrier, and she loved it. I like to nurture people, it's my spiritual gift. We ate some dollar menu cheeseburgers and had a good trip home.

I dealt with my icky side effects and got my nap. It was a beautiful, sunny day. I wanted to make sure I got some garden time, but I had to get my sleep. I've noticed a nap works wonders on any kind of side effect issue. I woke up after an hour (I set my alarm) and headed out.

I started with garden bed 2. Each garden bed is 4x4 square feet and will be intensively planted. When I first laid out the beds, I double-dug them and worked wheelbarrow loads of organic matter into each bed. I mulched them with at least a couple of inches of mulch, so even when I was "sick" they didn't get overrun with weeds. Most of the mulch has decomposed and while it's still clay, the soil looks way better than it did when I started.

Garden bed 2 was worked when the ground was moist but not wet. I was able to till in 5 gallons each of chopped dry leaves, compost, and straw. I mulched it (about 1 inch) with more straw. I got my manure so I sprinkled 1 (2.5 gallon) bucket over the straw mulch. I've read a bit about mulching and one problem, if a bed is deeply mulched, is the bed has trouble warming up in the spring. Soil temps need to be at least 60 degrees for most plants to do well.

Can you tell I seriously considered a horticulture major? However, I didn't want to spend one year on pesticides/herbicides and another year on irrigation systems. I'm a happy, fairly well-read amateur.

One cure for the "cold soil when you mulch" problem is black mulch. Enter our buddy Chuck and his pickup. I bought 6 cubic feet of black hardwood mulch. All I had to to was sprinkle 5 gallons of mulch on top of garden bed 2. All done. Since I want to grow some root crops, btw, I didn't sprinkle manure on a 3 foot square area. That's reserved for the root crops. I gave a little composted manure "snack" to the collard plant, tucked under the mulch.

I moved over to garden bed 3. The soil was incredibly soggy, so I couldn't work it. I finished weeding it, and layered manure, leaves, compost, straw, mulch. It was a fair amount of carrying. I'm glad my disabilities are all in my head, and I don't have problems except for the tremor. Anyway, bed 3, done.

Bed 4, I weeded about half of it. I noticed some fire ants. Since I have an organic garden I got out my trusty bucket of coffee grounds. Coffee grounds are "bouncers" for fire ants, nontoxic, and good for the soil. I went ahead and threw coffee grounds on all the garden beds.

Once I finish bed 4, I just need to "layer" it. I need to put the manure and the mulch onto bed 5, and then I get the fun of digging up the pear tree stump. The ground is soaked, so it should be pretty easy (relatively speaking) to get the roots out.

Once I get that, I need to do bed 1. Right now it's 3x4. I want to expand it to 4 feet square, but the soil's too wet to work. Do I just do the 12 square feet, layer it up right? Do I wait and do it all when I expand it? I'm leaning towards layering the 12 square feet and then amending the 4 square feet I'll add to the bed.

I found a lovely surprise when I was looking for my pizza in the fridge. When I was manic, I'd buy all kinds of seeds. I kid you not, easily 1/6 of the fridge was seed packets. I threw them all out a few months ago.

Or so I thought. I had a fantastic surprise when I found radish, bean, and herb seeds hanging out in the back of the fridge, just waiting for me to find them. Awesome. While I "Could buy more" like I thought when I threw all the others out, it's fun to rediscover old freinds.

Which brings me to the dividers. I have some great plastic barriers, thick, tough plastic. They do a great job of keeping the bad guys out of the garden bed. I got them at Home Depot, but they don't have them anymore! The cheap "Pound-in-edging" is OK but not very effective. I've got to find a good edging that's easy and effective.

I'm going to go hunt around right now.