Gardening 2024

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I can't count or maybe I took a few more than I thought.    Came home with 21 plants, some are for other garden leads.  Sunday is a stormy day too so they are hanging with me until Wednesday when we can put them in.

I got to Garden of Hope, the garden my ladies' gardening club maintains.  It was supposed to be a work session to clean up the garden.  The wood chips had arrived early and were sitting on the parking lot.  It was me and the lady in charge who showed up and she can't do much physical work.  Says they don't have many people who can do that kind of work moving wood chips.  Fuck.  And she wants to lay down cardboard all over the garden and then the wood chips but first we have to put a berm of them along the one side.  Two hours later and 7 carts, done with the berm.  I joined this club so I didn't have to do physical labor.    I did like the dump cart, so much easier than pushing the wheelbarrow.  I have to get one of those.  Garden looked good though.  They had already done a few work sessions to clean it up.  It's going to take forever if I'm the only one moving the wood chips.  Decent size garden.

Beautiful night, rain coming in but may not actually rain.  Decided to burn my brush pile.  It was a beautiful night until the thunder started and then sheet lightening.     Ran for the house and left the fire burning.  Almost didn't rain but then a brief downpour put my fire out.  Will try again tomorrow.  That brush pile needs to go.

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Up to 31 plants.  I told Donna if I came back to turn the hose on me.  But I did go back and picked out 5 more for Scott's area.  Left them there for him to plant.  In the meantime, I'm clearing out the areas I'm planting all this stuff in.

So the rain just put out the flames.  Sondra eode her lawnmower over and we burned for  a few more hours.  Coals still hot this afternoon and I got the pile close to half gone.  The coals are so hot they are black so I'll burn some more tonight.  Kind of need to empty the fire pit.  It's getting full.

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Chris came down on his bike and Dennis walked over.  Nobody brought marshmallows but still a nice night around the fire.  Burned some more today but the rain put it out.  The brush pile is in pretty good shape but I'm going to have to let it dry out before I take care of the rest of it.

When did the sun become my enemy?  I use to love the sun.  These days I prefer the shade or cloud cover.  I use to tolerate it up to 90 but now the 70's seem hot.  Maybe just not use to it and we got hot real quick but moving north seems to be reasonable.

I did finish up the milkweed display by adding a couple of Slender Mountain Mint.  Added the Pink Veronica to the Crepe Myrtle bed. 

In the past I always used the foundation beds to display the leftover annuals from the plant sale but Marsha doesn't want to do that any more.  She explained at the general membership meeting why they kill the leftover plants.  Said the seed cost her very little and it was the promix she wanted to reuse.  I added and the pots.  She said something about we were into retail meaning decisions have to be made on profit.  What a contradiction.  First off, it doesn't cost her, it costs us, the organization.  She's very fond of telling me I can't do something because it's not horticulture and we are about horticulture.  Yoo-hoo, killing healthy plants is not horticulture it's retail.     Keep my mouth shut, she does an excellent job with the plants sale and all I have to do is support her.  The rest of the group can bitch about her killing plants.  Anyway, I'm going to start filling up my beds with perennials.  Donna can grow just about anything.

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Here's what happen with 31, 32 and 33.  The important part is they didn't come home with me.   

Met Sharon at the garden early this morning with her three asiatic lilies.  She already has a row of five tree lilies so I tell her there is more and where they are at if she wants to plant these in a back row in between the ones she has.  She would need 4 to do that.  She blows me off, doesn't want me to stay and help her weed.  It's a thing with her.  She's in her 80's with arthritic hands and like a child wants to prove she can do it herself.  Nice lady, takes care of the roses and does the ladies high tea.  I leave her to it.  Come about three o'clock, she calls, wants to know if we have more.  She needs one more for symmetry.  Did I not try to talk to you about that this morning!     I would never yell at Sharon, told her I would take care of it.

But to take one left just two behind, 32 and 33.  Couldn't fit them in that rose bed but the one next to it had a dead rose in the middle.  Now I need another plant, I have roses on each side those two so I need something for the middle.  Maybe 34 or maybe something I already have, we'll see.  Never knew lilies got so tall.

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All plants are in ground.  I'm heading for the nail salon.     Took all the houseplants outside for the season too.

Beka and I are plotting a new bed.  We want to do a xeriscape.  It's a garden that doesn't need a lot of water.  I'm tried of walking at an angle between the building and the greenhouse plus it's hell to mow.  One of these days I'm going to fall into the side of the greenhouse.  I'm already collecting plants for it because I want a bigger plant when I put it in but it's a project for fall 2025 or 2026.  I like instant garden.  The plants can just hang out in pots at my place where it's easier for me to care for them.  The Agave and Rattlesnake Master should do well in there and they can get a decent size.  I'm thinking about doing those in mass.  More of a desert look.  I have a big black snake that lives in that area.  I'll have to be careful not to destroy his habitat.

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Doing a little bit of trimming at the garden and the leaf mulch came in.  Game on!  Finished one side of the building, went and got a mani pedi, came back and finished the backside.  Only have two bushes left to trim and my to do list is complete.  Finished off the brush pile so I'm cool at home too.   

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I've been working on hardscape for the Bee Bar.  Normally I don't care for all those bee signs like, bee kind, etc.  But I thought this one described Beka, Bee Sweet and Bumble.  Not in the fuck up way but in humble, which is Beka, sweet and humble.  Got some metal bumble bees, one really large one.  And a bee hive.  Melanie is working on the name signs for the Bee Bar and the Chocolate garden.  The Bee Bar will have some of the bees attached.  Not sure what she's dreaming up for the chocolate garden.  Hard to come up with hardscape for that one.  Chocolate melts in the sun.     I should look at Hershey's gift shop, might give me some ideas.  The moon garden we are using the large silver plates but I haven't got Melanie working on that yet.

I picked up 34 and 35.  Another long headed cone that will go in the ground and another rattle snake master that is staying in it's pot at home with me.  Any bets on when I chip my nail polish?

Here's the Bees from Amazon.  Not the really big bee; that's from Hobby Lobby.  They had Fall and Christmas items they were putting out.     Amazon has no chocolate ideas.

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Cute but it melts.


So much for googling chocolate ideas for the garden.

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Bunnies as in chocolate Easter bunnies.  I was thinking paint a couple of bunny statues chocolate color or white chocolate to set in the garden.  I don't think the other girls were all that hot on the idea.

Got to the garden at 6:40.     I had a cramp in my arm that only work was going to get out.  By the time Donna's crew got there I had washed two thirds of their pots they were going to do.  Left at 10 as it started to rain,  One of those rains like we got in Denmark.  It was small drops but soaks you.  Not sure if they got to finish.  Went back this evening and helped Theresa with her bed.  She had been there since one and was glad for the help.  I was on a cardboard run for the Salvation Army Garden.  Tomorrow's project.

My ex gave me Lilies for Mother's Day.  I could smell them walking up to the car and his windows were close!  He's forgotten I'm allergic to flowers or maybe I haven't told him how bad it has got.  First thing I did when I put them in my car was to pop an allergy pill.  I drove home with the windows open in a panic.  He suggested I put them in the house so the whole house smelled, oh hell no, outside with those.     They're very pretty and very nice of him.  They're white so I think I will plant them in the moon garden.  There use to be this easy rhythm, flow, timing thing between us but it's just another reminder of how off it is.  He's trying but the connection doesn't work.

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Took 4 of us a hour and a half to cardboard 3/4 of the Salvation Army garden.  Two of us went back to dumpster dive for more cardboard at the recycling center.  We'll be back at it again tomorrow.  We have 3 teenage boys volunteering to run the wheelbarrows of wood chips.  Oh thank god.     I've been spoiled with that dump wagon and turned off on wheelbarrows.  Or maybe I'm just dreading digging that pathway we have coming up at the demo gardens.  Could we get started on that, it's only getting hotter.  Soil weighs so much more.

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https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=964380185689742&set=pcb.964412025686558
Extension posted pictures of my milkweed display.

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An Oompa Loompa for the chocolate garden.     Why didn't I think of that before?

Marsha is in the hospital.  They need to remove an obstruction in her bowels.  Didn't need to do surgery at this point.

Leads meeting tonight.  We do a garden stroll to see what everybody is doing in their garden and then I treat them to ice cream.  Nothing really on the business agenda.  I do have my request for a new overall lead on the agenda to replace me.  Give them a chance to listen to the cicadas.   

Speaking of cicadas everybody is complaining how loud they are.  I don't hear them at the garden or at my place.  Maybe they are still coming out.  I see the holes in the ground but not that many.

The pot plantation won in the lottery for an upgraded license.  The SIL is very excited to be expanding his business.

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Marsha expects to be in the hospital over the weekend.  The doctor still hasn't told her what he wants to do about this.  He regular doctor is on emergency medical leave so she has a new guy.  She's too tried for visitors.

Nobody stepped up for the overall lead job.  Instead they went off on how we should train people to take our jobs.  It works that way in the business world when you pay people.  It doesn't work that way in the volunteer world.     It's usually a small group that gets stuck with all the work until they get burned out and then some other sucker steps up.  They may stay a while or quit the next year.  It takes time to get that one committed volunteer who stays a while.  It use to be the two Marys running everything and then several years went by until Marsha and I became the moving forces.  We've been looking for replacements all along, none are stepping up and there is a real danger our teams will fall apart without good leadership to follow us.  Then again, it's happen before.  We started to unravel, got so far and strong leadership stepped up.  You know, somebody has to straighten this shit out. 

Anyway, I let them vent and when I brought the conversation back to who wants the job, silence.   

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The Parks Department buried me in pots and flats.  All of them dirty.     Not sure if we will use them because we like to have a uniformed color.  But there's enough there to make this our new color.  If we won't use them, I'll give them to the Master Naturalist.  They grow only natives.  It's enough to fill up both their greenhouses.  They give their plants away to projects and they would have to clean the pots!  I'm favoring them.   

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Cloud cover!  I busted ass all day at the gardens.  We're going into the 90's next week and staying there so I wanted to get some stuff done.  Yes I hurt and I dared to go into Marsha's area and mow/weed wack.  It will grow back before she's out there again.   

Maureen always says the rope fence we put around her garden keeps the deer away.  We're getting some significant deer damage so I googled it.  Turns out she is right.  "Yes, rope fences can be an effective, inexpensive way to deter deer. Deer can feel the 30-lb test line when they brush against it, but they can't see it during the day or night. They also won't know how high they need to jump to get over it."  I wonder if a bell on it would scare them completely off.

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I need to stop, blew out both my shoulder and wrist yesterday gardening.  There has to be another name besides gardening for what I do.   Maybe I should call it landscaping.     Leslie can put her own mulch down.  Enough I weeded her whole area.  It looked like shit when we did the leads stroll last week.  Granted Leslie has a lot on her plate.  She was probably embarrassed.

But before I try to stop I put up the rope fence.  I used a yellow rope so I would remember it's there, more visible, but it attracted a bumble bee while I was putting it up.  Bumbles don't sting you but they never stop buzzing you.

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Had to apologize to my team.  One of the lawnmowers wasn't where it was suppose to be and someone put crates on the floor of the tool shed.  I sent out a reminder email not to do that (bitching) and it turns out it was none of them.

Marsha is still in the hospital.  She reports some progress but you would think something would have happen by now.

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Watched Good Bones, Better Yards.  It's the mother's landscape spin off from the daughter's home renovation show.  It was so bad and she starts off the show mentioning she is a Master Gardener.  She use to be a red head and now she's blonde or white headed, wtf.  And she has a small dog she treats like her dolly.  The landscape design was more suited to a bachelor pad than to a couple who just had their first baby and planned to have more.  She had a large item in each section that made the backyard look crowded.  There's a reason a basketball court is smooth and not made out of pavers!  That's not going to be flat and smooth after one year.  I can see why she would want the children playing in the front yard because there's nothing safe back there or to entertain them.  Nothing to play with in the front yard either but you won't have to worry about that once the baby snatchers come by!  It will be years before the parents can enjoy that yard.  But the most disappointing thing was, she did not use one native plant in that design.

I should mention the couple spent $100,000 and were very happy with the final results.

They are sleep deprived.   

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It may have been too early to go back at it but I was at the garden at 6AM.  5 or 6 wheelbarrows of mulch and I finished off the Perennial garden for Leslie.  She texted me just as I was finishing up wanting to thank me if I was the one who weeded.  I like to surprise them when I help out but don't tell them until I have a finished product.  Tomorrow I hope to mulch the Lasagna garden and get started on the Bird Garden.  The heat is coming on with humidity. 

Marsha called just as I was walking away from winning on the new Elton John pinball.  Said she couldn't talk very long but needed to let me know what was going on in her garden.  She sounded like shit, tired and hoarse.  Long update and the only thing I got out of it was I needed to help her crew get some soil.  No update on what's going on with her before she had to quit talking.  Her husband dropped off the fruit trees this morning on his way to the hospital.  He didn't stick around and chat which is unlike him but did say they were hoping to take the tube out of her nose today.  I figure it's up to them to disclose what's going on so I don't push.  Them not talking makes me think the worse.  Hopefully they got better news today and she can leave the hospital soon.  I texted her an update so maybe I will get some news out of that.

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Marsha went home today.  She still can't keep food down.

So I got marching orders from Marsha on what she wants me to do for her garden and I got a call to assist on the Salvation Army garden.  I'm in a position where I'm just watering on my stuff.  Kind of annoyed that people seem to think I have nothing going on that would interfere with me helping them.  I know, I could say no, get somebody else, but I can squeeze them in.

The Army garden needs to finish up wood chipping the paths.  There's a work session scheduled but it's so damn hot.  I didn't want to commit because I have to manage how I'm dealing with the heat but I'll probably have it done by the work session.  I went up tonight and got about a third of it done.  If I feel like it tomorrow I'll hit about 7 in the morning before I have to be to the gardens at 9.  I may be able to hit it again tomorrow night.  Marsha's garden is a little more complicated but I'll set that up with her crew on Wednesday.