Box covers

I've mentioned before that I have a problem with squirrels tearing up my garden.  Well, now that it's fall, this problem is getting even worse.  I came home from work on Tuesday to find that the boxes with lettuce and arugula seeds, and little snow pea plants were TOTALLY DUG UP.  There were holes everywhere, and more than one snow pea plant was throw askew.  Those squirrels make me so angry!

Today is the day we begin to remedy the problem.  Covers for the boxes!

We built a square frame from some cheapy wood from Home Depot.

Done frame!  56"x56"

Husband's dad bought us a roll of chicken wire.  (How sweet!)

The dog was supervising, and barking at strangers, squirrels, and cats.  Good Dog!

Done!  (There aren't any pics in between because it's hard to take photos while making the frame =])

It's kinda lumpy, but that's chicken wire for ya.  I'm sure we can make a nicer one.  For now, this one is functional, and will keep those stupid squirrels out!

There's only one made so far; it took a lot longer that we thought it would, plus we're out of wood...  The covered box has snow peas and lettuces.

Baby lettuces!

Snow peas are getting tall =]

Presents in the Mail

My new seeds arrived!!!!

I mentioned in a previous post that I ordered seeds from Heirloom Solutions.  Three and a half weeks later...

Ta Da!

I can't plant the broccoli yet, but the carrots and greens will go in this weekend.  I am SO excited, especially since the greens will grow super fast and will tide me over until my carrots and snow peas are ready to harvest.  Yay!

Here are some more photos of my growing things:

 

Fall produce update

Last week I planted snow peas and carrots.  AND EVERYTHING'S SPROUTING!!!!!!

Snow Pea sprouts - day 7

SP - day 9

I'm so stinkin' proud of these guys.  Yesterday I came home at some point to find 3 freaking holes in this box.  We have squirrels EVERYWHERE in my neighborhood.  Usually they are pretty harmless; mostly they like to tease the dog (the fence is literally 3 inches too tall for the dog - who is apparently part pogo stick.....).  However, our landlords warned us that the little rodents might try to dig up our pretty little peas.  And they have....

Fortunately one of the holes was NEXT to the peas and they just threw dirt over the little plants.  I was able to brush the dirt back where it belonged.  But another hole pulled up a sprout!  The nerve of those fat furry things!  The sprout had no visible damage (thank goodness), and I put him back in his little hole and covered him up nicely.

We have no many neighborhood cats that you'd think they would keep the squirrel population down...  The little old lady across the street puts out TONS of birdseed that draws both pigeons and squirrels alike to our block.  But I think the problem really lies in that she also puts out food for the neighborhood cats... thus negating the need to the kitties to perform their squirrel hunting duties.  I really don't think the squirrels even fear the cats.  Although for a while there was this REALLY mangy squirrel running around that looked like he'd seen the wrong end of several cat fights...

Anyway, the peas are happy and healthy =)

Carrots - day 9

AND MY CARROTS ARE SPROUTING!!!  Everything I've read online said that it takes, on average, up to 3 weeks for carrots to sprout, so I was planning on patiently waiting until next weekend before I would check them every day.  Not the case here!  I have about 5 itty bitty bitty little carrot fronds popping through the dirt!  I know that I will eventually have to thin them out; the seeds were SO TINY that I couldn't really sprinkle them out very well.  No worries though.

I'm so happy to be a little gardener <3

The Most Amazing Photographer

Meet Laurel.

I met Laurel when we were little high school frosh.  Since then we have been on many adventures, both big and small, and mostly involving ice cream or Jamba Juice.

Once upon a time, back in high school, Laurel picked up her mom's little point-and-shoot camera.  It was then that she discovered her love of photography, and then that she freaking blew my mind with her natural eye for it.  And I mean "blew my mind" as in every photo I looked at made my jaw drop.  And she hadn't even started using Photoshop yet.  

At the time Laurel was mostly taking pictures of flowers and random things.  I remember when she bought her first "big girl" camera and lens.  She got it just in time for senior prom.  She was living with my family and me, and boy was she excited about this thing.  She mastered it in about two seconds, and took some awesome prom pics.

Since then, Laurel has learned and mastered Photoshop and cameras galore.  She does editing work for a photo company, and has just recently really started up her own business, Laurel Marie Photography. 

She does weddings, 

engagements, 

extreme sports, 

pets, 

products; 

you name it and she'll photograph it for you!

If you live in the Northern California area, or possibly SoCal, and need photos, you really should consider her!  She is so professional and fun to work with, not to mention an amazing photographer and photo editor.  Check out her website at http://laurelmariephotography.com/ or check out her facebook page.  I really hope this blog helps her business out, so please let her know if you hear about her from this page.

Autumn crops

I can never say enough of how much I just LOVE to garden.  I love to dig, and I love to plant, and I love to watch my green things grow!

Today Mr. Amazing and I went on a short shopping trip to Lowes.  The main reason was that we needed some wood dowels to stick in the porch windows.  The screens all have holes, and the stupid giant cat we have likes to shove the window open with his face and escape.  We've lived in this house for a year and half, and it took until today to fix our problem!  Husband cut the dowels to size, and now all our porch windows are open about two inches.  YAY!

This might seem trivial to you, so I'll give you a little perspective:  NONE of the windows in our house open, except for the porch ones...  So we get very little fresh air, only through the front door screen.  The windows are all super old, single pane, crank open windows.  They are all either sealed shut from years of paint, or the crank handles are broken.  Super duper sucky.  But now we have fresh air!  Woohoo!

Anyway, I'm digressing here; back to the garden and Lowes.

I also bought a bag of 100 bulbs of daffodils for $20!  There are many things that exist in the little cloud of "my favorite things", and shopping deals are a major favorite thing.  I bought some African violets that were done blooming, and so were only $1 a piece.  Hubby picked out a soaker hose.  I've never seen one, or I've forgotten.  It's basically a hose that's made of a material that lets water leak through everywhere; it's the ultimate drip line!  So now the garden bed that's right in front of our house is getting watered.  

We dug up a thin strip of lawn that lines the sidewalk and I planted most of the bulbs.  I'd say about 70 (maybe? I didn't count).  I can't wait to see all those bright yellow flowers in spring!!!  I'll probably plant the rest in front of the house, where we have our new drip line.

(Bulbs are hiding here!)

Yesterday we pulled out the squash plants and dug up the boxes that had the squash and watermelon.  Today we added a half bag of compost-y poopy stuff to each box and mixed it all up.

In one of the boxes I planted three rows of snow pea seeds.  And in another box (this box has never had anything planted in it yet) I planted two and a half rows of carrots.  I'm so excited for more yummy veggies!  We have to wait a few months to actually eat any of it, which makes me sad, but I love watching them grow.

(Clockwise: front box is currently empty; left box has my peppers, orka, and eggplant; back one has 2.5 rows of carrots; right box has 3 rows of snow peas)