Gardening 2023

[cineater]

Plant sale is going really well.  It was a nice day and shoppers are buying us out.

But I am so screwed.  They forgot to fill the pantry garden order for plants when they were transplanting and threw away any extra plants.  Rather than just fill the order from the plants we had for sale, they wanted to wait and fill it from the leftover plants.  No, I want very specific plants because I'm demonstrating all the kinds we sell, not just growing something for the food pantry.  But they wouldn't agree.  Actually I got blamed for the order not getting filled, I should have reminded them.  I have pictures of the tomatoes cut open to stick by every plant for the educational piece and we planned a taste testing session when we harvest.  Does it make any sense to sell the plants at one price only to have to buy them for twice the price some where else?  At the end of the sale today we only had 22 tomato plants leftover and the peppers were down to a few varieties.  I can ask around for enough plants to fill the beds but the education piece I spent all winter working on is trash.  What we have is eggplants.  I'm switching the cherry tomato bed to all eggplants.  That will be left because nobody likes eggplant!  Why did they save the extras of those and not the tomato and peppers?!

[cineater]

We just about sold out of everything!  $25,000 total sales.  $5,000 more than last year but we did raise our prices.  There's only two tables of leftover plants in the greenhouse.  We could have sold all those marigolds we sent to the parks.

Not one fucking tomato.     I'll contact some of our veggie people and see if they grew extra plants.  I'm thinking instead of three beds of tomatoes, we'll kill the bed for cherry tomatoes and do eggplant.  Lots of that left over.  Not that I don't like eggplant but the plant itself is a pain in the ass.  It doesn't like it too cold or too hot, or too wet or too dry.  Not sure if the people at the food pantry like it but it is pretty sitting there.  Maybe they will give it a try.

[cineater]

Hey, I'm growing lettuce.  I can have tacos!  Mom's still commenting on what I took her.

I only came home with 10 additional flats.  I'm up to 15 in the garage and three still under the lights.  I like my new lights that all plug into each other.  I can pull one plug and turn off the row.  The new flats are all greenhouse plants so they have to be harden off.  I'm going to take the week off from plants and plant up next week or maybe Saturday.  The guys assure me they have mowing covered this week.  Yeah, what day are you doing it?    I had that on my to do list but I'll let them take it.  Found out Craig has been sick.  Explains why he hasn't called to come give me a bid on the work I want done at the house.

I have two garden tours this week.  One is with the people who fund the place.  I have a garden outfit for that.  There's not much to see out there but I have a lot to say that will show them what we are teaching the community with the gardens.  If they've been around a while, they'll know my name from a different area they concern themselves with.  This is what I'm doing now.  You know my work ethic.  Should get us some points.  The other group is Vision Leadership.  Not sure who they are but they will not walk out of the Native Gardens without a vision.  

Forgot, the regional bigwigs from all over the state had a meeting while we were setting up for the plant sale.  They were impressed to see the small army of volunteers we had out there and the whole set up.  We know our shit when it comes to this even with Marsha out sick.  We do a conga line getting the plants out of the greenhouse and it goes on forever.  Flat after flat going down the line of people.  Gives you a chance to see what we have for sale.  Everyone knows when the basil is going by.  

Anyway, I'm tired.  Want to clean the car and get all these garden dishes out of here.  Hopefully tomorrow, it warms up later in the week.

[cineater]

Don't hate on me.  Got all the leftover plants watered in the greenhouse, cleaned all the garden dishes and got the car vacuumed all before 1.  Would have finished the car but I had grandma duty.

They wanted all the leftover plants out of the greenhouse tonight or they would be compost.  When I left at 7:30 there was only a half flat of lemon grass in there.    Craig was just finishing mowing and I dumped all the annuals on him.  And scheduled the bid on work at my house.  The herbs and peppers were sent over to the food pantry garden.  I only brought home two more flats.

Our winds have been gusting pretty strong.  I've kept the plants in the garage the last two days and they aren't going out tomorrow.  Putting my hardening off behind.

[cineater]

So I brought home the shade coleus.  They never prune these things back in the green house and they end up kind of scraggily and a foot tall.  I cut them back and made myself a coleus bouquet.  They will root and I will have a bunch more plants.  The cool thing about a coleus is you can put it in a pot and move it around your garden when you don't have anything blooming in that area.  They come in many colors and are very colorful.  They do suck up the water and in full sun all day they will collapse in the hot afternoon sun.

I have Black Dragon.  It's almost a black purple.  Really stands out against your lighter green plants like hostas.  And I have Wizard Coral Sunrise.  A coral orange that lightening out  all over the leaf.  I guess that's wizards lightening.  It stands out as a bright spot in the darker places of your garden.

I feel kind of bad for the coleus.  Usually I'm in the room that has that and I can sell that plant out.  There was a lot left.  I was down in the greenhouse with the veggies trying to learn something.  They stuck me on the check out table, math!  I have forgot my times tables starting with the sixs.  I cheat and do it by half and then double it.  550 tomato plants sold.

[cineater]

The tour went really well.  The gardens can be impressive even when they aren't in full bloom.  Maureen brought some milkweed with monarch eggs on it.  One hatching out as we watched.  Everybody was interested in that.

2nd thing this morning I threw the apple baskets in the car.  Had to vacuum again.    Wussed out and ran the car through the car wash.  All the garden dishes are back in the greenhouse.  Found a home for the lemon grass.  They will walk in there tomorrow to kill plants and there aren't any.    Potheads are hanging out at the greenhouse.  They stay in the apple baskets during the winter.

These are potheads.  Mine aren't painted.  I'm not talented like that nor do I really like them painted but if somebody wants to, I'll let them.


I do have one that is kind of painted.  It's very Rastafarian looking, complete with the dreads.  Love that one.

[cineater]

Shoot myself in the foot.  Get me away from the plants and taking care of the place, I come up with educational shit.  For the month of June I'm setting up garden tours for the public.  General tours and 7 speciality tours they can sign up for.  I've already set this up last year through the library but the heat came on and their staff fucked up the advertising so it went belly up.  This time they are going to let me access the 1700 names we have on our email list for the plant sale.  This could be really busy or a total flop.  They can't fire me so no need to stress about the success.

[cineater]

Woohoo, my scheduled just got cleared for tomorrow.  I'm planting!

Kevin keeps telling me he has the tomatoes we need and the next time I see him, he's telling me he doesn't.  I'm just buying them if he doesn't come up with them.  Rural King has 4 for 3 bucks.  Cheaper than we sold them.  I need 30 plants.  $25 or this headache.  I'm shopping tomorrow.  Forget it Kevin. 

[cineater]

Not sure what happen.  Might have been all that sugar they feed us at the plant sale.  Not only did we have donuts but some guy brought us some.  I was sick of sugar by the end of that.  Or it might just be my physical active is way up there.  Or maybe the tree pollen has settled down.  But my mood is out of the dark and it's blue skies.  You know when I have to struggle to write humor that I don't even laugh at I'm stumbling around in the dark.

[cineater]

Up and on my feet.  Got the side of the building and in front of the greenhouse planted.  Plus did a garden tour.  Going back for a meeting and will get some seeds in the ground before hand.  Doesn't look like we are going to get that rain they were expecting.  We are dry out there.  2 inches short of rain for April.  I'll have to arm myself with a hose.

Marsha called today.     The chemo messed with her legs and she can't walk well but it's getting better.  She will try to come to the garden Saturday.  I didn't ask about the chemo.  Stuck to I'm sitting here for 15 minutes after getting my 4th covid shot and straight into garden business.  Let her say about her condition what she wanted to.  Good to hear her voice and she didn't choke up once.

[cineater]

I forget about plants I put behind my driver's seat.  Third time this year and one fell over so third time vacuuming the car this week.   

[cineater]

Spent all morning printing out and laminating the educational signage.  They did a really good job on these.  Was going to go out and put in the cannas and elephant ear but the sun came out.  Might go back up tonight and do that but I will be up there tomorrow morning.  We jump into the 80's next week.  92 on Sunday.  We're planting in my daughter's yard then.  Not ready for the heat to come on.

[cineater]

Damn it, we are out of leaf mulch.  Did get the cannas and elephant ears in and their bed mulched.  Easy enough, dig a hole and drop them in.

That tree branch I hear squeaking in the wind is in my neighbor's yard.  That needs to get cut off before it falls.  Sounds like a large sized branch that can hit my living room if it comes down just right.  There's enough trees and branches in there to slow it down.  Hopefully it doesn't bring the whole tree down with it.

Told Jim he would be getting 15 eggplants and we would be cutting back on the peppers.  Said he's never grown eggplant before.  His face said eww.  Geez people, they're purple.  How pretty is that?

[cineater]

Worked my ass off today.  Helped Greg get all his educational signage up.  Looks good.  Propagation gave me a bunch of perennials.  Doona and I walked the property putting them out.  Got some help and they all got planted.  The one area we don't want to mow got 7 prairie dock.  If they take hold, they will take over that area and shoot up yellow daisies 8 feet tall in the fall.  My one problem area got shrubs.

Marsha came up as we were done for the day.  She is mellow, sounds tired. 

Came home put out all my veggies and most of my summer plants.  Got my patio lights back up.  Looks like Disneyland out there.  Checked the 10 day forecast and started putting the houseplants out.

Then something told me to check radar.  We need rain bad but it's been drying up before it gets to us.  Radar shows storms coming through at 2 for a couple of hours.  Okay, stop with the houseplants.  Listen to the 10 o'clock news.  The storm heading for us has a history of producing tornadoes for two hours with hail.  I need a new roof but fuck me, die out fucker!

[cineater]

It died and we didn't get a drop of rain.  Not good we need it bad.  Got up to 91 today.  I need to water all the stuff I've been putting in.  I have a 100 foot collapsible hose.  I can connect all over the garden and get to what I need.  A lot better than dragging one of our heavy duty hoses and then having to wind it back up.

Planted up my daughter's yard today.  They need a scoop of mulch we'll have to put out.

[cineater]

That's it for the lights in my growing room.  The tomatoes and peppers go outside tomorrow to start hardening off.  I've got the tomatoes up to 46 out of the 48 we planned for.  Not the varieties I wanted but enough plants.  But I got to thinking, do we have that many tomato cages?     Not on me, Kevin was in charge of planning the beds.

So the girl on some of the educational signage poked holes through the lamination and the paper inside.  Means it leaks and now the paper is moldy.  And the girl who was putting the sticky tabs on only put one tab on one side.  That will never hold up in the wind.  Fixing all of that.  Otherwise, the educational signage is coming out better than my vision.

The girl in the office doesn't know how to make labels from an excel spreadsheet.  She's been doing them manually.  Explains why those aren't getting done timely.  I can send her the labels just have to hit print.  The guy in the office missed hitting print on a few signs.  We're getting there.

And the native team continues to run rogue.  They however, did get in the description of their speciality tour on time.  The other 4 haven't gotten to it yet.

Folks you're tripping me up and making more work for me.  They're volunteers, lucky to have them and can't fire them.  I'll pull it together.

And Del's back.  The former Pantry Garden lead, retired gynecologist.  He wants to know all about Marsha's cancer.  He needed a nurse to keep him organized in the pantry garden.  He's going to see what I have done and he may ask for his job back.  I'm pretty sure half the pantry team would quit if he came back.  He's very good at getting production out of those beds, good at all of it but the people skills.  I'd like to turn him into a teacher but he's boring as all get out.    Lets hope he's into his new thing, president of his golf club.

We're running hot and humid.  I don't do that well.  I'll switch my schedule to sleeping in the afternoons and hitting the gardens at the crack of dawn and the evenings.  That's the plan anyway.

[cineater]

Coming together.     Turns out most the people I was looking to talk with were coming out of a meeting.  Kevin eludged me but I'll get him tomorrow.  Got another donut out of it, a big one.  Damn it I can't talk and eat a donut and I hate trying to juggle that sticky mess when I'm trying to work.  Knowing that I still took the donut and it took me a half hour to eat it.

Phebe and I walked the pantry garden.  Some of the brassicas have cabbage worms.  And while we were discussing worms, we got onto squash bores and tomato worms.  Learned more than I wanted to.  I was done with my donut by then.  Not so much the worms but how the chemicals kill them and how they kill the plants.

[cineater]

I went from just a few tomatoes to the 48 we planned for and now I'm at 50.     We'll figure it out.  Took over a lettuce harvest, a whole trunk load, along with the pantry team to tour the food pantry we supply.  And we took them some eggplant they were all excited about.     They were amazed by us and we were amazed by them.  I just kind of rock back and am amazed what I'm doing is working and people like what I'm doing.  Phebe even gave a 10 minute training on how to grow eggplant.  I of course only had an ear towards it because I was busy loading up the lettuce and keeping us on time.  I never get to focus on veggies because I'm too busy working the gardens.

Got all my speciality tour people except one and I'll get her Friday.  Only need two more of the tours to lock in their dates.  Garden tours in June is coming together before its deadline.  I'm either in early or freaking out which is kind of like my "on it" when I'm working on a project except now I'm doing the stuff myself.

Marsha stayed several hours.  I didn't see much of her.  She's tired but she keeps doing just one more thing.  I think the tired is more the shock of coming to terms she has cancer.  I'd be tired of that too.  She looks good except you can tell she's freaked out.  And every right to be.

[cineater]

Called Marsha with a "I need your expertise" question.  She called me right back.  Talking through it, there's our girl.  Energized talk, even laughing.  The cancer came up but it was how to work around it and follow up with plans for the garden.  I think that helps.  Not denying what's going on with her but acknowledging she's more than her cancer.

I had the day off from gardening, sort of, still making some plans and following up but it wasn't all about the garden today.  Maybe things are starting to slow down a bit.  Morning meeting tomorrow, hopefully no donuts, but I have the afternoon off.  And I have the weekend off for family things. One of which is planting flowers at moms.  Doesn't involve garden management team but it does involve mom.  She follows me around coming up with more shit I can do.  It's like let me complete one thing before you come up with something else!  Keep that to myself.  She's almost 90.  I'm not losing my shit with her.  Hope she likes her flowers.  Everybody is blooming.  Got her a mailbox cover, has flowers too.

[cineater]

Panicked when they said hail and I could see it coming on radar.  Brought all the plants back in and covered what I couldn't.  Barely rained.