Hope Springs Internal

Today I staked out a 12ft x 9 ft section of the really grassy part of the property to plant for a garden this summer. And I am thrilled about it.

When Brett and I moved in, I talked to the land lady about wanting to put in a garden and she seemed to think that was fine. Over the course of our months here, I started to get worried that she might change her mind and not want us digging in the back. So I tuned down the garden dreams and figured I'd just plant a little basil in the kitchen and maybe a pot of tomatoes on the deck. The closer it gets to warm weather though, the more I've been thinking about the pleasure of spending time doing something productive outdoors and the joy of some fresh garden veggies of my own.


Aunt Karen, suggested that I look for a community garden to plant in, and though there's no such thing that I can find here in The Coop, I'm pretty sure that if I asked my neighbors for 100 square feet of dirt to cultivate, someone would be very accomidating. But I really want to be able to walk out and get busy, or I doubt I'll stick with it.

So, I did my research, planned out the size I wanted, then I called up the landlady and asked very nicely if it was still ok to put in a garden. And she said yes! I do plan on sending her an addendum to the lease agreement for us both to sign (just in case), but I'm optimistic enough to believe that I might actually have instant salads this year, and perhaps some homemade pickles, salsa, tomato sauce, etc.

Now, I know that the garden I had at Living History Farms was massive. Way too big for Brett and I to handle alone. The garden I staked out is very modest, easy even. Based off of yields from the Farms garden (knowing how little vegitation this household actually eats) and the recomended spacing for planting, I've figured that we don't really need a ton of space. I would like to do some pumpkins and watermelon though, and my research is saying they need around 10 ft to vine out. We absolutely have that space, so I'll probably hill a few out in the grass, weed a little and hope the native flora doesn't do them in.

In knitting news, I really want to finish my second Pacific Monkey Sock (from Knitty. See?) but I'm still short a needle. When we were in Oneonta, I even looked at the Big Box Retailer for another US2 DPN set, but the best I could do was US3! Next time I'm somewhere I can grab US2 double points, I'm geting a few sets. It's my favorite size for fingering weight and aside from the joy of having a spare, I can see using more than one set if I want to work on more than one pair of socks at a time. I'm about to put away the snowshoes for the season, but here's a shot of the lone Monkey sock in action.