The Plan(ts)

Today I work a half day. It's a rare occasion, and the fact that the high for today is seventy makes the day even better. I'm hoping the ground will be dry enough by the time I get back home that I can plant my strawberries. I hope there is still some life in them--I bought them at the Wichita garden show at the beginning of March and they've been sitting on a shelf in my kitchen ever since. So this morning, I pulled them out of their paper bag and put them into some water, in hopes of reviving any life they may have left.

We shall see.

So, the strawberries are one thing on my list for today. Another thing is to pull all the leaves out of the front flowerbeds, and the bed on the back of the house. It's time. Winter be damned. The leaves will go into the strawberry bed and I just have to hope there aren't too many maple seeds in the mix.

I need to fertilize today, also.

I'm excited about this year. I've expanded my plans several times now, and with each adventure I just keep coming up with more plants. A woman who works with my mother has a yard full of stuff that she doesn't know what to do with. We went there last Wednesday to help her identify and assess the yard. She had a raised bed full of weeds, which were hiding the fact that there were raspberry canes everywhere. They're going to be putting a pool in that spot, and they were nice enough to let my mother and I dig all the canes we wanted. I made the mistake of leaving the roots bare overnight. They're in the ground now, but it's really hard to tell if they're alive or not. Time will tell, I suppose.

But things like free raspberries are what I love about gardening. Once people learn that you get all geeky about plants, they offer you things. Irises or lilies or hyacinths or crocuses (hyacinths and crocuses being the other things we're going back to that yard for)... Anything that makes my favorite pastime, my therapy, cheaper is awesome in my book. Because you could spend a fortune buying plants, if people weren't kind enough to share. To be truthful, I never would have bought raspberry canes. But for free... yeah.

Also on the list for today is altering the soil in a few parts of my yard. Nothing major, just mixing some bagged garden soil in with the rocky, dry, sandy stuff that exists by the fence. I want to grow peas there but so far have had no luck, and I'm sure it's the horribly mistreated soil.

So what have I said so far?

Strawberries...
Fertilizer for the raspberries...
Pulling mulch...
Amending soil...
Oh! I have to measure my front flowerbeds, so we can buy some new border (BoyWonder hates the natural rocks in the front yard. He wants brick instead.)

So, that's what's happening in the yard today.

I'm a few weeks away from taking "one year later" pictures of my yard, which should be an adventure in and of itself.

So for now...