Square Foot Garden

An orphaned garden (weed) spot for a number of years was the perfect (hopefully) spot to create a square foot garden. I've wanted one for many years, but finally quit asking for assistance in building one. Until this year. It only took a day to build. 

We used redwood for endurance. I hope it won't be too long until it looks weathered.

A few years ago I bought the All New Square Foot Gardening book by Mel Bartholomew. He has step-by-step instructions that are very easy to understand. IFA now carries his garden soil mixture, Mel's Mix, which is the perfect combination of 1/3 blended compost, 1/3 peat moss, and 1/3 coarse vermiculite. Purchasing the ready-made mix in bags was well worth the time and energy it would have taken to mix it ourselves. 

I was delighted to find brown weed barrier material. It won't show up as much when bark is put down.

Wood lathe was an inexpensive material for marking the square foot measurements.

I planted both seeds and plants: corn, radishes, beets, bush and pole beans, Sun Sugar (cherry-size) tomatoes and a few other tomato varieties, basil, crookneck and zucchini squash; pansies for some color. In SFG, several crops can be planted in one square. For example, one cabbage would take up one full square; bush beans - nine plants per square; whereas radishes would be 16 plants.

Amber's Birthday..a Day Late

It was sweet Amber's birthday on Saturday, but they had plans so we visited today. They've done a remarkable job in all their remodeling. Matt's a very lucky guy!!

Visiting Cemeteries

These flags were posted at Evergreen Cemetery on Monroe in Ogden. We put mums on Mom and Dad's grave.

North Ogden Cemetery is such a beautiful place. There were two letter "R"s on either side of one of the Rice ancestors - one of the oldest markers there.

I went to Layton in the late afternoon and saw this beautiful scene between Layton and Syracuse on one of the back roads.

We tended the grandkids Saturday night. They discovered the snowball tree, and with a little encouragement from Gram....they had a snowball fight. It's a little hard to take photos when you are being slammed with snowball flowers, so I made them sit still for a minute.

Little Hazel.

Purple in the Yard

Arrival Time

After a long day at the office, with an impromptu meeting with Roger and Cathy that lasted till 5:30, then the "parking lot" meeting with Cathy afterward, I arrived home at 6:30 tonight.

A Good Title: "Paid Off"

I paid off my Mini Cooper last week. The car title came in the mail today. WhoHOOOO!

Looking Through the Rear View Mirror

Wouldn't it be nice to see something beautiful like this whenever one looks out their rear view mirror? Kind of like memories. Sometimes things don't seem so bad when you look back at a later time. We can look back and choose to either remember the good tiimes or the bad.

I hurried home from work, changed into jeans and a t-shirt and drove to Flints Nursery in West Clinton. They have beautiful plants for good prices. I also bought some tomatoes and learned that I haven't been planting them deep enough in the dirt.

Snow Today

It's almost the end of May and visibility on the freeway this morning was difficult due to snow.

Snow on the windshield after arriving at work. This is the latest in the year it has ever snowed!

Snowballs at Dusk

The snowball tree has hundreds of blooms on it. Thank goodness I put off trimming it last fall!

These look like they have the texture of felt.

Black and Blue: To Storm or Not to Storm

An interesting sky - will it rain or not today? I think the weather is having a hard time deciding.

"Spank Grandma"

A new design for all the grandmas who spoil their grandkids.

Weston's Birthday and Lacie's Bubbles

Today Weston turned five! He was so excited. I can hardly believe he's this old.

Weston's birthday bike

 Lacie was fascinated with the bottle of bubbles Wendy brought her.

It was a challenge to focus fast enough to get the shot at the same the bubble appeared.

 A bubble in the grass.

A 1960's Collage

After an afternoon training at the USOE office in Salt Lake (and a quick visit to Nordstram's Rack...) I spent the evening with my Aunt Nelda. We had a great visit. She said she wanted to give me back a piece of artwork I had created in high school. I still remember when I was in art class at Ben Lomond High and brought this piece home. When my aunt saw the collage, she immediately "adopted" it, had it professionally framed, and it has hung in her living room for most of these 30 years! It's now hanging in my living room. It may look like an oil painting created with a palette knife, but is actually torn pieces of magazine paper placed carefully to create a "Picasso"-like collage. I have to say that my art teacher wanted it too!

See Jane at Work

Joanna brought her new baby, Jane, into work today. She's six weeks old and such a sweet, darling baby - all that HAIR! Cathy and I accompanied mom and babe while they visited other departments. Then I was able to tend her for awhile.

An Empty House

My mother's home is empty. Now it's just a house.

Spring in the Yard

A few shots I took in the yard this evening.