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Soda Bottle Garden
This is a great little recycling project I’ve seen variations of in many gardening blogs. I decided to keep it as simple as possible so I could involve the Man-child who just turned three. These teaches about reusing materials and caring for plants. How to make a soda bottle garden: You will need plastic bottles from your recycling bin, scissors, two rocks big enough to stop up the bottle opening, potting soil, plants, water, and four pipe cleaners or twine.…
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Set for Success
I’ve found that when if comes to having successful playtime with the boys (and the Man), it is important not to set them up for failure. In the realm of gardening, this means supplying them with the proper tools and gear. For instance, the picture on the left shows the Man-child with the Man’s shovel. It is clearly too heavy, and he was whining. The picture on the right shows him with a more size-appropriate tool. Purchasing kids’ tools isn’t…
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Here We Go!
Well, here it is, and here they are. This is the spot of my future garden and these are my three boys, my loves. There is the Man, the Man-child, and the Baby. Gardening is something we do as a family. It preoccupies our weekends and ravages our dining room during the winter and early spring. We all get dirty. The Man does the heavy lifting, I do the planting weeding, the Man-child runs around runs around making sure everything…
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Starting from Scratch
It’s a new year and I’m looking at an empty back yard. The latest issue of Organic Gardening came in the mail and even if I wanted to start planning the spring gardens, I’m completely overwhelmed by the clean slate. Do we go with raised beds or in-ground gardens? Fence? Square or organic boundaries? At the back of the lot or next to the house? Of my 4 raised boxes, only one remains intact. The fire ants shredded the others,…
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Waging War on the Ants
Fire Ant Colony 4, building their nest this afternoon before I attacked (The attack was like a really moving Pasodoble on SYTYCD… one that brings Nigel to tears and has the angsty pre-teen audience on their feet screaming when they should be sitting in awestruck silence): The thought crossed my mind this afternoon that it was possible that my entire back yard is one giant fire ant nest and what I thought were separate colonies are really just the various…
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Pea Plot Pulled
So I was going to title this one “You dooze you lose,” but I figured that was a little to crass even for my tastes. My peas reached the end of harvest sometime last week while I was quarantined in the bathroom with a stomach virus, so now I have a pail full of overripe peas. The only thing these are good for is replanting, so I will shell them, let them dry out and save them for the fall…
