Work the Earth Day!

Happy Earth Day!

Steve and I have been working the earth all afternoon and up until now.  I'm finally able to sit and relax for the evening.

Steve started a Boston Butt cooking in the smoker early this morning.  (We aren't going in to the story and how I feel about him spending $800 for a smoker when I could use a different car to drive!)  Later he threw in some prepared potatoes to bake.  We finished eating about 45 minutes ago, and it was very good.

We got busy planting a garden today.  It's not large by any means, but hopefully we will reap something this season.  The dirt in this yard is sure not what is needed for a good garden.

I attempted to start a compost pile last summer.  It never turned in to anything but a pile of dried up stuff.  I had put in some little shells from by the river, shredded newspaper, dry leaves, weeds pulled out, and lots of food stuffs like strawberry hulls, egg shells, banana peels, old lettuce, orange peels and more!   I watered it and turned it on a regular basis, so I really have no idea what went wrong.

The spot was covered with tall tall grass.  I looked under it and lo and behold it had a top layer that was hard and dark black.  I pulled out the tall grass and dug out the area and put it on the garden.  I don't know if it will help, but it can't hurt.  I have a new start on a compost pile for this year, so if you have any ideas to help me make it a success, please pass them along.

We bought 1 grape vine and 1 raspberry vine from Aldi when grocery shopping yesterday.  We also bought a 2 cubit ft. bag of Miracle Grow (some special kind) to plant them in.  Steve put one on one side of the fence and the other on the other side of the fence.

We didn't use all of the Miracle Grow so we have put some in with the things we planted in the garden area.  We planted:

Purple onions--I found the bag of them marked down to .80 at Walmart.

Snow Peas--I found half a bag of "seeds" from last year in the kitchen drawer.  I only planted about 25 of them--worth a shot.

Potatoes---when getting out potatoes to bake there were some with huge eyes growing.  Worth a shot to go ahead and plant them.

Wild garlic--I planted this last year after getting it from someone on freecycle.  It came back up.  (I need to know how to and ways to use this please)

Spinach--I didn't plant it this year, but it seems 3 plants came up from I guess a re-seed from last year.  I clipped the leaves so hopefully the 3 plants will keep producing at least a little spinach for us to eat with our salads.

6 Bell pepper plants--These are a transplant from my daughter's house.

6 Tomato plants--also a transplant from my daughter's house (they were evicted from their house and given 3 days to move out--also another long story that I won't go in to)

That's it for the ground garden area.   I bought a bag of strawberries at Walmart.  I planted those in one of the large round planters that were here at the house.  The planters were already full of potting soil.  I don't know if that was the best place to plant them but I knew the soil would be good.

I planted basil (and some more of the purple onions) in the other large round planter.

In other save the earth news----This is day 2 that I am getting back to hanging the laundry on the line to dry instead of using the dryer.  Honestly, with as mild a winter as we had I should have been hanging them out to dry most of the winter too!

I've also been cutting up newspapers to use in the litter boxes.  I've been doing this for months now.  A different way of recycling our newspapers, but a real money saver on buying cat litter!

I've felt like little Susie Homemaker (Homesteader) today  LOL

How was your day today?  Do you have a garden?