Veggie garden mini-success!


This summer I had the most successful garden yet. It was just in containers, but the secret was the drip system. In Nevada, the entire garden can die in one day without water, and this has happened to me three years in a row now. After installing the drip system and a time, voila....veggies!! We had tomatoes that were pretty successful, and the one bell pepper plant did really well. Three corn plants did terribly, we got 3 midget ears. I guess corn is not the best container garden plant. But I can't seem to learn things like this from a book, I need to plant it, see what and how it grows, then learn from my mistakes. The zucchini did well in a huge container, but we will need much more than just one plant next year. One tiny pumpkin was all we got before the plant was spent, and a cantaloupe smaller than a tennis ball is hardly worth mentioning. But the point is........nothing died! It survived all summer long, with several days well over 100 degrees, on a hot, dark brown deck in Nevada.  

Gretchen enjoying a tomato!

Another thing we did this year was to purchase this sail shade. I can't say enough about it! We'd gone back and forth about building a pergola, the permits it would require, the concentration and time (all while having a new baby) and just decided to try this option as a temporary measure. Well.... for about $50 on Amazon, we had amazing shade all summer. I love it! We will take it down for the fall and winter, but for now it casts this pretty warm light on the deck, and reduces the temp by 10 degrees at least! Even enough for baby to enjoy the deck during the day.  


Sail shade shadow

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

New name?

I realized that I have had a Bloggy Renaissance lately, and I'm not sure why. Maybe I miss writing. Maybe I have stuff to write about these days with this house, rather than just bitching about the daily grind. I like to have a place to put all my pictures and stories too, like a proud mama. Maybe it's because the "transition" is finally coming to a close, and I have a real life back after traveling, living in four different states, school, marriage, house, career, etc. This morning before it warmed up enough to paint, I spent a couple hours going back to 2006 and reading my bloggy. Woah. This blog was very different then, and I kind of liked it. In '06, I was struggling, and searching for something. Mostly money. I did a lot of philosophizing, and ranting. Man, those next couple years were stressful. It's funny though... all the things I wished for have come true, and I have emerged a different person. My blog has changed too. I think is has become kind o
Read more

Sad little wall.

Image
I thought I was done with interior design for a while. I like how everything looks and feels in the house. Eclectic, collected, sentimental, and MINE. But, recently two people poo-pooed my lion wall. This makes me think they don't know a thing. Or, is my lion wall not as great as I think? The wall in question. This wall is in the living room; a tiny, open, 15x20 room squished next to the kitchen that functions as family room, den, living room, and office. The left (in photo) side is flanked by the bar, with two stools. It has the world's frumpiest couch (but very, very comfy), and two chairs. On the right is a picture window. The couch faces the TV. I have struggled with this wall several times. Should it be an accent wall? House a large piece of art? If so, what? I've tried to make several montages of family photos, found things, and it always comes out mish-mashed. Until I found the lion. She came from an antique store in Reno, and was living on the tallest part of
Read more

Tales of an unemployed journalist

Yesterday I worked for the big-name shoe company again, Nike, bussing tables at an event for 700 regional sales managers in town for the Spring '07 sales convention. The staff was mostly college students, and a few tired, middle-aged women with little education or work experience. There were a few oddballs and creepo's too, those who probably couldn't get work anywhere else because of criminal records and whatnot. Courtney, a relatively fair-looking black man asked me to come over to his place after work and watch a movie. I thanked him and told him my boyfriend would probably not appreciate that. Ten minutes later, he offered to drive me home in his van. Later, he asked the woman standing next to me if she had a car, a boyfriend, and any plans for that night. I found out later he'd gone around to every woman working and asked the same things. Anyhoo, while working there I couldn't help but be my curious self, and I pretended to be an employed, undercover journalist
Read more