Aidenbaby's Anti-Suburban Sprawl

[TanksHill]

We have programs around here (this might be a good one or you Dace) where families can house foreign exchange students. You need to feed them diner and drive them to and from school each day. They usually stay about 4 to 6 weeks. You are reimbursed several hundred dollars a month. If I had a spare room I would definitely consider it.

 

[Blackbird]

Kelle! Where are you?! I hope that you are ok, and that another egg didn't explode on you..

Let us know!

 

[Dace]

I have been wondering about you as well! I hope everything is well and you are just busy!!

 

[Aidenbaby]

I am yanking my journal up from the bottomless depths where it had been buried.

Here's my plans for today:
1. Go grocery shopping.
2. get some of the broccoli seeds in the ground.
3. shovel 1 wagonload of rocks to the side of the house.
4. Spring clean the kitchen. That means also removing things that are broken or unused, too. We've got that new fridge coming next week and I want the kitchen to sparkle by then.

 

[Aidenbaby]

Of my list, I got one thing done. LOL I got the grocery shopping done. While at Wally World, I picked up a bunch of seeds. I now have 2 varieties of sunflowers, alyssum, cosmos, marigold, 2 varieties of nasturtium, calendula, lemon cukes, butterfly weed, spinach and lettuce. So much for only grabbing the sunflowers. I forgive myself though. We next headed to Lowe's to look at the price of mesh for rabbit hutches. I realized I probably ought to have the measurements of the pieces I'll need and ended up buying: a kit with 10 strawberries, 1 rhubarb, 3 seed potatoes, and 2 asparagus; a 80 pack of onion sets; 2 little pumpkin starters for the younguns and 2 large bags of potting soil.

Did I mention that my mother gave me a TON o pots of various shapes and sizes? None of them are really big enough to grow t-maters or large veggies in but they could hold the mini-carrots I have or lettuce or spinach or stuff along those lines. I'm probably going to have a few of the random sized ones out front and the remaining same-sized ones in the back. I was thinking it might be a good way to add more plants to the beds without actually taking up more soil space. I'll take a pic later and show you what I mean.

 

[Aidenbaby]

I made the kids a "teepee" today out of last year's Mammoth sunflower stalks and wool yarn. It doesn't look half bad either if I do say so myself. I'm planning on going out tomorrow and going round with a little more yarn to make a lower round of yarn for beans/peas to climb along while growing. I've never done this before but am hoping that the "teepee" will at least survive the season. In the fall, I'll either break the staks down and give the to the rabbit to gnaw on or add it to the compost pile. Then, I'll save this year's stalks after they've bloomed and we've collected the seeds. I was thinking about putting them in the rafters in the garage to dry until next spring.

I'm thinking about being wild and crazy and experiment with NOT weeding my garden beds of the grass that I've been pulling for the last... ? years. I'll still weed my arch-enemy, Bindweed, out but I may actually try to cultivate the dandelions. I don't know, though. I'm still sitting pretty on the fence.

I've been working on an afghan for the last couple of weeks as well to get rid of some of my yarn stash. It's roughly 42 inches wide and 40 inches long right now. It has 27 1/2 inches of cream, 5 inches of dark blueberry blue and will have another 27 1/2 inches of cream for a total of 60 inches. I'm also going to crochet a border with the blue to finish it off. I think it'll look very pretty but simple when I'm done. I'm trying really hard to stay focused on completing this project and my mantra is, "I'm almost done, just a little more to go." This will be the 4th knitting project I've completed.

 

[Ldychef2k]

A teepee out of sunflower stalks? How genius is that? I am going to have to figure out how to do that with PVC pipe! LOL

 

[Farmfresh]

Just a tip. Instead of yarn use a thin jute or hemp twine. That way the whole mess can go into the compost pile if you need it to!

The garden I have a few houses from mine used to be home garden to a Missouri River fisherman. He used nylon or synthetic twine to tie EVERYTHING and loved to tie stuff up!! I have been battling chunks of string that will not rot for the last 6 years!!! At least he WAS an organic gardener.

 

[Aidenbaby]

Better late then never, I always say. Here are the pics as promised.
Together with "basin" on top.

How to stack them together.

Inside the pots. Rod with gaskets and nuts. The picture doesn't show the washers that need to be added for more support.

Be sure not to over-tighten the nuts on both ends or you could crack the pots.

Here is the Sunflower Teepee.

I planted peas around the bases of each pole and added a gazing ball on top (the base to the ball was broken anyway and I thought it looked interesting.

 

[Henrietta23]

Cool! I made a small bird bath like that a few years ago. The puppy knocked it over last summer. I really should redo it.