Monday, January 29, 2007

Yesterday was Sunday...

and I kicked ass cleaning and decluttering. I got up at my normal time, showered, dressed, cooked pancakes and cleaned. After I watched CBS Sunday Morning. The boy helped out in his way. He pretends to vacuum. He also took a really long morning nap. That is more helpful than anything. I decluttered my closet, the cedar chest and my dresser. I can't believe how many articles of clothing I was hanging on to for no reason. I can close my dresser drawers easily now. I cleaned off the top of the piano. Things were starting to accumulate. It changed the whole look of the livingroom (to me anyway).

Monday, January 22, 2007

Sunday afternoons


I'm really wondering what is up with me. The last 2 Sundays I have been sluggish and mopey. It's like I'm 12 again and dreading school on Monday. I hated Sundays as a kid.


Some days I feel the need to DO something. Clean, cook, de-clutter. If things weren't frozen solid I could be making up garden beds. I guess, based on this little exercise, that my problem is cabin fever. I'm between projects and feeling restless. I'm not getting enough exercise.
Next month I'm going to visit my friend Sharon. Hopefully I'll get some inspiration from her. She doesn't get everything done but she seems content to let the little stuff go. She is way busier than I am. Every now and again I need to get reinvigorated and inspired about the things I feel are important (my child, growing food, wasting less, our health).

Thursday, January 11, 2007

I usually fizzle

Every year I start out in January with big plans. I want to expand my fruit production. Last year I had raspberries and they were very successful. This year I want to do blueberries. Plants are expensive but the county will have them for the plant sale.

I try to draw out where things are going to go in the garden. Then a nice day appears in March or April and I plant lettuce and peas. Then I totally forget about my plan. I try and squeeze in one more tomato plant. I plant kale and never eat it or freeze it. The rabbits eat it. I SHOULD plant kale. It's easy to grow. I SHOULD eat kale. It's really good for me.

This year the goal is to not over do. I'll use my space efficiently. I'll do succession planting and I won't expand by more than one bed.

Watch me fizzle!

Wednesday, January 03, 2007

2007




I don't make resolutions but, I do start planning for the garden. The seed catalogs are arriving and the vegetables are all sounding so good. The trick is to actually eat what you sow, and keep the rabbits away. I am all about good intentions and eating more vegetables. I really look forward to tomatoes and corn (I buy it, don't grow it). Lettuce and snow peas are the first veggies we have and they are a great treat. I'm liking summer squash more and more.

If the winter stays mild I might even start the landscaping around the house.

We are the proud owners of a paid-for John Deere tractor. Unfortunately it is not a real tractor, it's a garden tractor, but, it's all ours and we do a lot of different stuff with it. We mow the lawn(weekly), the pasture(annually) and the loop around the pasture(quarterly). We haul wood in from the woods. We scrape the horse paddock and push all the manure into a great big compost pile. We move the compost to the garden. The driveway gets plowed. I'm sure there is other stuff we do with it but it's enough to say that it's a pretty useful tool. In a perfect world I would be doing stuff with fewer steps and with horse power. However the tractor only needs a little bit of gas run through it in the winter to keep it in good working order. A horse eats a lot even when not doing anything.