Garden Goodness

August 1, 2021

Hello again,

We're doing a double-header today and getting things all caught back up after dragging our feet on last week's email. And, we have some big news! The bridge on the frontage road between us and the post office has finally reopened and our daily trip to the post office just got much shorter. Now, instead of having to get on the interstate and driving six miles each way back and forth, you can just stay on the frontage road and only have to go two miles each way. Not the biggest difference ever, but just avoiding the interstate alone makes it worth it! When we came out to interview for the job back in October the bridge was still open, but ever since we got here three days before Christmas it has been closed and only just opened back up on Wednesday. In a similar vein, our trip to our storage units is now much shorter, too, and should hopefully facilitate us actually getting over there each week so that we can keep making some progress on getting all of our stuff down from two units to one. And, until Kim moves into her new house, we're going to park one of my cars in the empty second unit that we have and then bring the car back here after we move into the house that she currently lives in. Then, after that, we'll have all of that room to store the many things that we still have at Erin's Dad's house back in Pennsylvania. Plans, plans, plans. And we had some interesting weather yesterday, too. We've had lots of storms before, both snow and rain and everything in-between, but yesterday was the first day that we've seen downpours that lasted for hours and hours. I would say that for a solid six hours or so it alternated between raining buckets, then doubling in intensity, then lightening up for five or ten minutes and then starting the cycle all over again. We finally saw all the ditches and arroyos full of running water, which went down just as soon as the rain would slacken. We're on a fairly flat piece of upland with hills ringing it, but it is not in any way steep or precipitous enough for us to have to be concerned about flooding. More than anything, this red dirt out here just opens up its pores and soaks in all the moisture and it makes everything an absolute muddy mess for a day or two...muddy horse heaven!

Erin's garden has been firing on all cylinders and it weathered yesterday's downpours like nobody's business! In fact, she told me that the beans and peas seemed to have lengthened another foot overnight. Just today she spent three hours out in the garden harvesting all of our goodies that we'll be eating for the rest of the week. Today's catch included: Roma, Royal Burgundy & Red Swan bush beans; sugar snap peas; beets; radishes; spinach; two kinds of leaf lettuce; chard; kale; Italian & Thai basil; cilantro; savory; purslane; onions; and mint. Zinnias and calendula are in full flower and all of our later season plants have flowers, too, and look to be developing nicely. Later this month we're expecting: summer squash; cucumbers; tomatoes; watermelons; and cantaloupe. We just went through a few weeks of highs in the mid-80s and lows around 60 and are now in a cycle that has dropped those two numbers by about five or so degrees each. Erin's pulling off the delicate balance between keeping her hot-soil plants nice and warm and also encouraging her colder weather plants to keep thriving thanks to the cool nights. In short, she's at her happiest every day when she's out in her garden, getting lost in the ancient rhythms of planting, tending, harvesting and storing. Already she has a million or more ideas about how to do things better next year and what needs to stay, what needs to go and what needs tweaked.

Now, this week's set of pictures were all taken by Erin and mainly are close-ups of things that she notices when she's out in the garden or when she's watering all the flowers around Kim's house. First up, a close-up of a big, green grasshopper. Then, a detail of a Monarch butterfly that landed to feed. Then, a shot of a praying mantis that she noticed one day blending in with all the myriad shades of green. Next, a shot of Ela wrapped around my head when Erin came downstairs at daybreak a week or so ago...if it's not her, it's Willow! Next, a shot of Rui(who never wraps himself around my head) doing his best Good-Boy routine for Erin, trying to get something to eat out of her. Then, a small sampling of the garden's bounty from last weekend. Then, a series of eleven flower closeups that are just amazing in their detail: first, some blanketflowers; then, two shots of calendula; next, a mystery flower from Kim's garden; then, four shots of poppies; next, a close-up of a sunflower; and, finally, two shots of some zinnias. Lastly, Erin couldn't help but snap this shot when I came back in from working on the cars one night...I do my best to wear 'old' clothes and not touch anything inside and get right in the shower, but sometimes it just doesn't work and I make quite a mess!

Have a great week!