blueyedkitty04's Blog

S-T-R-E-S-S is not just a 6 letter word...
Jun 24, 2009 | 2:10 AM PST
Tags: Hannah , Veggie Patch , Pests , Raccoon , Surgery , Garden

To save time (precious time....) I just re-posted from my "other" blog.  I will try my hardest to do a strictly "garden" post soon just for here, but things have been so darn busy.

http://cluttermommy.b
logspot.com/

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I have so much to write and so many pictures to post since my internet hasn't been working too well the past 2-3 weeks.

Here it goes, my attempt at updating you all on the past 2-3 weeks worth of going-on's......

(Above: Hannah and a little green frog. She loves frogs!)

We are still dealing with Hannah's recovery from her eye surgery (June 17th) to correct her "lazy eye". It's been a really crazy week. She is continuing to progress and heal but still fighting the antibiotic eye drops. Boy-Oh-Boy she is fighting them. The redness has reduced quite a bit and I am feeling pretty good with the way they are healing. On July 2nd we go in to see how they are healing and see what the doctor has to say about it. I'll update more on this tomorrow (it's so late - 1:37 a.m). I have some pictures from when we were at the hospital, after and more recently that I will put up to show her surgery recovery process.

(Above: Hannah and I before going into the surgery room where I held her until she fell asleep from the anesthesia.)

(Above: Hannah the day after the surgery.)

On Father's Day we had a wonderful "surprise". Kyle went outside around 11 a.m and saw that our garbage had been gotten in to. We had noticed that the dogs had slept down at the bottom of our steps the entire night and also realized that if they had been the ones to get into the garbage they would have pulled out more and gotten to the really stinky stuff. As Kyle was walking down the stairs, one of the dogs ran towards a tree and started barking. He hollered up the stairs for me to get him a gun because he figured there may be a raccoon up in the trees. I hollered back that I doubted it since most times the dogs just think they've treed a raccoon, but it's really escaped by hopping from one tree to the other. Kyle looked up and in a different tree he saw a raccoon looking down at him. The dogs had indeed treed the raccoon that had gotten into our garbage. What good dogs....

Kyle came running into the house, trying to figure out which gun to shoot it with. We agreed on the "proper" gun - Hannah's new Pink "10 - .22". Six shots later (man those suckers are tough!!) we ended up with a dead raccoon and a wonderful Father's Day photo too!

(Above: Hannah, Kyle, Mitch, Luke, Pink .22 and a dead raccoon - what fun.....)

After the whole ordeal I found that something had ransacked my garden, breaking off my nice "natural trellis", knocking over some of my garden decorations and digging a bit near the base of my "natural trellis". I can only guess - it may have been the raccoon or the dogs tracking the raccoon, but who knows. I will set up Kyle's new "Game-Cam" in my garden maybe tomorrow and see if I can catch any night animal activity in my garden. Can't wait to see what shows up....

I caught a snake 2 days ago with/for Mitchel (my little brother-in-law). I think it's a "Rubber Boa" or "Rat Snake", not sure what the correct name is, but that is what we call them. They're not poisonous, but are good for getting rid of summer nasty bugs (ie. mosquitoes) and even some eat mice. It's not very big and was really calm/gentle although we didn't let go of it's head and let it crawl on us. We kept our fingers on it's head in case it decided to bite/protect itself.

The weather has been really cold the past 3 days. Today it finally warmed up, but in the evening it got colder again. Not cold enough to freeze, but definitely cold enough to wear long pants and a sweatshirt. I haven't had to water my garden for those 3 days which was a really big help since Hannah has to stay away from dust and our yard is sooooooooooooooooooooooooooo dusty that we stay inside quite a bit. Also it's rained a few days on and off so that has helped keep some of the dust down (until today). We've spent time outside when the dust isn't so bad.

My veggie patch is growing like crazy and I am so proud of it! My radishes tops are really big, but not much is growing below (I pulled one today to see the progress and was so disappointed, maybe I am doing something wrong...too much water?). My Zucchinis are doing so well, I am just thrilled. My beans are growing nicely and my peas too. The carrot patch is measly, but I will plant some more soon in my open areas. The lettuce is not coming in well, but it was old seed so I will try some of my new seed in a next planting.

(Above: My garden before the ransacking)

I will try and take some more pictures in the next few days of my garden, veggie patch and Hannah.

Two weeks or so ago we brought Hannah to the "Fat Cat Children's Festival" and she got to color a rock. It was not nearly as good as the year before and we had more fun watching the ducks and geese than standing in line for things. Needless to say, we may not go back next year. We did get some cute pictures though (see below).

(Above: Hannah and I posing in the park at the "Fat Cat Festival")

(Above: Hannah and Kyle posing in the park at the "Fat Cat Festival")

Kyle has to leave again for work probably on Saturday. Big bummer! I am not looking forward to him leaving again. This time it better be for only a week or two or I will go nuts! I had hoped to go camping (don't know if we will get to do that anytime soon until Hannah's eyes are healed, got to keep away from dust and lake water). Kyle even bought a tent that goes in his truck bed (3 person tent) and two fold up chairs to start out our camping accessories.

Anyway, this is getting long. I will try and update more often, but like I've said before, when Kyle get's home things get super crazy and with Hannah's surgery it's gotten harder to find time.

More soon!

~M~

(Above: A crazy picture of Hannah a few days before her surgery)

(Above: My sweet little girl happy as a clam in the bath 2 days after the surgery)

Oie! So busy!
Jun 12, 2009 | 12:14 AM PST
Tag: seeds

Pictures, pictures, pictures and a major busy week +

My last post was titled "Feels like it's been forever", well it has now been quite a while since I last posted a blog entry here. I miss my GG friends! Wish I could catch up on all your blog entries, but who knows when things will settle down enough (probably sometime after the 20th)

Things have been so crazy around here! My husband came home over a week ago which is WONDERFUL, then my daughter had quite a few appointments regarding her eye surgery coming up.

The weather has been just wonderful. We need the rain, but we are enjoying the sun and warmth! Hannah, Kyle and I spend a ton of time outdoors. Since Kyle's been home, we've gone bear hunting (basically a nice drive out in the woods enjoying nature and wildlife - we saw lots of deer and 3 moose), quad riding in the orchard down the road to see the deer eating the cherry tree leaves, and of course playing in the garden!

Things are really coming along in my garden and veggie patch! I am so happy! I have quite a few pictures to post, so maybe I will just post the links to them on my Facebook page so you can see them all there instead of having to upload one at a time on here. I will have to figure that out in a few minutes.

My Zucchini seeds have come in great, my zucchini starts from the nursery are doing well and the cucumber seed I had planted is coming in nice too! I have a great start of radishes, carrots, peas, beans and broccoli as well as lettuce seed that should be coming up soon. I can't wait! Things seem to be going well in my veggie patch! Thank goodness since I worked so hard on amending the soil there! I do need to put some more liquid fertilizer or more manure on the zucchini areas soon.

I have one concern though. Some of my flowers that were started outside from seeds seem to be turning yellowish. Could that be lack of nutrients or more likely over watering? I am trying to only water once a day or every other day there and things don't seem to be changing.

Speaking of watering. I have two questions I've been meaning to ask on that matter:

HOW DO YOU WATER YOUR FLOWER GARDEN?

HOW DO YOU WATER YOUR VEGETABLE GARDEN?

My main preponderance here is to figure out what is the most efficient way of watering plants. Also w/out wasting water and minimizing the weeds around the plants/garden area. There is no need to water around the garden really is there? I water my garden by hand with a hose nozzle sprayer that can be adjusted to lower/higher levels of water. I feel it's pretty efficient, but I am so curious what other methods gardeners use.

Okay, so I decided I will add links to a Facebook photo album so you can see all the pictures there instead of one at a time on here. I have so many, it will be easiest to just upload them there and then post the link here. Sorry if this bothers anyone, but I don't have a ton of time to upload them the slow way.

Gardening June 2009 and beyond....

I hope everyone is doing well! More as time permits!

~M~