Peas, peas, peas!

I planted the peas this morning.

40 foot rows, three kinds

Sugar Pod Peas
Snap Peas
Garden Peas

Overnight low of 60 degrees.

Yesterday's high was 70.  Nice!!!!

Temps

Overnight low of 35 degrees.  Chilly this morning.

I expect we'll get into the mid sixties.

Rain

It rained overnight.

Sure, it wasn't much by the rest of the country's standards but it will be just enough to boost rice grass production.

Unfortunately, it will also be just enough to boost weed production, too.

I got the newspaper and landscape cloth laid out in the front.  Hubby moved the 1/2 wine barrels over after I emptied them.  I'm going to do flowers in the barrels on drip instead of having sprayers in the front.  I'd like to do a pond out there as well at the end of the boardwalk.  Maybe a seer ball with water trickling over it or a rock with a hole in it and water spewing out the top.  Some gold fish would be nice.

Really warm overnight at 45 degrees.  Cloudy but 60 already today.

I have to go.  The homemade hamburger buns need to go into the oven:)

Productive Weekend

We had a fairly productive weekend.

Hubby stacked a bunch of  wood that has been sitting in two large piles with assorted cherry and poplar and elm sitting in small piles around the two large piles.  He's wheel barrowing the cut firewood into the shed and stacking it.

Looks like we used about 1 1/2 cords of wood over the winter.  It was a pretty mild winter.  This is our second year of having a wood stove for the winter.

In fact, I am running the wood stove again this morning but only for a couple of hours.  It wasn't super cold in here - 68 degrees.  At first I was going to tough it out because the house was definitely chilly but, hey, 68 degrees inside, 48 degrees outside, high of 60 or even 64 degrees later today, how bad can it be?

I certainly would have toughed it out when I was running the propane for heat.  I realized that I don't have to be tough.  Wood is inexpensive.  By taking the chill off the house, I live comfortably.  Is that such a bad thing?

I am running the water in the East Zone already this morning.  We really do have to keep up on the watering around here.  I need to go out an fix one or two leaks in the system.  I usually get at least a little bit wet.  Coming in to a warm house will be nice!!!

Over the weekend, Hubby also re-rototilled the area I want to put the peas in and the area that I am putting the strawberries in.  I should have moved the strawberries last fall but I ran out of time or oomph or both:)  So, moving them now will be my next best option.

Of course, there is a whole list of projects to get done but I think I will just try to prioritize and do the best I can.

The iris are coming up and some of the daylilies are, as well.  We have our first daffodil blooming.  The forsythia is blooming.  They are still quite small.  Maybe next year they will be big enough to really put on a show.

Temps

26 degrees for the low
51 for the high

Inside the greenhouse this morning was 48 degrees - not bad

The lettuce and rads are coming up in my greenhouse planters.  Too cool.

Windy

The day is turning windy.

Overnight has been pretty warm at 48 degrees or so last couple of nights.  Will not last.

I brought in the seed starting materials so that I won't have to work with cold trays, potting soil and such.  Any day now I will be starting  my first batch of seeds.  Maybe petunias:)  Definitely tomatoes.

Cleaning up the Long Shed.  Straightening out the irrigation supplies.  So far, I don't think we will have to buy any irrigation supplies.  Yay!!!  Get to spend that money somewhere else.  Looks like I won't have to buy any seed starting supplies either.l

Lettuce and Rads

Yep, today we got some lettuce and radishes started in the greenhouse.  This is the first year we have done this.  I put some planter boxes on the ground, filled them with potting soil and watered in the seeds.  Let's see how our little experiment goes.  Overnight in the greenhouse has bee about 44 to 46 degrees.

It has been above freezing overnight for a couple of nights in a row. Yea!  70 degrees for the high today.

Finished transplanting the mums and the iris today.

Tomorrow Hubby and I need to clean the house since his folks are coming for early dinner.

Spring is Springing

The weather has been fabulous for the last several days.  High sixties.  Could be very temporary but enjoying it while it lasts.

Hubby carried the fifteen panels and the gate out to the back area where we are putting up the round pen.

He positioned the panels one at a time while I put the saddle clamps together on the uprights.  The project was done in about four hours.

We brought Wiseguy in and the first thing he did was lay down and get a good roll in the sand.

Then he snuffled the area with his adorable big nostrils.

He had a good run around the pen in both directions.  He had a great time.

After awhile I called him over to me and he came right over.  I was so pleased.  I didn't want him to over do it for his first real chance to run since I got him almost a year ago.

Time sure flies.  I brought my cute little guy home one year ago at the end of April.

Greenhouse

I noticed a huge hole in the foundation so I plugged it up and was hoping the temp in the greenhouse would be better this morning.  The foundation is dirt.  So, the temperature inside was better but still cold.

21 degrees outside

36 degrees inside.

More rocks:)  Should start improving as I get the rocks in there to soak up heat during the daytime and I will go on the outside to day and shove some more dirt in.  I may need to fix the plastic.  I was hoping not to spend the money:)

Looks like another sunny day.

Spring is Coming Fast

This happens every year.  Spring is suddenly pouncing.  Sure, we still have cold nights and a few cold, windy days ahead but today is lovely.  34 degrees overnight.  Should be well into the fifties. Only a bit of a breeze.  Nice.

The greenhouse was only 40 degrees this morning.  Still too cold to do much but...I think I can plant lettuce in a couple of more days.  We had a couple of really cloudy days in a row and the door wide open while I was working on the interior.  Now that it is sunny, we should get some heating in there.

I am bringing some more dark racks into the space to help soak up the heat in the day time.  I have a barrel of water to fill.  That should help with the overnight temps.  We shall see.

I worked really hard to get the new ventilation door done.  Hubby did the real work on that but I insulated it and worked on getting the planter boxes set up and the shelving in and the rocks in.  A few more loads of rocks over the next couple of days.  I have to spread that out since it is very hard on my arms and shoulders.


We went to Fallon and we bought our round pen!!!!!   I am so very excited.  Wiseguy and I are going to enjoy our new adventure.  We can't use the cart in there because the sand is too soft but we can do lunging and trying the harness and different things.  Maybe even teach him a couple of tricks.

The panels are supposed to be delivered on Wednesday.  By sheer luck, Hubby will be off that day so he can help unload.  That saves my puny little arms a lot of strain.  Yay!

I am transplanting chrysanthemums and getting rid of some of those golden rods.  The golden rods are trying to take over the world.  Not too happy about that.

That should be enough for one or even two days:)

The farrier was here yesterday.  He has a new lady working for him.  He is a very good farrier so I trust him on his judgement for hiring in a new person.  I met the gal, raven, and she is very nice.  She likes doing miniature horse feet so that is good.

Miniature Go Round

The cutest little miniature horse in the west and I are doing lunging.  He knows what he is doing and I don't but we did a few circles and a couple of whoas in each direction while Hubby took our photos.  Wiseguy is very patient since I am still trying to figure out which hand is doing what:)

Mantis Tiller

I am thrilled to be the proud owner of a Mantis tiller.  Hubby and I went to the chainsaw shop the other day. Okay, Hubby went to the chainsaw shop and I was with him.  Then I saw it, the Mantis tiller.  

We had looked at a tiller when we were at the Cal Ranch store in town earlier in the day.  I didn't like it much.  It was a Stihl.  It was selling for almost $400.

This used Matis was $60.  Of course, I have Hubby who knows how to fix small engines and machines of various types.  He sure helps us keep the costs down around here.

That would be Rusty the Red Dog helping me with the tiller.

Greenhouse Refreshed

This is what happened over the winter.  The plastic has been up for  three years?  Maybe four.  The sunlight has rotted the plastic.  This is the east side of the greenhouse.

This is the west side of the greenhouse.  You can see that the plastic has rotted where the sunlight shines directly on the plastic.

You can see my flimsy support piece in the middle of the wall.

These two photos show you how we insulated the walls.  It's been working great.

We used a roll of insulation on the ceiling since we could staple it up.  I found the insulation in front of the home improvement store on super mark down since it was out of its wrapper.  Still, insulation was pretty expensive and straw was $8 a bale and I probably used 2 bales.

Here is a photo of the west side with the shade cloth going up.  The shade cloth has been repurposed several times.  First it covered a friends horse pen.  Then it did several miscellaneous jobs around here for a few years.  It is getting to be in sad shape but I decided it could be used in the greenhouse for its final incarnation.

Here is another item being repurposed.  It was the legs on a cheesy table I made for the back patio.  That table was in use for about 7 years but I finally decided it was too rickety to put potted plants on so I busted the table apart.  Anything too small is being burned in the wood stove but the bigger pieces are being reused..

There is our table leg as a sturdier support for the shelving in the green house.

Here is the east wall with the repurposed shade cloth almost covering the entire wall.  A few more staples and it will be done:)

This is a to be continued spring saga.

A quick note on the weather.  The overnight low was mid-forties.  It is cloudy and raining!!!!!  When you live in the desert rain is a very good thing.  The rice grasses would so appreciate getting some real moisture.  I hope it just keeps raining.  This is not a hard rain but a gentle warm rain.  

I'm baking banana bread.  I had to cheat and put a little melon from the freezer in it since I was a bit short on bananas.  I like to take the over ripe bananas and throw them in the freezer.  When I have a bunch of them, i thaw them out and make banana bread.

Spring is in the Air!

Well, it feels a lot warmer out there.  Overnight lows of 28 and 31 degrees last few nights.  Highs in the upper fifties and low sixties.  Nice.

Plenty to do around here as usual.  March could be windy so I guess I better get as much soon as possible on the nice days:)

I'm going to chip away at the greenhouse.  I have some old shade screen cloth that is in good shape so I think I will get out the staple gun and use it to fix up the sides where the plastic covering the straw has deteriorated.  If I get lucky I'll find the staple gun and the staples quickly.  Hope so anyway.

I am planning a "door"  in the north side of the greenhouse and I have an old screen that I want to fit into the opening so I have to see if that will work.  Hubby is actually going to measure and cut the hole for the ventilation door on his next days off.

I have to figure out what I am going to do to fix the straw slumping problem on the north side as well.  I have lot of old string board.  I might use that on the bottom half, stuff straw in between the studs to insulate the wall and then I can use plastic on the top only.  That would probably work.

I'll try to take some photos today.