Spring Cleaning with Little "Angels"

Truthfully, they're not so little anymore.

But my six youngest and my friend's three youngest children (the littles in their respective large families) tackled the back yard today.  

The garden was a mess. If you look carefully at the following picture, you'll see the garden fence, with lots of stuff that needs to be raked:

There was paraphernalia left over from finishing off the siding last fall.  There was an old door, tossed aside when the back door was replaced.  There were weeds and dry old vines and rocks and bits of glass and screws and nails.  Lots of junk to clean.  UGH.

Here you can see that the fence has been removed, and the garden area has been raked and cleaned.  

Elena is rejoicing...we're almost done:

Josh, Dan & Pat took turns driving the tractor around.  Here's Joshua taking a turn.  

They gathered garbage, taking it to the burn pile.  They pulled out the fence, which we plan to re-install after we till and make our garden about 50% larger than last year's.  They pulled out two posts that used to belong to our old wooden swing set, which collapsed a couple of years ago under the weight of a fallen maple tree.  

Linda, Elena, Tiana, Jessie and Joy used rakes and shovels to get rid of weeds and debris.  They worked tirelessly for hours, making a dreary task fun by working together.  

Christopher did lots of running for the older kids.  He picked up some nails and screws.  He ran and got buckets when we needed them.  

"Job well done, kids!  Now it's time for a tea, but just let me get a final picture of the back yard.  C'mon, everybody line up so I can get your picture."

"Aww, do we HAVE to?"  (Half the kids had already made it inside...)

"Naww... it's okay...I know you're tired.  Snap."  

Granny Miller's Monthly Gardening Plan

Granny Miller has a feature on her blog called "Ask Granny", where she answers questions about food, gardening and farming. I compiled a list of her gardening chores month by month. For her original post, go here.

Gardening Chores from Granny Miller - Zone 5

Month	Chore
January	Spend January looking through garden catalogues;     Read and plan!
February	Start spinach or lettuce in a couple of pots on a sunny windowsill.     Ordering seeds, fruit trees or nursery stock
March	Ensure garden tools & equipment are clean and in good working order.     Prune apple trees, brambles and grapes.     Start cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts in a cold frame.
April	Spray Apple trees with oil dormant spray. Sow oats. Clear farmyard and garden of debris. Rake and burn debris. Divide and move perennial flowers. Plant onions and peas as soon as the vegetable garden is dry enough. Plant cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, spinach, radishes, lettuce and kale. Plant new asparagus beds and fertilize old ones. Plant new strawberries in April and bare root fruit trees and roses. Check herb garden for any winter die off. Cut back plants. Chives are first! Plant sweet peas Enjoy the daffodils. Clean out fishpond. Plow in the middle of April. Start tomatoes, peppers or any other tender vegetable or flower annual from seed indoors or in a hot bed, the middle to end of April.
May	Continue with basic garden chores     Apple trees begin to bloom.     Tulips and lilacs bloom in May     Grass first needs to be cut     Make sure that strawberries, onions and asparagus are well mulched.     Pick first asparagus in May.     By the middle of May the garden gets well rotted horse manure and is tilled.     Roses are pruned in May.     By the last week of May the garden has warmed up enough to safely plant corn, potatoes, green beans, tomatoes, melons, winter squash, summer squash, pumpkins, cucumbers, wax beans, beets, carrots and green peppers. Some years I will plant celery.     Plant marigolds in the garden for pest control and annual flowers for cutting. Sunflowers are planted for the winter birds and any annual herbs are planted at this time too.
June	First strawberries are ready to be picked by the middle of June     Asparagus are still being harvested.     Make yearly pantry list.     Start canning and freezing.     In June weeding and tilling are the main garden chores.     Lettuce, radishes and spinach need to be gathered and sometimes peas are harvested by the end of June.     Apples are sprayed every week.     Vegetables are sprayed every other week     Keep a close watch out for cutworms and other garden pests.     June is the time for hatching out chicks and ducklings.     Hay is first cut in June.     June is often when deer become a problem in the garden and the garden needs to be fenced with electric fence.
July	July brings cherries, blueberries, broccoli and cabbage.     Weeding, spraying and pest control continues.     Green beans are often ready to start picking by the middle to end of July.     Dig the first sweet onions     Pick summer squash.     Cucumbers come ready and so do the very first tomatoes.     Cattle are bred in July for April calves and hay is cut again.     Harvest garlic.     July can bring a bumper crop of blackberries.     By the end of July canning season really begins to pick     Many herbs are ready to be harvested during July     Grapes are beginning to form on grape vines.
August	If I intend to plant turnips, spinach or lettuce for the cool weather I sow them at the beginning of August.     In August the annual flowers that were planted from seed are blooming.     Sometimes it is dry here in August and certain flowers and vegetables will need extra water.     Check for insects and plant diseases - late July and August brings      Continue to spray during August and take particular care with the grapes     Sweet corn, tomatoes, peppers, summer squash, carrots, beets, spinach, lettuce, melons and new potatoes can all be harvested.     By the end of August cucumbers are beginning to play out.     Cabbage should be harvested before they begin to split.     It’s important to keep the seed beds well watered - it's so hot in August it’s easy to kill cool weather vegetable seedlings before they have a chance to get started.
September	Watermelons are ready.     It's the end of most vegetables in the garden.     Sometimes hay is cut for the third time.     Tomatoes and peppers are still producing heavy and summer squash and green beans are mostly over unless I planted a second crop.     Sometimes sweet corn is still harvested.     Harvest and dry certain herbs like sage, rosemary, fennel and basil.     First apples are picked in September     By the end of the month some of the winter squash and pumpkins are ready.     As the vegetables are finished, begin to clear out the weeds and old plants.     Collect tomato, pepper, corn and other types of seed on dry, sunny days in September.     Allow all the chickens into the garden to help me clean up.     Move the ducks temporarily to the garden so their manure can be added to the soil.     September is when meat chickens are slaughtered and market lambs are sold.     By the end of September we usually have a killing frost. Kale and      Concord grapes are harvested after the first couple of frosts.
October	Sow winter wheat in early October. October is time to remake the garden and to plant garlic. It is also time to transplant and mulch strawberries. October is the best time of the year to transplant trees or shrubs and is when tulips, daffodils and other spring flowering bulbs are planted. It is also the time I collect flower seeds for next year's garden. Apples are harvested in October and the orchard is cleaned and made ready for the coming winter. Often the garden is tilled or re-plowed in October. Sheep are bred in October for March lambs and kale and Brussels sprouts are first picked.
November	In November field corn is harvested.     Brussels sprouts are also harvested and any garden debris is cleaned up.     Sometimes a single rose will bloom in November     Often the weather turns cold before the garden can be put right before winter.
December	Life begins to turn indoors again.     Parsley, sage, chives and other herbs can still be harvested.

Granny Miller

One of my favourite web-Grannies is Granny Miller (not her real name).  She lives a simple and deliberate agrarian lifestyle in rural Pennsylvania.  She writes with wisdom and knowledge, and takes great pictures to go along with her advice.

I've subscribed to her blog, and look forward to her posts.  She's written about her animals, about canning and freezing, about gardening, and about her wonderful companion dog, Riko, who died recently.  

Her blog is well worth the visit.  Pay special attention to her "Ask Granny" posts, located in the sidebar.

Progress in Planting

The above pictures were taken at Creekside; however, I couldn't resist sharing the beauty.

Today we (the girls, Critter and I) went out and planted more of the garden. We planted zucchini squash, grape tomatoes, marigolds, beets, heirloom great white tomatoes, beefsteak tomatoes, and two varieties of peppers. Whew! It's windy and warm...perfect for a thunderstorm. I think we'll need to cover the tomatoes tonight.

Before I came in, I sat on the stoop and prayed, asking God to bless our efforts. I am well aware that gardening is a lesson in the age-old question regarding Man's Responsibility and God's Sovereignty. God is in control of the seed, the soil, the temperature, the precipitation, and even the pests that can seek to destroy the crop. Man is in control (to a limited degree) of the tilling, the hoeing, the planting, the weeding, the watering, and the watching for pests. He must also be aware of the signs and the seasons, especially in Canada; for planting in January would be foolish!

Proverbs 24:27 Prepare your outside work, Make it fit for yourself in the field; And afterward build your house.

Christians know and acknowledge that the Lord is Sovereign over all (and that makes us humble and thankful that He blesses us so abundantly) but we are also even more aware of our responsibility before God to work diligently, to persevere in hardship, to shun laziness and embrace productivity.

Proverbs 18:9 He who is slothful in his work Is a brother to him who is a great destroyer.
Exodus 34:21 "Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest; in plowing time and in harvest you shall rest.

I am thankful that we have this beautiful area in which to plant a garden. I am grateful to my boys and my husband for tilling and putting up the fence to keep the pesky critters (not my son, Critter!) out of the garden. I rejoice in the help I had today, because many hands make light work.

Psalms 77:12 I will also meditate on all Your work, And talk of Your deeds.

Most of all, I praise my God, in Whom I will trust, because I know that in my labour, He is glorified, for I am doing what He created me to do.

Ephesians 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.

When doing anything according to His design, we are reflecting what God did, when He created the heavens and all their starry host, the world, and all that is on it, and the seas and all that is in them. That's why we take such pleasure in our creations, whether it's a drawing made by a four year old, or a garden coaxed out of a pile of dirt by a 50-something year old!

Hebrews 1:10 And: "You, LORD, in the beginning laid the foundation of the earth, And the heavens are the work of Your hands.

Lord, may I continue to reflect just a little bit of Your glory. May this property be a little piece of heaven. And may You be pleased to bless our efforts, so we can bless others. In Christ, I pray. Amen.

Homesteading

Stacy MacDonald put this video onto her blog, and I had to embed it on mine, too. It is truly amazing to see what one family has done on 1/5th of an acre in California.

The website is here: The Path to Freedom


We have nearly three acres, and this year we will be raising 130 meat chickens. We have 6 baby ducklings that just hatched. We have been planting our garden, and so far, we have onions and garlic coming, plus romaine lettuce. Tomorrow I plan to plant our tomatoes and peppers, and a zucchini plant.

We also want to put corn and potatoes into the field.

I have been praying that God will bless our efforts to become more and more self-sufficient. The food we raise ourselves is not only more nutritious, because it doesn't have to travel 100's of miles in a truck, but it is more satisfying, because we've put the "sweat of our brows" into it!

I know we don't live in California, and we have a much shorter growing season, but I am hoping to grow plenty of our own food this year.

The stuff of life.

We were supposed to be camping this weekend, but the weather forecast called for cold AND rain. I can handle cold. I can handle rain. But I can't cope with both in a camping situation, especially not when I don't really have to.

Last year, when we were at Camp de la Joie in Quebec City, it poured buckets one night. The children that were sleeping in the tent found themselves in the middle of a lake by the next morning. I have pictures of the makeshift clothesline we fashioned by stringing a rope between Adeena's van and my van!

Anyway, that was a necessity, because we were a day's travel from home. However, the camping we were planning to do was to be within a half hour of my nice, warm, cozy bed. The warm bed won over the adventure of camping. We'll do that later.

So, today turned into a cleaning day. My oven needed attention, so I sprayed it and began to scrub. I was able to do the door without much problem, but found that I could not scrub the sides or the top or the back of the oven without a great deal of pain. This neck problem that began with a car accident on February 8 last year has not resolved itself, even after more than a year has gone by. Patrick came to my rescue and finished the oven.

I had all of the children scrubbing baseboards - another job I found impossible to do. Then, later in the morning, I had Daniel and Linda clean the ceiling fan in the kitchen. I cannot look up long enough to do that job. They were great, though, and they had it done in less time than I would have taken.

After our deep cleaning of the kitchen, the kids headed to the pool for public swim. They met Heather and the entire gang, who were there to celebrate Quinlan's 8th birthday.

Linda and I stayed home, relishing the peace and quiet. We did a little bit of net-surfing, but the rest of the time was spent in doing other jobs around the house. After the kids got back from swimming, we all went outside to do yard work. I emptied the pond, which needs a good cleaning. Elena discovered that we have 7 baby ducklings! Elena and Tiana closed the ducks and geese into a pen to keep them from my pond. Linda installed a brick walkway circling the far side of the pond. Daniel mowed. Patrick helped me with odd jobs.

As the day drew closer to evening time, Tiana and Elena went inside to make supper while the rest of us finished our projects. Rick and Jared got home just when supper was ready!

When I think back on this day, I realize that it's the little things that matter. We accomplished so much more than a clean oven, a clean kitchen, clean baseboards and a clean fan. We worked together all day. We built relationships. We had fun together, both at the swimming pool and at home or on the truck.

This is the stuff of life. And it's all good.

Garden

The south side of our house is perfect for a small garden. It used to be a less-than-stellar spot, because we had four huge maples that shaded the entire area. However, since tornado-like winds took out most of the trees, and since Rick and Daniel took out another one the other day, there is plenty of sunshine in a very sheltered spot.

So, Rick tilled up an area about 40 feet long and about 12 feet wide. He added good, broken-down manure and soil, then tilled that in.


Today the children and some of the grandchildren helped me mark out the beds and the pathways. Presently we pass to some other object which rounds itself into a whole as did the first; for example, a well-laid garden; and nothing seems worth doing but the laying-out of gardens. Ralph Waldo Emerson



We got onions (white and multipliers) into the ground, but I am not planting anything else until we get a fence up, to keep ducks and geese and dogs and various other animals, including two-footed ones, out of the garden! Thankfully, we have plenty of posts and enough fencing to get the job done. Planting shouldn't take place before the third week in May in our area, anyway. I can plant onions, and I will put in some Romaine lettuce and a few peas, because they don't mind the cold.

There is something about gardening that warms the heart. It's amazing to see that the dirty soil has enough nutrients in it to transform lifeless seeds into beautiful plants, bearing fruit. There's nothing like seeing the flowers transform into beautiful tomatoes, or gigantic zucchinis, or perfect peas!

Poetry and Gardens go together...


Of all the wonderful things in the wonderful universe of God, nothing seems to me more surprising than the planting of a seed in the blank earth and the result thereof.

A GARDEN is a lovesome thing, God wot!
Rose plot,
Fringed pool,
Fern'd grot—
The veriest school
Of peace; and yet the fool
Contends that God is not—
Not God! in gardens! when the eve is cool?
Nay, but I have a sign;
'Tis very sure God walks in mine.

Dorothy Frances Gurney
The kiss of the sun for pardon,
The song of the birds for mirth,
One is nearer God's heart in a garden
Than anywhere else on earth.

It doesn't matter a whit that some of my vegetable gardens in past years have been overrun by weeds or consumed by creatures. It's spring, and here we go again!


Vita Sackville-West: The most noteworthy thing about gardeners is that they are always optimistic, always enterprising, and never satisfied. They always look forward to doing something better than they have ever done before.


Meanwhile, I hope you are all planting seeds, and remembering how nice it is to play in the mud.

Mud

Mud is very nice to feel
All squishy-squash between the toes!
I’d rather wade in wiggly mud
Than smell a yellow rose.

Nobody else but the rose bush knows
How nice mud feels
Between the toes

By Polly Chase Boyden

God, the Gardener

That God once loved a garden We learn in Holy writ. And seeing gardens in the Spring I well can credit it.~Winifred Mary Letts

Genesis 2: 7 - 9 "then the Lord God formed man of the dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature. And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east, and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.


Of course, now that it's past the middle of January, and the days are getting slightly longer, my thoughts turn to spring. Have I ever mentioned that spring is my favourite time of year?

I was reading Genesis this morning, and it struck me that God is a Gardener. He formed man out of the dust of the ground, then planted a garden in the ground. Out of the ground came beautiful things, tasty things... wonderful things!

And we get to be like God in this, too! Mere mortals we are, yet we can plant flower gardens that are pleasant to the sight, and vegetable gardens that are good for food.

A Garden is a lovesome thing, God wot!
Rose plot,
Fringed pool,
Ferned grot -
The veriest school
Of Peace; and yet the fool
Contends that God is not -
Not God! In Gardens!
When the eve is cool?
Nay, but I have a sign:
'Tis very sure God walks in mine.

~Thomas Edward Brown

(wot: knows; grot:like a cave, secluded)

The gardens I am planning for the Spring will be glorious in colour and texture. They will grab the senses and pique the interest of those who visit. My daughter Adeena sent me some plans for perennial gardens, like the one pictured above. It has

1. 3 Mixed Lupines
2. 3 Crimson Coral Bells
3. 3 Barlow Columbine Mix
4. 1 Scarlet Bee Balm
5. 3 Tenor Tall Hybrid Phlox
6. 3 Montana Skies Delphinium
   

Not only do I want a full-sun garden, a shade garden, and a vegetable garden, I want to plan an herb garden, too.

I will soon pull out the garden manuals and order some seed catalogues. I plan on starting my own tomatoes this year, and I want to make sure I have nicotania, because it smells incredible.

It is such fun to dream of gardens in January!

The kiss of the sun for pardon,
The song of the birds for mirth, -
One is nearer God's heart in a garden
Than anywere else on earth.

~ Dorothy Frances Blomfield

The garden seems the one spot on earth where history does not assert itself, and, no doubt, when Nero was fiddling over the blaze of Rome, there were florists counting the petals of rival roses at Paestum as peacefully and conscientiously as any gardeners of today. ~ Edmund Gosse.

Gardening

This is going to be the year we have a great garden. Every other year, we start out great guns, then we get busy with projects inside the house and lose track of what is happening in the yard. The next thing we know, the weeds are waist high, we can't see the vegetables, and the ducks and chickens are eating more of the produce than we are.

This year is going to be different. Why, you ask? Because we are determined! Also, because my son-in-law, Steve, has a weedless garden, and explained his secret: do a little bit every day!

So, on May 20 we began planting. We planned the layout of the garden, then all of the children got busy. Daniel put up chicken wire and other fences for the beans and the beefsteak tomatoes to climb. Sarah planted garlic, onions and beets. Linda planted Romaine lettuce, Swiss Chard, dill, and peas. Jared planted the potatoes; Elena put in sunflowers across the north end of the garden. Tiana happily planted watermelons.

Day after day, we were out there, digging and tilling and pulling up the roots of weeds that went on for miles. Daniel fixed the fence and planted morning glories so they would climb the split rails. Patrick patiently hauled load after load of well-rotted manure to augment our clay soil.

I am happy to report that the zucchini and sunflowers are up, as are the radishes. Only two brave potato plants have made their presence known, and half a dozen bean plants. A couple of our tomatoes have been attacked, but the majority are looking fine. NO sign of carrots or corn or lettuce or watermelons or peas.

Gardening is an endeavour that takes a lot of patience and a good measure of faith, along with hard work and consistency. We marvel that these tiny, lifeless (from our perspective) seeds, when put into the ground, suddenly sprout and shoot out green stems which search for sunlight! Day after day we see changes in the size of the plants. The weeds are astounding - where do they all come from??? We attack them every day with hoes and rakes, and we are winning the battle. We know that all good gifts are from above, and come down from the Father of lights. We know that no matter how hard we work, there isn't a blessed thing we can do to make that plant grow and produce fruit. We do our part, but we must trust God to do His part, which is really the biggest part. Even what we consider to be "our" part is only because of His grace - He has bestowed on us the strength to hoe and water and carry and plant and dig. He has given us the intelligence to read and learn the best way to plant each seed and care for each vegetable as it grows. All good gifts are from Him.

I have begun a gardening journal, and each of the children is working on one, too. I hope to be able to report by the end of the summer that we have eaten much, canned and frozen some, and have reaped the rewards of our consistent, hard work mingled with prayer and faith in the God Who Provides.

I hope to be able to tell you that this, indeed, was the year we had a great garden!
So far, so good.

Janet