Surprises I Adore!

Seedlings

Livin' large with my awesome labels made with painters tape!

   I've started my garden, indoors. Yes I have accepted this crazy thing called a grow light for vegetables. I'm sure my electricity bill will have some new numbers on it this round. I set up seedlings for sweet peppers, Brandywine tomatoes, Black Cherry tomatoes,

I KNOW you are digging my sophisticated set up, with a heating pad between cookie sheets!

Green Zebra tomatoes, and leeks. Then I let them all coexist in my makeshift grow light area thingy place or whatever. I read that they needed to be warm. Some people wrote that the light at a 3 inch distance would be enough, others disagreed. So I put a heating pad on a cookie sheet, with a towel on top. Under the cookies sheet are two 1/2 thick pieces of wood. This keeps the heat away from the dresser and the towel helps with moisture and cleanliness.I sat looking out the window, wondering when exactly I would need or be able to or want to clean off the deck and the downstairs concrete area. That's when I saw a six pack sitting upside down against the house, on the deck. Oh that's right. This was my first every fail in gardening. The six pack has stayed out all winter, reminding me not be gullible again. In early fall I read an article stating that I could plant Rhubarb. Mmmmmmm rhubarb....pies and sauces....all sorts of yum! I quickly ordered the plants in total excitement. I didn't even transplant them, before them seemed completely toast. It was awful. They were shriveled, broken, limp little things. OK all you dirty minded people this has nothing to do with little old men. The next day my dog knocked the six pack off the deck. I thought, "screw it, those are toast anyway" with many more fwords and a strong threat to skin the pup and wear her like a Davy Crockett hat! Apparently one of my little angels today they are angels, who knows about tomorrow brought the six pack back up to the deck. Then with multiple windy storms it flipped around. So fine you evil little six pack, I will finally throw you away. Much to my surprise, when I lifted it up I found six happy little rhubarb plants! Well paint me pink and do a happy dance, who would have thought such a happy surprise would occur? I totally did of course, because all of my screw ups end up in serendipitous happiness. So in a nutshell, my sprouts are happily poking out of their little nests of seed starter AND I have rhubarb!

Week 1 with my baby rhubarb...my little survivors!

Let There Be Wood!

    So late last night I began to think about mulch. Yes, its sad....or very cool, that my head spins with all things garden. Just wait, soon it will be amazing! Anyway, back to mulch. We have a few trees, but not enough to really get mulch from the pruning. I'm creative....and cheap....there must be some way to get inexpensive mulch. I REALLY don't want to go pick up. Where are you wood fairy? I cruised Craiglist, and Offerup.com...but nothing. Then I happened upon Chipdrop. OMG!!! This is the coolest thing EVER! They hook you up with arborists, not for love silly, for mulch! When an arborist in your area completes a job they look on a map and fins a place to dump their mulch! I may have just peed myself a little. So I read and read all the information and signed up. It seemed that many people made donations except for really cheap Mandy, and were able to receive a load of chips within a month or so. There are some catches to the wood fairy:
1. You will not get any advanced notice. Or at least don't count on it.
2. You never know how much will be dropped off.
3.  You must leave an area readily available at all times.

But here are the really cool parts:
1. Free mulch delivered to your doorstep...literally!
2. You keep this stuff out of the dump by taking it.
3. You can specify if there are species that you do not want.
4. You can also get logs!!!! Oh the logs! You can make tables, stairs, wood chopping blocks. Just think of the things you can make!! The logs they showed were rounds, like tree slices rather than logs like Lincoln Logs.

OK, this works for me! I have a week or a month or whatever to get the yard ready for mulching, based on what other members have posted. I'm so excited. Sign me up baby!

Fast forward to this morning, I'm off to take the kiddos to their first Pacific Northwest dentist appointment. Once we are about ready to finish up and go home, I check my email. Chipdrop will be making a delivery, hmmmm I wonder when THAT will be. Email number two, Chipdrop has made a drop. WTF???? So my mind spins with what could be waiting for me at home. Is it those really cool logs? Oh the things that we can do with those! It could not possibly be the wood chips. Aren't there like a million people waiting for wood chips? It must be the logs. Of course I'm now thinking I MUST go buy a chainsaw! WOO HOO! Love me some power tools. Alas, I refrain from that purchase, and yes the Voice of Reason (my hubby) didn't even need to be there to help me not purchase just one more tool. That's right, give me some candy. I quickly drive home and find this.....

Oh yes...the amazing mulch mound! Delivered in less than 24 hours!!!! For free!

   Yes my friends, another fan-flipping-tastic suprise...well except for the fact that it supposed to rain all night and all day tomorrow. Oh the joy!
Best-
Mandy