My very first vegetable garden

A few weeks ago we decided to plant a vegetable garden - we spent a while deciding where would be the best place for it, and then moved the roses that were growing there to make space. xxx and I made one of our many pilgrimages to Home Depot for supplies, and not too much longer, we had created this:

Two lovely beds shaped to fit along the path. The white hoops are 1/2" (I know aren't inches so old, one drawback of living in this country...) pvc pipes, bent over and fed into short lengths of 1" pipe, screwed onto the inside of the frame. The idea is to cover in bird netting. Hopefully bird netting will also become gopher, skunk and raccoon netting when there is something worth eating. As yet, its not needed.

After a dosing of hardware cloth on the bottom (gopher and mole protection), various types of soil, manure and grass clippings we got to the most exciting part of the whole process (well almost the most exciting) - planting!

And planted we have:

• PEAS! 2 whole rows of peas. Peas are my favorite (hence why my garden posts are titled with peas)*
• Yellow corn (x6)
• White corn (x6)
• Green globe artichoke
• Icebox watermelon
• Sweet million tomato
• Sugar tomato
• Heirloom: Martin's Roma tomato
• Yellow plum tomato
• Bush beans
• Kentucky wonder pole beans
• Radishes
• Carrots (Long Imperator #58)
• Oak leaf mixed lettuce (x6)
• Sweet bowl mixed lettuce (x6)
• Orange bell pepper
• Sweet banana pepper (x4)
• Yellow zucchini
• Japanese cucumber
• Big Bertha bell pepper
• Red bell sweet pepper
• Black beauty zucchini
• Green zucchini
• Scallopini squash
• Butternut squash (x5)

When you write it all in a list like that, it seems like quite a lot. I'm a little disconcerted now as there are only 2 of us. And seemingly quite a large number of vegetables!

* I was a little disappointed that the only pea seeds I could find were Disney themed children's pea seeds. I have nothing against children's pea seeds, but Disney ones? Really? Do they dance and sing? I'm also going against all advice I received from the garden center - perhaps the reason the only peas I could find were Disney seeds is because its the wrong time of year to grow peas here...to hot or something....hmmmm. We shall see.

Birthday Resolution

Well, its my birthday today and I have decided to make a "birthday resolution". This is something that my husband has been trying to help me stop doing for...hmmm...well...about as long as I've known him (make that over 7 years). Because I have a really bad habit - I bite my fingernails terribly. So much so that they bleed, the sides are all ripped, my fingers are stubby, the nails are completely damaged - got white spots all over them and are all ridged, and they are such a mess. I thought that when I got my beautiful engagement and wedding rings that I would be shamed into stopping biting them, but it didn't help either.

But for no longer will they look so messy! From tomorrow onwards, I am going to stop chewing, biting, ripping, picking or mouthing my nails.

How you ask? I've been biting them for 28 years, how will I stop now? Well, firstly, I'm going to create myself a sticker chart (I already have an exercise sticker chart, more on that another time). My sticker chart is just a calendar, and each day that I go without biting my nails, I'll get a sticker. At the end of the first week of complete stickers, I'm going to buy myself a treat. And the same after three whole weeks. After a month, I will get a bigger treat. (I'm hoping that the age-old child sticker chart - treat method will work for me!). I've also got bottles of that foul-tasting nail polish which from now on I will carry at all times, along with a pair of nail clippers.

I'm also hoping that by being accountable and making it public...I will be more motivated to stop. So I'm going to provide updates, with photos!

Any help, suggestions, encouragement, tips or anything else would be much appreciated!

Here are photos as at t:0

My Very First Blog

So this is my first foray into the blogging world. My idea is to blog about things that excite me, upset me, ideas I have, and my own little world over here in California. But who knows, we'll see how it all turns out.

But what great timing! I have exciting news for my first post. I am currently a lawyer (attorney) in New Zealand, and in the United Kingdom and I just passed the bar exam in California so I can be an attorney over here now. It was a huge accomplishment and meant:

1. 2 months off work
2. Study. Study. Study. Study.
3. 8 - 12 hours/day of it. 7 days a week.
4. For 8 weeks.
5. An amazing husband who did all the cooking/shopping/cat taking to vet/cleaning/washing for that time.
6. 18 hours of exams. Over 3 days.
7. 6 essays. 2 performance tests. 200 multi-choice questions.
8. A gas leak during the exam. And horrible LA traffic.
9. Logging onto the website at 6pm on Friday May 13 (what a day to pick huh?) to see this:

 

It was the highlight of my month, no make that year.