the unexpected domestic

A New Hitch, A New Beginning

Whenever Kevin leaves to go on a new hitch, it always feels like a new beginning for me to get stuff done around the house. I mean, it may be that I am trying to fill my time that I would have otherwise spent with Kevin but it also gives me a fresh perspective on what needs to be done around the house. I hope I'm not going to overwhelm myself but I've come up with a list of (mostly) small projects that will slowly help get our house on better shape. I already began working on the new chicken coop and the front bed! So that's a good start and I've still got two weeks left until Kevin comes home.

 

1 - Submit DVDs and books to Amazon trade-in program

 

2 - Start building new chicken coop

 

3 - Clean our hallway closet

 

4 - Clean off front porch

 

5 - Remove stuff off bottom two shelves

 

6 - Weed front bed/thin out elephant ears

the gardening diaries: quick update

I don't have much to say this week.  My focus has not really been on my garden, oops.  I started to weed a little bit last week, I think I already posted about that, but I haven't done much since then. 

It stormed yesterday and my corn stalks took quite a beating and are slightly leaning.  I also need to add some more supports to my tomato plants, they fell over and the tomato cages are just not strong enough to hold them up anymore with the weight of the tomatoes added to them.

This morning after I mowed the yard, I picked some beautiful veggies from the mini-garden.  It has always done well for me since I began using it as a garden space last year.  The chickens used to live there so I think that's the secret ;)

I also spotted some "volunteer" tomato plants on the side of the chicken coop that had blooms and some green tomatoes.  Jessica has gotten some of these before and they call them "chicken cherries." Ha!  I think these look more like grape tomatoes so I'm gonna go with "chicken grapes."

While I was mowing, I spotted more blooms on my raspberry bushes that I got a month or so ago.  They were almost dead at Lowe's and I picked two plants off the clearance rack so I paid almost nothing for them.  I planted them in the yard and I just let God water them!  My pastor's wife, Mrs. Angie, used that phrase with me once and I really liked it so I use it myself!

Ok y'all!  Until next time :)

my mini-garden [winter edition]

Y'all I don't know if that's necessarily the correct terminology for what I have planted, but I planted garlic yesterday!!  Yay me!  I planted some garlic in pots last year but then my cat, kitten, totally thought that would be just the perfect litter box!  I was so so angry!  But, whatever, that was last year.  This year, after such success with my late-summer mini garden I decided to plant two large cloves of garlic that I had!  For the past couple of weeks I have been kind of working the ground to try and get it good and mixed up and prepared for whatever I decided to plant next.  Obviously that ended up being garlic, haha.  

This past week I decided to finally plant a few rows of garlic.  Mainly because I want to.  But also because it is another way to practice growing something!  So I began peeling the clove to get to all the individual cloves.  I am unsure of the right words so this is what we are going with. :]  Anyways, it did not take very long and I got about four small rows out of the two cloves (bulbs, maybe?) that I had.  
It's kind of hard to tell because they just look like white dots, but that's the cloves I planted!

I am excited to see them grow and I really cannot wait to cook with them.  I found this picture of braided garlic and I would like to try and braid what I have.  I don't know if I planted enough to do a large braid but small ones will do as well!  I found this picture on Pinterest and thought it looked neat :]

 

Garlic Braid

Doesn't that look so neat?  I would love to hang that in my kitchen or in the chicken coop I'm gonna have!

Well y'all, I gotta run!  Thank you for stopping by! 

Elizabethy

my container garden.

At the beginning of March, I had a dream of having a beautiful plot garden this year.  I had spent many hours on Pinterest in January and February while recovering from my eye surgery and had discovered all these great looking gardens and different styles and I was determined I would have a garden.  I even drew out my plan for my little garden including all of the yummy veggies that I love to eat and could not wait to have them growing in my own backyard!  My wonderful b-i-l helped me with getting the plot worked up for me to plant everything and things were going along according to plan.

It looked great and we worked hard on it.  Then I kept putting off purchasing my seeds and baby plants.  One reason I waited was because of how cold it was.  Living in town my whole life, I've never grown a garden or hardly anything so I was hesitant because I didn't want my plants to die from the cold!  I also got distracted with working on my front walk, I laid brick down to make it all pretty and nice looking.  Then other things kept happening and the plants never got planted.  Kevina and I talked about it and decided to not do it this year but we did agree that I could have a small container garden.  I was so excited about my little bitty garden and could not wait to get started on it!  I have grown herbs in containers all year and have been successful with that so I figured it wouldn't be too much of a difference.  One day after work I went to Hill Hardware downtown and got a galvanized oblong bucket, some container soil, and several tomato plants, green bell peppers, okra, and peas!  Then it was on to plant my finds! Here is my container garden the first day I planted.  These pictures were taken on May 16, 2013  

In the oblong container, I have four tomato plants and three bell peppers.  I am sure I will probably need to thin them out and repot some of the tomato plants in a better area.  Actually I am positive, after looking at the pictures that I took Friday.

What a big difference in just two weeks!  I even have a bell pepper.  Sometime this week I plan to replant some of the plants in different pots in order to help them grow better and not be so crowded.  I put my tomatoes and bell peppers in the backyard beside my chicken coop and near my pecan tree.  When Kevin and I first moved into our house, this tree was so small!  It has grown tremendously in the past year and I love it so much.  I cannot wait for it to grow wider and will provide shade for me to sit in!

 

hello monday.

Good morning y'all!  It is another week here at the Haddox house and week seven of Kevin being home! I am getting so used to it and I love it!  Alright, let's go!

hello hot weather - it is a little cool at night now, but it is defintely hot during the day! this past saturday I was watering my plants and ended up turning the hose on myself.  It was magical.

hello backyard farm - due to circumstances we decided to not plant my big backyard garden, but I negotiated a small container garden.  I have this set out there by my chicken coop.  

hello coffee - I'm starting at the Second Street Bean two days a week! yay coffee. and seeing lots of people!

hello budgeting - I love putting together a budget and using spreadsheets and such!  I love reading blogs about tips and ideas on keeping all of that organized and everything.  Hopefully Kevin will get to go back to work soon so I'm preparing for that!

finally friday.

although I say it's finally friday, the day of the week does not mean much to me since I do not work.  my weeks actually go by when Kevin leaves for work.  which is monday night.  anyways...this has been a pretty long week.  sunday night at about nine fifteen I got a phone call from Kevin that he had his hand closed in a door and broke his fingers!  His parents and I drove to his dock and picked him up and then took him to the hospital.  I have some pictures but do not have them transferred to my computer yet.  It is pretty bad and it will be about six weeks for his recovery.  

this is a preview of what i have been doing the past couple of weeks!  I have not liked our front yard because it really has not been taken care of besides just being mowed.  I really wanted to begin dressing it up this spring and began with the front bed, and that led into this wonderful brick path!  i'm totally in love with it now that it is finished.  I can't wait for the bed to begin sprouting it's beautifulness.  I have also been working on a garden that I need to begin planting this week or next.  It needs to be soon no matter what! this is my first year to plant a garden and I am very excited but at the same time I am hoping to not be overwhelmed.  currently I have a lot, a lot of herbs and I do not want to be overwhelmed by how many I have and just give up on them.  Because I really love them. I love the idea of cooking with fresh herbs and plants.  

so that's it for now!  byeeee