Why One has Insurance .... or

This is SO How I Did Not Want to Spend my Day Off!

Remember our new - well, nearly new - hardwood floors?  We had them installed just over four years ago.  [Here]  They looked a lot like this ...

Two evenings ago Mitchell heard water dripping ....

Turned out to be the hot water line from the water heater to the kitchen sink.  And, it was gushing, not dripping!

Fifty gallons later, we got the water shut off and started damage control.  There are no photos of all our bath and beach towels blotting up the small river flowing thru the kitchen - we were a bit busy at that time.

Today a nice "man" [he appeared to be slightly more than thirteen] came and ripped up the rippled floor and left us with five large fans and one huge dehumidifier.

Pulling up the warped boards.

It could be worse.  Only the kitchen and dining area have to be re-floored.
Is that even a word?

Insurance has been called, and they will cover most of the damage and repair to the floor.  We have returned to the source of the floors and found one that will match almost perfectly.  That means we will not have to replace the "good" floor, too. 

All will be well in a few weeks , but I really had planned to spend my day off digging and planting.  Maybe tomorrow will be a better day!

A Different Kind of Guest Garden

Single Brothers Garden - Winston-Salem, North Carolina

We made a quick trip to Winston-Salem this weekend to test out a car for possible purchase.  I had hoped to spend a good bit of time touring the gardens there, but the weather interfered.  Fortunately, I did get a few minutes between rain drops in the Single Brothers Garden.

Do you recognize this vegetable?

When I go looking for gardens to tour, I tend to think more BBG or Longwood and not so much about kitchen gardens, but Old Salem got my attention in a new way.  Had I been thinking, I would have realized that settlers in the 1780's had more pressing needs than flowers on the table - altho i suspect a few did appear.

They needed to provide food for the village and these were all kitchen gardens - tucked up in the back yards of many houses.  But nothing to compete with scale of the Single Brothers garden.

The entire space was the equivalent of a large city block, divided into six "plots" that i paced off as something close to 50 feet by 50 feet each.  There is 25-50 feet separating the individual plots, all in beautifully maintained grass.  Somewhere i read that they are now rented out to Salem residents.

 At the moment the individual plots are in all stages of planting.  One was completely plowed and ready to start over for the spring.

Others were partially turned over and partially filled with the remaining fall and winter veggies.  Several were top-dressed in  loads of beautiful, black compost and many were mounded almost like raised beds.  The individual "rows" were about three feet wide and 25 feet long - not your typical kitchen garden.

Cabbage in the left, onions on the right, and - wait for it - sunchokes in the center.

Yep!  It's horseradish!  What a beautiful plant.

But my very favorite were two squares with impressive beds of horseradish.  These reminded me of my dad.  He used to raise very small crops (two plants) and share his special recipe with us.  I think it was grated/ground horseradish with salt and vinegar.  Delicious, but tear-inducing to make.  He burned out several blenders before he happened upon an old fashioned meat grinder that did an excellent job!

Even as my kitchen garden grows, it in no way resembles this one!  How about yours?

A Non-Project Project

It started off simply enough.

Things are coming up nicely now.  

The plum bloomed last week and is already gone. 

Lilacs and wisteria are blooming next door.  The dogwoods are open and the azaleas right behind them.  The viburnum coming out.  All in all, things are looking good and the weather has finally moved into spring-mode. 

So, one small assignment for Saturday:  just rake out a few leaves and then maybe spread a bit of mulch.  Nothing difficult - 45 minutes max. 

Can you see where some critter has eaten the blooms, but left the leaves and stems?  Nice clean teeth marks!

I raked.  I carried leaves to the compost pile.  And, that uncovered the pachysandra had grown into the path, so ....

I pulled out the errant pachysandra, and made a quick trip to the Big Blue Box store to get rock, and then ....

I spread rocks.  

Now it was clear that some of the azaleas were dead,  and the hosta was gone.  I made a second quick trip to the Big Blue Box store for pink [what else?] azaleas and a hosta. 

I planted them, and then finally spread the mulch.  Forty-five minutes?  More like five hours!

Ah, the life of a gardener!

If it's Spring, it Must be Project Season

Even tho cold still has us in its firm grip, it truly is spring now and we are promised warmer weather next week.  It should be in the upper 60's already, but we are promised lower 60's for the next 10 days.  That's a start.  Inevitably, then, it's time for the project list for spring. 

With my "sneaking away from work" time curtailed because I am already training my replacement, I will have less time to work in the garden until June.  But I still have one large project planned and two smaller ones.   First the smaller ones:

Clean up the bed of hellebores:  We have just let the hellebores spread unimpeded for the past 15 years.  There are hundreds of volunteers each year.  So far I don't have any weird colors from the cross pollination, so i am very happy with the situation.  Originally i had heuchera and tiarella in this bed, as well as the monkey grass, but the former have disappeared.  This year, I plan to dig out all of the money grass and clear the way for the hellebores to take over the whole bed.  Not so much a project, as a recognition of "che sera, sera".

Improve the cutting bed:  I've never really had the time that I should spend on the cutting garden, and it may be June before I really get to this, but I want to expand and improve this bed.  I'm going to make it a little wider and put some pavers down so I can step across it more easily.  Soon i will have a source of stones to put around the entire bed as an edging - to better define the bed and to keep some of the grass out.

And, the big project:  I'm going to pull out the pond - also known as "the local heron's feeding grounds"; move the sitting area to the future former pond area; and put in a raised tomato bed where the glider is now. Whew!  This will take several weekends.

First, I need to drain the pond, but it has been way too cold and wet to do it yet.  Normally, I would have done it this weekend, but with soggy ground, I don't dare pump 75 gallons of water into the garden.  If it stays dry all week I can do it next weekend.  The water is full of "fish nutrients"  [wink, wink!] so even if i had another way to dispose of the water, i would want to use it to water and feed the perennials.  

With the glider here and facing east (right) one can look down the length of the main bed.  From May to fall it's full of flowers, birds, butterflies and bees.  It will be a great place for a glass of wine now and then.

Then, obviously, i will need to fill in the hole.  I have most of the clay that came out of it still in a mound behind the compost piles, and will use some of that in the bottom of the hole, but at least the top 12 - 15 inches will be the good "webb dirt" that I have made over the last couple of years.  That creates an additional sub-project ... getting rid of the ground hog.  

As far as I know, he [or she] is still ensconced under the good dirt that is left in the compost.  Am calling the county agent on Monday to see if s/he has any suggestions.  At this point, i am thinking of running water down the hole and making him move ... or swim.  Am a little concerned about this approach.  Anyone got a suggestion, or even better, actual knowledge about how to encourage a ground hog to move on?

Assuming I can free up that dirt, i'll fill the hole and then move the pavers from the right side of the walkway over to the the left side and make a new sitting area.  There is actually more natural shade on the left (now that the crabapple tree is gone) so it will be a more comfortable place and more likely to be used.  Then I'll put a 4 x 4 raised bed in for additional tomatoes this year.  Already have the corner braces, so only need to make quick run to the lumber store and many bags of compost to do the bed.  Hope to have it done by the first of May.

I plan to put a new fence along the shed and have ordered some lavender that is supposed to do well in our humid summer climate to plant along the fence along with some daylilies that I can move from over-grown clumps.  I think it will look pretty by next year. 

All those stones that are currently around the pond will someday be around the cutting garden.  As i recall it's more than 1,000 pounds of rock, so will take me several days - and many, many trips in the garden cart, to move!

So, what projects do you have planned for this spring and summer?