Mini projects

For those of you who know us we have a hard time taking it easy. Well today we "took it easy" and built a trellis for the rose bush and a fence/railing for the driveway. The old salvaged/repurposed trellis didn't survive the last wind storm so it needed replaced. Some bamboo and zip ties did the trick.

We have an old driveway that slopes down to the basement with a patio next to it and the kiddo has be getting a little to close for comfort. So we took some old fence boards and use them to make a fence. Fancy that.

You might notice in the rose pic the beehive next to it. We will give an update post on them soon. But for now the new bees seem to be adjusting well.

On the Up & Up

Growing food in the city comes with its challenges.  The major one is space.  I am not telling you anything new here.  Growing vertical is one way to get the most out of your small space.  One thing we found out last year was if you think your trellis is tall enough, you are most likely wrong.  So this year we went BIG!

This is our trellis for the snap peas.  Last year our trellis was maybe two feet tall and soon was toppled by our peas.  So this year we decided 7 ft should do.

Snap peas coming along nicely.

Some left over welded wire from our chicken run makes a good trellis for sweet peas.

This year for our raspberry patch we used wire instead of twine.  The twine couldn't hold the rows neat enough and made for some scratch filled harvesting.  The rows are looking nice.

This picture makes me thing of Skuller's IPA ( a nice local ipa brewed at Skagit River Brewing). This is our golden hop trellis.  We have 2 skulls mounted on bamboo sticks and one hanging for our hops to grow through this year. 

Latched

Well got the gates done today as well as the little walkway up to the main gate. Starting to hit the home stretch. Still have the arbor to do as well as the trellis. We decided to run a wire trellis between the post on top of the fence rather than cut the post flush with the fence. The trellis might take some time. Mostly decisions, like what gauge wire and most important what to grow? Putting it up shouldn't be too difficult. (Famous last words).

Hops Gone Wild

The hops are coming up like gangbusters and need trellising. Last year we took and old beat up red chair and put them in the hops. So this year the wife decided to do something different. What do think?

Garden tour

We thought we should give you a little tour of the perennial gardens. So here we go. You might also catch a glimpse of our hired help as well.

The Pie Patch

The pie patch consists of rhubarb, two varieties of blueberries, Chandler and Jersey as well as red and golden raspberries. Still trying to find space for strawberries. Someday

Garden update

Thought we would give a little update on the garden since its been so long. So here goes. First we have the garlic that we planted in October. It's seems to be doing better than last years. We got different seed and did some amending if the soil. We'll see how it goes. Next is our over wintered broccoli. This has been amazing. We have harvested so much we will probably do this every year and not bother with growing any in the summer. Then we have our over wintered red and Dino kale as well as some collards. The red Russian kale has been especially wonderful. Behind it we have snap peas that we planted in early march. So far so good. Now we have to finish planning and planting the rest of veg. All in good time.