I took Esme into the doctor this morning - the fever just would not keep away.  She fell asleep on the table in the room before he finally got in to us, but I was able to wake her up when he did come in.  He thinks she has a bacterial infection in her sinuses/upper respiratory and ear canal - possibly a mild case of strep to blame.  She did not tell me her ear hurt, but it was red and she had been touching it several times there in the office which led me to ask him to check both of them.  He gave us an antibiotic, which she has thrown up and cannot have more of until tomorrow.  I hope she absorbed some of it.  I am going to give her a cooler bath in a bit but have been letting her sleep some since we got home.

Mark and I were talking more about where to put a chicken house, and how, and where to fence.  He thinks we could keep two goats in the same fence with the chickens.  I am reading up and we are planning what materials, where, and how to build.  It probably will not coalesce until later this summer.  It is a lot to take up but with the garden already ready to produce for them it might be the time to act.  We keep seeing deals on the livestock themselves but I have instincts that say to prepare their 'nest' beforehand - then we can get serious.

 

My idea of a structure based on Mark's plan.

He says my brain thinks in 'messed-up isometric'.

The blue 'pins' are cedar posts, and there is a fence along the side.

To me, this is a perfectly understandable representation of what we will build!

In the meanwhile I am a hovering mama.  I stayed home from work today because of getting sick myself in the middle of the night, chills and then crashing until Esme woke me up at 2 am with 102 fever again saying she needed something for the hot.  She seemed in fairly good spirits this morning despite it all - just very tired and hot and wishing I would stop and let her sleep.  I work late tomorrow - hopefully we will both have better health to report before then.

On Productivity in the weekend...

I've got less 'done' this weekend than I have in many weeks... two days off usually has quite a bit of accomplishment with it.   But, with Esme sick I was pretty much hovering over her and staying inside out of the garden.  She seems to have benefited from it - she is quite a bit better than she had been, and is talking up a storm to me, coming up with all her usual complicated plans and imaginary playtimes.  Just about the time I was winding down and wiped out she began her upswing and drug me outside into the heat of the day to play in the sand, play ball, play puddle.... and then Queen and Princess and Knights in Shiny Arm (Shining Armor).  We took a brief jaunt up to Grandma's to bring her radishes and for Esme to play.  Most of the rest of the day has been absorbed by three complete seasons of Scooby Doo on infinite loop.  We should all know them by heart by now!

Productivity:.  Some laundry, some squash plants transplanted out and watered, some corn seeds sorted out and three half-rows of field corn put in at the west field (making 7 or 8 total). I also did a small bit of weeding,  picked radishes and lettuce, put a few rows on the knit blanket and then began feeling not entirely happy myself (just as Esme picked up speed).  I think I hit a caffeine headache mixed with the heat.

I was thinking I should plant much more field corn down there at the garden - but.. do I really want to?  I have some pink popcorn coming in the mail to plant and the peanuts yet... I think I am now finally at that edge of how much can I take care of when I am not really gung-ho into working on it.  This weekend was one of those .. and I still managed to water a lot of things and do some work out there. 

bit

Esme has been running a fever since mid-afternoon yesterday.  I got home from work and her 'cheeks hurt' was all she could tell us.  I think it is a sinus infection brewing, maybe stepped up by some bug she caught at the auction for the Amish school.  There were a lot of people and animals there, being in a crowd etc.. usually gets us all with whatever is going around.  She had a good time that day but later that night she was snorking and crying again and up half the night.  Her usual temperature is 97 on our underarm thermometer and it has been running up to 101.  Any higher than that I would have given her a fever reducer immediately - but she has been hovering between 'normal' and that for nearly 24 hours.  Mark is in town and will pick up some tylenol so we can try it out on her.  Everytime we buy it it seems she gets better before we open it and then it expires before the next time we need it!

She had seemed somewhat better this morning, woke up and was hopping and wanting me to get my blanket around my shoulders (at 6 am or so) and go outside.  She went back to sleep for a little while, and after it was over 70 outside I took her out to the west field and planted three rows of field corn - but she was just sitting there on the bag of fertilizer we have had out there for a while - staring at the ground, and the bugs, and the plants moving in the wind.  This is not my normal whirlwind child.  Inside, she was staring at her drink, and not asking for Scooby Doo or any of the other things she begs for normally.  She ate a popsicle and then wanted back outside.  She played for a few minutes before saying she was too COLD and asking for a bath.  I went to give her a bath and she puked on the floor again (after drinking juice and eating a piece of a cookie I had) and then tried to sleep in the bathtub after a few minutes.  She is still near 100 degrees - and sleeping, with liquids back in her again. 

I am monitoring her and knitting a bit on a blanket from last year - waiting for Daddy to get home from town (will be a few hours) and we will see what the rest of the day brings.  If she seems better again I do have some squash plants in the windowbox that need to go in the ground somewhere, at the very least.

Note:  I am looking at a terribly tempting pumpkin and squash seed variety site : kurkubita club, to keep my mind busy.  I keep checking on Esme every once in a while - and a few times she has woken up and looked at me with this 'wonderful teenager look' and said 'Mom!  I'm sleeping!'  OK... yes I get a bit too mothering hen at times... even she tells me that.

The medicine brought her fever down, but Esme is still tired and not perky.   I put the squash plants in the garden, hope they will make it there.   I am trying to get her to eat some chicken and drink something before she goes down for another nap.

 

Esme's 'first day of school rose'

The small fenced-in garden coming along.

Mouse cat is out there in the background.
Even the squash hills that were not producing yesterday are now showing signs of life.

 Misha dog checks out the end of the 'planted' area of the west field.

The corn and squash coming up there are nearly microscopic - but they are there.

Green tops of radishes pulled earlier in the other garden.

 

Now, with water run out there we will be thinking of planting

more low-maintenance things (like the field corn seed saved from last year)

Hooded Blue sweater finished and water to the west field

I finished Esme's blue hooded sweater, that was began in December. The warm weather is nearly here already, but not quite. She insisted on the hood, and it has already been used in the rain.

There is also lots of room to grow for next year. The buttons are large, so she can do them herself. I didn't have more than five of anything, so added one pretty green button for the very top.

Particulars:
Lion's Brand 'Vanna's Choice' in royal blue, size 7 straight needles, size 7 circular needle, crochet hook (large) to finish edging on bottom and on hood.  Pattern: Red Heart seed stitch cardigan with alterations and a by-the-fly hood based on a few other patterns I found online.

We also went to town today and bought the twenty foot plumbing pipe to run water to the field corn in the west field.  An hour after we were home, there was water running down there!  The corn and hubbard squash that are coming up down there (and sunflowers later) will be very happy.  We are on our way to having enough ground and infrastructure to feed turkeys or chickens in the future.. or whatever else we plan to bring here.  In the short term, I can experiment with the field corn genetics and try to learn more about what is the best seed to keep, select and grow for storage over the winter.

what a weekend

I worked the weekend and Esme was still coughing even with the new medicine. Nights were long and miserable, with many loads of laundry from her 'losing' what medicine and liquids she did get in waking up coughing in the middle of the night. Mark thinks she has caught another cold on top of the allergies. And she feels pretty good most of the day, but miserable at night. We are feeling a little bit of the 'under the weather' ourselves. I have today and tomorrow off - then two on, then next weekend off. I made 'semi-real' chicken soup, canned soup with added cooked meat, carrots and spices, for Esme this morning and forced her to drink as much of the broth as she would. Now if she can hold it down, it might do some good.

It is up and down cold outside. I have had a lot of trouble keeping warm. I haven't been out to the garden because I can't help having a tag-a-long, and she isn't in condition to be out there. I might sneak a few minutes to check up on things later today when we hit the daily high temperature. I need to sneak a look at the west field, as well.

I am knitting the hood on her blue sweater. It is looking a tiny bit large, but not swimming, so she will have a year to grow with it. I need to find buttons for it... usually knit the buttonholes and then go find something that fits (know that is backwards). I also intend to work out the crankiness in the sewing machine again later tonight or tomorrow. Every time I look at Esme's clothes drawers and think 'she needs more pants' I empty the latest load of laundry out of the dryer and find six pairs...

Loula has been doing well with her kitten charges...
She has been helping clean Pogo's orphaned kittens since she disappeared
for being without a mother since four weeks old they are scruffy but growing well

Kenearly beans sprouting inside...

Esme wanted me to take a picture of what she would look like if she closed her eyes and smiled at the same time... I thought that was a decent request...

Garden updates: The popcorn is coming up, as are the 'a squash' plots (saved seed - not sure if it will be what I want it to be). The lower hill squashes are still not producing, but the radishes are! I pulled in a handful and also a small amount of lettuce for a tiny one person salad. Ha. The west field corn is just barely visible with a microscope ... getting water over there will be critical for it to continue growing.  Planted cucumbers, cilantro and tennessee greasy beans.  Planted replacement beans in several of the beds and saw that a lot of the last round of 'replacements' were starting to come up.  Weeded the carrot bed and found carrots are growing there!  YAY!

bit:  It still freaks me out a little bit when Esme tells me she thinks I am another mama and the other mama went to work today but I stayed here with her.  Is she pulling my leg?  She told me the mama with the hair tie went to work today, she is not here - but I am here, and I have a pink shirt and I made her food.  

Painting by Mom

 

"That is me, up there.", she says.

It is a painting of her, by mom.

Esme asked me to paint a picture of her yesterday - while she was wearing the blue hat.  I obliged with her watercolors and a piece of cardstock.  This is a very cheap frame to keep it 'good' for a while.

A while back the nurse prescribed some allergy medicine for her coughing, and she has been getting it every night at 8 pm, but it still isn't working really well.  She has slept through the night a bit better... without waking up for an hour coughing, but we probably have to see if we can see the doctor and try something else.  Her nose seems to be always full and she won't blow it - and the nurse said there was no chest congestion, just post nasal stuff.

I went out in the garden and planted Pawnee shell beans, and more herbs in the places where they have been reluctant to take.  It was too cold out there and Esme was insisting on being with me - so I cut it short at that and came inside.  She is now playing with a balloon around the house and watching Scooby Doo.  I'll try to give her another eucalyptus bath before bed.  I've been watering 'greenhouse' starts inside and some of the beans are VERY early.  The tomatoes and peppers are all making niceties.  Whenever this cold spell breaks and we get into 'summery' temperatures I will put the seedlings out and plant the cowpeas.  That probably will be the first week of May.

raining down on sprouts

 

'waiting ten minutes' 

for the rain to stop, which sadly, it did not.

 

funny face - Daddy said this Grandma needs to see this one.

This was part of her describing about the 'ten minutes' 

and how then she could go outside in the hat

and play and be a lady.

I call this the Curious George smile she does.

She really thought the hat was going to do enough

to protect her out in the rain.

We are having a good rainstorm now - needed it for a week or more.  I just got off of work two hours ago and when I got home something pushed me to put the potatoes in the ground that Mark had suggested we plant instead of throw out.  The Resilient Gardener has a chapter about potatoes, as well.  I read it yesterday so was armed with knowledge today.  I put in 11 hills of potatoes and a few scant rows of sunflower seeds (real seed bearing ones) and the rain began to fall down on my shoulders just as I finished the second to last packet of seeds.

Mark is warming up some of the barbeque he made the other night (cooked all night from a roast), and Esme is watching Scooby Doo after being very disappointed by the rain.  We have not yet run water pipe to the west field, so it needed it, too.  I hope the seeds there were waiting for it and had not rotted yet.  We will need to buy or dig a bag of compost material to put over the potatoes in another week - so they will stay buried in the ground for a good time.  I was only able to dig down about 5 inches before hitting clay - so the book says the rest can be made up by hilling good earth over the top of it and then composting and mulching to keep the spuds safely out of the sunlight to avoid greening of the new potatoes.

Oh how I would love to make this: Sami octagonal hut - it reminds me of the 'Universe House' that I used to draw in my dream drawings.  It is too large of a job for me right now, though.  Although, I could see making one of these on a vacation one year... and spending my birthday solstice morning in it - as the door would have to face East with the ventilation windows to the North, Northeast, South and Southeast.  East is the Sunrise and West is the Sunset.  The door would have to face dawn and not dusk. 

And anyway, what we really need is a barn :)  Mark and I have been planning that out on paper to be a dugout barn on the bottom level and a hayloft and plant starting greenhouse on the second level.  He has a place in mind and is working up a plan.

small crafts and the elusive hunt for canned squash

Today was for small crafts, getting some things done that needed to be done.  I made Esme another pair of pants, finished my knit slippers and made Esme a new pillow for her bed, which she helped me stuff.  There was a lot of laundry to do and some general cleaning up and weeding in the garden.  We spent a long time in town - Esme's new mattress had arrived site-to-store and we needed groceries as well.   Mark bought a large set of Scooby Doo cartoons and Esme is enjoying them as much as I am.  It brings back a lot from my childhood and I get to see her laugh and cry along with them.

I had the bright idea to try a can of Libby's plain canned pumpkin.  That is the 'winter squash' I remember eating canned as a child and have not been able to find since.  I have been looking in the vegetable aisle and for something marked 'squash' - altogether wrong.  All of this time it has been hiding under the label of pumpkin by the pie filling.  The 'pumpkin' I remember as a child was always more runny than this - that was what separated it from the 'winter squash' cans.   Now that I know we will be buying more of it over the course of the year.  There is something to it that cannot be replaced by sweet potato or carrots.  I mixed about a 1/4 cup of this can with olive oil, salt, pepper and garlic powder and spread it on a piece of toasted bread.  I expect to use some of the rest of the can in thickening what is left of the other day's soup and save some in the freezer until next week.  

great day

We've had a great and productive day.  Esme went to school and we went to buy the toilet while she was there.  She did not want to leave the playground when we arrived - thought the teachers were mad at her and that is why she needed to leave. We completed the toilet install, and hauled a lot of trash away.  I did some work in the garden and also went to see Grandma and Grandpa with Esme.  We put out another tray of seeds in the window and also repotted the aloe vera plant.  The garden still has a long way to go - but it is progressing nicely.  I need to get out and do some careful weeding tomorrow.

Esme's comment about the toilet:  It has no batteries and goes crack. (it does not work/flush and made an awful clattering noise) But, you fix it, and this one has batteries and does not crack!  She thought we did a good job.  She fixated on the new shiny silver bolts as the old ones had blackened.

planted today:  blue sweet corn, new squashes in the bottom left hand square because it seemed the seeds had not taken there.  The blue hubbard and glop pumpkins are in that square too, but they are plants and seem to be doing okay.  The strawberry popcorn was put in last week in front of the sweet corn in two rows, with a few squashes and zinnias between them.  There is spinach planted between the rows of the sweet corn which is not on the map.  I found the summer savory and basils coming up in small amounts.  There is 'maybe' a speck of chamomile coming up - and I planted more again there.  The zucchinis are coming up by the black krim tomatoes in front of the sunflowers.  I put a few Kilarney beans in front of the sunflowers where the okra did not take.  I really think there are some 'volunteer' tomatoes coming up from last year - probably yellow pear tomatoes.  I see some carrots here and there, as well.  Only two of the lima beans are up :(

I put one third of the Virginia bright leaf seeds, several bean varieites and several squashes into the next greenhouse flat.  The tomatoes in the other one are getting close to having their second set of leaves and there is one solitary pepper seed that may be germinating out of three pots of four to six seeds each.  There may be more coming.

Labelling Notes for Myself:

The zucchini on top is the zephyr while the other one is 'dark green zucchini.' label from the sample bags.  In the bean patch the identifications are: on the left are pintos (second planting - first with parchman/lockwood which did not do well and now with my seed from last year) with blue/black shackamaxons on the 'top' (3/5) of the row by the red field corn.  The next row over is the 'King of the Early' bean, which came up the best out of all of them.  To the right of that and on top are the dragon's lingerie beans (2/3), then the maria amazalatei's bean (1/3) below them.  Then the blue field corn in a row, then the Bosnian bean on the 'top' (2/3) and the 'jimenez' on the bottom (1/3), the ingot summer squash is on the top between them, and the 'goldrush' bean (of which only one came up) is the last row on the right.  I planted more Provider bush beans where only one Goldrush did not come up, and the little pink square are Mayflower pole beans.  There are Dragon Tongue pole beans actually at the 'top' of one of the other rows but I did not note which row for the map.  The Lina Siscos are planted along the 'right' edge of the sweet corn and are bush beans - they seem to be coming up about halfway and I planted more of those today along the rest of the row.

bit

Esme insisted on helping cut carrots for my soup last night.  She did not do too badly of a job, although after half a carrot I asked her to let me cut them and she could put them in the pot.  That worked.  This morning she put on her cut down shirt that had been mine, grabbed the store apron that looks like mine from work and insisted she was going to work with me and help fix things and eat lunch and help mama walk in the work.  She was upset but eventually helped me pack lunch and then opened the door to wave goodbye to me as I left.  Now we are eating dinner and spending some time outside.  The zucchinis are starting to come up but no other squashes yet besides the glop pumpkin.  The popcorn is not yet up.  I planted the spinach seeds in between the rows of corn to see how they will do.  We have a big day tomorrow - it is my day off but we have to install a toilet!  I have a small nerdy joy in finding about thirty Kenearly Yellow Eye beans in a bagged soup mix of beans.  I didn't feel compelled to buy that variety 'as seed' but upon having found them, they will likely become part of the planting mix.  They are bush habit drying beans - which will not be green beans and will be left on the bushes until they dry.

bit

I had a few beautiful dreams last night - one included something we did the other day, walking up and down the road looking at the property thinking of things we will do in the future here.  I saw a white flower growing by the side of  the road - which, I did in real life and it was a particularily pretty blackberry flower.  However, in the dream before my eyes it turned into a white lily with shaded to purplish black petals and spots and pink insides - something beautiful and striking.  I was worried dreaming of lilies was a bad thing - but it is actually exactly what we were doing - looking to the future, planning, making provisions.  Very nice.

It rained gently last night and I know the gardens enjoyed it.  I have Wednesday off from work and we will likely be out there again fiddling with little things here and there.  I've told Mark I have been thinking about different things we could raise out here - reasons for a barn and a fence and further etc...  I am researching turkeys instead of chickens.  Every time one runs in front of me across the road I think about how hard they would be to catch - but then, if they were already caught (as farm turkeys start out at the very least) it would be partway there.

Esme has a small poison ivy reaction by her eye - but it is already better than yesterday.  We washed her hands immediately after she grabbed a leaf yesterday but that was without soap at the hydrant and she did touch her face before we could get inside to the soap.

Esme comments

I want my m & m's BUT are s's  (skittles).
Ouch Mom, don't do that - you hurt me! (when she is stumbling over my shoes on the other side of the room and I am nowhere at ALL near her)  Oh, haha, yea.. but YOUR shoes Mama.
Loula is my scooby-doo, (and you're shaggy then, right?)  No, I'm a Velma.  You're the Shaggy.
(Do you know what a barn is?)  I'll find it.  BARN!  BA---ARN! (calling this out into the woods and wondering why nothing comes out.)
I am a chef, and cooking and magic stuff. (sitting in front of a bowl of water she is dunking toys into)
I don't want to cook a smurf, ew yuck, don't want to eat it.  BUT - I could watch them.  I like Smurfs.  I could put them in my hand and put them on the table and then, it could talk to me!
Pizza!?  I want bologna on my pizza!  Please?
I Tell Daddy.  Daddy I see a battery up there and it will fall on our heads! (there is a battery exposed in the hallway smoke detector and she is afraid it will fall out).
I am not saying anything. (I've been hearing this one a lot lately when I ask her to repeat something that she said while I was far away)
You missed one Mom, right here.  You fill it? (When I was sorting corn kernels and had not filled a hole in the pan)
Here, you want a million dollar?  (handing me a pack of cards)
I told her we could break into her piggy bank to get some more watercolor paints for her (not that we can't afford it - but I'd like to see her reaction to paying for something small like that out of the bank).  She says:  OH NO Mama, NO NO, People like piggy banks.  Do not hit it go break - no no......  We don't have to 'break' it as it has a plug, but I didn't press it!

I heard her doing the naa-naa-naa type voice saying 'in a minute, in a minute... Mama says in a minute' after I told her I needed to water something in the garden and would be to the swing to push her in a minute.  HAHA.  A few days before that I heard her saying 'no no no... mad mad, I don't like Mama, but she is mad.'  I had just had a discussion with her about something important and she was not agreeing with me it was important.

I can't see in there.  I can't.  It is all dark in there.  ((looking down into the tube of a roll of paper towels on my desk))  Minutes later, I see her using a flashlight to look down into the tube and turning it on and off to see inside the tube.

other:  I saw a whole line up of her metal cars on the table with her watercolor paints.  She has been trying to change their colors with her paintbrush and it is not working.

She was calling Christopher Robin outside in the woods and had the whole imaginary pooh collection of characters following her in and out of the house and a pack of four baby Baxsons she was leading around the yard.  She petted each Baxson on the head and picked them all up to sit on her lap while she was on the swing. 

I can't remember exactly what the conversation was - but it was about morning and the brown bears were all asleep in the daytime, but it is nighttime now, and she went out at night to get her cook (a silver pot she left in the sand) and used the flashlight and the brown bears were not awake yet then but they would be and she was safe now.  We watched her get the pan and she came back in and had to talk about it for quite a while.

When I was at work she fell asleep in the yard with Loula the puppy while Daddy read his book.  He said she was so happy and it was such a nice afternoon he just let them sleep there for a while.  She was in a very good mood when I got home from work that day so she must have needed the nap!

The tomato seedlings are up, some of them.

I sorted corn kernels last night, Esme tried to help.  After reading more on corn genetics I decided to try to sort the blue out of my b/w/y and plant it exclusively in a different area.  I did some spring cleaning, need to do more.  Other than that - I am waiting for Wednesday.

Update : I couldn't wait for Wednesday.  I bought a German Queen heirloom tomato and a Blue Hubbard squash at work - because *hide* they weren't there last time I looked!  Yes, I know this is one of the warning signs of gardening addiction.  I confess, I am getting so addicted people have looked over my shoulder as I read about squash genetics at work and then they smile uneasily and say 'I wondered what is what you've been so intensely concentrating on.  It's that interesting, huh?  I'm very scared now.'   I told him I had learned more about different types of pumpkins and squash in that book than I had ever thought possible.  At that moment an old-time gardener across the room piped up agreeing with me and I took my book over there and we started comparing notes and things we had grown.  The other coworker gripped his iphone tightly, cowered and tried very hard to deal with what had started as a joke and turned into a reality, a full-fledged discussion of corn and squash genetics between two gardening geeks.  My Lina Sisco beans are coming up in the garden, and everything seems to be doing well.  There are several tomatoes that have grown LARGE and are getting ready to make flowers.  I am wondering if I should pinch them back and have them wait another week.

note on corn properties

After reading the corn chapter I did a few 'field tests' on the corn seed from last year.  The first test was extremely low-tech.  I found a flat rock with a depression in it and a sharp rock and hit the kernels of corn until they cracked in half.  Then I examined the inner makeup of the kernel to see how much flour and how much 'flint' it had in it.  The flour parts are powdery bright white and the 'flint' areas are clear and glassy.

The blue/white/yellow cob was interesting.  The blue and purplish kernels in it were mostly flour based and I could almost pick off the outer coating with my fingernail itself, while the yellow and white kernels in it had a hard glass-like outer coating that went much deeper and very little flour around the middle.  And these had all been part of the same single cob.

The 'butterscotch/rose pink' cob had mostly glassy kernels with very little flour.  These were the hardest to crack open. It would be called a flint corn.

The reddish/striped variety cob was right down the middle.  It was easier to open than the butterscotch and had some flint and some flour.  It would be called a dent corn.

The kernels I had grouped together as 'easy pop' were surprisingly mostly flour.  Even more interesting - even the yellow and white kernels of those cobs were mostly flour even though they were not easy to tell apart from the yellow and white kernels of the blue/white/yellow cob.

The second 'field test' I did was trying to parch some of the easy pop corn.  It did not go well.  I used too much oil and really didn't get the concept.  Plus, the pericarp (outer coating) of the corn was too hard I think.  I did not get any 'parched' corn.  They do have specific varieties that are 'best' for parching - but most of them seem sold out by this time in the season.

The third 'field test' was just trying to pop a bit of the b/w/y corn and the easy pop in the microwave popper and see what happened.  Both popped about half of the kernels in 45 seconds.  The resulting popcorn had a VERY hard hull center with soft white popcorn around the outside.  Keep in mind I don't really 'like' popcorn - it gets stuck in my teeth, which was why parched corn sounded like a good idea.  However, the b/w/y popped material had a salty 'limey' feel to the inside of it that was good.  The easy pop corn was like very dry fake popcorn and not worth the trouble.  The flinty yellow/white kernels of the b/w/y popped easier than the floury blue/purple kernels but the floury kernels tasted better.

And now the drumroll - the west field is planted with : b/w/y corn kernels  It will be interesting to see what comes of it this generation around, and what the 'sweet' cobs might taste like if I pull them a bit early to try before the rest dries in the field.  Mark makes a good point that chickens will not care about these qualities of corn - but well... it is nice to know more about it than I did before.

Corn planting stick and Esme comments

I think we are ready to plant the west field with field corn, but we are not going to till it again.  The earth there is just too hard for the moment.  It has been broken with the tractor but not tilled fine and deep.

I am going to make a corn planting stick today, which is a simple but useful tool.  A piece of plastic PVC pipe large enough for the seed type to go down, with one end cut at a 45 degree angle, and a piece of electrical tape taped around the bottom at the proper depth for planting that seed.  You will need to 'measure' it against yourself to find out how long it should be to have the bottom on the ground and the hole at the top at a comfortable height to work without bending. It keeps from having to stoop and make a hole for each seed but would not work too well in wet soil.  The sharpened end makes the hole, squidge the pipe back and forth and lift it to loosen the soil that is driven inside the pipe, drop the seed down the pipe into the hole, cover up the hole with your foot.  Continue to the next seed all the way down the field.

ACTUALITY: Like all good things - it can be improved upon.  We made an 'advanced' corn planting stick by cutting the top of f of a two liter bottle for a funnel, heating up the screw top end and putting it into a 3/4 PVC coupling, then attaching the coupling to a 3/4 inch PVC pipe.  Then we duct-taped it down well.  Using the stick was different than I had imagined it, as well.  I had to scrape the ground clear with the pointed end and make a furrow with it, as the earth was very rocky and hard and there were sticks etc in it. I did have to bend down several times to throw sticks and rocks out of the way and spent a lot of time 'chicken scratching' with my feet to even up the better soil that remained.  Once I had a clean furrow I used the stick to space the seeds evenly without bending over and covered up the furrow with my feet.

We are waiting for the temperature to get a little higher today before going out.  It is 50 now and an expected high of 70 today.  The other night was expected to be the very last frost.  Next year I will check the 'long schedule calendar' for frost dates - but I am glad to have a month headstart on everything that we have done.  Esme has had a bath for her sinuses and is playing with kittens.  They are getting big enough to pounce and wrestle each other now and usually come running to their dish when they hear a cat food can open.  They are definitely Pogo's children - when they open their mouths nothing comes out.  They are supersonic mewers.

Greenhouse seeds are not up yet - it has only been three or four days.  Our golden hubbard (sometimes called red hubbard) seeds have come, and I am trying to decide if I will put those in the little garden or out in the west field.  I need to plant a Jarrahdale or two from last years's seed, as well.  They are both maximas, as is the table queen that is already planted in the little garden.  I actually had an image of my Mayflower beans come to mind this morning when I was waking - not quite a dream, but a memory.  I have been intending to plant some of those few saved seeds from the plant that survived last year - but have not done it yet.  Reading The Resilient Gardener before bed, beans and squash wandered often through my mind in between sleep.  I enjoyed her anecdotes about her ducks, dropping pumpkins from heights to crack them (instead of risking trying to cut the terribly tough skin with a knife, and all of the different experiments and record keeping she had done while she bred her varieties.  I doubt I could ever keep that good of records of which plants produced which seeds with which qualities!

Aren't we just terribly stylish in our outside in the garden clothes?  And the Christmas decorations are still up because Esme really likes them.  Remember it was 50 degrees or so when I started, ie the sweater and dockworker knit hat was deemed necessary attire.  That is the sweater I made last year and it is extremely warm, even without a collar, and tpants made of a thick cotton material that has not torn when grabbed by thorns or on my knees weeding in the garden.  Esme hadn't put her coat and hat on yet, or that would have been quite a sight to boot.  She did grab a tray of seeds and told Daddy to take a picture of her posing with me and the corn planting stick.

Planted today:  Strawberry popcorn, 5-10 days germ. 100 days maturity, field corn blue/yellow in the west field, golden hubbard squash (6 seeds) in the west field.

Esme comments from the last few days:

I can't spell that word Mama. (for I can't remember that word).

He is pirates, the hand, he is pirates, on your yarn, pull the string on the boat like pirates.  (she was unravelling my knitting yarn hand over hand pretending she was pulling a boat in).

Mama, I offer you a gretchen. (ask you a question) In the big town, a truck with a man and it (sings).  ((long description with hand signs and large gestures showing how an ice cream man has a truck with a slide up window and he has people line up and hands them ice cream one by one and they eat it))  And now it's GONE!  Can you take me there?  Please?

We are ladies.  You are a lady, and I am a lady, too!  We make cakes and foods and then we bite them LIKE THIS and are happy! (said before she went to sleep at night days after we had made her cake for Grandma)

Mama, put on the batteries on this door please?  And then it go sing and you fix it go sing please?  But Mama, you are STRONG, you can do it, come on.  Please?

Mama, I will bring you this, your beans, and you will be happy?  (no - those are seeds, I don't need seeds right now - we put those in our garden)  But, you eat them, they are your beans!  (we want those ones to grow and make more)  Oh, haha, okay.

When we said we might go look at a donkey for sale in the paper to see if we liked it she started off on this conversation:  We like donkeys.  But, I don't like horses, I am scared of horses.  Horses, your hands, they will EAT them, LIKE THIS (pretends to bite off both of her hands and sucks them into her sleeves of her shirt).  But, donkeys, they are nice.  You can pet them, like this (pet something in midair and pretend to look at it adoringly).  We like donkeys.  //what?//  Mark and I both just rolled our eyes at that one.

No, Baths are for morningtimes it is night time all dark outside! (screamed at the top of her lungs as I had suggested she take a bath at 3 am because she was crying her sinuses were blocked and a drink had not helped).  She did calm down after another drink and eventually fell back asleep until 7 when I did talk her into a eucalyptus bath, which helped a lot. 

It is morningtime, it is blue outside (the sky), and it is hearts (a shirt she sees) and pants like go to work (my jeans).  I see them.  It is no work, you don't go to work today.  You going to stay HOME.  (yes, I am going to stay home today, yay!)  She expected a fight on that one like usual, and wasn't quite sure what to do when she was right and I was staying home HA.  

Mama, you find it please I need three. (she had three).  You have three, one two, three.  No, the three, she is there, I move it, you look I can't find it anymore!  (I looked under the cabinet and there was a fourth of what she wanted, pulled it out).  This is not the bumblebee lady, she is more, find the bumblebee lady more please?  Apparently there was a fifth to that toy set, too -- but I could not find her and she was very sad.

boxes and bricks on plants

 

boxes on plants

Mark and Esme covered Grandma's garden and ours with boxes and bricks last night.  It seems to have done well.  The plants looked 'boxed in' when I removed them - but they seemed happy otherwise.  There was frost on the car windshield at 7 am, which was proof of how low the temperature had gotten.  We were glad to have had all of these old boxes - they were set to be brought out to the recycling center for a VERY long time, but we had not yet gotten around to it.

I received a book The Resilient Gardener, yesterday.  It seems to be a wonderful resource on many of the things that interest me - and I am eager to read it further today at work.  I bought it because of the reccommendation by other field corn growers.  It has a lot of information about how to select for genetic traits in corn, beans and squash.  It also covers duck raising and potatoes - probably something to be gotten into 'later'.  We might have to look into keeping livestock even sooner than we had thought... Mark found an ad on craigslist that he is calling on today.

I did some mending last night and general putzing with small projects tying up ends.  I am feeling less tired and think the pumpkin seeds, nuts and green things I have been craving lately have been helping.  I read an article somewhere that nuts and seeds help produce the precursors (omega 6 and niacin leading to tryptophan)  to creating serotonin in the body.  I was having a very hard time getting 'rest' out of sleep and was in a grumpy sleep-deprived daze for several days there before I began craving spinach, bananas and nuts... so maybe my cravings for those things was biologically based?  Or, maybe I just put too much stock in what seems to work - and it is just a more balanced diet and a priority for sleep that is taking effect now.

bits of pumpkin info

Hair washing last night was not quite the usual trial.  Esme is getting ready for school and is very happy about it this morning.  I found a 'Sweet Dumpling' squash at the market last night and was very surprised - I had to buy it, at least for the seed!  I baked it at 350 for about an hour - maybe should have put some water on top of it halfway through.  It was very good, sweet but a little dry because of that.  The best way to cut them is to cut out the stem first, jack o' lantern style,  then saw them in half.  I did save some seed for planting. 

I truly have become a squash fanatic.  I tell Mark it is because of the seeds - the nutty taste really tunes into some natural craving I have.  I'm not sure what oil or mineral it is in the pumpkin seeds, but it is something I need in my diet.  In the garden this year there will be two or three types of zucchini, two other summer squashes, common pumpkins, Jarrahdale pumpkins, Red hubbard squash, Table Queen acorn squash, green cushaw, butternut squashes and perhaps this new Dumpling squash as well.  That is a lot of squash!  I am hoping the butternut and perhaps another one will have better resistance to the squash bugs.  Butternut Squash is a 'moschata' type, and the cushaw is a 'mixta' type.  Both of those are supposed to be more insect resistant than the maxima and pepo types.  The common pumpkin is a pepo variety in most cases, as is zucchini - which means they can interbreed if saved for seeds and produce new varieties!

Pumpkin Seeds:
To use the seeds I rinse them really well with water, boil them in a pot with some salt for 10 minutes or more, dry them off, then mix them with a very small amount of olive oil and roast them at 250 for about 10 minutes or less while stirring.  When they have become drier and white on the surface, but not burnt - they are ready for cooling and then for cracking and eating.  Find a small space at the top or bottom of the seed and crack the two outer layers of the seed apart - then pull out the 'meat' in the middle and eat it.  Some seeds will be 'sweet' while others will be nutty or oily.  Different varieties of squash and pumpkins have different seeds.  Some pumpkins are bred to have no hard outer later at all on their seeds - these varieties, like Kakai, are called stygian or naked seed pumpkins.  I have not yet grown this variety, because it is not as strong against the squash bugs which ate my plants last year!

It is a laborious task for whatever that small amount of green oily pumpkin seed oil is giving to me - but it has become well worth the work for me.  I tend to be drawn to 'tedious' things sometimes, anyway -- remember I hand bound that quilt last year and it didn't bother me one bit.  I am not bored easily by repetitive tasks I find productive - which perhaps is the mark of a good gardener and a good seamstress.

bits

I need to start on a sundress for Esme.  There are several fabrics set aside and several patterns - now I just need the ambition.  Also, my sewing table needs cleaning up in a major way. I have just been too tired to mess with it lately. To be honest, the whole house has a 'settled debris from a tornado' look.  Not quite that bad, but it is needing attention.  Maybe after the temperatures get a tiny bit warmer and I am on a better schedule. For some reason they have jacked me way early these past two weeks and I just have not adjusted to it yet.  The kittens seem to have adjusted - they are underfoot and very loud about their needs.

King of the Early bush bean

Esme had a great day yesterday.  She played outside in the water and sand a LOT, even though there was a slight chill to the air.  We all crashed about nine pm, which is not usual for this household.  The nurse practitioner said (last week) that her coughing was caused by sinus congestion from allergies.  Some days it is much more noticeable than others, and she has been drinking a lot more and sleeping a lot more.  But, I have not put her on the allergy medication they recommended.  She has never been on any medication at all.  Since they did not say this was serious - that it would pass when the pollen count goes down?  I hope that it will not last too much longer.  When she stops coughing so much it won't sit in the back of my mind worrying me (and I won't be putting chicken soup in her by instinct!)  I am off to get coffee, scan and water the garden and get ready for work.

For the record:  The squashes and dill  planted on the 1st of April are not yet up.  However, the sweet corn, lettuce and calendula are.  I am not sure how much of the basil has survived the cold weather.  I have been trying not to overwater it.

Easter day

Playing by the rose bush in a little sprinkler stream

 

Corn coming up in the garden

This is some of last year's field corn cobs replanted

a big frog that came to see the sprinkler

 

planting dahlias and lillies

We brought Esme's Easter cake up to Grandma and Grandpa's house along with some barbeque Daddy made.  It was all quite good.  Grandma came for a walk with us to see the kittens and the garden and the lake.  I am getting some rest today but mostly Esme wants to play outside.  The kittens seem to have taken to the wet food and are exploring the whole house. Misha dog is taking care of them some.  It looks like they might make it just fine?  It might be too early to tell, still - but I have a lot more hope now for them.

garden note:  planted zephyr summer squash, a zucchini and marigolds
We are predicted to have another 'near frost' on Tuesday.  I have started my transplant tomatoes and peppers in the potting mix flats inside - we intended to start them later and put them in the ground as backups to the determinate Romas.  They should be 1 to 2 weeks to come up and a bit more to get large enough to transplant into the garden.

run by posting

This is my last day of six for the week - and everything has been very hectic this week.  The cold temperatures, Esme's coughing again, Mark not feeling very well, cat disappearing leaving baby kittens behind, etc... and I have just felt very tired every night when I come home.  Hopefully we will get some rest tomorrow on Easter.  Esme's basket is hidden and waiting for her.  The kittens ate a little yesterday - I don't know if they will eat enough to survive.  The mama cat is definitely gone if she is not back by now.  The sweet corn is just starting to come up.  The cold temperatures have not yet hurt anything in the garden... off to work now.

I've shrunk or the shirt has...

my mini me demonstrating how to make a dress...

I've shrunk, or the shirt has.  Actually, the shirt has.  I made it smaller so it would fit Esme - after both of the sleeves ripped nearly clean off at work the other day.  The tears were so symmetrical - and Mark indicated where they tore it would probably fit Esme.  He was correct!  Esme indicated to me it was my job tonight to sew something for her - so here it is.  I used a basic dress pattern, split the front instead of the back and used the original button band shortened up on the front of the shirt.  It has no collar.. but it looks a lot like the shirt did on me.

Further garden notes - both the blue and red field corn are coming up, some of the white summer squash, and the wax beans and some more of the pole beans.  We planted watermelon and cataloupe in Grandma's garden today.  It is due to get down to 39 degrees Friday night, and 36 Monday night.  I hope our plants are not damaged by that.  Miss Pogo cat went out and did not return yesterday or all of last night.  We fear the worst, as she does not stay out long at all.  Her kittens are not old enough to eat by themselves.  Misha dog is trying to help with other facilities for them - but they seem to not even recognize milk or meat as food.  We are seeing what we can do for them but it may not be enough to prevent an unhappy ending.  This has happened to us once before many years ago - but the kittens were old enough to take quickly to other types of food when offered - and that is not the case now.

Note: The other day Esme picked up a bath soap container I have and said 'EWWWW Mama, soap for brains.  Eww... Mama, why you do that anyway?'  I had no clue what she meant until I looked at the container.  It had a picture of a large raspberry on it.  I had to laugh.  'That is a raspberry, not a brain.'  She insisted it was a brain, and I was going to use a soap made of brains, and it had to smell BAD.  I told her it smelled like a strawberry, and the picture was like a strawberry, but very big so we could see all the pockets of juice.  She looked hard at it.  I took some out and held it out for her to smell.  She looked like I was offering her a terrible rat on my hand and asking her to smell.  Then she sniffed very tentatively and said 'Oh, yea!' and laughed about it.  'It does smell like strawberry!  It is Good.  I can have some on my belly?'  I gave her some to wash up with and she was happier about it.  I told her how silly I thought it was she thought that was a brain - but that yes, it did sort of look like the pictures of brains in her body book!

planted flowers and a few thoughts

I planted flowers today in the tires in front of the garden, and along the fence.  Morning glories, moonflower, cardinal climbers, scarlet runner beans and other things along the fence, hollyhocks, marigolds, lupines and gaillairdias in a few other places.  In the garden I planted chamomile, savory, sage, lina sisco beans and a single solitary zucchini seed.  The sisco beans are all along the front edge of the corn on the house side of the garden.   The pumpkin seedlings from yesterday seem to be doing well and taking to their new home.  And - the lima beans are up!  I was happy about that - as that was the only one I used all of my seed on.  It is the Florida speckled lima beans and there were eight seeds total. I need to redo my map again now - as there were lots of additions.

The other day in the car Esme was describing all of the things she was seeing - and Mark turned to me and said 'see, you were worried about her language development, and you got her speech therapy for it.... and it's working.'  It is working, and it hasn't been much more than a month, with classes once a week - but she has more to talk about, and more she wants to do, and just a larger pool of communication to draw upon.  The teacher called it 'auditory bombardment' which is tech speak for 'she hears more - she'll talk more.'  And she still mixes some things up but it is getting so much more understandable.  She gets so serious sometimes though we fall out laughing at her - which she hates.  She also still has fits where we want her to do something and she pretends to be too little, falls on the floor, and then screams 'don't leave WAIT' when we walk away.  That is just being four years old.  We tell her she is not too little, she can pick up her toys/use the bathroom/put dishes in the sink whatever it is - and she should do it or she will have to just stay there on the floor while we go about our business.  We've put the 'very unhappy' foot down on the PT again and she has gotten much better with it - there were days there she thought she could go through eight pairs of pants and not be yelled at about it.

Yesterday I told Esme she was not being sweet - and she did not understand.  She was 'Esme' not sweet - not taste like juice.  *roll eyes*  OK.  So I explained it was when she did nice things, nice like sweet things, like drinking juice makes her happy.  She understood that in context.  And that we like to "be sweet" and do nice things.  So - point is, when I told her we had to go to sleep early and she did not like it - she came back from pouting near her bed and stood by my ear.  I was trying to sleep, and she says to me 'Mama.  This is not sweet.'  HUH?  'What is not sweet?' I asked her.  'Bed.  I don't want to sleep.  This is not sweet.'  Well okay then... I told her I could tuck her in and give her a kiss goodnight and that would be sweet.  She agreed but was sad about it - yes - that would be sweet... but she was still not happy.  She did go to sleep knowing that the sun would come back.  She is so happy that she is 'strong' and can do things like open the doors for the dogs, and get things off of shelves at the supermarket.  She was 'helping with the getting of the foods' at the grocery store, pushing the cart (very slowly and not so accurately) and taking directions of where to go and helping to get the food into the cart.  It was a bit tedious - but she was very happy to be helping.  She has also learned the words 'It is my job', although she says 'it is me' sometimes for this or 'it is you' instead of 'your job'.  She really wants to do her 'jobs.'

Today we were waiting for dinner to be ready and she was dancing in front of her reflection in the patio screen door.  She said she was little, but she goes to school, and the kids at school like her, so she will grow big.  She says 'people in the big town don't like it' when it is something someone at school has told her not to do or to do differently.  However, she will also say it about things like not bringing your food outside the kitchen or having a bath etc. because the teacher has told her to please not play with her clothes at school, and that they do not take baths at school (but I doubt she has really explained to her WHY in context.)  She also told Daddy once that he should not take a nap in the bed during the daytime because the people in the big town don't like it - 'adults' do not take naps at her school, either.   She still has not learned that rules at one place and one situation are different than rules at another - but that is a lesson she needed to learn as well and would not 'get' just at home.  The other night when I was going to give her a bath she asked 'You wanna wash my hair, dont'cha no?'  She would not get in the bathtub unless I promised no hair washing.  I really hope she doesn't ask that next time I DO have to wash it - as I will have to tell her yes.  She is always thinking about something - although she will never admit she is 'thinking' - for some reason she hates that word.  She is not going to school tomorrow because of spring break - but I have not told her that.  She will be very mad when she realizes too many days have gone by.  She already argues when she goes to bed that it is Wednesday tomorrow - and we say no, it is (whatever day it is) and then say Friday, Green, Three etc.  She does not like that game at all!  She is getting more understandable - but sometimes we still have to guess.  She wanted her kitty cat sprinkler today and we thought she was talking about a movie inside.  She said she reached for it and it went round and round and then it fell and oh no.  We got worried - thinking she had knocked down a pile of DVDs or dropped a folder etc... But then I realized she meant the sprinkler that went round and round - and she had dropped it off of the wellhouse where we had put it up from the dogs.  She is explaining to Daddy right now about how he needs to get the toy that goes fly on the hands and spin spin spins and goes UP.  She pointed to the toy she meant and it is charging on the batteries.  She is telling it needs to get ready and be blinking and pretty until it can fly up.  She knows I have been planting 'food' in the garden - but it will take a long time to grow, and it is corn and carrots and 'Mama' foods and flowers :)  She just told me to 'come on Mom - you have work to do - you have to sew something - over there, cmon, I'll show you.'  Then she decided we needed to play kitties instead.

We were watching a semi-scary robot movie the other day - and she was watching it with us.  It was quite mild, cheesy scary stuff.  She saw a spider on the floor and freaked about it.  We told her it wouldn't hurt her, it was okay, but she was serious about getting rid of that spider before she could rest.  So, we told her to step on it if she seriously thought it was a bad spider - she said NO I'm too little it will bite me!  We laughed - and then told her she could hit it with a shoe.  She got this weird little smile and said 'OH. haha.  Yea. I could.'  She put on one of my shoes and went over to where she had seen the spider and said 'Oh, I'm not too little now, I am STRONG, but it is gone and I no hit it.'  Then she put the shoe away and went and sat with her knees up on the bed and made sure she could see any spiders that might come by for the rest of the movie.

some seeds are up

I have some pumpkin seeds up from a batch of 'glop' from my storage room.  It had been a pumpkin from last year -- and then it wasn't a 'complete' pumpkin anymore before I found it again.  I threw it out into the forest but marked where I did - just in case something was viable.  Now, the next generation has sprung from it.  I will see if I can transplant any of the little seedlings from the 'glop pile' in the forest into the garden.  There are also radishes, carrots, beans, sunflowers and okra up from seed.  I was worried it was too cold, but obviously not!  Our little garden is on its way.

I think the zinnias are up... seed list

First seeds up this year look like the zinnia flowers.  And I am here on the last day of my weekend off going through all of the saved seeds and freezer seeds from last year and trying to see what to do next.  It is still mighty early for most things - and I hope I did not plant the beans too soon.  If I did - they were not the last ones of any of those varieties, and it can be tried again.  A lot of the seed I am listing will stay in the freezer packets.  We also like to stock up on the (29 centers) cheap seeds especially for flowers  - I grabbed a lot of the squashes and carrots and herbs that way last year - for this year - as well.

Note to self:
I need to plant the radishes all around the zucchinis this year - it was just after it became too hot for the radishes to grow well that the bugs took off in there last year.  Mark suggests leaving the last crop to bolt so the sharp tasting greens are still in there when the bugs hatch out.

I also have some lavendar and tomatoes which need to be started in the garage.  But, I am not a great one at watering seedlings when they are not in front of my face every day.  Just ask my houseplants!

These are the seeds in the freezer bucket - some are just a very few seeds, half-packets and some are what we bought last year in anticipation for this year.

Beans
Kentucky Wonder pole bean
Black Shackamaxon beans (planted some already)
Dragons Tongue
scarlet runner beans (ornamental)
Lina Sisco's bird egg beans
Mountaineer Half runner bean + co-op pack says 'half runner' and looks similar
Mississippi silver hulled cowpea (package + saved seed from crop + co-op)
Mayflower bean (package + saved seed)
 Pawnee shell bean
Dwarf horticultural beans
last of the purchased 'whipporwill' cowpeas + saved seed from crop
 King of the Early bean
Hutterite soup bean
Maria Amazalatei's bean
Dapple grey bush bean
Bosnian pole bean
Dragons Lingerie bean (prob same as tongue bean above)
Pinto beans
Goldrush wax beans

Corn
Blue Jade sweet variety
Ornamental indian corn variety 'rainbow mixed color' (planted last year) 
strawberry popcorn
peaches and creme corn
yellow jarvis field corn
saved seed from last year 6 divisions

Herbs
Wormwood (to plant near other things for insect control)
Dill
summer savory
Joe Pye Weed
Oregano
Lavendar (start inside)
sage
Marjoram
chamomile
basil
lemon basil

Tomatoes
Amish paste tomatoes - just a few seeds in one packet
Black Plum tomatoes from seed savers
Roma tomato seed

Other
watermelon
cantaloupe
sunflower chianti / sunset / last years mix
pansy
white popping sorghum seeds left over
broom corn saved seed
morning glory (blue, pink)
canary climber + several unpronounceable climbers
cockscomb
cardinal flower
coleus
gourd mix, bottle mix, dipper mix, saved gourds
lupine
moonflower
Grand Rapids lettuce (freebie last year)
calendula (29)

orange/ yellow marigolds (29)
giant marigold (29)
red and yellow jester marigolds (29)
red and yellow french marigolds (29)
cosmos
zinnias
gaillairdias (29)
green lentils
dipper gourds
turnips
Pickling cucumbers (29)
scarlet nantes carrots (29)
short zahoria carrots
chantanay carrots (co op)
dixie butterpeas
giant english peas
California black eye #5 cowpeas (29)

Cherry Belle Radishes
Salad Rose radishes
Spanish black radish
Trial Summer squash packets
Black Beauty squash (pepo type)
Ingot summer squash (pepo type)
Waltham butternut (moschata type)
Table Queen squash (maxima type) (29)
Small sugar pumpkin (pepo type) (29)
Connecticut field pumpkin (pepo type) (50)
Jarrahdale blue pumpkin (maxima type) (29)
Grey Zucchini heirloom (pepo type)  (29)
Red Jalapeno peppers (29)
bell pepper mixture seed
Spinach (1/2)
Painted Daisy two packets - never came up last year at all

Planted today:
lemon basil, saved basil seed, dill seed, calendula, dragon's tongue beans, grand rapids lettuce
conn.field pumpkin (3) pepo
table queen (3) maxima
waltham butternut (3) moschata
ingot summer squash
peaches n creme sweet corn
gourds (saved)