Obligatory Garden Update

We are halfway through the gardening season so now seems like a great time for a garden update. Year two of raised bed gardening has been both challenging and rewarding; the challenges coming mainly from pests and the rewards appearing in the form of victories over said pests. I'll get to all that in a bit.

Due to the increase in social activities on my calendar this summer, I have had to spend early weekday mornings and late weekday evenings tending to the garden, rather than large chunks of time on the weekends, ironically; I think this might actually be a smarter way to handle the duty, as it allows me more frequent opportunities to check for issues.

As an added bonus; mornings and evenings are when the hummingbirds are most active, which spurred me to hang a couple of feeders on the veggie trellis. Hopefully, I'll get some decent pictures of the birds in the next few days.

The spinach and arugula that I planted had a great season; I harvested a large majority of it before it bolted in the summer heat. Then, I pulled out what was left, in order to give its neighboring plants more room to breathe.

Once the spinach and arugula vacated the garden, I was able to see amongst the cucumbers a little better, which is when I found this guy.

There are tons of flowers on the cucumber plants, so I am hoping this isn't the lone product for the season. Time will tell.

My beets have done splendidly; I already harvested once, and, still have two and a half rows to pick from later down the road.

The various lettuce varieties that I planted have all produced well, and, I've already sowed the second planting, which should be ready for harvest closer to the end of the summer.

My butternut squash is growing rapidly. I am training it over the trellis again this year and hope to see it reach the opposite end of the garden by fall. It goes without saying that I hope the tiny butternuts currently nestled among the foliage will mature into large, soup-worthy butternuts by then, as well.

At the beginning of the season, I planted five tomato plants; at the time, they looked like this...

Now, they tower over their cages, threatening to topple right out of the raised beds. I'm hoping that doesn't happen; they are all loaded with green tomatoes and I would hate to lose them before they ripen enough to harvest. Also, if you recall, I planted four of the five with an egg and one without; the goal being to see if the additional nutrients provided by the egg at planting would encourage more growth. Based on the resulting uniformity in the plants, I think it's safe to say; the additional egg mattered not one bit. The control plant is just as large and hardy as its neighbors., and, it has just as many fruits.

 

Now, about those garden pests...

...no, not this guy...

...I'm talking about the devil spawn that comes from these harmless looking eggs.

Squash bugs. Bane of my existence. Terror of the garden. Asshole creatures, to be sure.

I've done a relatively good job of eradicating the adults when I catch them fornicating among the squash leaves; this required me to set squeamishness aside. Happily, I have actually gotten really good at plucking the little bastards from their perch, hurling them into a container, and watching as they die a quick (although, hopefully painful) death when I spray them with organic insecticidal soap (I use a mixture of castille soap and water and the little assholes die, almost on contact). 

Unfortunately, they are legion, so I am bound to miss a few, which is how their eggs occasionally end up on the underside of a squash leaf. In those cases, I sacrifice the entire leaf, rather than taking a chance on just squashing the eggs.

As a result, my yellow summer squash is healthy and productive, and I have those aforementioned tiny butternuts.

One last thing that has multiplied in the garden since the beginning of summer is the amount of metal signs and license plates that I have collected. I now have three Colorado plates, one Texas, one Hawaii, plus a variety of the signs; mostly reproductions of vintage advertisements. I love them and feel like they make the garden even more charming.

So, that's how it's going so far. I continue to advocate for a greenhouse to replace the kennels currently taking up space next to my garden. Hugh is unconvinced, but; Hugh is also the owner of an expensive side-by-side and two 4 wheelers that I didn't have a say in purchasing, so...

Yeah. I'm getting a greenhouse.

Links and Drinks

I spent the better part of Saturday on the golf course with my staff; we don't play golf, but we dress for the part quite impressively.

This year marked my fourth tournament for Not So New Job and I can honestly say that I've come a long way since 2020, when I was almost eaten alive by anxiety. Back then, every little thing that went wrong felt like a big, big thing, which, is ironic since that first tournament ran the smoothest of the four. This year was a shit show, due to issues with the golf course, but I never once felt anxious or stressed. Annoyed, hell yes; stressed to the point of a nervous breakdown (2020, I'm looking at you)? Not even close. In fact, I found a lot of humor in each challenge that the day presented, and, as my staff kept reminding me; even at our worst, we're still better than Jacob (former Executive Director, whose messes I cleaned up for over a year). We're thinking of having tee-shirts made that say exactly that.

Anyhoodle, in addition to my awesome staff and three of my amazing Board members, Erin and Kristi showed up to help. They always make the day fun and do a lot to remind me that my perspective sets the tone for everyone else. I'm going to miss them when they're gone; have I mentioned that?

The staff at the golf course was less than organized or prepared (they had a lot of sudden turnover in key staff in the month and week leading up to the tournament; namely, their general manage and their golf pro, who was supposed to participate in a Drive for Donation event for us, but, instead, dipped out with not a word to anyone. Seriously, one minute she was there and the next, she was gone. No explanation, no apology, nada. It was...annoying), but the golf course itself was gorgeous and all of the players had a great time.

This includes the Man-Cub, who played with Hugh's foursome and did a great job while he was at it.

While the Cub distracted Hugh, my staff  planted rubber snakes in his golf cart and golf bag, which provided several opportunities throughout the day for the Cub and his other two teammates to make fun of Hugh for screaming like a girl. Good times. 

We were quite pleased with ourselves for making it happen. We are also easily entertained, so there is that.

Although I was pretty beat by the end of the day, I did rebound long enough to host a small blind rose' wine tasting with Erin, Kristi and Shanti. It was on the Bon Voyage Bucket List and was meant to help me pick a wine for Mia's wine fountain at her shower next month. Imagine our surprise when the bottle that Erin brought, simply because the label cracked her up, took the grand prize. Snoop Dog; who knew?

The Cub acted as our sommelier, presenting the wines to us and eventually making the big reveal.

All in all, it wasn't a terrible way to spend the day, but I am definitely happy to be done with the tournament for another year. As an aside, my staff and I are going to be taking golf lessons from the golf pro at the course where the tournament will be held next year; he has a program called Wild Women Wednesdays and it's for beginners who want to learn how to play the game while drinking cocktails and bonding with other women. 

We couldn't sign up fast enough.

What Do You Tink?

Since they made the decision to move to the UK, Erin and Kristi have been slowly paring down their possessions; what they aren't taking with them will go into storage and they are determined to store it in the small shed they have on their property (they will be renting the house out while they are gone).

The larger items that would require a rented storage unit were among the first to be sold, including Erin's beloved 1950's camper, affectionately known as Tink.

Since parting with Tink was so hard on Erin, I offered to do a retro photo shoot of her while we were camping earlier this month. The idea was #9 on the Bon Voyage Bucket List and I'm pretty sure we knocked it out of the ballpark. Hopefully, the pictures took the sting out of watching Tink being driven away by her new owner this past weekend.

One of Erin's favorite features of the camper was the outdoor shower set-up. Tink had no running water, so this was basically a retractable shower curtain that one of the girls could stand behind while the other one poured water over her head, but, still; it was adorable.

Tom couldn't resist getting in on the action

And that's what he gets for messing with Kristi's girl :)

Kristi is definitely the less girly of The Lesbians (I'm going to miss them insisting on being called that), so she was less interested in dressing in a vintage outfit and more interested in channeling her inner lumberjack.

Erin was all over it, naturally. She found this vintage dress at the store where we did our DIY hat making project and had been dying for an occasion to wear it.

The girls leave for the UK on September 19th and our vintage-themed Bon Voyage party will give Erin another opportunity to wear the dress. I'm going to miss that crazy girl. I'm going to miss them both. I would be lying, however, if I said I wasn't excited about the prospect of visiting them overseas, because I am alllll about that!

Friendships Are Like Whiskey; They Just Get Better With Age

I had been looking forward to this past weekend for months, as I do every year that features a Girls Weekend. Last year, we just couldn't pull it together ( five women with busy families, full time jobs, second jobs, and other obligations are seldom able to find a date on the calendar that aligns with everyone's schedules, so I'll take it when we can get it), but, this year, we nailed it.

Thursday evening, Jules drove down to Petticoat Junction, and, Friday morning; we hit the road to New Mexico, where we met Tee. Tee recently purchased a small houseboat on Navajo Lake, and we were looking forward to a couple of days of bobbing about on the water. 

When we were all in college, we spent weekends on the Colorado side of Navajo, but the marina on the New Mexico side is far superior to the Colorado side, and Tee was happy to get a package deal on the houseboat and a pontoon, plus, her neighbors in the marina are friends from Durango; so she had a lot of help when it came to learning how to be a boat owner.

Tee, Jules, and I got settled in (which means we got alllll the liquor stored away in the fridge and coolers) and waited for Phoebe and Reese to arrive (Reese had been in Mayberry, visiting her dad, so she and Phoebe convoyed over the mountain). Finally, we were all together!

Friday night, we were invited onto a boat owned by a friend of Tee's, where we were treated to an incredible dinner and a liberal application of libations (drinks just taste better on the lake) before turning in to get some sleep.

Saturday morning, we made breakfast, lounged on the boat deck, and sipped Bloody Marys and mimosas. Then, Tee introduced us to some more of her friends (one of whom is Tee's business partner of the past decade), who invited us to spend the day on their ski boat, which is what we did.

That evening, we donned our traditional Girls Weekend shirts (no picture of all of us in them this year, sadly) and made the rounds to Tee's neighboring boaters, where we chatted and sipped and chatted some more before heading back to Tee's for carne asade grilled to perfection.

Sunday morning, we took the pontoon out for a leisurely troll of the lake, stopping for several hours for good conversation, sunbathing, and a light charcuterie board lunch.

Then, sadly, we headed back to the houseboat to pack up for the trip home. Reese had a seven hour drive ahead of her (back to Phoenix), Phoebe, Jules, and I had three-to-four hours of driving ahead of us, and Tee needed to get home to treat a mysterious head wound that had been getting progressively uglier during our stay (the cut on her forehead appeared 4th of July weekend and she has no recollection of how it happened, which is not unusual for our Tee).

Jules and I rolled into my driveway around six and we said our goodbyes so she could finish the last hour of her drive.

I had such a nice time with my Girls and I miss them already. It's so amazing how we can go for long periods of time without seeing each other, just to fall back into a comfortable rhythm like no time at all has passed. I guess that's what happens when you have thirty-five years of friendship under your belts.