Weekend in Review

Had the granddaughters, Morgan (9) and Kathryn (12) over on Saturday to help in the garden.  Morgan came willingly and Kathryn only came because there was nothing to do at home; guess which one lasted the longest? Morgan didn't last more than 30 minutes before she needed a break, but Kat wound up helping for about 1.5 hours.  We turned and sifted the compost, getting about 10 gallons of the rich black gold.  Then we took a lunch break and afterwards Morgan decided to help again as I dug a hole to plant the Pomegranate I got on clearance @ WalMart last Fall for 1/2 price since it had shed all its' leaves and looked like a bunch of sticks coming out of the pot.  I waited this long to plant because I wanted to be sure it would survive and I also wasn't sure where I wanted it. She enjoyed sifting the soil and using a small shovel to help dig the hole and as soon as the hole was done, she wanted to fill it up again, but I convinced her I needed to line it with weed blocker and rim it with edging first.  Here it is all planted and mulched, looking good and holding the promise of fruit down the road.

The girls spent the night and this morning Morgan and I went to the park to practice fielding grounders and throwing, since she's playing Little League Softball for the first time this year.  After I took them home and spent a couple of hours doing more "family time" stuff, I got back home and decided to take the neighbor up on their offer of the use of the roll up dumpster they rented, so I disposed of the busted block and cement from the side yard gate demolition I did a couple of months ago; nice to have good neighbors.  I guess this is  the thanks I get for sharing excess herbs and produce from the garden with them.  Next, I took down the old microwave from over the stove, as it literally blew up recently, and it went into the dumpster as well.  Replaced the microwave with a range hood, as we'd already bought a new microwave that has an oven drawer for making frozen pizza, cookies and other baked goodies.

I was talking to the neighbor when her son came up with an old rusty wheelbarrow that was destined for the dumpster and I commented that she should save it to use as a planter for her succulents. She said she didn't have room for it, but I was welcome to it, so it's sitting in my backyard waiting to be planted.  Next weekend is the Desert Botanical Garden's Spring Plant Sale and hopefully I can find some nice, reasonably priced specimens for the wheelbarrow.

I took a stroll around the yard and snapped a few photos:

Tulips from bulbs bought @ the 99 cent store

The hyacinths from the 99 cent store (the feet are Larry's, not mine)

"Eureka" lemons on the tree I planted last year; the fruit get can get up to 1/2 lb ea.

I spent the last 2 hours of daylight cleaning up the area where I'll be planting 3 Black Monukka grapevines and got the first post into the ground for the support structure the vines will be trained onto.  Black Monukka is a seedless variety that should complement the Thompson Seedless and Red Flame Seedless vines I already have.