Which Direction to Go

I just returned from my mother's funeral in Washington.  As my aunt put it, "It was a fun time on a sad occasion."  It was good to see the family mostly all together.  My co-worker looked after my dogs.  She only lives 5 minutes away and knows them all because I bring them to work sometimes.  If I move from here, I'll have to find a new dog-sitter.  That brings me to my next subject, when will I be moving?  My optimistic answer is still November.  I don't have a place to move to yet though.  My nephew is still living in my mobile home and my tiny house still does not have electricity.  My job has not laid me off, in fact, they want me to go out to our corporate office in Connecticut at the end of next month to discuss the next project that I will be working on with accounting.  I just can't seem to quit a job with perks like bringing my dog to work, flexible schedule, and being able to work from home all of this week because my co-worker is on vacation and I would be alone in the office.  I'm going to hang on until the office lease is up August 2020 and see what happens.

Here is what has been going on at the house in the past month.  Gutters!  The old gutters were removed and new seamless gutters added.  No leaking anymore.  The black mold which has stained the pavers below will be gone after the landscaper replaces the walkway and fixes the drainage.  I hope that will be completed next month.  I don't have a firm date yet.

New windows!  The new windows are in and look great.  I hope it lowers the electric bill this summer.  I also dug out the old barrel cactus and planted some Lantana flowering shrubs.  The cactus are too heavy for me to move or cut up so I will ask the landscaper to haul them away.

My own tiny garden in the backyard is loving our abnormally cool weather.  This sunflower decided to bloom all at once.  I also have some grapes, Moringa, and alfalfa growing.  Last week was really windy and the grapefruit tree has been dropping the fruit that was out of my reach.  How convenient.  The wind also blew over my mailbox.  It appears the post rusted at ground level.  I still haven't decided how to fix it but it is propped up with rocks and a bungee cord attached to a screwdriver pounded into the ground until I think of something.

My co-workers all chipped in and bought me a tree for my mother.  They bought one for my father three years ago.  That was very nice of them.  This tree needs about an 18 inch deep hole.  I'll probably wait until the fall to plant it on my property when it is cooler and I won't have to worry about watering it.

My dove couple is back sitting on their third batch of eggs.  I wonder how long they will keep laying them.  It is fun to see the babies hatch and grow.
                                                                  

So, that's what is happening.  I'm also continuing to sort through boxes and plan a trip to New Mexico and Texas, probably in the fall since traveling with dogs during the summer seems too complicated. I'm leaning toward renting a minivan and turning it into a stealth camper with a 12V cooler, porta-potty, fan, and bed.  I'll have to actually look at minivans to see if my plan will work. 

First Quarter

Last day of Quarter #1!!!  1/4 of the way through senior year of high school.  Remembering back to my high school days, senior year went by pretty quick.  It was exciting to get to the finish line and then anti-climatic when it was over.  I went to community college and floundered for the first semester, excelled the second semester, and then went off to a four year school.  Floundered again, and found my footing, graduated, floundered, floundered, floundered (that's my new favorite word), went back to community college, and finally got on a career path.  As soon as I got a "real" job, I started reading early-retirement books.  Work for 10 years and then retire!  It didn't quite work out that way.  I've been working in the engineering/drafting field for 17 years now.  I'm much closer to my goal though.  Retire by 50?  More realistic.

My nephew goes off to visit my sister on Monday.  He will spend 12 days in California and I will not have to hear "What's for dinner?" or have to say "Is your homework done?" for all that time.  The next quarter will go quicker.  He will have more extracurricular activities for choir and youth group.  Thanksgiving break is coming soon and then he will go visit his Minnesota relatives for Christmas break.  I keep telling him that he should stay and get a seasonal job over the break but he's just not motivated enough.  Maybe next year when he is a poor college student he will appreciate the benefits of a holiday job. 

The weather is great.  Still a few days in the upper 90's but the temps are going down.  My garden is looking very green but not producing much.  I grew my first 2 zucchini!  I know a lot of people say zucchini is really easy to grow but it isn't so easy in the desert. 

 I got four acorn squash.  The gourds are not producing anything yet and if they don't get any female flowers soon, I don't think I will get any gourds.  The tomatoes don't have many blossoms.  The sweet potato vines are doing great.  Last year I used the sweet potatoes to grow new sweet potatoes but didn't eat any.  I have at least 6 mini watermelons growing from volunteer plants.  And the pomegranates are starting to fall off the tree. Usually they aren't ready until the end of October but we had such a warm spring, some of them got an early start. I got more free seeds from the seed library for cool weather plants but I don't have any space to plant them until the squash and watermelon have died.  

I need a bigger garden.  I have plans for a bigger garden after I move out to my property.  I have 4 acres.  Of course, taming it will take money.

Plans for this weekend?  My nephew and I will pull weeds in the front yard, go get a haircut for him at the cosmetology school (only $6), visit the cats at the cat shelter to see if Alegra allergy medicine is better than Claritin, cook something (maybe zucchini bread?) and take a nap.  Such grandiose ambitions!  

Homebody

Last weekend I did everything I could to avoid doing anything  in public.  Sure, I could have done a million things but I just wanted one day where I didn't have to get in my car and go anywhere.  I got up at 7am, fed the dogs, pulled some weeds, watered the squash plants (free seeds from the seed library!) and went back to bed for a nap.  

Baby squash plants.

The overgrown yard. Nice and green for a change.

My little weed-eating egg producing quail.

Then I got up and made fried quail eggs, bacon and tater tots.  Then there was laundry, the weekly sweeping of my bedroom, and sporadic web surfing.  At 6pm, it was less hot so my nephew and I hacked at the weeds in the front yard so that the neighbors don't think I've abandoned the place.  My nephew is saving his money to buy an Alienware computer so I pay him $10 per hour and he is semi-enthusiastic to help out.  After an hour, I made chicken alfredo for dinner and then I started watching Meet Joe Black because I knew my nephew would be so bored that he would do his Calculus homework (it worked).  It was a pretty nice day besides the heat and the sweating and sneezing from the weeds.

Three more weeks until my next 3 day weekend.  Yes, I am wishing away my life again.  In other news, my niece, the one that helped my fix up my mobile home last year, is going to Austria next week for a semester.  It is the same program that I did 23 years ago.  Wow, that was a long time.  It was an awesome experience for me and I hope she has a great time too.  I am looking forward to her updates since she will have a computer there and wifi.  When I was there we had to use pay phones and no one had a computer.  I even had a camera with film that had to be developed and then it broke and I ended up just buying postcards which really aren't the same as photos.  Technology has changed so much.  

I have no after work chores this week until Friday when we are going to the dinner theater so that my nephew can write a review for his school assignment. It is an amusing play but too long to sit through after a long day at my desk but I will do it for him.  At least they have good pizza so that's a plus.

Too Hot to Cook

It's been hot.  105, 107, who cares, it's just hot.  Every once in a while I think, "I should bake something or cook something" and then I remember how hot it is especially with just an evaporative cooler and no air conditioning.  I'm stubborn though.  I won't spend thousands of dollars to get air conditioning.  I just complain about it being hot while loving my low electric bills.

Anyway, I had an abundance of cherry tomatoes from my plants that are as tall as the roof and I decided to make sauce out of them.  I now know why people don't typically make sauce out of cherry tomatoes.  There isn't much to them.  I cut them in half and simmered them until they looked soft.  Then I took my stick blender and chopped them up.  I tasted it.  Too bitter with all the seeds.  So, I strained out the seeds but that also strained out most of the skins and pulp.  I was left with tomato juice.  I added a small can of tomato paste along with spices and I had sauce again.  I'm not sure how much of it was actually from my tomatoes.

Well, at least I used up a lot of cherry tomatoes.  The hornworms attacked the plant and trimmed it down for me.  I only get a dozen tomatoes a week now.  I'm sure it will bounce back when the weather gets cooler and I will be drowning in cherry tomatoes again

My other cooking experiment entailed a bright idea I got while watching a video on Panko chicken.  I bought Panko breadcrumbs a few weeks back but hadn't been brave enough to try them.  I didn't have any thawed chicken so I thought I could Panko some summer squash and zucchini.  It seemed like a good idea until the pan started smoking.

I attempted to eat them anyway but it was like eating tasteless squash with burnt toast.  Luckily, I didn't Panko all of the vegetables.  I tossed the rest with olive oil and JoJo seasoning and it was delicious.  No Panko needed.

I think I will stop trying to be creative in the kitchen until it is under 80 degrees outside.  That might not be until November.  My nephew is returning the day after tomorrow and I will have to plan dinners again.  Idealy he will help me.  I rarely eat dinner and prefer to eat lunch as my main meal.  It should be easier to make meals this school year since we are at the house, not the mobile home with just a 2 burner stove top which couldn't be on at the same time as the microwave.  He has been visiting his grandfather in Minnesota and his aunt in California.  Maybe he will have some new meal ideas.  That's probably expecting too much.  I have asked him what he eats at other people's houses and he can't remember.  I made lasagna from scratch once and served it with Stouffer's lasagna.  He ate them both and couldn't remember which he liked better.  I don't think this is something I can win.  I'll just try to teach him to make a few things so he doesn't end up living on cereal and bologna sandwiches.  One more year and then he can go live on cafeteria food at college.

My Two Biggest Expenses: Pets and Autos

Another long week and I am glad that it is over.  It is too bad that these days are so busy and stressful but there is an end in sight even if it is years away.  On Wednesday, I took my dog to work with me and then to his vet appointment.  The vet says he needs some teeth extracted so there's another appointment for next week.  As usual, he growled and barked at everyone.

There's a dog under my desk!

After the vet appointment, I stopped by the house to fill up the water bottles, check the mail, and water the plants.  I grabbed my nephew's suit coat and shirt for his choir festival this weekend but he ended up getting a cold and deciding not to attend.  He stayed home from school on Thursday.  That's the first time he felt bad enough to stay home.  He was back to school on Friday and I didn't catch this cold, which is surprising.  Maybe it was the same cold I had 2 weeks ago, although, I thought I caught it from him.

On the way to work on Thursday, I heard some strange scratching noises coming from the right side front.  When I tried to turn at my off ramp, the power steering was completely gone.  I drove straight to the mechanic but they said they were full for the day.  They offered to fill up my power steering fluid and maybe that would temporarily fix the problem but when the technician looked in the reservoir it was full.  Then he looked over where I heard the noises coming from and said that the power steering belt was broken.  Ah, that would explain the total lack of power steering.  They decided that they could fit me in since it was a relatively easy fix.  $155 later and I got my car back at the end of the day.

After work on Friday, I put up more snake deterring wire mesh on the mobile home fence before we loaded up the car and went to the house.  We are going to stay at the house all week which seems like a mini-vacation.  It would be better if I didn't have to work.  I'll have to get up early to take my nephew to school and he will have to stay after school in the library (working on homework, I'm sure) until I can pick him up at 5:30.  It's a short week because we have Rodeo Break here in Tucson.  The kids get Thursday and Friday off when the rodeo comes to town every February.  There's a parade and everything.  I've never been but then I don't get any days off for the rodeo.

Today was the first day in a long time that I didn't have to drive anywhere.  I almost went to a plant exchange but decided that I should spend my time cleaning up my garden plots instead of collecting new plants and perhaps spending more money.  Besides, anything I plant now will just die when the weather gets hot.  Next year when we are living at the house full time again, I can plant a garden.

Solitude

My alarm went off at 5am and I jumped out of bed.  I always get nervous before a flight and that includes other people's flights when I am responsible for getting them there on time.  I got ready and checked to see if my nephew had finished packing.  His suit was still hanging in the closet but his suitcase was full.  I opened it and found his dress shoes (at least he remembered those) and 5 pairs of cargo shorts (3 were camouflage pattern) as well as t-shirts.  I don't think he was thinking about the temperature in Minnesota.  The high is around 25 degrees.  Some of the shorts came out to make room for the suit and we left for the airport on time, I thought.  The line to check in was all the way to the door and then the line for security wrapped around the ticketing area.  He made it but, wow, I've never seen our airport so crowded.

I got to work early and drank a Coke to wake up.  I'm not a coffee person.  Usually I drink tea but occasionally I need something stronger.  We had our office audit so I was nervous until it was over at noon.  After that, my brain slowly tried to relax and prioritize my gift list which needs to get done in the next few days.  I tried to leave work early but ended up chatting with a coworker and then there was a huge traffic jam because an accident closed down the I-10 freeway and it was re-routed on to my usual way home.  I had to take another route which took twice as long.

Anyway, came home to just the dogs and didn't have to make dinner for anyone, well, except for the dogs.  I made pan fried asparagus in olive oil with JoJo potato seasoning for myself. It was good.

Here is a picture of the tree that my nephew and I decorated last weekend.  He wanted to know why I was bothering to put it up since he was going to Minnesota.  I said there wasn't a minimum occupancy requirement to have a Christmas tree.  He then commented that the trees of his childhood were much larger.  I was thinking, or maybe you were smaller, hmm?

I only put lights around the front window with some garland instead of stringing the whole house.  I have the window lights on a timer so I don't have to worry about it.  My cardboard "gift" boxes wrapped in paper are in the front yard.  They got rained on last weekend so I should recycle them and make new ones for next year.  They are easy to make.  Large cardboard boxes, a rock or two inside, wrap them and add ribbon and a bow.  A very inexpensive decoration if they can be protected from the rain/snow.

We have had freezing temperatures at night this week so my tomato plants have mostly died.  I pulled off all the green ones and they will ripen slowly.  I need more recipes for tomatoes. Maybe I'll make and freeze tomato sauce.

One of these years I am going to start a tomato plant inside so that I have tomatoes by the time my green tomato stash runs out.  That's on my to-do list after I quit my job.  Until then I will just have to appreciate my abundant tomato harvest while it lasts.

My Favorite Things: Dogs, Gardens, and Tiny Houses

Taxes are done, but not submitted.  I'll finish up next weekend and move on to filling out my nephew's financial aid paperwork.  It will be so nice to get both of those over with.  It was another lovely weekend.  Sunny on Saturday with a little rain on Sunday.


I have a new foster dog.  He was picked up by animal control with a gash across his eye.  The eye couldn't be saved so they sewed him up and he should be ready for adoption in a few weeks.  He's a friendly dog and housebroken, that's always a plus.  In a few days he will get the cone off his head and then he can meet my other dogs.  For now he stays in his puppy pen which is attached to each side of the door and I let him out in the side yard twice a day.

Besides taxes, I pulled more of the never-ending weeds and started cleaning up my garden.  It's going to be a little bit bigger this time so that I can move around in it without crushing plants.  I still need to buy top soil to cover the plant clippings, horse manure (from a friend) and pine kitty litter.  I would love to buy more bark mulch too to make things look pretty but that's not really a priority right now.  Then I will hook up a drip system and my garden will be so much easier to maintain than last year, at least, that's the idea.  If I end up moving to my property during the week so my nephew can ride the school bus then at least the garden will get watered.  My nephew has until April to decide where he is going to school next school year so I am still planning for either possibility.

I finally heard back from my handyman, the one who had an appendectomy, and he is back to work and going to call me to meet out at my mobile home sometime next week.  I was thinking about why I like my mobile home.  First of all, I like it because it is there.  It already exists and is taxed at a really low rate of around $100 a year as personal property.  I've heard that it would be taxes even less if it was legally 'attached' to the property.  Second, I can remodel it without worrying about bringing down the value or having to hire a professional to match the architecture.  I guess those are the 2 biggest reasons.

I found this blog last week about a tiny house on an island off of Washington.  Scott's Tiny House  I like his little house.  It would be too small for me with dogs but it is simple and reminds me of a really cool playhouse for big kids.  This is the kind of thing that would make my co-workers cringe but surprisingly, my boss would think it was cool too although he wouldn't want to live in it.  I already have an 8'x10' shed on the property, maybe I can turn it in to my guest house?

Ok, enough dreaming.  On Tuesday I am taking the afternoon off to go visit my dad for his birthday and have lunch with my mom.  I think that is the only interesting event of the week besides looking forward to another weekend.  Each day I work is another day closer to my semi-early retirement so I will happily get out of bed every morning and make the most out of every day.

Not as Planned

This weekend did not go as planned.  I was hoping to go visit my parents but I didn't feel well so I stayed home and then puppies started dying.  They caught kennel cough from their mother and weren't nursing and I think the mom's milk started to dry up.  So, I stayed home to relax but ended up bottle feeding the remaining puppies and texting the vet for medicine.  I did finally get medicine and IV fluids for them tonight.  Only 3 puppies left out of 7.  I hope they make it.  I'm going to bring them to my office tomorrow so that I can feed them goat's milk every two hours.  Did you know Safeway sells goat's milk now?  I actually saw in on sale last week but couldn't think of a reason to buy it.  I should have bought it and froze it just in case.  At $5 a quart it's still cheaper than puppy powder formula and there's no mixing.

Anyhow, I'm not very optimistic about the puppies because they are only 2 weeks old but I will do everything that I can.  On Tuesday I will be taking my other foster dog in for her long awaited knee surgery.  What else this week.... I ordered free seeds from the seed library.  I'm going to finish installing my drip irrigation system so that my garden needs less tending.  My winter garden has been a flop for the most part.  Some of the seeds finally sprouted but today they were gone.  I think a bird found them.  At least the snow peas are doing well.  No peas yet but there are some blossoms.  I collected so many seeds from last years crops plus the free seeds from the library so I won't have to buy any unless I want something more exotic and I don't because I don't have time for it.

Oo, oo, and I get to make my extra mortgage payment this week because it's the end of the month.  I always look forward to that!

Good-bye, November

November, I won't miss you.  Last week was delightfully short but busy.  On Monday I picked up my car from the mechanic and paid the $700 bill.  Tuesday was a dentist appointment.  No bill and no new issues but I have a couple of sensitive teeth that need to be dealt with some day.  Wednesday, well, I don't even remember Wednesday.  I think I bought cat food.  Thursday, I drove to my mother's house and my car's radiator was boiling again!  Yes, the same car that I just paid $700 to have fixed.  It was making all sorts of hissing and bubbling noises.  Of course, the auto shop was closed for the 4 day weekend.

Thanksgiving lunch at the church was fine but it didn't feel like Thanksgiving.  Afterwards, we went to visit my dad and watched TV until he fell asleep.  My mother graciously switched cars with me since mine is still drive-able for short distances and she lives close to the auto shop.  I'll have to call them on Monday and make an appointment.  Friday was my first day to relax and I did just that.  On Saturday I was planning to go out to my property and rat-proof the dog door in the mobile home but I was having such a nice time relaxing so I put it off until Sunday.  I had planned to take at least 3 of my kittens back to the shelter to be adopted but they all started sneezing again on Saturday.  My hopes for being cat-free soon faded so I went to the feed store to buy more horse stall pine pellets for the litter box.  They are really cheap compared to the feline pine products sold for cats.  Unfortunately, they told me they were out and didn't know when they were getting more because their supplier burned down.  Oh well, I had to switch back to clay litter which I don't like because of the annoying fragrance and dust and it is just too heavy to cart to the car and then out to the trash.  Other than my quest for cat litter, I finally had time to collect seeds from my morning glory plant and my pole beans.  The pole beans came from the seed library and it will be fun to be able to return some seeds this year.

And finally, today, I loaded up the momma-cat because she was not sick and took her back so that she can be adopted.  Then I met up with the person who was adopting my foster dog.  After that, I wandered the rows of dogs looking for my next foster but I didn't get a new one yet.  I am trying to wait until my chihuahua puppies are adopted which will be another 2 weeks from now.  I like this fellow but there are a lot of other dogs that are more in need than he is so I probably won't get him.

Next I headed to my property to cover up the dog door hole with an old campaign sign and some caulk.  The plastic sign was perfect because it was easy to cut and lightweight so it could be glued in to place.  The white part is the plastic sign and the grey part is what is left of the door flap.

Luckily, there was no new pack rat activity inside.  As I looked around, I thought, "If only I had a few days to spend out here to get things organized...oh wait, I just had a 4 day weekend".  Oh well.  I grabbed a few things and was headed back home in under 30 minutes.  And that was my 4 day weekend.  Time to set the alarm and start December!

Mortgage Payment Plan Pause

I've had this sinus headache-earache since Thursday.  The weather keeps changing as each new storm rolls in and out again.  I had a doctor tell me once that sinus headaches aren't affected by weather but experience tells me otherwise.  It was too still too hot to do much outside anyway so I had another relaxing weekend of laundry, pulling weeds, cleaning floors, napping with the dogs, and watching my latest Netflix show, Longmire.  Kinda makes me want to move to Wyoming but I looked up home prices and they are the same as Tucson so I will stay here and avoid the snow.

Tomorrow is Sept. 15th already but I can't think about making an extra payment on my mortgage yet because I am expecting to go to an out of state funeral soon and that will cost around $1,000 for airfare, hotel, rental car, food, and pet sitting.  I am glad that I have the money available when I need it though.  My mortgage payment plan will just get pushed back a month.

In gardening news, my tomatoes haven't been producing because of the heat so I decided to cut them back.  I found 2 green cherry tomatoes under the vines but unfortunately, I cut the vines so I will wait to see if I get more tomatoes when it gets cooler.  The yellow squash gave me 3 female blossoms today, but no male blossoms and blossoms only last one day.  My birdhouse gourds were looking good until I saw some chew marks on the gourds themselves.

Looks like cabbage loopers.  I had no idea anything would actually chew on green gourds.  I picked them off.  I have one new gourd and I should probably put it in an old nylon stocking so that it doesn't get chewed.

My pole beans are as tall as the house with lots of blossoms and no beans but I saw a tiny 1/2 inch bean today so there is hope.  People tell me that winter gardening is easier in Tucson.  I hope they are right because right now I feel like I am just wasting water.

What's Growing Now?

The high today was only 90 with occasional rain.  It was a wonderful day to putter around, pull weeds and inspect my little plant minions.  I am looking forward to cooler days...in about 4 weeks or so.

Here's my red bird of paradise, the desert type, not the tropical type.  I love this plant because it loves full sun and not much water and provides shade.  I have tomatoes in the pots.  I was supposed to transplant them somewhere but I have enough tomato plants and I don't know where I would plant them.  The bougainvillea, to the left, can take lots of abuse including having its leaves chewed off twice by some unknown assailant.

These are (were) the geraniums I bought myself for my birthday because I thought they would be easy to grow.  I should have bought Mexican petunias instead.  Maybe it is just being in pots that they hate.  It is awfully hot to be in a hanging pot.

My little watermelon plant is climbing the fence.  I didn't realize they climbed.  I should have planted this months ago.  No baby watermelons yet.  I don't think there is enough time for a watermelon to ripen even if one appeared.  I must remember to plant them sooner next year.

My moringa tree is finally planted in the ground.  Planting the seeds in the ground did not work since my dogs dug them up.  Planting them in pots first and transplanting has been successful so far.  It is sensitive to frost so I will have to protect it or let it die back this winter.  The gourds were planted late.  They still have 3 more months to make gourds.  We shall see if anything appears.

This is a bit hard to see but I planted some Hopi Red Dye Amaranth.  The leaves and seeds are edible.  I hope to plant more next year so that I have more seeds.  I have read they can be popped like popcorn or ground in to flour.

This is my baby plant nursery.  I have 3 desert willow trees and 3 red bird of paradise.  Maybe I can trade them at the next plant exchange.

The pomegranates are looking good but I had to take some off because the poor tree was leaning.  They still need 6 or 8 weeks to ripen.

Another moringa tree in my big pot.  I planted purslane around it.

And this is the wild patch of purslane in my yard.  I learned from the gardening group that it is edible and nutritious but I still haven't done anything with it other than nibble on the leaves.  I really should align my eating habits with the food that is cheap and available like purslane.  I'll put that on my to-do list: Find recipes for weeds in yard.

This is my newest patch of garden.  The pole beans are climbing the fence and the squash is blooming.  The squash planted in the spring didn't produce at all.  I know people joke about planting too much zucchini but I don't have that problem.  I would be thrilled with any zucchini at this point.

My favorite sunflower in a pot of horse purslane.  I learned the difference between purslane and horse purslane this summer.  Horse purslane has round leaves, the other has oval leaves.  Turns out I have both in my yard.  The quail like the horse purslane so it is good for something.  Plus, I like the look of it.  Anything that is green without thorns or thorny seeds is welcome in the yard even if it is a weed to many people.

The sweet potatoes are taking over.  I ate sweet potato leaves 3 times and now I am sick of them.  I desperately need new recipes for them.  What's the point of growing vegetables if I won't eat them?

Only 2 tepary beans remain.  I had dreams of boiling my tepary harvest but now I will be lucky if I get enough beans to plant next year.

The tomato jungle is still going strong.  Pruning tomatoes is optional in the desert.  Many people don't prune to give the plant some built in shade.  I am reluctant to prune because I know the tomato worms will find me soon and will do the pruning for me.  That's the lazy way.  Why prune and pluck worms when I can do nothing and those 2 chores will cancel each other out?  

And lastly, another popular weed that I have learned about from the garden group.  This is a green variety of amaranth.  Once I found out what it looked like I just wandered around the yard until I found it.  More free greens to eat.  I really need to attend a 'how to cook with local weeds, I mean, plants' class.  All this free food going to waste.

Dumpster Diving with my Boss

On days that my boss flies out of town, he gives me gas money to pick him up from his apartment in the morning since I live closest to him.  Once I forgot to pick him up.  I got all the way to work and wondered where my boss was...oops!  This time I set my alarm for 6am and made it out of the house early.  As I pulled up I noticed that the dumpster was full of what looked like the possessions of a previous tenant.  Right on top were 2 big fiberglass pots, the kind I have been wanting quite a while now.  I even walked around Big Lots with 2 pots in my cart once but ended up putting them back because they were only half as big as I wanted and I just couldn't spent $20/each.

These wonderful dumpster pots were just the right size.  Only problem was, my boss was waiting outside for me.  Now, he's an understanding boss and he values frugality so when I asked him if he thought I could take them he said he didn't see why not.  We dumped out the dirt and I strapped them in the back of my truck.  I was thrilled with my prizes.  I tried really hard not to look at the other things in the dumpster.  The thought of good stuff going to the dump seems like such a waste but that was not the time nor place to do any in-depth digging.  Later, I looked up the price of similar pots from Home Depot.  I found some for $60.  Wow, I just pulled $120 from the dumpster.  My boss calls me 'trash digger' now but it was worth it to save them from the trash.

On my lunchtime walk, I picked up a semi-truck mud flap that had been on the side of the road for a few days.  I saw it there earlier but didn't pick it up because I couldn't think of a use for it.  Well, after work I was headed out to my property so I decided to use it to mark the entrance of my driveway.  Now instead of telling people to turn at the first thing that kind of looks like a driveway, I can tell them to turn at the mud flap.  It has a reflective strip along the top too so I can see it at night.  It goes perfectly with the rest of my trailer trash decor, and I do mean that literally since I have a trailer and trash.  Soon, when the temperature goes back to the 70's, I'll have to go pick up all that trash but not this week.  Wednesday is supposed to be 110F.  I have a few more months before I start on chores out there.

I did pick up my baker's rack that was in my shed  It will be at least 3 years until I move out to my property so I might as well use my things instead of just storing them.  I'm glad I brought it to my house because I was able to organize my gardening gear and it looks much neater.  Next step, fill those pots with dirt and plant more seeds!

A Growing Hobby

Finding online groups who share my interests are fun.  They can also be expensive.  Why?  Because I see all of these great ideas and I want to try them all.  I joined a gardening group and people keep sharing photos of plants and trees and now I want to run out and buy plants and trees.  So far I have limited my spending to $19 for an 80 pound sack of alfalfa pellets for horses.  It seems that people use it as mulch and fertilizer for their garden.  I was going to buy hay but after joining this group I learned that hay is bad and alfalfa is good.  Alfalfa in pellet form is even easier to handle than hay (except for the 80 pounds part but then how much does a bale of alfalfa weigh?). I love the smell because it reminds me of horses and this is probably the closest I will ever come to having a horse although I did attempt to build a horse stall in our backyard in suburban S. California when I was around 12 years old.

My other purchase this week was Moringa tree seeds.  It is an edible tree and grows quickly.  I need more shade in the yard so I thought that growing a shade tree that I can eat would be worth the time and money.

I bought 10 seeds for $3 plus $3 shipping and I got 14 seeds.  I went to Big Lots to look at pots but I couldn't bring myself to pay $14 for a plastic pot.  I ended up buying three 18 gallon Rubbermaid totes but after some thought, I decided not to use them as planters.

  So far I planted 3 seeds in front of my bathroom window, 6 seeds in old yogurt containers and paper cups, and I need a little bit more soil for 3 more pots.  If all of them grow then I will have something to trade at the next plant and seed exchange in the fall.  I missed the exchange last week but that is probably a good thing because I would be out buying more pots and soil for whatever I got.  I need to just calm down and work with the plants and containers that I have.  With a little creativity I can make pots out of many of the items in my recycle bin and many plants will grow in the regular dirt in my yard or a half dirt/half store-bought soil mix.

Only one item was actually on my shopping list this week and that was a new splash pool for the dogs.  I found one at Big Lots but it was $20 for either a Disney princess or a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle pool.  That is ridiculous.

I hadn't thrown last years pool away because I was thinking of planting strawberries in it but I got the bright idea to buy a $4 tarp and just cover the old pool.  Only the dog that I am dog-sitting for next week really likes the pool so it only needs to last for 2 weeks.  I think it turned out quite nice.

More Tomatoes and Eggs

Lunch today was, you guessed it, quail eggs and cherry tomatoes!  The picture would have been more colorful but I only had iceberg lettuce and ranch dressing.  White lettuce, white dressing, white boiled quail eggs.  If it wasn't for the tomatoes, it would be a very boring picture indeed.  It was quite delicious though.  I don't really like hard boiled eggs because I don't like the egg white but these little eggs were just the right size and, strangely, added a little sweetness to the salad.

Yesterday I blew out 10 eggs which really hurt my ear drums.  Maybe that is why I have a headache today.  If I ever need to do this for a craft or something, I will buy an air compressor to be my lungs.  I put them in a sundae cup and they are on display on my kitchen window shelf.  I don't really like them there.  They would look better on a table.  I'll find a better way to display them.  I just have to think about it some more.

One other thing I did over the weekend, I hung this fabric shower curtain over the sliding door in my bedroom.  I have had this curtain in storage for years from when my rental house was furnished.  It is short but that's ok because the dogs won't rub against it.  I only need it for the Summer to help block the setting sun and to make it darker on the weekends when I get to sleep in.  If it is dark the dogs won't wake me up at 5:30am on Saturday morning.

I put up more shade in the garden too.  My jasmine shrub always gets sunburned and I am determined to avoid that this year.  Right now I have half of a  bed sheet shading the shrub but that is not good when it is windy like it is every other day here.  I'll keep thinking and maybe I can come up with a solution from the things I have around here.  Maybe I could weave a shade out of plastic shopping bags or sew together those net bags that oranges come in (except I only have one of those).  I should have planted sunflowers like I did last year.  They were great for shade.  I thought they would re-seed themselves but no luck.

Finally a 3 Day Weekend

It was a wonderfully relaxing day off today.  The HVAC guy came to start up my cooler and shut off my furnace in the morning which got me out of bed before 9am.  I spent the day watering my garden and trees, tidying up the house and yard, and watching movies.  My Desert Willow trees are blooming.  Aren't they pretty?  They smell good too.  I bought them 2 years ago through the electric company's Trees for Tucson program.  They survived being thrashed by my puppies and now this one is a little bit taller than me.

I have planted 7 trees in my yard.  Soon I will have shade!  Then I'll probably sell the house, move back to my property and plant more trees!  I planted trees on my property when I lived there but last year's freezing temperatures and last Summer's lack of rain killed off 2 of them.  There is only one left and I am not there to cover it or water it so I don't know if it will still be there when I move back.

Here is my little dog patiently waiting for me to finish watering the garden.  He dug a small hole, lay down in it and put his head on my foot so he was all comfy.  

I also changed my nephew's Summer flight so that he doesn't have to change planes.  That means I have to pick him up in Phoenix but I'm willing to do that at least until he is 16 and has a little more airport experience.

2 more days of no work!  3 day weekends are just lovely.  I need more of them.

Sweet Potatoes Out, Green Onions In

Seems like it was Friday just a few hours ago and now it is Sunday night with Monday looming ahead.  Saturday started with a trip to the vet clinic for yearly shots for one of my dogs.  He hates the vet and usually bites someone but we made it out of there with only a few close calls.  Then we went to my mother's house to help her do some organizing and yard work.  She has a tiny yard but the sun was hot and I couldn't spend a lot of time out there without taking breaks every 15 minutes.  I found some green onions that were outside in a pot waiting to be thrown out.  I brought them home and added them to my windowsill garden which is looking much better after a week.  The sweet potato moved to the garden because it just kept growing roots but no leaves.  Maybe it needs some soil.  Now I have green onions, celery, lettuce, and more green onions.  I'd like to add garlic next.  I hear it grows well on the windowsill too.

Today I got up the courage to review and submit my taxes online.  A few minutes later I received an email "Federal tax return has been rejected".  Ahh!  Panic!  It turns that I didn't write my nephew's complete name.  The form asked for first and last name only but he has 2 middle names which I left out.  I had to give him 2 first names and 2 last names to get the whole thing on the form.  It was accepted the second time so that was a relief.  Now I will wait patiently for my tax refund to magically appear in my bank account.  I am so glad that is over for another year.

Windowsill Gardening

Look at my latest additions to the windowsill!  That is celery on the left and Romaine lettuce in the middle.  My sweet potatoes are growing roots but no sprouts yet.

I read about growing Romaine from the stump and I couldn't wait to get home today to try it.  I just happened to have celery too.  Green onions work but I don't like them so no point in growing those.  Now, all I have to do is change the water daily and wait.  They are supposed to grow pretty fast.

Right now I am growing:  celery, Romaine, sweet potatoes, (and outside) snow peas, salad greens, tomatoes, and (not plants) quail for eggs.  It sounds great but the vegetables aren't big enough to eat yet and the tomatoes are all green.  The quail have gone on a laying strike and I actually bought chicken eggs at the store because I got used to having eggs and bacon on Saturday mornings.  Having quail eggs and bacon is more fun than chicken eggs but I can't do much about that until they decide to lay again.

I have more seeds to plant outside.  Corn, squash and beans.  I was hoping to buy more garden soil but I am trying not to spend money so maybe I will just make due with what I have this year.  I still have my aquaponics set-up to put together.  I'm a little worried about it because I read that gnats can become a problem and I hate gnats.  I had a gnat problem in my RV once.  They were living in the drains.  They are quite difficult to get rid of in aquaponics.  It might be better to set it up on the patio if I can figure out where to run the extension cord for the pump.

Anyway, the point of all of this is to not have to run to the store every week for produce.  I'd still need to buy milk unless I got used to frozen milk.  I suppose that would be ok for baking.  Powdered milk is out of the question.  I had too much of that as a kid.  I've never tried shelf-stable milk but that is an option.  Then there is soy milk and almond milk.  Not quite the same.

Hopefully, my plants will produce edible food soon and my quails will start laying so I can pretend I am a mini-urban farmer or something like that.  Oh, and I almost forgot my vanilla extract under the sink.  I'm still shaking it every few days.  It doesn't look dark enough yet but it's getting there.  Maybe I should take a drink and find out how vanilla-y the vodka is.

Frost Protection, Sun Protection

The weather here in Arizona has been strangely warm and last year's tomato plants are still alive and well.  I thought about ripping them out in November because they looked sad but I left them.  Then I made a tent with 2 cattle panels and a barbeque cover.  It worked well and the tomatoes thrived.  They grew so much that they started poking out from under the cover.  I decided to give them more room so I put 2 wood spacers in between the panels.  This works great for frost protection (if it ever gets cold again) and sun protection since the days have been creeping toward the 90's and the leaves were drooping.

The one thing it is not good for it wind protection.  It was slightly breezy today and one of the spacers fell down.  I need to drill holes in the ends so that I can connect them to the panels.  I have been taking the cherry tomatoes off green and letting them turn red inside the house but now they are turning red on the plant.  Oh, and the best part of having tomato plants in February, besides the tomatoes, is that there are no bugs!