Needing a Shower and a Massage

Another gorgeous day spent out in the garden. Other than gardening, I can't think of one single thing I would do that causes me to get so stinky and puts me so much in need of a therapeutic massage.

I mean gardening is HARD work. And I love it. It's creative, thought provoking, provides great exercise (hang on a sec while I walk off this cramp in my left thigh), and supplies us with the healthiest of food year round. But, my goodness, it surely does give a work out to muscles that tend to get soft and flabby. Still, I'd a gazillion times rather feel the tiredness I have at the end of a gardening day than a day spent in an emotionally unhealthy environment that leaves me with a different kind of tired. One that a good night's sleep won't help. Yup, I love gardening.

I didn't get any potatoes planted today, but I'm all ready to go for it tomorrow. Even have my row markers up. I don't know what's wrong with me (no unsolicited comments from the Peanut Gallery, please), but I want to try planting some of the potatoes under mulch again this year.

If you remember (like you don't have more important things to stash in your memory bank), last year I planted half our potatoes under mulch and half using the hilled-up dirt method. We got only half as many potatoes using the mulch method. (But they sure were clean.) Does one year's trial qualify as an accurate study?

I even have the bales of straw to use for mulch lined up against the fence line at the end of the field garden where I'm planting the potatoes this year. I keep reading of wonderful yields others have gotten using the mulch method. Why won't it work for me?

Yet it sure doesn't make sense to go to the work of planting potatoes under mulch if I'm only going to get a 50% harvest from the time, effort and garden space used. Plus, will that short us on potatoes to have to eat over the coming winter?

A mighty heavy decision to make, I know. Maybe a comfortable answer will come to me by planting time tomorrow. (Oooh-mmm.)

The above picture is a good illustration of why we have trouble getting apples to mature up here. You can see our trees are just now starting to leaf out. Nary a sign of a blossom yet. And it's already past the middle May.

My husband is the one who does the lion's share of work on the fruit trees, and he's determined (do we detect a tiny streak of stubborness here?) to find the right variety or way of raising our own apples. Pears, plums and cherries would be lovely, but we'd really like to be able to raise our own apples.

Crab apples grow very well in our area. No problem there. In the past I have made sauce and jelly from them but we'd really, really like to be able to grow a supply of eating/cooking apples. Ah well, never a lack of something to research and test out.

Okay, I must strip off these dirty, dirty clothes and get into the shower. Good thing tomorrow's wash day . . . these garden pants can just about stand alone.