Flowers & Herbs

Last Saturday I woke up early and went down to the St. Paul Farmers Market for the the first time this season. It was bustling with people and flowers and herbs. And of course rhubarb and asparagus and other early season veggies here in the great north. It was quite a site. The flowers were remarkable. Everywhere you looked people were taking photos of the grandeur of it all. I picked up two beautiful baskets of hanging petunias for either side of our back door. They add lots of cheer to the back yard and I loooove them!

In addition the to the two baskets, I also bought herbs to fill the herb garden between the strawberry patch and our massive rhubarb plant. 3 basil plants, rosemary, cilantro, thyme, sage and lavender.

All of these I also grew last year, with the exception of the lavender. I am determined to get lavender in our yard, and since it didn't work to start from seed I just picked a little guy at the market.

I didn't worry to much about how they were going to be placed in the garden. I just set them down and made sure there was good spacing between them to give them room to grow. Then I rearranged a bit. I put the basil plants closest to the door, because, lets be honest, those are the ones I'm going to be going at the most. Henec the fact that I put in THREE plants.

And I gave the lavender a big spacious spot in the back.

The remaining herbs (sage, cilantro, thyme and rosemary) were put in between the basil plants and the lavender. The only consideration I made here was to put the sage by the rosemary because I thought the silver of the sage would look nice next to the purple of the lavender. 

Here is the herb garden in all of it's newly planted glory. You will notice (with the help of some text) that I have also trans-planted a little hasta that was barely surviving at our fence line. And our chives from last year came up on their own this year. Back at the fence line I am going to grow two types of beans. It might not look like there is room in this picture but...

If you look from here, you can see that this is the PERFECT place to cram a few more veggies in. If you ask me, fresh garden beans are second only to tomatoes. So the more the merrier.

                           

Have a lovely memorial day weekend! I hope to be back again, sooner than later, but no promises. 

Mid Century Chair

You may recall that the husband and I took a vacation back in February to Florida. (If not, feel free to follow the hyperlinked "Florida" for some best of the best pictures from our trip. Yes, I am being overly obvious by stating what a hyperlink is after I have given you a hyperlink.) One thing I did not mention in that post - actually I didn't mention a lot of things in that post -- was that I fell in love during our trip. I didn't mean for it to happen, but it was a love at first site sorta thing and one thing led to another and I bought a piece of furniture!

Yes, I fell in love with a chair. And now, three months later, and several thousand miles in various vehicles (my mother drove it from FL to IL, we drove it from IL to MN) it is finally sitting in our living room. And I still LOVE the sh*t out of it. See for yourself. I think she looks damn good in our living room.

Check out those legs, eh? Aren't they sexy! And the way she ever so gently curves at her midsection. Oh dear! Moral of the story. White chair is to Amber, what blue chair is to Chris.

If you are ever in the Fort Meyers area of Florida, i suggest you stop by the Swamp Shop and see if they have anything you might like. We paid $157.94 for this chair, it was a HUGE splurge for us. But seeing her in our living room, I know it was the right choice.

Diggin' in the dirt

We are about to hit the road, head south, and do some celebrating over this fine Mother's Day weekend. But before we go I thought I stop in with some exciting news. I transplanted my seedling last night!

Here you see a garden bed with Lettuce, Kale, Spinach & Mesclun greens...

Here you see the same garden bed but this time it also five tomato plants (3 Roma, 1 Big Boy, 1 Black Pearl) and south of that line of string is a row of Brussels Sprout seeds. There are also two incredibly tiny, nearly invisible marigold plants in this bed. Turns out I am not so good at starting flowers from seed. 

Here you see garlic...

But here you see garlic AND (from left to right) 3 jalapeno plants, 3 bell pepper plants. In the bottom right corner I have also seeded two types of cucumbers. 

Oh the excitement! Oh the joy! Let summer begin. Happy Mother's Day!!! Be sure to give your mama a big kiss & tell her how amazing she is.