How my Garden Grows?

This morning I woke up to the sound of rain beating against the window pane. I have been craving a few undisturbed Saturdays at the homestead. Therefore I was relieved to hear the sweet sounds of this mornings soccer game being canceled.

My relief only lasted momentarily as I had visions of the destruction that last weeks down pour cause. We had two mini wild rivers running through the garden. The rain uprooted several onions and tomatoes plants. The rivers raged on, washing our precious plants down stream to the foot of the garden. We also lost several mounds of cucumbers and watermelon. I was extremely saddened by this as we paid more this year for our heritage seeds verses supporting companies such as the infamous Monsanto. Now much of our hard work and precious seeds down the toilet.

After last weeks devastation my husband tilled a trench on the right side of the garden in hopes that it would divert the water. This morning when the probability of that not working finally hit me, I could no longer fight with the dark realms of the unknown. I threw on my tennis shoes and a sweat shirt and ran ferociously through the pounding rain. I fought for my footing as the rolling thunder shook the ground beneath me. The lightening threw daggers into my path but I ran on because I am super hero awesome like that. ;)

Finally I reached the garden to do a quick scan of the damage. So far so good. There are a few areas from last week that need to be fixed but I didn't notice any new damage. I was relieved... sort of.

The garden has weighed heavy on my mind this year. Last year we planned the garden months in advanced. We over bought on seeds and way over planted. This year we didn't draw out the garden plans until the very last minute. We bought quite a bit less and spaced our rows out farther apart. I have been worried that perhaps we under planted this year and without thinking things through a little better, we have made mistakes along the way. So add those worries to the worries of the weather destroying what is already in the ground... lets just say I have been on the verge of a gardening melt down.

We feed 6 people with our harvest, not to mention the foods that we tithe to the community. We depend on our garden for our financial and physical well being... If it is a flop, we hurt from it.

I try to chop everything up into a learning experience. We have already started implementing our lessons this year that we had learned from previous years. We have started our pest control program; hanging reflexives in the orchard, scattering deer repellents and garlic, and I have already started dusting our small seedlings with DE. All winter long we have been saving and crushing egg shells to scatter around the broccoli and strawberries in order to deter slugs. We have also learned that a pest could wipe out your garden in a day, so we have also started keeping vigil over our precious seedlings. We watch and listen for the plants to tell us what they need. I feel optimistic in the pest protection department. I feel we are ready for them. It is the weather I fear. The weather I can not control.

We have already learned so much from our garden this year and we are only just a few weeks into the season. Although I am always excited about learning the new ways in the the natural world, I am worried as too how far mother nature will go to teach us.

It is suppose to pour rain all weekend. On that note, I think I will run through the rain and lightening once more, just to have a few more hours of piece of mind.

(Before, when we actually needed rain)

Enjoy the weekend, everyone. ;)

Dimetapp Induced Delirium and The Suckish Weekend

This weekend was like I was just going through the motions of day to day life but not really present for any of it. There were many unpleasant moments... maybe it was the cold medicine, but I mentally wasn't there for any of them. I just know that in a normal state, I would have been angry sad happy nostalgic but I wasn't anything, except, I was present.

Friday morning we got the call that Lee's cousins wife had passed away. She was just twenty six years old. She left behind an 18 month old daughter, a 6 year old son and a loving husband.

She had been waiting for a new heart. Three months prior, a heart became available to her, but due to the fever she had continued to battle, she was unable to receive the heart. You could tweak the scenario a thousand different ways with a million different ifs but in the end, the chips fell the way they did and there wasn't anything anyone could do to change it. In the wake of a tragedy, I always hated hearing people say "it was his/her time to go". As a result to the phrases over use, it just gets annoying but at the same time... the slightest detail could have changed things... the only reasoning in such a tragedy is, it was her time.

I am not an emotional person. Well I suppose I am but I tend to not physically express those feelings. What I am trying to say, you would be more likely to find me expressing my emotions in writing instead of a physical expression, such as crying... Does that even make any sense!?

Crying makes me extremely uncomfortable. Therefor events such as weddings baby showers and funerals are quite awkward for me. I hate to see people cry no matter the circumstance. Just as I fear those feeling in others, I fear them in myself as well. Therefor, I was really nervous to view the body, I wasn't sure what kind of feelings that could trigger. I hadn't seen her in over a year. I was scared she wouldn't look the same and she didn't. It was startling to see her laying there. I knew it was suppose to be her but it didn't even look like her. It looked like a doll... just laying there. I cant describe the feeling other than being completely freaked out. My conclusion to this experience... I want a closed casket for my funeral.

To continue with the flow of the weekend.... About 5:30 pm Lee called and said he had a blow out on his way home, I dropped my hoe (I had been gardening) and set out to Morgantown KY to assist him. It was about 9pm when we finally arrived back home.

Friday night my throat was starting to tickle, by midnight my tickling throat had turned into a full blown hacking cough. I took some children's Dimetapp (yeah, cause I am a baby and children's medicine taste better than the grown up stuff) and conked out. Morning arrive way too early. Sat morning I had to coach a soccer game (with a cold medicine buzz). It was anything but fun and exciting. I am assuming that the kids picked up on my lack of enthusiasm. They were really draggy out on the field and as a repercussion to all of our lack of effort, we got our tails kicked.

FYI... Green team you better have enjoyed it because in three weeks we are taking you down!!!! GURRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!

Once we arrived back home (with our tails between our legs). I laid down and slept until it was time to go to the funeral home. While I was at the funeral home it was hard to not be somewhat thankful to see some faces that we haven't seen in such a long while. The entire time we were visiting with our old friends I couldn't help but to feel like it was such a shame that we did not spend more time with these people. We use to have so much fun with them. Why did we not make more of an effort to keep these people in our lives? Maybe we should work harder at it? I finally concluded that one of the leading member would be missing, so now it wouldn't be the same anyways...

Sunday, Lee tended to the children and animals while I laid around coughing and sneezing. I will be so happy when I have the energy to enjoy being outside. I did leave the house for about five minutes in order for Lee to show off his Spring clean up job. I was pleasantly surprised that he managed to fix most of the ruts in the field, left from his unintentional winter plow job (Blog post, Its Going to be Very LOOOOOOONG Winter.)

Last night I took some more cold medicine and slept in a deep coma like state. It was a much needed rest from an unpleasant weekend.

This morning I dropped Sissy off at school. Today is her first day back from spring break. She was really excited to go back to school but I have really missed her today. I cant wait until she gets out for summer break.

That has been the gist of my weekend. I promise to have a better post next time. Have mercy on the choppiness and lack of blogish flow.... I am still sort of buzzing from all the cold medicine. Speaking of which, I cant believe I give this stuff to my kids!!!? I am feeling super spacey, like my head is about to float away...I hope posting this is safe... I mean, I hope its not like drunk dialing!? I am sure we all know drunk dialing never ends good! NEVER!

****Note this blog is different than the Cold Induced Delirium that I posted back in Jan. and "One of these Days" that I posted in March. Which brings it to my attention that I really need to start taking some Vitamin C.