Emmi-girl!!

Starbucks!

Well its true, I am officially back at work. So far so good, however its only my 3rd day. Today I have to close the store which will be my first time in almost 2 years. I never closed at my old store as the college kids liked to work at that time. It was great for me! This will be my one and only close here too! YAY!! I think I will be working mostly 7-3pm which will be awesome as that is close to Anthony's schedule too.

Things are falling into place, finally! We are so blessed for all that we have in our lives these days. I am so thankful for our friends and family and their support they have given and continue to give us.

Today is suppose to beautiful and in the 80's!!! It is suppose to be this way tomorrow too, which is great as Anthony and I both do not work so we will get to enjoy it together.

On the gardening front I need to plant some onions and some potatoes that I bought recently, maybe tomorrow.

Have a good day everyone!

Updates!!

The 4 dozen roses that were waiting for me when I got home! I love you Hubby!

My first bowl of spinach! It was super yummy! We had it for dinner tonight since today is "Meatless Monday."

Seedlings are still growing!


Garlic...can't wait to try it!

Daffodils

Tulips

I finally got to plant my baby peas outside, hope they like it!

My wonderful hubby building more trellis. I needed a lot more than he thought.

Wonderful Husbands

Like many women in my life, I too, have a wonderful husband. You know the kind that do things even though they don't see the point in it, or the kind that just do it because it is something you want or think you need. Yes, I am very blessed to have a wonderful hubby, whom while I am away having a great time with a friend has to work, and take of my crazy dog, (I did take the other 3 with me) decided that he would finish my 'hoop house' and build my trellis for my peas! I was so thrilled when he told me that he was going to do this and then when he called me a few hours later, the task was complete! He also said that he was going to plant my peas too, which to be honest made me nervous but I wasn't going to turn down the help. I instructed him to please watch the weather report first to make sure it was going to be nice weather for a few days so the peas could get acclimated before serious rain or wind hit. Unfortunately, it started raining last night and was raining earlier today when I spoke with him so I guess the little guys will just have to wait. I can't wait to get home to see my new trellis and hoop house, which my wonderful hubby calls a 'poop house.' He giggles like a little school girl every time he says it too.

On the vacation/dog show front, I am having a great time with my new friend Amanda, who just happens to be Anthony's boss' girlfriend. The dog show is just ok, but I am really enjoying hanging out with her cats during the day and then her when she gets home from work. I will be heading back Sunday and then she comes to visit on friday for Easter weekend. I think both the boys have to work Easter morning so if it is nice I think I will go pick her up and we will go to the park or something. Thats all for now.

Happy Gardening!!!

Stuff!

Well we survived another Meatless Monday. Tonight we had grilled Portabella mushroom sandwiches which were DE-LISH! Anthony is getting better at making things up for Meatless Monday! I had wanted to plant me peas in the garden today, but instead had to make a trip to the vet. Thank you Kirby. I swear that dog is going to be the death of both me and my mother. He is fine now and will be better in couple days, unfortunately this time it is not entirely his fault. Tomorrow I leave for Raleigh, NC it is going to be a long drive but I will get to see some good friends when I get there! I am going to try and take pictures along the way, but we will see! Hopefully when I get back all of my seeds will have sprouted, unless Anthony kills them why I am gone. Anyway, off to watch Hurt Locker...hope its good!

More Seeds!

Pretty Emma's face wanting desperately to come in! It was raining out side this morning! The princess doesn't like rain.

My poor Lemongrass did not fair well with the move. It got smashed in the moving truck! The Parsley would do better if the dogs would stop eating it on their way out the door! Bad Maddie Grace and Kirby!!! The Rosemary I have had for over a year and I just planted Cilantro two days ago.


Since we don't show dogs much anymore I have turned the grooming table into my seed table! Everything is doing great and Anthony and I just planted more seeds (Hence the covered tray in the middle)yesterday afternoon. I love this time of year!!!

My peas just keep on growing, I need to plant them outside, but the weather is not working with me!.

Small Pie Pumpkin seedlings, they were out growing the egg holders so I transplanted them and they seem to like this home better.

These are the seeds that I planted the other day, they are coming up like crazy I am thrilled with my choices in plants this year! 100% germination so far, gotta love that!

First Day of Spring!

YAY!! First Day of Spring, First Day of Spring!!! Of course for the last two days it has been beautiful, however today it is suppose to rain and tomorrow its suppose to snow. LOVELY! While Anthony had the last two days off I took full advantage of him. Poor guy! Yesterday we went to the community center and swam for about 45 minutes, it felt so good to get back in a pool. I suddenly remember how much I love to swim, and I can't wait to go back.
As we were leaving the community center we discovered one of the best finds a gardener could find! FREE COMPOST!! About a week ago, the area in which we leave smelled horrible, well like hot compost! I figured that they were probably shredding and turning the pile for the city's own parks and flower boxes, but to my suprise I was wrong. So yesterday, we drove into the parking lot, stopped and asked this nice old couple what they were doing, they of course looked at us like we were dumb, and said nicely, "we are getting compost." To which Anthony replied, "Is it free?" The nice gentleman said, "yes!" I could have jumped out of my seat! Anthony thanked the man for the information and turned to me and said, "lunch and than compost?" I said, "absolutely!!!" I have been debating on composting my new garden beds as compost can be kind of expensive and I already have put some money into these beds and lets face it I am not made of money. Well, problem solved and no money spent. I love St. Louis! This is just one of the many 'go green' things we have discovered. After, retreiving the compost we came home and I began spreading it all over my beds. Anthony decided he was going to start cleaning out what we think used to be a fire pit. There are pictures below. The last two days have been great and I am sure only the beginning of great things to come this spring and summer.

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures

Potato buds!!!

Smallest bed I think I am going to plant sunflowers here, maybe marigolds to keep the bugs away!

We put black tarp over the newly rototilled beds in helps to heat them up high enough to kill any parsites that might be in the dirt.

My wonderful husband, doing the hard labor part of my gardening, thank goodness for husbands!

What the beds look like under the black tarp, beautiful dark brown dirt full of worms.

Happy St. Patty's Day!

So I didn't get to go to the parade since Anthony had to work late, BUT we did take the dogs for a walk at the park, which was totally packed thanks to the parade. So we took three dogs, Kirby, Hope and Emma as well as two Korean Interns that Anthony works with. Anthony had asked me if we could go pick them up and take them to the park with us as they don't have a car and can't get around very easily. So off to the park we went. I decided to let them walk Hope as I thought she would be the best for them. SHE WAS AWFUL!! As soon as we got out of the car, Hope took one look at those two girls and knew she was in for the best walk of her life. She sniffed and drug those poor two girls all over the park. The funny thing is the girl loved it! Note to self, my dogs are smarter than I give them credit for and they take FULL ADVANTAGE of situations! Bad dogs!

Kirby and Emma were thrilled as they got to go swimming! Kirby jumped right in as always and Emma ran along the edge whinning and then gave in and jumped in. Silly dog!

All in all it was a good St. Patty's Day!! The only bad thing was that Maddie Grace couldn't go with us as she is inseason! She had a fit when we left and it made me feel so bad. For the next two days Anthony doesn't have to work so we will be busy working out in the yard, as my seedlings are getting big and they need to move to their permanent home!

Spring is coming!

Early Spring Peas!!


Daffodils and Tulips!!


This is the spinach I planted last winter, it over wintered well and now is starting to grow like crazy. I tasted one of the leaves today and it was so yummy!!!


Garlic!!

We have SPROUTS!!!

Yay for sprouts! I have snow peas and lettuce sprouting! Anthony and I are going to lime and rototill hopefully on Wednesday, if the weather is nice. Once we get that done, I will move my peas into their permanent bed. I also planted squash, zuccini and cucumbers. Those pictures are below. Tomorrow I plan to go out and take pictures of my over wintered spinach and garlic. They are growing like crazy with the nice weather we had and then the rains over the weekend. Also, those flowers in my previous post have doubled in size, we are sure to find out what they are soon!

What a weekend!

Well the weekend flew by, the good news that our little pointer Emma won the Sporting group on Saturday!!!! Anthony and I are so proud of our little girl! She showed beautifully and made the hour and half long drive totally worth it.

I did, however, decide on my drive back and forth to the dog show that I am so lucky. As I left St. Louis and headed west towards Columbia, MO the landscape totally changed. It went from very busy city-life to country and field after field. I realized that I am lucky because in my short 27 years I have seen so much of the country. I lived the first 23 years of my life in beautiful western Washington and then spent 4 years in the South, and now I am getting to live in the mid-west! I have seen all up and down the east coast and been to so many historical places in 4 short years and now as we head westward I get to explore the mid-west. This was definitely not in my life plan originally, but to be honest I don't know really what was. I have to say that on Saturday morning as the sun started to rise over those fields, they were so beautiful. I know they were just empty fields but there were acres and acres of them with the occasional farm house. I wish I could have taken pictures but somehow taking pictures and driving at the same time, doesn't seem quite possible. There were 3 wineries on my way to the dog show, so I am thinking we will make another trip up there to visit those soon.

On the seed front, I will be taking pictures later and posting them, they are growing like crazy!

Nice AGAIN!!

Woohoo, it was so nice again today. Of course it stormed last night so much it woke me up but everything seemed to be fine this morning. My little sprouts got to spend the day outside again. I think I am going to have 98% germination on my early peas, which I am thrilled about. The pumpkins are starting to pop up which is great, I would love to grow 3-4 vines, which is going to be way more pumpkins then I need but the dogs will eat pumpkin.

On a high note, I received a whole box of seeds today. YAY! I am soaking a bunch of seeds tonight so that they will germinate a little quicker. I am hoping that Anthony will be better soon so we can rotatil and I can get my early corn in the ground. Spring is coming, my last frost date is quickly approaching.

While Anthony has been laid up with his back the dogs have been SOOOO GOOD! They have been locked up and have been so patient. Tomorrow he is off again and I am hoping to spend some time outside. Another high note, my spinach that has over-wintered is starting to grow like crazy and the garlic is growing like crazy too! I am so thrilled with my plants so far.

Tomorrow more seeds!!

75 Degrees!!!

It was 75 degrees today, WOOHOO!!! Unfortunately, I had to spend the day inside, but thats ok. I did however, put my little sprouts outside, they seemed to really like it. It is suppose to storm tonight so we will see. More tomorrow.

Spring is coming!!

Yesterday was beautiful, 64 degrees and sunny! Unfortunately today it is raining! Anthony and I took all 4 dogs for a walk in the park yesterday which actually went suprisingly well. I let him walk the two good ones, Emma and Kirby. Which meant I got the two bad ones, Maddie Grace and Hope on a Rope! When we got home we went to work in the garden, we got alot done actually and hopefully the recycle men will take away all the brush on Thursday. They didn't last week, so I am hoping this week they will or we are going to have problems! Pictures are below and we still have two garden beds to go, but we have removed some small trees and 3-4 roses bushes from the beds already.



My seeds are starting to pop up, which makes me very happy! I will take pictures of them when they get a little bigger.

Oh, on a strange note when digging in the one garden bed we didn't finish I discovered green leaves coming up. I am not sure what they are, so I took pictures of them, can anyone name them. They are in clumps all over this bed, I dont think it is a weed cause they are very uniform. I didn't dig them up yet, but if they are a weed they are coming up!

New Toy!

So while Anthony and I were out looking at new dog food for our pets we discovered this toy. It didn't say anything about being indestructable which even if toys do say that I don't believe them, as most toys last two seconds in my house. So Anthony convinced me to buy this toy for a whopping 12 dollars, which is about what I normally spend on toys for them. See picture below...This is Hope guarding it from everyone else! You can also see little Maddie Grace's nose waiting her turn for the ball!

Well I can say that ball has lasted almost 24 hours, which I might add is a miracle in this house! Currently, the 3 dobermans take turns trying to distroy it and when they can't; they pass it on to someone else! Emma thought it was interesting for about two minutes. The dobermans are definitely more into destructing their toys then her. So we will see how long this poor toy lasts!

Pictures FINALLY!!

This would be our attempt at taking a family photo, well half the family...as usual Kirby can't seem to cooperate. Heaven for bid should he just stand, face the camera and be happy! UGH, maybe when he's 10 he'll be less of a butt! And Emma bless her heart, she always closes her eyes. You would think as much as I take their picture they would just deal with it.

Next me telling Kirby to STOP AND JUST BEHAVE!!! He said NO!


Sprouts...Day 3 or 4 I don't remember.


Garden bed #1 all cleaned out, this is where I discovered all the worms in my previous post. The second bed is coming, I started by myself but I decided I needed more muscle...enter Anthony!!!

Well I am caught up on my pictures. Anthony and I spent yesterday taking the rest of the boxes to the basement, woohoo, I am mostly box free. Today is suppose to be right around 60 degrees so I think we will take the dogs to the park again! This time we will take Maddie Grace, and Hope. I am think I am going to have to buy two more flexi-leads as I have 4 dogs and only 2 flexis! Anthony has to work today and tomorrow but has Monday off, so I think Monday will be the day we work out in the garden again. Oh, I did plant potatos yesterday, have no clue if they will grow but will give it a try!