Saturday, July 30, 2011

Garden Update

A few months ago I mentioned that I got a garden plot in the city and was working away to cultivate the best garden I knew how. With some help from friends, reading tons of gardening blogs and lots of hard work the garden seems to be flourishing! I love it. The picture above is a section of the Picardo P-Patch in Seattle, my garden is located a little farther on the left

I've noticed when I describe my garden plot to some of my more rural-based friends their eyes get huge at the concept. I suppose it is a bit unusual but I really love the community aspect of it. I've gotten unbelievable gardening advice from complete strangers and one day a nice guy came over and gave me about 40 leek starts to plant in my plot.

So for all you inexperienced P-patchers out there here is a quick tour of my plot. It is a 10x40 rectangular plot split in half with a path as to easily harvest all the food that you are growing.

Here is the north side of the plot:
 And the south side:

 
Needless to say I'm pretty pleased with the plot and have loved being able to share the fresh produce with friends. If it ever gets warm enough I'll have tomatoes coming out of my ears! 

Monday, July 11, 2011

Don't forget...

It's FREE Slurpee Day!

Thank heaven for 7-11!

(Thanks Carrie for the reminder!)

Sunday, July 10, 2011

pick a little, eat a little, pick a little, eat a little, pick a little, pick, pick, pick...

Once again, one of those days when I wish I had remembered a camera! 
(Pictures brought to you by my dinky camera phone.) 
I'll be better about that! :-)
 A few days before Ben and I headed to Salt Lake City for a visit with his family, I took the kids strawberry picking at Biringer Farm. A friend of mine who has two kids, that my nanny kids love to play with, organized a big group to go out picking. My goal for the day was to cure William's distaste for strawberries and to get enough berries to make some jam. 
 I managed to accomplish both goals, William left the patch with red lips and red fingers from eating so many berries and I had about 13lbs to make some jam!

 The boys decided early on that we should have a 'picking contest' since we had two bins to fill. They announced it was boys against girls to see who could fill their basket the quickest. Well, like most young boys they easily got distracted by sticks that look like guns or bugs to examine, so Natalie and I ended up kicking their butts in the contest. :-) Nat and I walked away with 8 lbs. of berries in our bin and the boys only had about 5lbs. (2lbs. of which were most likely picked by me because I felt sorry for their empty basket). 

 I loved hearing them walk around in search for the biggest-reddist-juiciest-strawberry. It reminded me of one of my favorite kids books. Check it out here. Leave me a comment if you want me to send you a jar of jam!

Saturday, July 9, 2011

July 11th

We've been off the blogging grid for a while... but we're back.

Ben has been asking me to update our blog for a while and I kept thinking, you do it :-) and we haven't done anything worth blogging about. Boring huh? I guess that's what happens when you're both gainfully employed. Your weekends become more of the catching up kind rather than the go out and doing fun stuff kind. 

I also have been a bit of a spaz in the camera department. I seem to not bring it places, 'forgetting it at home', maybe it's my subconscious' way of wanting to just enjoy the moment rather than capture every single second of it. But once I'm there I always wish I had a camera so my camera phone has to pull through for me. 

On this particular morning we were walking through the University of Washington on our way to the Annual Spring Scrimmage Football Game. The cherry blossoms were in full bloom (man I wish I had a camera). 

After the game we got to go on the field and meet the players and coaches (man I wish I had a camera). Below is our friend Tyler meeting his childhood hero, Ben's now adulthood hero, Coach Sarkisian.  I was shocked that 'personable' Ben was a bit bashful around the man he so admires and hopes never leaves the University of Washington. He wouldn't even ask for a photo. So this was the best I could do. I really wanted to find my favorite player Devin Aguilar but the field was so crowded we never found him.
The scrimmage game was a lot of fun to watch too! They played both aspiring QB's, Keith Price and Nick Montana, and based on my amateur football eye Keith Price was looking pretty good. We'll see what happens when he's not playing his own teammates!  

July 11th is the date when Ben and I can buy our 4-game Mini Season Pass. I've had the date on my calendar since February and I've got to say I might be as excited as Ben is for football season to start up again! Go DAWGS!