Yard work

When you live out in the country and own a large yard, it's a necessity to own a riding lawn mower. During spring and summer months, we have to mow nearly every week unless it's extremely dry (and if it's extremely wet and we CAN'T mow, I resign our yard to being a jungle and move on). Part of having a riding lawn mower is teaching the kids to be responsible around it and learn to drive it so they can start mowing the lawn at our earliest convenience. I figure we've got another five years before that particular convenience is available, but that didn't keep Oz from putting M1 on the mower and letting him push the accelerator.



Getting started was somewhat difficult.

M2 was appropriately freaked out by the thought of her brother driving ANYTHING and climbed to higher ground immediately.

She's a wise child.

That look of intense concentration is due to the fact that he was attempting to max out the speed on the mower.

Stopping is a lot easier when it simply means taking your foot off of the gas pedal - thank heaven he didn't have to try to press a brake. That boy's adrenaline was into serious overdrive.

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Then it was time for a garden check! So far, I only have one plant that's looking puny - one of my cucumber plants is looking a bit off, but the other one is doing just fine.

Here's the pictorial update:

The basil is REALLY starting to grow! M1 keeps asking me when we're going to pick some and cook with it. I told him I want to give it another week or so to make sure the roots are seriously into the ground before I pick anything off, but it's looking good!

We caged the tomato plants a couple of days ago. Didn't want to hold off much longer since they're also really growing well. I got some good advice on a gardening web site that suggested planting some of the actual tomato PLANT into the ground as well as the root system. You'd never know there's probably three inches of plant underground now! That Roma on the left side of the photo is nearly up to the first rung of the cage.




SEED! I grew these from seed!!! These are my green bean plants, and I've probably got close to 10 of them poking out of the ground now. I'm going to wait until it finishes raining tonight or tomorrow and then go thin them out. I may hang on to the ones I pull, though, lest I kill the rest. I'm still nervous about growing anything from seed. Historically, that's where my plant-murdering tendencies come out the most.

My hens and chicks. Oz's grandmother gave us this plant last fall since the container had broken. I need to repot it but wanted to see if it would make it through the winter first... and it HAS! I'll probably put it in another pot this week and find a place for it.
I'm just so excited - spring has definitely sprung!