Been Sick

I'm feeling very grateful that we had such a beautiful early spring so far. We got a lot of stuff started before we got hit big time with this nasty flu that's going around. We probably lost a few not-yet-planted seedlings because it was warm and dry last week, but now that the rain has set in for this coming week, we're actually in pretty good shape (good thing since Ria took sick tonight - she's the 5th kid down with this out of 6, with the Map Guy as our single hold out, but he's not feeling 100% either).

We did manage to finish up most of Bernie's garden this weekend. She's been a big part of the inspiration for this year's gardening. She's six and really into flowers. She poured over garden catalogs starting in January and it was so fun to get enthusiastic about her big plans. About 10 days ago we planted the front of her little flower garden with tulips, dahlias, and gladiolus (sp?) bulbs as well as some cute little flower seedlings - morning glory, canterbury bells, lavendar, moon flowers, and columbine. We put a few paving stones in the middle along with her little sign (at Target we picked up some metal garden frames that hold a tile with a letter on them - we splurged and got one for each child's garden). She also inherited a pretty hanging plant holder with a hummingbird motif. She absolutely loves it, but I've been a little concerned/amused that the set up looks a little bit like a cemetary plot.

Finally this Saturday, in the midst of running non-sick kids around to birthday parties, I found two butterfly bushes and we got them planted. I also picked up some pretty pink, purple and white petunias which we planted in an old hanging pot to put the finishing touch on her little corner of the yard. All we need now is a little more mulch and enough dry weather to plant some more gladiolus between the butterfly bushes. We figure that when the bushes get bigger (they're supposed to hit 8 to 10 feet tall AND wide within 5 years) that we'll move the gladiolus bulbs to a new location.

By the way, check out the other homeschool garden/outdoor blogs and sites in the sidebar. Some of these ladies are so amazing - all these beautiful books and ideas. Wow. One fun thing about blogging is seeing the difference in time between various flowers blooming based on location.

We're getting a lot more done this year than we've ever done before (partly because of the necessity - needed some color in the front yard big time, partly because we wanted to start each child on their own garden area and partly because, sigh, our "baby" of the family right now is over 2 years old - this has never happened before), but we're generally very seat-of-the-pants and kind of hit-and-miss in this sort of thing. It's a good thing we have all this Wisconsin former-farmland to work with. Tends to make our hit-and-miss attempts a little more successful - at least in the flower department, I think. I'm a little worried that the Map Guy's veggie garden will be shared primarily by rabbits and deer.

Photos should be forthcoming. Currently uploading pictures from the camera requires many more steps than it ought to. I do have a cable around somewhere that would allow me to download pictures directly onto my laptop. St. Anthony?