Square Foot Garden Salad

Yum.

# of times people told me I would like garden peas even though I hate (HATE) canned peas = 4, 287,945

# of times I believed them = 0

I was wrong. So. There you have it.

The Garden, July 15th

Pepper.





Carrots. Potatoes. Carrots. Potatoes.



Pea pods.

Updates.

Gluten Free Eating Update: SuperDad wanted lasagna for dinner last night, so I made a gluten-free version for the kids using DeBoles Rice Penne, spaghetti sauce, ground turkey, cottage cheese, mozzerella, and parmesean. D said, "I LOVE zagna!" :)

Reading Update: I finished Little House on the Prairie just in time to get it back to the library (ahem, note to my mother, who never reads this: you could bring over my own personal copies anytime, thanks). I know we're supposed to be outraged that they were kicked off "their" land at the end of that book and had to walk away from the crops they'd just planted and all, but... Well, it just wasn't really their land. Sorry. (But then... is my land mine? Sigh.)

On to Farmer Boy. I remember really not caring for this one as a kid, since it isn't about Laura, but about her future husband, Almanzo. I must not be the only one that feels this way, since the library copy of this is practically pristine in comparison to all of the other books. One of the first scenes is about the teacher having to battle a group of big boys who beat up the last teacher so badly that he died from his injuries. And we thought school violence was a new thing.

Money Update: Due to my own laziness, when I took our weekly cash out at the bank, I never separated it into the envelopes. Groceries are bought, gas is full, and we have $39 to make it until Friday. Can we do it?

Garden Update: Looking good! We ate our first radishes. SuperDad put up a trellis type thing for the peas, which are growing up it nicely. I'll try to take photos sometime this week.

Baby Update: 23 weeks along, everything looks fine, I am already enormous, no, it isn't twins.

You Can Almost See Them Growing

Over Budget

Again. Sigh.

I think we need a $150 "we're too sick to care about the budget" cushion built into our budget. Yuck.

The whole family was sick this week, and little expenses added up quickly.

I did save us a bundle, though, since we were almost on our way to the emergency room Sunday night. It had been too many days of sick little ones and was still too many hours until the doctor's office opened, and I knew an ER visit would TOTALLY blow our budget, when I remembered that our insurance company offers a 1-800 call-in program where we could speak to a nurse about the symptoms and she could help us identify if we really needed to see a doctor or not.

I was more than relieved to find out we could treat this at home, in fact, we were already doing everything right (go BRATY diet!), and as usual, things turned around the next day anyway. Wonder how much money that saved? (Oh, I get that it saves the insurance company money too, but that ends up saving all of us.)

In other news, the garden is SPROUTING! Woo! Pictures, hopefully, soon.

Planting

I* set up my Square Foot Garden today.


Peas, green beans, lettuce, radishes, three kinds of peppers, and corn in this 4X3 foot, 6 inch deep box.

And potatoes and carrots in the 1x4 foot 8 inch deep box below.



*Ahem, with lots of help from SuperDad. Which is one of the many, many reasons he's so super.

So... Gardening.

I've been slowly reading through Mel Bartholomew's All New Square Foot Gardening. Slowly. Because I have my doubts. I've tried this gardening thing before, and failed miserably. But, maybe, just maybe, I'll give it another shot this year. (Oh, how I know all of you in the warmer climates are already harvesting lettuce and whatnot, but we've still got SNOW on the ground here, so I have awhile to ponder this yet.)

My first step was reading the book. And this one too, just for good measure. And this.

My second step? Well, I made myself a "Garden" envelope, and I put $15 in it this pay period.

The third step? Don't hold your breath on that one. ;)