Best Weekend Ever

Hi friends.  We just finished up the best possible March weekend ever.  Sunny.  Warm.  Beautiful.  Productive.  Slow-paced.  That's what I'm talking about. 

Saturday we spent the morning watching cartoons in jammies, then we went for a visit to our neighbor's farm.  It's lambing season and OMG does he have the sweetest little lambs ever.  Makes me want one; you know, for a pet :)  Mara was determined to pet a lamb, so we lifted her into the stall and she stood bone-still for a solid 10 minutes waiting for a lamb to approach her.  Eventually this little one did; and they just stood there, gazing at each other, studying each other for the longest time.  I loved it!  After we scraped the sheep poo off our shoes, we went carpet shopping.  There's some irony, yes?  We picked out the carpet for our basement remodel, now we just have to knock out a couple walls and we're ready to go.

Sunday after church, we spent the afternoon outside, enjoying the sunny 65 degree day.  We planted the first 200 onion sets, with another 400-500 to be planted later in the season.  We also got leafy greens planted in a raised bed and the site for our new tater bed prepped.  Well, partially prepped.  We're creating a tater bed behind the rear fence, 3 feet deep and approximately 100 feet long.  It should be able to provide for us the #200 of potatoes we're hoping for this year without taking up precious garden space.  Along with the 3ft X 75ft bed for onions and about 10 feet for sweet potatoes, we should have plenty of root veggies to last us into the following spring.

So before I sign off, I thought I'd share with you what turned out to be one of the best investments we ever made.  After much naysaying on my part, Jeff bit the bullet and bought a new yard sweeper last summer.  I thought it was a complete and total waste of money;  if we want grass clippings, we could rake them, right?  Wow.  Was I ever, ever wrong about purchasing a yard sweeper.  Last year, from our little 1.18 acres, we would get 2-3 trailers full of grass clippings each week to mulch the garden with.  What I found yesterday under all those grass clippings was wonderfully loose, dry, easily turned soil.  No need to till.  Few-to-no weeds.  Planting onions was absolutely effortless.  Didn't even need a pitch fork to turn the soil.  So if you've thought about a yard sweeper, please do not hesitate!  You'll thank yourself next spring :)