Monday Garden Club

There is so much to report this week!

I'm happy to say that Spring has indeed sprung here and the trees are beautiful and green. I think the foliage arrival occurred earlier than usual thanks to our 90 degree weather a few weeks ago. Most everything started to come out big time last week but now all but the Oaks are holding out. It's good to see everything out of dormancy again!

Yay! (taken Saturday)

Nick got home after a very, very long week in Idaho. He left on Sunday for a business trip and did not return until 2 in the morning Saturday. The kids and I spent the week sick and miserable (so did he) . Luckily, we were all better by the end of it and I have an awesome MIL who watched the kids Friday night so I could get a much needed break for a night out with the girls. Thank God as I very much needed it for my sanity! Ever heard of plum wine? I hadn't before Friday, but let me tell you it's great stuff!

On our way home from Northern Virginia, Nick and I picked up some tomato plants at a local nursery and planted them. We planted three tomato plants including a roma, a 'super fantastic' and a grape tomato. Next year, my hope is to have tomatoes from seed. Nick made fun of me for securing them with a seat-belt on the way home but he ate his words because this method worked out really well! They arrived safely despite my erratic driving tendencies and curvy roads.

My precious tomato plants riding shotgun.

I'm the ONLY person who eats tomatoes in the house so 3 plants should cover us (though even Nick can't resist my yummy tomato basil soup... good thing I grew several basil plants from seed earlier this year, YUM!). I can't wait!

The newly planted tomato plants.

We have tiny little blueberries forming on our blueberry plants. I'm so excited about that. I hope production continues in future years. I'm a little worried about them doing well because our lot is wooded. It's ideal to have these plants in direct sun from dawn to dusk. I'd say our garden gets direct sun from about 9-5 mid-summer (about 7-8 hours or so). I hope that's enough. I'm thinking that they should do OK, the fruits just might not be quite as prolific.

Nick worked on widening the upper garden terrace by tilling an extra 8 feet of row. I had planned to add the upper terrace next year but realized I had no room left for the squash so we were obligated.

Before. We had already expanded it to be double last year's size.

After.

Later, I would regret all the planting I did this weekend. I had looked at the forecast well in advance of this week and all looked well (i.e. no frost). I viewed the local forecast again while in Northern Virginia (NOVA) and again there were no warnings. NOVA is a little colder than our region, so I figured we were pretty safe.

Yesterday, after a day of working in the garden, I thought it had gotten chilly out so I figured I should take another look at the forecast just in case. Though we only have a 10% chance of frost after April 16th, it turned out that we had a frost warning last night! We were in the 10%! I went frantic.

Me: "Nick, cut up some 2 liter bottles so I can put 'em over the broccoli!"
Hubby: "I'll throw a trash can over the tomatoes!"

How our garden looked after we finished prepping it for potential frost.

We came up with some clever solutions on the fly. Nick covered the bean seed with moving blankets. I placed the slip n' slide tarp over the squash while protecting them from getting crushed with bricks.

I hope this is the last close call because that was a lot of work! In the end, everything turned out fine. Only one of my tomatoes looked a little peeved, but she sprang right back up today. Turns out she needed a bit of a water.