Hi All,
It was so cold yesterday. Tod and I were planning a trip to Berkeley but that fell through and once that did we realized we didn’t want to be out in the cold anyhow! We both just kind of dilly dallied in the house, finally hung our lanterns up from our honeymoon in Vietnam! Yesterday afternoon was another knitting circle with the friends:) This time our knitting friend showed us all how to make a stocking knit stitch! She wanted us to practice both the knit stitch and the purl stitch together to see what it looks like. That is a good thing, me, and another one of our friends, do not like the purl stitch AT ALL, but seeing them together brings me hope that I may actually make something one day! Tod and I watched the new “Free Solo” movie and I was kinda disappointed but do not want to give anything away so I will keep my mouth shut for now!
Brenda did an interview with Diablo Magazine! It will be in the March/April issue for Earth Day!
Last week in the garden;
York was out and they helped to weed out the paths between the front A & B beds! They got right in there, knocked the soil off the roots and hauled away a heaping wheelbarrow full of plants! Kaleidoscope was also out to help clean labels and Kelly with carpentry work! The ladies all worked together to get more labels cleaned off for our seedlings and the guys helped Kelly to measure boards for the G beds which will be built taller for the students and clients to use!
Friday & Saturday saw G4 getting planks replaced, installation of new planks and corners replaced. Lots of Bermuda grass was pulled up around the area as well. Saturday they added chickenwire to keep out the gophers, covered it with soil from G3 and started the same process on G3! Go Team Go!
Thanks DB for mixing compost and native soil for the G beds as well as mowing and regrading the hills in the field!
Lot of weeding going on right now. Garden Wide Lance has been out not only mallow hunting but thistle hunting too! Yes, vicious thistle as he likes to call it! He even found some over in bed K18! Over by the Worm Are bed JA1S was weeded to make room for more of the grapes CL is bringing in! There are already 2 grape plants from her garden over there so please go check it out! While weeding the crew also moved the rain barrels to the other side of the Worm Area to make room for the grapes. The West Native bed got some weeding attention this week-the plan is to dedicate about 15 minutes per shift in the Native bed to keep the weeds at a maintainable level! If anyone is interested in helping out please let us know!
The Hoop Houses are coming together! Brenda got the electric all figured out in the Little Hoop House and got the Tunnels of Love re-covered! She also got in there and hosed the tables down! The LHH is also sheet mulched and is now ready for us to start placing the seedlings in to it! FYI, the South side is currently turned off so seedlings need to go on the North side right now. The Big Hoop House also had its Tunnels of Love re-covered and the Bermuda grass weeded out of it. That will be used as the plants start getting bigger!
Speaking of seedlings going in the LHH. The week before we had started some Yokatta-Na seeds and last week we needed to prick them out and pot them up into their own separate cells! Over 400 seedlings for Yokatta-Na! This will help us with keeping the garden producing as we go through the Winter crops. There were also some pepper plants that were potted up into 4” pots! There were more seeds started-96 in total, for Plant Sale & garden. PB & AP planted up the last of our garlic for us, over 400 cloves planted in the P beds! This week we need to look at getting the lettuce seeds either pricked out!
Oh my gosh, so many chores done; the Texas privet was pruned over by bed M01, Pump House #2 was weeded out on both sides, there was an old toolbox by the worm bin that was broken down and thrown out. In bed E02 the bitter melon trellis was taken out, the Native beds were mapped out and the Berry Patch was weeded. In the Orchard the first 2 rows had the trees topped off and the first tree in the first row was shaped. Did I miss anything? If I did, please let me know! I love it when volunteers let me know what they accomplished each shift. It then goes in the calcs log for me to use when writing this note as well as helping us to keep up on what has been accomplished in the garden so we possibly don’t repeat it!
Harvest got us almost 95# of produce to send in to the local pantries! FYI, that was also with a conservative harvest on Wednesday since we only needed to send to 1 pantry that day!
Take care
Lori