Prayers for Pa

I'm waiting for some things to work out.

Kinda like a warlock making a wish. Yup.

While I'm waiting, let's take a look at some things I've been doing.

Before Mother's Day, I replanted my Norfolk pines, which I probably should have done last year.  They like to be pot-bound and typically need to be transferred about every three years, but, this was the fourth year. So, I was a whole year behind and it showed.  My two Norfolks are about 11 years old now!  I got them in 2003 at Whole Foods in Philly when they were petite little ladies to decorate my apartment for Christmas and I still have them.  I'm guessing they were about a year old when I got them. 

Here's one with the planters I was preparing for Mother's Day:

My 11 year old Norfolk pine with some prepared planters for Mother's Day.

I made pretty planters for Mother's Day again this year.  I like giving a beautiful, reusable planter potted carefully with organic soil and organic, heirloom seeds of edibles to the mothers in my family.  The seeds, latent with life, slowly bursting forth with nourishment upon proper tending seems an apt gift for acknowledging motherhood.  This year I gave (organic, heirloom) Sweet Marjoram to my sister and (organic, heirloom) Lettuce Leaf Basil to my mom and my mother-in-law.  My son's teacher also got one planted with Sweet Marjoram (the rooster planter with the marjoram went to the classroom) since she mothers him so carefully and well during the school day.

Sweet Marjoram and Lettuce Leaf Basil planters for Mother's Day.

Oh, and I did plant some stuff in my gardens.  Here's the plan I used:

Chicken Scratch, I know.

Here's the shed garden.  It took a bit of time to weed it and "recondition" it.  We put almost finished compost into the gardens at the end of the season last year and let it overwinter.  The compost gets rained on, snowed on, freezes, then defrosts again etc. and finishes breaking down any bigger pieces.  In the spring, I weed the gardens and finish breaking up any chunky bits of the beautiful, rich compost by hand.  It's quite fun!

Before:

My Swiss chard (left) and sage (center) overwintered. 

Just look at all those weeds and tree sh** that fell into the garden!

After a while, I got it to look like this:

Ready to be planted.

On May 9th, I put in (organic, heirloom) cilantro, parsley and a few nasturtiums I had left from last year.  I'm sure the groundhog will eat my cilantro again, but that's OK.  She likes it!

Beware the Elven Archer of Haddonfield:

He Who Guards the Gardens is ever watchful.

Ah ha! A groundhog! Get him!

And the garden is safe once again.

More overwintered chard:

A video of Pa .  This airplane was awesome.

Prayers for Pa!

I might be offline for a bit, so, if you leave a comment, know it is appreciated!