"They can't all be winners, kid." Failure on the Farm.

One of my favorite lines from one of my favorite movies: Santa to "Kid" in Bad Santa. It just fits in every scenario. I go into every hobby thinking I will be the best, a natural, and I fall way below my exacting standards and usually give up. Not this time. Things aren't exactly awesome on the homestead, but I'm far from giving up. Let's take a look.

Sara's Fails

Let's just get this out of the way here. We have what I believe is our first casualty of the year. Sorry, Violas. I thought you could take the heat. They were perfectly fine when I watered them last night. Now, they have the texture of cooked spaghetti and appear to have given up on life. I'll monitor them over the next couple days, but if they're not better by Saturday, a burial may be in order.

My poor artichoke plant has aphids. Bleargh. I thought it was just dirt (because I am an IDIOT) but the other day, I was all like, "Hmm...my artichokes don't look so goo...oh my God that dirt is moving." I've been looking up all natural solutions to this, but the end result might be the just trashing the plant. Not going to give up yet.

I didn't know cilantro was supposed to look like that! Because it's not. I don't use a ton of cilantro, so I don't care that much, and the flowers are kind of pretty, so, meh. Whatever. My parsley is doing well though. Harvested a whole bunch of it over the weekend, and it's bouncing back like a champ.

Eeeh. Separated tomatoes aren't doing so hot, either. I call the one on the left my Charlie Brown Christmas Tree. It hasn't grown, vertically or horizontally, at all, but there are new buds forming, so I haven't lost hope. Also, I've been obsessively checking the three wee tomatoes on the plant on the right for signs of rot, thinking that the plant is just giving up. Well, the tomatoes keep growing, even if the plant isn't. So, once again, wait and see. I might have to repot Charlie Brown.

This sprout needs to be repotted, forthwith. It is not pleased to be in that tiny little pot. It appears to be growing, somewhat, and I hope it's not too late. There are little buds on the stem which signal the appearance of Brussels sprouts at some point in the future. Also, it's being eaten by something. I really, really need to look into pesticide.

And...onto the (this far) successes!

My jalapeno has, like, six peppers on it, in varying stages of growth!!! Eeeee! In fact, my habaneros and bell peppers are doing OK as well. There still aren't any actual peppers on those, but there are lots and lots of buds. So, if anything, we'll always have peppers.

The sprouts that have suitable living conditions, despite being a little bitten up, seem to be doing quite well. So does my asparagus. The more I read, the more worried I get that I am not going to be able to eat it this year. The challenge, in this case, will be keeping the damn thing alive over the winter.

And here come my lovely herbs to make me feel like less of a failure! Look at that forest of dill! I hacked A TON of it off over the weekend, as well. Seriously, like I took away a third of that plant, and it's bounced back like crazy. I'm concerned about my basil, but other than that, my biggest problem with the herbs is that I don't have enough ways to use them (or the time to cook with them the way I'd like to).

Yay, at least some of my serranos are doing something. I still don't think I'll be able to harvest before Christmas, but I'm convinced I will get at least one pepper out of the pack of them.

Last year, my lavender was super depressed, so this makes me happy that it's growing like crazy. I think it and the marigolds (the ones that aren't in the death pot with the violas, anyway)get along quite well and are helping each other. And finally, my white whale...Tarragon!!!

It has FINALLY tripled in size from when I first got it! Hallelujah!!! I think I need to repot, though. Pretty soon it's going to outgrow its space, and we cannot have that!

I plan on having a super productive day on Saturday (no rain, got it????) repotting, and burying, and de-infesting, whatever the case may be. So, look forward to (if you care, which, seriously, I don't think anybody reads this, but isn't it a nice record of the growth??) more updates on Saturday!

Doing the Lord's Work

I love the expression "Doing the Lord's work", or, more specifically, "Doin' the Lord's work" (gotta drop them "g's"!). Used in a non-religious context, I see it like the phrase "Fighting the good fight", but more fun and dramatic. I say it all the time at work when somebody else is making coffee (which, I need to stop, because everybody thinks I'm weird enough as it is). I think it when I see somebody returning a cart to the corral at the grocery store. I also love the expression "Come to Jesus", as in "Somebody needs to have a 'Come to Jesus' with Nancy about her ham salad. She uses way too much mayo!" But that's neither here nor there.

Despite the threat of rain looming overhead, I got up early this morning and decided to do the Lord's work with some of my plants that were in pots simply too small for their ever-increasing girth. Let me tell you, repotting established plants SUCKS. I hate it. Last year, I wound up actually taking a hammer to probably $100 worth of terracotta pots (cry) instead of attempting to extract the root ball. Weak, and this year I attempted to avoid this by planting in pots that I *thought* would be big enough. Well, I thought wrong, so that was a fun hour and a half.

I started small by taking my serranos out of one of those long planters, which, even as seedlings, they were threatening to outgrow imminently. That was fine because they were tiny. From there, I moved on to one of my Brussels sprouts, which was flourishing yesterday, but today looked sick and sad. Since it's just one plant, it went along relatively smoothly and without incident. And finally, I moved on to my globe or cherry tomato, not sure which, and that was a nightmare.

I mentioned in a previous post that my tomatoes make me a complete basket case. This is because I'm scared I'm either doing too much to them or not doing enough. Nothing seems right. Also, the squirrels, or some vile animal in my neighborhood, will straight up attack them, just kill the damn tomato but not actually eat it, just leave it mangled and rotting on the vine. Infuriating.

Anyway, my globe or cherry tomato plant is starting to get brown leaves, and I think it could have been one of two things (or a combination thereof):

1. The pot I started it in was much too small, and/or
2. There are actually three separate tomato plants that came out of that seed pod, and they're fighting with each other. Whoops.

Both of the above statements are totally true, so I decided to do something about it. I took the one tomato plant that was off to the side of the pot and savagely hacked at the soil in the original container until it had started to knock free of the rest of the dirt. I then ripped it out of the pot, and put it into its new home. The other two plants I see as Siamese twins, there's no separating them without doing major, life-changing damage to the whole. So, they went into a new home by themselves. I'm just going to take a wait-and-see approach to this, and just hope that they thrive apart as they (previously) thrived together.

To wind down my morning of manual labor, I decided to stake my peppers, which I find super fun and exciting because it's easy, and I get to poke sticks in dirt. Last year I didn't have any twine, so I had to tie the stakes with gold sparkle ribbon. But this year, it's a bit more appropriate. (Although, between us, I'm not quite sure the habaneros really need to be staked? It seems to be growing more as a bush than a tree. I'll keep an eye on it)

Also, I decided that I need to get more aggressive about my basil. I'm obsessed with basil pesto, and my one plant, while robust, won't provide for my pesto needs. So, I'm took some cuttings, and when the roots develop, I plan on sticking it in the windowbox that formerly held my serranos. And then I will have PESTO FARM 3000!

The rest of this post will be basically a picture dump because I need to be praised for all of my hard work and because I have probably another hour to kill before I can grill my Thai pork fail Mu Ping.

Here's my partial shade group--cilantro, parsley, and artichoke. They're so easy. I really, really hope that artichoke plant produces in the first year.

Most of the herbs, also super easy and thriving. You don't hear the dill complaining to be repotted! I'm talking to you, tomatoes!

My beloved beagle, Pickles. Such a brat, though. But still, cute. Here she's "helping me garden". Oh neat, and there's my computer chair. It's famous!

My repotted Brussels sprout. Seems to be doing ok.

My crown jewel and white whale, tarragon, which seems to finally be growing (!!!!!!).

And here's what I see when I look out the sliding-glass door: the majority of my garden, my favorite hobby, and what will hopefully become the well-earned results of doing the Lord's work.

Meet the family.

Since Blogger's mobile app really, totally sucks, and the 300 word post I wrote didn't go to the draft box on my computer (what the hell, it's completely inconsistent, my other failed blog post did!!!), I'm being forced to retype this BY HAND. Did we lose a war or something?

Anyway, here's what I meant to post on Thursday. I think it's important to take an inventory of what I have and what I'll be obsessing about for the next three months.

So, if I'm going to do nothing here but talk about plants, I'd better start talking about plants, right? I can't think of a better time to list everything on my deck! Let's do this!

On my deck, I have:

Grape tomatoes (established)
Roma tomatoes (still seedlings, because I germinated them in April...whoops)
Regular tomatoes? Not sure which kind, grew them out of those nifty Miracle Gro Plant Pods and can't remember which one it was. So either globe or cherry tomatoes, because that's all they got
Jalapenos
Habaneros
Serranos
Purple bell peppers (in theory, let's see if I can keep the birds off before I get too excited)
Brussels sprouts, three plants (which, they're already huge)
Asparagus
Artichokes (once again, in theory--I heard there are both annual and perennial varieties. The annuals--I think--produce the first year, but the perennials don't. Once again, not sure which one I have, I need to pay closer attention)
Marigolds
Violas
Lavender
Some sad lily whose head I broke off when I first got it, sorry lily

And every herb ever:

Sweet mint
Basil
Thyme
Rosemary
Oregano
Dill
Sage
Cilantro
Flat leaf parsley
And my crown jewel and white whale, which is finally kind of growing...Tarragon!!!

Mostly everything is growing really well. We have a huge deck that gets a lot of afternoon sun, so that helps, but it also means no lazy Sara. 100 degrees outside, hungover, just don't feel like it, too bad. Strap on those flip flops and turn on the hose, ho. Remember potting all those things? It sucked, right? Go garden, slothy!

So, the plants I'm most concerned about are my tarragon, rosemary, and tomatoes. Tomatoes make me a basket case because the leaves will start to turn brown at the bottom, and I'm too chicken to see if that's normal. And even if it's not, what can I do? Rosemary almost needs less attention than I give it, but I can't stop loving you! And the tarragon, I had to order from Amazon as I was too lazy to go to a nursery in the city to get it. The fact that I'm concerned that it hasn't tripled in size in the two weeks since I acquired it is a legitimate and totally rational concern, right??

I totally can't wait to get my hands on those brussels sprouts. Those things are magical little plants.

And that's it! A complete inventory of plants and a shocking indictment against my sanity.

Welcome to my Garden! Grab a beer and get to work.

Imagine my shock when I downloaded the Blogger app, and EIGHT discarded blogs stared me in the face. Like my neglected blogs, I have no shortage of hobbies, thrown by the wayside and summarily forgotten.

I start everything, but I lack follow through. Thousands of dollars in beading supplies are in a bin under our coffee table. I have a nice sewing machine that I've used three times, and then hid out of shame when I screwed up the bobbin. Knitting needles, embroidery floss, enamel paint, hell, even a very nice electric piano, all victims of abandonment at the hands of my frustration and caprice.

Except when it comes to my little container garden. I am obsessed. Perhaps it's my (failed) Mormon upbringing; I'm always looking for ways to be marketable in the apocalypse. And while prostitution sounds fun, it also sounds very unhygienic in a futuristic hellscape with no running water.

So, gardening it is! Instead of clogging up my friends' Facebook feeds with more f'ing plant pictures, I'll just post stuff here until I'm bored with the blog. Welcome to my little garden of iniquity! Don't get too attached.