This past month has been one in which I haven't been able to finish a sentence...or even a thought. I have started several blog posts, and written notes about random observations, but so far, I haven't been able to complete anything. And I believe the problem lies in too much multi-tasking. May is a multi-tasking month. The garden begs for weeding, pruning, planting and mulching. The children have end-of-year projects, spring sports and endless lunches to be made and clothes to be washed. Even the goats have extra needs right now! We recently trimmed their hooves, gave them medications for worms and mites, and cleaned their barn. I have begun posts about all of these adventures, but haven't finished any of them.
Here is a post I started the first week of May:
It's taken much longer than usual, but I can finally say with some certainty, that Spring is here! It isn't warm, and doesn't exactly feel like spring, (especially as I am still wearing my thinsulate lined boots and gloves on most days), but I think we are at least past the possibility of 30 degree temperatures.
The very next morning after writing these words, we awoke to 37 degrees. This REALLY made me question my "spring is here!" proclamation. I decided not to post it. And I have since been unable to follow any garden thread I have started. Every attempt to understand our weather this year has failed. Everything I know to be true about our seasons (based on my 40 years of living) has been off.
Here is another sample of my mis-guided hopes, and a post that went un-posted:
Slugs. They are slimy, squishy little creatures. And like every Northwest gardener, part of my Spring garden job is to try and control the little beasts. If I didn't at least make an attempt to battle the ubiquitous, invasive brown slug, I wouldn't have much of a garden. They chew down sweet pea starts, dahlias and lettuce, and make the hostas looks like they have had hand grenades thrown at them. Some years, I begin my battle with them in February. But this year, thanks to some ultra-cold temperatures, I'm hopeful Mother Nature has given us a helping hand in the form of slug death by freeze.
This post would have been about organic methods of slug control (and I promise to write a post on that soon), but two days after writing these hopeful words, it was as if the slugs awoke from their winter slumber hungrier than usual! I hadn't put out any Sluggo yet, and almost overnight had holes chewed into the ornamental rhubarb. Ugh! And so much for my confidence in them being frozen. Apparently they thaw out just fine.
So, I'm definitely off my garden game. I am still planting my vegetable garden, weeding and composting. But I am a little timid in everything I'm doing. I finally bought some annuals and planted a few pots by our front door, but I half expected to wake up and find them frozen. At least the broccoli and lettuces seem to be doing fine in the garden. The peas are safe beneath row cover, and the tomatoes are in the green house where they may live for the whole season.
I am old enough to "think" I know the garden, but still so young that I am thrown off course by our strange year. So here is to beginning again. And to accepting all of the variations in weather and seasons that come our way.
