Oh Great Garden!!! A Houston School & Garden Update

 Oh what a year we have had!!!  It was cold, dark and we were told to stay home for the most part all the time!  This is a hard thing for Alaskans!  Our daylight in the winter is very short - some places get no sun for months, my area gets only a couple hours of light a day.  We NEED to be out in it.  Sometimes, when we are busy as all get out, we leave home in the dark and come home in the dark and we dont see sun for days or weeks!  We try to make up for it in the summer months when it is all outdoors and daylight all the time - literally 24 hours of light per day! We have to make the most of it!

June 17, 2021 10:58 pm  Sunset touching the lake.

Our school was open for the whole year for in person learning, and we worked hard, HARD!  We had some rough patches, but we survived and we also had some very great things happen! We are a combined Jr/Sr High school now so we have grades 6-12 at our school, and we have everyone in cozy like, tucked everywhere.  Our Middle School was destroyed in the 2018 earthquake, and they are just now beginning to build a new school out here, the new one will become the High School.  We are so excited!

The groundbreaking went great and we had lots of excited, happy people there! Equipment is on site and the beginnings have begun!

One of the other great things that happened this year is that one of our teachers, Mrs Wendy Bredberg, got a tree grant from the Alaska Department of Natural Resources, Community Forestry Program, so that we could add apple trees to our garden!  It was a lot of work to make this happen, the paperwork seemed endless and we had to map the school garden while there was 4 feet of snow on it!  It all worked out great though!  

Our trees came from Fire Apple Orchards on Hollywood Road in Big Lake, and they have a wonderful orchards and gardens!  Dan and Nancy Moore are the owners and are so knowledgeable. They are happy to share their knowledge and help to make sure your tree planting will be successful!  The orchard is so large that they use the wheeler and trailer to haul the trees to my car - yes that is a GMC Acadia - my SUV - the "U" does stand for "Utility" after all!  He thought it was hilarious that I was putting them in the car but our trees had blossoms to set fruit and I didn't want them to get blown off by the wind driving down the road.

This is one of the gates to the orchards.  I love that is says "romance" above one of the rows.  It was a fun job to pick up the trees!  The trees we got are; Parkland, Westland, Battleford, Norland, Norkent, and September Ruby.  We chose them for hardiness in our area, eating and cooking qualities.

Here they are safe and sound in the yard of the school garden.  Waiting for it to get cooled down enough to plant them.  And we have some holes to dig too!  You can see the tanks from our water system to the left of the trees.  We have to fill those about three times per summer.  Huge thanks to the Bredberg family for that donation!

Here is Christy Way helping to measure the spaces for the trees.  We planted as recommended about 10-12 feet apart.  The area we are planting in is also used as a storage area right now for both the schools, so we have to be careful to plant where the orchard area won't be needed as a storage ground!

Huge shout out to the McRoberts family; Ryan, Ashlynn and Alayna, for coming to help dig the holes and bringing the Kubota for the assist!  The area we are planting in is very rocky and graveley and it would have taken us 6 days to dig the 6 holes for the trees if we had to dig them with shovels and people!  Life saver!

We used a mix of our soils that we have had donated - topsoil from Davis Constructors from when they put the turf down and took up the topsoil from under the football field, and composted horse manure donated by the Weber family and their friends!  Great stuff to grow in!

We also used the "complete fertilizer" blend from Arctic Organics in the bottom of the holes when we watered in to plant the trees.  We just had to go for it and choose the "coolest hot day".  The trees were at risk of becoming too "hot in the pot" and being damaged by it.  We also run the risk of damaging them if we plant when it is too hot - 6 of one I guess - We didn't have a day in sight of cooler weather any time soon so we had to go for it! 

We planted on a separate day than the digging of the holes, with the help of a couple of kids who want to remain nameless; even though "working in the garden is cool Mrs. Humphreys"!

We showed the kids how to break apart the roots of the trees so that they know they have been released from the pots.  Apples tree roots are prone to grow the same direction as they have been growing in the pots if they aren’t released this way and they will strangle themselves.  

Here is the September Ruby tree with the apples on it!  WooHoo!  We did have a little yellowing of some leaves - probably transplant shock - but they seem to be recovering and didnt drop all the blossoms or fruit!  We had four out of the 6 trees that will produce apples this year.  

These photos are from just about two weeks ago around 4th of July.  You can see the yellowing here, but also in the background that there are some clouds and that means it has cooled off a bit so the trees can recover.  The tree above is Parkland, and it has about 40 apples on it.  It will have to have some of the fruit culled off of it so that it will feed its roots too.  If you let it set too many apples in the first year or two, it doesnt feed the root system enough to survive winters.

This is the Westland tree - "our little Westland".  It is a younger tree than the others so no apples on it this year - I chose this one because I am familiar with it for its hardiness and good eating apples.  I have one here at the farm also.  The grey grid at the bottom of the photo is a stem protector.

This is the Norkent apple.  It has one little apple on it that will be good eats when it is mature!  We expect great things next season with all of these trees.  You can see how the stem protectors work, they keep out the voles, rabbits and other critters that might want to eat the bark off and kill the tree!  Some folks use a wire mesh as a stem protector but it is really difficult to cut and wrap; these ones are much more kid friendly.

Here is that Parkland a few weeks later when we know that all of these baby apples could turn into big apples, so it has come time to cull some off of it.  This is the only tree we will have to cull this year - we had a little blossom drop on the other three; either from transplant stress or not getting pollinated well.

Here I am!  Sad!  Cutting off the smaller of the apples from the Parkland so we get good big apples on the tree and it will feeds its own roots too.  The key is to take the smallest ones, and keep the biggest ones.  

It is ideal accouding to Doug at Snowfire Gardens (my dad and a fruit tree expert), if the apples dont touch each other.  It is one of my hardest things to do - culling the apples - I am a "but it wants to live" girl!  I like to give credit for effort!  But I have also killed a tree or two by letting it overproduce!  That is a really, really sad thing!

Here they are!  All planted and pretty!  We have put wire fencing surrounds around them for right now.  We arent able to fence the whole garden area right now- that is in the plan for when the school separates and the garden doesn't share space with storage connexes and other stuff.  We have to have the surrounds to keep the moose from eating the trees down to the ground in the winter should they get into the campus fence- it happens more often than we like- even though we like to see the moose!

Due to the gravelly nature of the orchard area and the heat wave that we have been having, we are watering every other day to keep the trees healthy using the water tanks and gravity feed system.  We have 450 feet of hose that we can attach to the spigots on the school, but it is so heavy it takes the football team to yeard it out and it really isnt fun for one person or even two to yard it out and water everything!  We also have had great help from our Youth-360 kids and staff who are here 4 days a week and have been helping keep the water flowing on our plants and trees!

Hee is the resting bench in the orchard.  I built it from a Pinterest project that I saw.  You can see my version of it here so you can easily build your own!

We also have a beautiful garden planted here at the school with cabbage, tomatoes, Kale, potatoes, beans, fennell, rosemary, squash, pumpkins, and peppers!  We had help from the McRoberts family and miss Sarah G who donated the peppers and helped plant and water!

This is our Fennel, with a few weeds and a couple of Rosemary plants that are in the very end of the bin.  We will dig those up for the winter and bring them indoors.

Here is the cabbage with the carrots and radishes in the background.  Cabbage has done wonderfully, and the radishes did well too but we have had a struggle with the carrot seed germination.  It may have been because the spring was so cool - not sure - maybe by September they will turn into actual carrots - stay tuned!

Here is the Kale bin - we have about 4 different varieties here and I cannot wait to have some of the kale chips that I know the culinary arts class will make with them!  I planted extra kale this year so I could make a little extra chips and have some for the freezer.

In case you missed it - see the information and recipes about kale chips here.  They are a favorite!

I know this was a long one and I thank you for sticking with us for the whole thing!  Stay tuned for the updates when we pick apples and harvest some of these yummies!

As we roll into a new fall and school year I hope you are blessed with bountiful harvests and good weather to glean it!  Blessed be!

Surviving Covid

 So.......  I went and got Covid!  Not a vaccine - the real illness.  And it was NOT on purpose! I have heard about people trying to get it on purpose, but that is not me!  I have sat in the middle of a school for the past 9 months with in person learning, and figured if I was going to get it I would have by now!  It is a bummer but I have been really lucky in that I have not been seriously sick with it - just mild flu like stuff and a couple of weird things!  I was diagnosed April 23rd, and I am mostly recovered now, with just a few mild symptoms lingering.  A dry cough once in a while, and feeling like I am breathing dust even during a rainstorm, when the air is clear and crisp!  

I know this illness is not funny and please do not think I am taking it lightly at all, but some of this stuff has been funny just for how it goes in our house.  Bear with me and Ill give you some tips from an almost Pro at the Covid!  Really?  There is no such thing!  Covid answers are muddy at best.

I started out having my regular neck pain and the headache that goes with it..... yes - nothing unusual about it at all!  I have a torn ligament in my neck that pre-covid shut downs was getting better with physical therapy and chiropractor visits.  If I overdo it in the yard or at the school or all of the above plus some other events, the neck will flare up and hurt like the dickens and have a bad headache to go with it.  I have a headache every day regularly.  For Reals.  Which I know is not normal- but my "normal" has not been for the past 4.5 years. 

I did not have a fever or other aches or loss of smell or taste (yet - wait that comes later), so I went about my business as usual eating my kind of aspirin I can eat (Bayer back and body pain works great - has a little caffiene though so hard to take at night).  I have  a red food coloring allergy, and Im also allergic to Naproxin which is the base for Alleve, so my choices are limited, can't have Naprox and cant be red, purple, orange, etc.... you get the idea.  So, as I said, business as usual!

I had had the opportunity to have tea with an auntie who was working from home so we should have both been fairly clean - but as usual - it gets weird with us and we have matching cups right down to the teabags in them and we accidentally drank off of each others cups!  Only realising it when I could taste the sweet in her cup and she the bitter in mine!  I likes a strong cup of tea!

Not sure if I gave it to her or she gave it to me, but..... we both got it!

The morning after I started having the headache and neck pain (4 days after having tea), she texted me early and let me know that her results had come back positive for Covid.  She was supposed to take a quick trip to drop off a car somewhere and had to test before the travel.  So, as I work at a school, I immediately texted and called our nurse who said "You're OUT!" (meaning I don't go to the school under any circumstances), and then said I should go get tested because my symptoms might just be Covid symptoms and not business as usual symptoms.  I may have had a slight fever and other body aches by this time - the days have run together!

So off I went to the Covid testing drive through!  Yes - we have an awesome drive through for covid testing about 20 miles from my house - its the best.  Results take about 12 hours though, but still - its a drive through!  Then I waited, and waited until...... Negative!!!

So....Woot Woot! Back to business as usual right?  Not so fast!!!  Nurse lady at the school says:  "Oh, weird.....Negative huh?  Well you have to go get another test! I was so certain you would be positive that I didn't think it would matter so you tested a day early to be able to go back to work on Monday so....retest!"

So again, off I go to the drive through Covid test where they recognize me from the day before and they are like..... "Ummmmm????  Why you here again?"  So I said, "I work at a school and...." thats as far as I got and they knew.  Swab up the nose again and this time she got lots of goo on it - not that I had any more goo than the day before, it just didn't seem like she really got a big gob of it the day before.  I don't even know if that matters really!?  So again, I waited and waited, and this time - of course- Positive!  24 hours later!

So began the close enquarantine of the Covid kind - or really - quite the opposite!  How to avoid your husband for days at a time living in the same house with one fridge and one stove!  It could be a sad country song, if it weren't so funny!  Two people in love in a three story house..... 

Yes our house is three stories tall - garage underneath.  It is still hard to avoid each other, except that he is currently terrified that he will get the Covid and be sick,so he avoids me literally like the plague!

This was not during the Covid "vacation" but the face he is making is the same one he gets when I get anywhere near him!  This face - this time is actually because Reedo is taller than he is now!

By about day 6 after the tea, I had definitely spiked a fever.  It was not high enough to be disconcerting, and it was one of those fevers where nothing but my lips and my eyeballs were hot!  Seriously!  Not kidding!  I was Hot Lips from Mash with sandpaper eyeballs for about 2 days!  Weird!  And only iced anything to drink - everything else felt too warm!

By this time the headache was gone, but I had also had joint and body aches and my skin hurt.  It was strange like a sunburn feels but no sun - just really sore.

Public Health has nurses that call me daily to see how I am doing.  It is very comforting to know that there will be someone who will be calling - just in case I'm too sick and hubby doesn't realize it.  They are from all over the state - I have talked to nurses from Dillingham, Anchorage and Kenai this week!  Its always a bit of an adventure with all their questions, and sometimes the answers sound so weird to me when I say it out loud (like the Hot Lips thing), but they have been very professional and not laughed too hard.

And then on day 8 I lost my sense of taste and smell!  It was not really gradual for me - like, cooking away in the kitchen and all of a sudden I can't smell the Pepperoni Stromboli!  Or taste the marinara sauce!  It was very garlicky so I know it should have tasted and there was absolutely nothing!  Also, because I couldn't smell anything I burned the Stromboli!  I never realized how much I use smell in my cooking - not just taste!  I have been making Stromboli for at least 25 years and have never burned a batch!

So I got one of the strongest cough drops that I could get - These bad boys are so strong that they will knock out any sinus crud and sore throat that comes along and you KNOW you had a cough drop!  I could taste and smell NOTHING!  NADA!  Zilch!

This is not like one of those "I burned my taste buds off with the pizza" either.  You still know if something is salty, or acid, and sometimes sweet but there is no flavor at all!  I'm not sure if it is like a "flavor memory", or if you aren't looking maybe you wouldn't know it at all.  I know that the cranberry juice is supposed to be tart and sweet, so ......maybe thats it?  

After about 10 days from the tea event, I started having strange muscle cramps - like spasms sort of but also charlie-horse-ish?!  I haven't felt anything like that before, and I certainly wasn't in charge of it!  I was able to stay very well hydrated so I knew it was not dehydration.  I was drinking about a gallon of water a day and very little caffiene - no coffee at all.  I was also having a little juice and some Gatorade, so should not have been having these symptoms for any of the "normal" reasons.  Weird!

This is the water I have always next to my sewing area!  I have at least this much next to the bed and the computer in the office.  I am drinking enough water!

I was also exhausted!  Mono type exhaustion - I could do about an hours worth of anything - cleaning, greenhouse, dishes, and I would have to go take a nap for about two hours!  Vacumming kicked my A*&!  Had to nap for three hours after doing about a 20x30' space!  I can usually do the whole house and then go do some other stuff before I need a nap!

So I rested.  Often and strangely well for me.  Usually I have to have a sleep catalyst, like melatonin or something to get me to the start line, but when your eyeballs are sandpaper, it is a little easier to not read all night or watch anything because they just want to be closed.  Luckily we have extra rooms so we could sleep separately and whenever I needed to!

On day 14 I finally felt mostly better, and was awake all day!  I got to go back to work on the Monday after day 14 and supposedly I will have at least 90 days of immunity and will not have to be excused from school or other activities for close contact!  This makes me happy.  It does not make me happy that I have been sick or that other people in my life have gotten sick with this darn stuff, but I am happy for the time that won't be taken up with quarantine.  I have quarantined 3 times before I got it!

A few pointers for you if you should come down with this crud:

1)  Rest as much as possible - not kidding - it is the only thing that helps so far.

2)  Do not eat anything questionable out of your fridge if you cannot taste or smell!  You will also not be able to tell if it is Covid symptoms or bad food!  Its a great time to clean out the fridge if you have the energy to do it!

This 10 days was the lowest steps I have had since wearing a fitbit for almost 3 years now!  I am just now finally up to my 10 to 12 thousand steps per day again!  

3)  Do not put your fit bit on - you will just be disappointed at the end of each day.  Keep your vibe up and keep the fit bit off!

May you all be well and be blessed!

Tomato Problem

I have always loved tomatos!  I think if you have read much of my blog you will read about all (or a lot) of my escapades with them!  I generally have a tomato "round-up" outlining what the favorites for the year were and any new varieties  that we tried and loved.  We have a great list of favorites - "sun gold", Chocolate Cherry", "Bush Early Girl" among a few!  "Cherry Punch" has been a big favorite for that past few years,(Aunt Cyn has always started those for us) but we werent able to get seeds this year for it!  Thats is a Tomato Problem - just one of them!

Supposedly when you have more than one tomato come up in one space, you are supposed to "cull" the weaker one and so it makes the other one strong.  I have never been able to "cull" and kill any of them!  If they come up and try to live - I am all about giving them a chance!  Pot them up and treat them well!

They usually do pretty well small or not!

A few years ago (about two summers ago) our internet got upgraded.  We had MTA (the local telephone cooperative) working at the end of the lane where the telephone/internet pedestal is.  Our lot is where the phone and internet, and actually the electric, comes into the whole subdivision; so if it needs work, the guys come and work at the end of the driveway.

(Tomatoes in the greenhouse - part of them)

How does that relate to a Tomato problem you ask?  Ill tell you!

(More tomatoes - even some of the small ones that would have been "culled" by other growers maybe) 

I digress - as usual when tomatoes are involved!  Anyhoo..... I am the only one in the neighborhood with a real "greenhouse", however........some of my neighbors are "growers".  One across the street grew marijuana on occaision - not in a greenhouse - in his house house!  Windows all boarded up, and darkening shades on others so the light couldnt be seen from outside the house.

(And there are two cucumbers mixed in with the tomatoes you see here- Cukes are doing ok!)

Whats the problem you say?  Marijuana is legal in your state, right?  This was before it was legal, and if you have a "grow" it has to be registered even today for more than a little bit for "personal use". 

So.....when the nieghbor (they don't live there any more), would harvest his "grow", the smell of the Mary Jane would waft over to our yard, and really throughout the neighborhood!  The smell alone indicated that it was more than a "personal use" grow!

(And still more tomatoes)!

So.... the MTA guys are out there working - they started at about 8:00 in the morning- and at about 10:00 a.m, an Alaska State Trooper shows up in the driveway.  Fortunately, it is a Trooper I know, and he is laughing a little as he says "Lis- I gotta check the inside of the greenhouse, if you don't mind?"  Because he knows that is not what I grow in there, but even he could smell the neighborhood smell that day (I'm pretty sure the MTA guys called them and thought it was my greenhouse)!

So, of course I take him right in and show him all the varieties of tomato I am growing as well as the Cucumbers and Peppers too!  Mixed in with the tomatoes, of course!

He laughed and said "You don't have a Dope problem, but you might have a Tomato Problem!"

Then he cruised over to the neighbors house!

(Cherry Punch - so tasty)

A Tomato Problem - it's not a bad problem to have!  Stay tuned for the round up at the end of the season.

I hope you have a great summer and a "tomato problem" is your only one!  Blessed be!

A Wicked Design!

 I was finally able to finish the design, pattern, and uploads for the newest Wicked Raven Design!  Introducing Wayfarers Star!  This is the second pattern of my original designs.  I call my pattern designs my "utter quilt bravery"!  They have required the most from me as far as creative bravery and learning new things technology wise.  

This is a big block - 18"!  I love how this block comes together and all the different colorways that can be done!

Check it out on my ETSY site Here!

My first pattern is also available on the ETSY Site too!  It is called "Twisted Star".  Twisted Star is a 12" block.  It was my very first moment of utter quilt bravery!  This is the block I agonized over and made umpteen copies of before I called it done.  I still hesitate about my designs because I dont consider them "perfect", but nothing ever is!

A friend a few years ago told me "put it out there"!  All of your time and the beauty will be wasted if you died tomorrow afraid to publish your work!  That goes for quilts, books, poetry, and just about anything that we do.  Creativity wasted when we arent brave enough to put it out there!

My process is pretty simple.  I start with a notebook of graph paper that I have pretty full of started designs.  It is a bit of a mish-mash of organized chaos and items that spark something inside my creative soul;  A piece of a tee shirt with a tree on it, an ad from a magazine that has the sea and a spark of sun, or just pages that I have begun an idea on.

I have my "travel set" of colored pencils in a pencil pouch with a sharpener and a few markers for when I need a quick grab and go pack, or when I am toting it around the house (like watching movies and making design notes).

I have a couple different rulers in the front of this particular design book as it is the one that I use the most.  I keep them in place with the sticky velcro so they are easy to remove and put back.

And then there is the design basket in the sewing room, with extra graph and notebooks, markers, pencils, sharpeners, and even a coloring book in case my creativity is stuck!

I use Electric Quilt 8 for part of my design, or sometimes to print templates for testing.  (one of the new things I have learned/am learning technology wise).  I also use MS Word to write the patterns out for publishing and copyrighting.  I used another pattern I had purchased as my sample for what it need to look like.  Remember to put the Copyright information on your pattern!

Copyright process is pretty simple once you know how it works.  I know it sounds like it would be complicated, but once you are on the site at 

https://www.copyright.gov/

You can register for an account and you can do the whole copyright process in there, including uploading most of the materials there for completion.  For quilt patterns I have had to send an actual physical copy of the item to the Library of Congress for "deposit proof" purposes, but they seem to be using that less and less and just using things that can be uploaded online.

The copyright process does take time after you have uplosded all your information and "proof".  I have one that is in the process since January of 2021 and I am still waiting for "completion" on it.  Covid has slowed things down at the Library I have heard.  

There is nothing like the feeling of when you get your first copyright certificate!  Such satisfaction!

Just begin!  Start your book, your design, your poem!  Be utterly bold and brave!  Be blessed!