Good morning everyone and happy Sunday!

This week I wanted to update you all as to what we have been up to outside to get ready for summer weather and getting our plants sorted. Last weekend, Andrew and I worked on the back fence area of our yard. We had two different vines growing there and wanted to take most of them off the back fence. I started by removing the main vine from the fence but I kept the grape vine that had two little branches growing. That took a lot of effort since we have a chain link fence and the vine was so intertwined with it! After we getting the main vine off the back fence (we like it on the side fence actually), we realized how much root there was trying to grow in leaves and plant debris on the cement that is behind our fence. This lead to us clearing out the debris and taking up the vine roots in an attempt to keep it from growing back in that spot. We also took out a baby tree that had been growing through the fence, since it doesn’t really belong there. I then made sure the grapes vine branches were getting trained to grow along the back fence where we would like them. Finally, we looked at the raspberry plants growing there and made sure they got the TLC they needed, because really we would love to have grapes and raspberries growing in that area. It was great weather to work on that last weekend! So nice to be outside but also to be cleaning up an area that needed help.

Also last weekend, our new cedar raised bed planter arrived for the deck. We are super excited since it is supposed to be self watering and it looks and smells great. We are using that to replace the multiple pots that I’ve had growing various herbs and plants on the deck. Since it arrived, I also bought seeds and can’t wait to start them! I’ll be growing basil, oregano, cilantro, rosemary, and radishes in this planter. Super exciting for me! These are herbs we use a lot in our cooking, so I plant most of them every year. The radishes I try my hand at every couple years but I’m pretty terrible at thinning them because I just love all my plants so much. I’m hoping by having them close to the house, I’ll be able to watch for when to thin them and harvest this year better than I have in the past. Just imagine teaching a toddler about plants and gardening— I can’t wait for that opportunity!!

One day at work last week we had a “lunch and learn” on how to care for apple trees. It was super helpful since we have two apple trees in our yard and weren’t doing all that we could to help them thrive. They taught me about pruning, fruiting, fertilizing, everything! Hopefully we can apply this new knowledge to help our trees going forward.

Yesterday we went to a plant nursery and to Menards to see about getting more trellises for the garage. Last year we started training the grape vines from the other side of our backyard to grow onto the garage and they quickly filled up the ground level trellises we purchased! Now we want to help give them space to grow up the garage and not just a few feet off the ground. But grapes are vines so they need something to attach to. Unfortunately we didn’t have much luck. neither store had what we were looking for. On the plus side, Andrew seems pretty excited to get wood and create more of what we want for the garage! That will be his project in the next week or two. While we were at Menards we found some really fun things though: an open bird house that is supposed to attract robins or cardinals and a butterfly bungalow to help our pollinators! They are super cute and I hope we get new residents in them soon. Andrew and I are on the lookout for a cool bird bath fountain as well—then we’ll have food, water, and a house for all our outdoor friends!

Soon (I hope) we’ll be able to start working on the garden on the side of the house and the back garden that we share with our neighbors. We might be building a raised bed on the side of the house this year, but nothing is completely set yet. It would be really nice to be able to add some better soil there, since the natural soil is pretty sandy. We’ll see what we come up with though!

~Natalie