Gardening in Gardiner

Today was the first day without rain we've had in over a week.  No wonder I've been cranky and irritable.   I had such high hopes for today.  In my head, no rain meant sunshine and warmth.  HA!  It was freezing all day.  I actually think the warmest part of my day was during the 13 mile run with the girls this morning.  From that point, it just got colder.   I must say, I was much happier with yesterday's weather.  We did get a few thunderstorms come rumbling through, but it was at least 15 degrees warmer and I DID see the sun a few times!  

As I said above, the girls and I did our 13 mile run this morning.  We started out at 8 am on the rail trail.  On our way back (2 hours later) we began noticing a lot of people walking their dogs - many more than normal.  And they weren't really just walking just any dog - a lot of people were walking greyhounds. When we came around the final corner, we saw tons of balloons and even more greyhounds and their owners.  There was a table set up with some information there, but we didn't go over.  Then I saw this event posted on facebook today.   I just hope they cleaned up their poop!  

Anyway, today's run, as always, was nice and easy.  I love these runs.  It was MUCH better than my run yesterday.  I decided to take Izzy in the jogger and go out of a run.  This was the first time I took the jogger out this year.  Jeez it was hard.  I have forgotten how hard it is to run with a stroller.  I felt like I was running a 7 minute mile, but then I looked at my Garmin and it completely disagreed and told me I was running a 9 minute mile.   I was exhausted at the end of the run.  My calves were hurting so bad I came home and put my Salonpas pads on each of my calves.  I know I'm not supposed to use more than one, but I really just had to do it.   

After today's run, I felt great.   Which is a good thing because we really had to get out in the yard and garden and take of the amazon.  The lawn was crazy and completely filled with dandelions and my garden was absolutely overrun with them as well.  What I really wanted to do was get mulch and put it down today, but I desperately had to weed first.  While Tucker, Izzy and I weeded the garden, Ward mowed.  

This is how high the grass was - the left over patch by the tree waiting for Ward to weedwack it! 

After weeding - let's just hope most of the weeds stay away until next weekend
- when I'll have time to get mulch on it!  

After all that was done, Ward moved the strawberry planter over to my berry garden.  Yes, that's right.  I've turned my old veggie garden into a berry garden for a couple of reasons:  1.  I'm a full share holder at the CSA now (and hopefully Keena has an awesome growing season!), 2.  I just don't have time for the maintenance of another garden right now, 3.  berries are so much easier and don't require as much work - I won't need, I mean, Ward won't need to rototill it anymore and keep up with the weeding.   

Strawberries

Last year I bought 5 blueberry (high) bushes.  I am happy to report that they all made it through the winter and are flowering right now!  

Blueberries

Also, two weekends ago, my in-laws split up their raspberry bushes and gave the "extras" to us.  They are looking good.  Hopefully I'll get some raspberries from them this year.  We'll see!  

They don't look like much, but these raspberries will fill in next year!