Joys of Gardening...

Currently, this area that we live in is experiencing a drought (along with many others across the country). Our grass is pretty brown and hurts to walk across barefoot. We had been hosing our garden down but recently we purchased a couple of soaker hoses.

Wow! What a difference it makes. Our garden seems to be getting bigger every time we check on it. Our bell peppers are growing like crazy. I saw a mini bell pepper (the size of a thumb nail) and then next day when I checked, it was the size of a child's fist...now I am looking forward to the day they turn red! We have so many tomatoes that if they all survive until they are ripe, we are going to be hoping that all of our neighbors love tomatoes as much as we do!

Yesterday, in our perusal of the garden to see what new has popped up...we found that a zuchini was growing. It is tiny right now, but I am really looking forward to having zuchini (from our garden) for our stir-frys and for zuchini bread. We have four plants, do you think we'll have enough zuchini?

At the moment, our biggest fear is that we are going to wake up one morning or come home from work to find our garden trampled. There is a cow next to us that has figured out how to get out of her electric fence. It is pretty interesting to watch her (a cow) slide one of her front hooves between the wire of the fence, then slip her head under, then the next front paw and then the two back legs!

We have been enjoying our garden, if you couldn't tell. As all people know who have grown anything, it is pretty satisfying to plant something and then eat it later!

Shindig on the Green

We went down to the Martin Luther King Jr park in Asheville to listen to some local bluegrass music. It was sweet...they allowed us to bring our dog and a picnic if we wanted plus it was free! What a great date night. It was a pretty nice setup...off to the front were actual bands playing and then you could walk around the perimeter of the park there were groups of 3 to 7 people jamming together underneath tents. Some of the guys looked like they might have been the originators of the bluegrass movement...but they probably just picked it up from their parents.

 

At the Shindig on the Green, Maddy was a friend maker, lots of little kids and even adults wanted to come and pet her. It was awesome that everyone was so friendly and that they even allowed dogs to come hang out. This vet was enjoying the show. If you can, check out his pack on the back of his rig.

Our walk this week consisted of going up the Parkway to Craggy Gardens and then walking down to Douglas Falls. It was a wonderful hike, if a bit on the humid side, but we hardly saw anyone. We were able to eat our lunch at the falls in solitude. Along the way we saw lots of mushrooms and a different type of rhododendron in bloom.

 

Madera had a grand old time, she was much better behaved than last weekend, when we attempted to go for a bike ride, but she jumped on the first person she saw. We are trying to nix that bad trait of hers, so we turned around and went back to the truck. On this hike she was more distracted by the stuff around, so she didn't jump on the backpackers and hikers we saw until the very end. We keep hearing that 3 is the magic age when dogs settle down...only 17 months to go...if the vet who guessed Maddy's age is correct.