Tuesday, May 31, 2011

A morning of gardening.


Planting Sunflowers is HARD WORK!


I gave up my dream of keeping everything on the farm native to Texas. I just can't wrap my mind around how to landscape with them. If I ever actually learn enough to do it then I'm writing a book about. One is ABSOLUTELY NEEDED! (Now that I've said that I'm sure that folks will point me in the right direction. You know, since I've already planted a slew of non native sunflowers, and such.)

It's not like this year was going to be a perfectly landscaped year anyways. I think it may take about 3 years or so before I'm happy with the way things look. Or 10 years. Or 20 years. 
Kiska shares her step with her Bubba.


I knew that if I didn't go throw some things in the ground that we would have NOTHING. I get caught up in that perfectionist thing that wants everything to look just right. (You would think that by now I'd know myself well enough to know that I don't do things that way.) I just hope that all the seeds that the littles planted make it up. Some of them looked a little deep to me.

Ronan assured me that they would be just fine.
Comforting.
 
Conner and Auriana preparing their Mammoth Sunflower beds.


Is it best to garden with a plan? 
Yep.

But if the plan gets in the way of actually
GROWING something....

all by YOURSELF....
Then forget the plan.  

Grab a shovel and some seeds and get to work.

(I PLAN on saving the seeds so that I control what goes where. HA! We'll see how that goes....see above mentioned inability to stick to a plan.)


I can't help it though. I think that even if the place were taken over by morning glories and sunflowers it would still be better than the rotten stickers we have around the house. 
Tyler is trying to thin out the stickers.

(disclaimer.....I know that it seems like I'm belittling native plantings...I'm not. But I finally decided that if I could plant non native tomatoes, herbs, potatoes, and pumpkins in my garden then why not sunflowers too?)

 

1 comment:

Jim Miller said...

Since joining and working with Texas Master Naturalists program, I'm nowhere near as hardcore about keeping it all native as I once was. Certainly, I remain pro native with a strong native bias, but I tend to think of 'native' in a wider, 'regional' context, as in native to the southern rolling plains. Talking 'bout people or plants, everyone came from somewhere else!