Planting time!

Northblue blueberry

Northsky blueberry

We've been busy planting various things: Latham and Heritage raspberries, Jersey Knight and Purple Passion asparagus, and Northblue and Northsky blueberries. The Jersey Knight asparagus roots were pretty puny and dried out, so I'm not sure if they will survive or not. It will be 2-3 years before I can try the asparagus if both varieties live. Supposedly, the raspberries will be ready to try later this summer. It will be 2 years before the blueberries are ready to try.

Siouxland cottonwood

We also got my first tree for the year planted: a Siouxland cottonwood. Yes, some of my family members have called me crazy. :) It was planted by the burn pile, so it won't be too far to haul the sticks and branches that break off.

Its a cotton-less variety, which should make Chris and the neighbors happy. I wouldn't have minded an old fashioned one like from when I grew up on the farm, but those are messier and bigger trees; the Siouxland one isn't quite as big or messy.

I have 3 more trees I want to plant this year: a northern catalpa (my mom planted one from a seed when she was little and it's still alive and growing today), scarlet oak and a cardinal royal mountain ash (my grandma had a mountain ash too, so that makes me think of her). The mountain ash is expensive, so if it dies, I won't be happy, so I'm still thinking on that one. I can get a bare root variety of a different type of mountain ash that would be ok and a lot cheaper, but I'd really like the cardinal royal variety since the berries are red, rather than orange.

I have more things I'd like to plant around here and there, but I do only have so much time to water, I (and family members) keep trying to remind myself. So, replanting windbreak shrubs that died during the winter will wait another year, along with some of the other shrubs I want to plant in our corner fence/property border areas. I also have a different corner garden area I'm also slowly working on... I have too many ideas and get too many plant catalogs in the mail!! I admit, I don't have a lot of patience and just want everything done right away and forget about the initial watering commitments that take a bit of time.

D has had fun helping plant everything so far. The blueberries are in pots so that I can keep the soil acidic enough for them, so that wasn't quite as fun for him since I didn't let him use his little shovel for those.

Purple Passion asparagus

Latham raspberry

Jersey Knight asparagus

Heritage raspberry

D has been enjoying the warmer weather we've been having and has been crazy exploring. We don't really have trees for him to climb, but he has decided to try an evergreen. Some of the lower branches had been cut off, so he's got toe holds and has been making use of them. He did fall down and scrape his tummy, but that hasn't deterred him from trying to climb it again and again!

He has also been wearing his bike helmet every where when he's outside, and not just when he's riding his bike, so I guess if he does fall more out of the tree his head will be ok! ;-)

The county scraped a bunch of gravel from the shoulder into our mowed ditch this winter, so it has not been fun getting that raked and picked out of the grass. We should have been working on it earlier, but were trying to get the basement done before the nice weather came. The basement isn't done, but we needed to get outdoor stuff started. A big thanks to my mom for all the help she's given us!!!

We mowed the lawn for the first time this week--argh! Not quite ready for that weekly chore to start, but am definitely liking the warm weather and all the plants coming alive again. Hopefully we can escape all of the crazy severe weather this spring and my little plants that I've just planted will get a chance to grow!

D climbing the tree.