6:45pm

It's been a long day.  We got a lot 

of stuff done though.  Spent most of 

the time outdoors since the weather was nice.

You know you live in Ohio when

you get up early to head to the flea market

and are wearing a t-shirt under a sweater

and are wearing a winter coat with socks and shoes.

Then by the after noon you change into

shorts and a sleeveless shirt and go barefoot.

LOL. 

The flea market was better than last weekend

with more vendors.  I did find a couple vendors

who were selling the flower and veggie seed packets.

I got 50 seed packets for $2.00

 I also bought a 6 pack of hot banana pepper plants for $2.00.

That was a really good deal considering 

I saw ONE banana pepper plant at Walmart for $3.00.

It was the only other live plant I wanted to get for the garden.

When we got back home from the flea market

Tony cut the back yard.  I wanted to plan out

my garden beds but as I watched the sun and shading

I realize where I wanted to put the beds along

the fence in the back just wasn't going to work.

It turned out it was all shaded in that area

so I had to come up with a plan B.

Plan B will be to put the garden beds 

where I previously had a garden

the year before last.  It stays sunny most

of the day and I already have horse

manure mixed in the soil.  This photo was taken in the

late afternoon as the shade was setting in.  It won't be 

as large as the one before due

to a vehicle sitting on half of

the previous garden bed.  That is why

I am trying to learn about square foot gardening

so I can put just as many plants into a smaller space.

I still have a lot of work to do in the garden space

from raking it all out, pulling up old tomato fencing

and digging up dirt and making the wooden beds.

About 3 years ago I was given a ton of day lilies

for free if I dug them all up.  I ended up with

a small pickup truck load.  So many that I had a bunch

left over after planting them around the house.

I ended up planting the remaining ones at the edge

of the old garden.  Well I had to dig them all

up today if I wanted a garden here again.

I found them all a new home in the front 

of the house by all the bushes where

nothing else wants to grow.

They'll probably look crappy this year being

thinned out and transplanted but next

year they should look much better.

As I go around and show you things in my yard

I'll tell you prices of everything to make

the flower and garden beds and how I managed

to make them as cheap as possible.

The little wheel barrow I found free

along with the hose reel that I found along

the curb on trash day and all our hoses

left behind by residents where Tony works.

I still ended up with about 6 or so extra plants

and had to figure out where to plant them.

I decided to put them in the middle of my

rock bed with the zinnias.

The rocks were already there dumped into our

yard by the neighbor behind us trying to

block off the alley way and to keep

people from driving in the grass.

It looked like crap.  And I was a little upset

that he did it.  But he has since moved

and I'm trying to make the best of it

considering I can't pick these rocks

up and haul them outta here.

I arranged them into the flower bed you see

to make it look like something other than a rock pile.

While there was no evidence of ants or

ant hills in the flower bed I managed

to dig up a bunch and found them 

all up and down my arms and hands.

Those little buggers looked pissed off.

And I'm pretty sure they bit me because

the areas between my fingers burned and

hurt like heck afterwards.  I'm going to put some

Diatomaceous Earth (Food Grade)

crawling insect killer in there.

It's safe around pets, people, flower and veggie gardens.

I'm all about natural gardening 

and have been using this stuff for the past year. 

I even used it on my banana pepper plants

last year that started getting bugs.

They were gone by the next day!

That 4 lb bag at about $9 goes a long way!

I still have most of a bag left.

I put some in plastic condiment bottles

I found at a yard sale for .05 cents each

and squeeze it onto the areas that have pests.

Here is my Concord grapevine coming back this year.

I found it at Lowes in their mark down area.

I've had about 3-4 years now.

No grapes yet.

Tony was about ready to throw out this iron

umbrella base when I rescued it.

We haven't used patio umbrellas for years

and this has been sitting around doing nothing.

I found a metal pole to put in it.

I would like to find a bird feeder to put

on top of it.  This will keep squirrels out of the bird seed.

 Iron umbrella base was free and found at

my hubby's work.

Here is a bird bath, but I use it to give

the squirrels and neighborhood wild cats drink of water.

I found the metal bowl for free

and the table used to be a patio chair I found.

I removed the back part of the chair since it was broke.

I have two other actual birdbaths,

one is plastic and one is like a ceramic.

Both were gotten at yard sales for $2.00 each.

I got the solar powered tiki torches put in along the driveway.

They were $3 for 4 of them at a yard sale.

The iron work on the fence was part of a gazebo

we got off Freecycle.  I tore it apart and hung

the panels on the fence for morning glories to grow on.

The hostas were all gotten from my hubby's work.

Residents leave behind plants on their patio 

and I'll go over and dig them up and bring 'em home.

The old street bricks lining the driveway flower

bed were gotten free from my mom.

Someone had them as a sidewalk in front of mom's house

when they moved in and mom put

in a concrete walk and had them tore out.

 I decided I wanted to jazz up my garden area

considering it is my retreat area to go to

and relax.  I brought up an old window I had

in the basement and put it up on the fence.

I found it free along a curb.

The shutters I also got free along with the flower box.

The two wooden benches I got with the free

wood I picked up recently off Craigslist.

The medium sized flower pots were .05 cents each

at a church sale.  I even found the John Deer

wagon out along the curb.  I use it all the time

for gardening hauling plants, tools, bricks

and what not around the yard.  All my yard tools like

shovels, spades, hoe and rakes were given to us.

 

When working out in the yard on a sunny day

be sure to remove any heat patches that you

may have on your shoulders.  I forgot about the ones

I had on and had gotten a little sun on my shoulders

and now have a white, rectangle spot where

the patches were, lol.

These things have helped my shoulder pain.

You can get a box of 20 at Dollar Tree.

We had supper outside.  Tony fixed up some burgers on the grill with all the fixins.  We also had tater tots and potato salad.

The grill use was free.  A coworker of Tony's moved

into an apartment at their work.  The residents are no

longer allowed to have grills on the property

due to being a fire hazard.

His coworker had asked us if we could store the

grill at our house and in return we could use it

when we wanted.  It even came with a full tank of propane. 

All folding chairs and tables were found free

at Tony's work.

After a long day everyone was tired

and had their bellies full.

I noticed one kid went missing.

This is where I found him, in his room asleep

with his birthday bike over top him, lol.

We got the bike for him on Saturday and

told him he couldn't ride it til his birthday.

So he's been cleaning and working on it in his

room and admiring it like it was a trophy. 

It's a DK General Lee bike we got

off Craigslist.