First Fire & More New Followers

We had our first fire of the season this past weekend. We love to sit outside by the fire with an adult beverage in hand. We find it very relaxing, especially after a hard days work.

I was very fashionable out by the pit. Perfect night for a fire & just cool enough to need my boots.

We got 2 more strips of the garden prepped. The wind cooperated all morning. We were able to lay all the newspaper, then wet it down, add leaves & horse poo & then topped it off with a thick layer of hay/straw, then water once again.







Leave & poo







Hay/Straw





We had brought leaves from the City which was enough to do one bed, although it was a bit thin but well composted. We then raked pecan & oak leaves from along the fence line & filled the huge trash can & 2 barrels (only took about 30 mintues). This was more than enough to do another strip. The more leaves the better. We also had just enough poop to do that 2nd strip. That makes about 1/2 of the garden done. (I have such a hard time positioning pictures on this blog, I originally had them lined up side by side but that didn't last after I added the captions.)

Since it was such a nice day & still fairly early we went over to my cousins to shovel 2 more barrels of horse poo. He has 3 horses & a barn which makes it very easy to gather the poo. The hardest part is getting the horses to move from the barn opening. They just want to be loved on.

I even got one of the pre-prepared beds outlined in blocks. I was trying to determine how many block would be needed for each one. After a bit of adjusting I've determined it will take 20 blocks per bed (20 block x 20 beds = 400 blocks!). The original goal was to have a 10' x 3' inside planting area. Due to the size of the blocks it wound up being 9' 8" long & 32" wide, which is just fine. This is just a prototype. When we lay them we will have to dig out a bit to make them all level & I will put cardboard under each to help keep the weeds & grass at bay.

MIL & FIL were up working on their little house & they brought about 60 block to use for a temporary project. Once that project is done we will use those blocks in the garden. I've got another 10. That means we only have to find (or buy) 320 more. Whew, my wallet & back is hurting just thinking about it.

Once all the beds are outlined, we will line the pathways with cardboard & cover w/wood chips (once I find a source for the chips).

Enough about gardening .... I'd like to welcome some new followers to my little blog world:

Kelly from http://kellyshappyhollowfarm.blogspot.com/. She's a lovely lady from out west that enjoys things that interest us all.

Red Woman from http://www.red-woman.com/ also decided to join. In her words ... she's "an opinionated woman who speaks her mind". I've been lurking around her blog for a while & am very happy she's joined mine.

Melanie from http://adventuresincountryliving.blogspot.com/. She's not too far from our Country House & we have a lot in common.

Thank you all for joining me on my journey.

Here's my crooked little snowman for the front door from an idea I got from Manuela. You can tell I made those wreaths myself, not at all perfect like the one Manuela posted. He's a lot like me, heavy on the bottom ... lol. Just perfect for our Country House. (Note: Greg wants to get him a proper scarf,  to replace the extra ribbon I used.)