Sunday Thoughts

Posted on May 9, 2021 by Sheila

We have 22 days of school left. 20 for the kids. I have an additional 2 workdays (Monday June 7th and Tuesday June 8th).
Today is Mother’s Day. My gift was being woken up at 12 am with Zach throwing up. Lily started getting sick at 2am. I have been up and down with them most of the day. Hopefully no one else will get this lovely bug.
On Thursday, Kendall had seizure like activity and was rushed to the Emergency Room. We currently have no answers and lot of questions. She has an appointment on May 19th.
I am trying something new and some different recipes this week. I made 2 casseroles that just need to be cooked. I will make a third one on Tuesday so each day will be heat and eat. I am hopeful that we can add these into the rotation as we are getting bored again of the same food. I am also trying to use up things in my freezers to make room for summer produce.
We have purchased a batting cage for Zach. The old swing set was taken down and we are currently waiting on rubber mulch to begin installing the cage. He is continuing t make improvements with his skills and really enjoying the game.
Matt and I added grids to the garden beds today. We currently have lots of things growing. I am also planning another planting at the end of May to extend the growing session.
I decided just this week that I will continue to work in Guam on Sunday nights all during the summer. This will allow me to keep some contacts and also supply the extra money needed for the outside projects we have been working on.

Saving on Saturday- Square Foot Garden Update

Posted on April 24, 2021 by Sheila

Hopefully we have experienced our last freezing temps this Spring! We have lots of tomato plants and a few other plants that are beginning to sprout. I am hoping for a large harvest this summer. We may lose the cherry tomatoes (middle picture) but so far they are still hanging on.

None of the cucumber seeds that I started inside survived but I did find a couple of our seed sprouted.

I have four Basil plants to keep alive this year.

Finally a couple of sugar snap peas have sprouted.

Off to a rocky start, let’s hope things get better!

Friday- Catch up

Posted on April 23, 2021 by Sheila

I think that April has been one of the busiest months that I have had in a long long time. Today April 23rd is the first night of the month that I have not had a need for a place to go!

Honesty is always the best policy so I am going to admit right now that this is also the first blog post that I have written the entire month. I did make a decision that I am going to post 5-7 pictures a day for the time we were in Disney. I also need to make a birthday post for Matt, update on the square foot garden and of course talk about Zach and his baseball as well. I am very hopeful to get all these pictures post in the next week.

We have decided to turn the playhouse that is no longer in use into a greenhouse for next year. My goal is to re-use and re-purpose as much as possible but also provide a watering system and organized way to use the space. I have already gotten plants started in the new square foot garden. I am looking forward to lots of fresh vegetables this year!

Financially we are still on the right track. Our gas budget is getting close for the month but his does include taxes and tags on the car in addition to the gas for our Disney trip. Grocery so far are really low but we have a Costco trip planned for tomorrow.

Now to enjoy some quiet time.

Square Foot Garden update

Posted on March 29, 2021 by Sheila

After spending many hours on both Friday and Saturday. We officially have a garden.

We added 3 12 foot beds that are 2 foot wide each for a total of 72 squares.

The bed with the wire climber is 8 foot long and 2 foot wide. The smallest bed is 6 foot by 2 feet. This is an additional 28 squares. This brings the new bed total to 100 squares.

We add dirt…

In total we have 100 square feet along with 22 spots for tomatoes and a sweet potato bed.

I am very happy with the look and hopefully after our trip will start to grow lots and lots of veggies!

Square Foot Garden Update

Posted on March 21, 2021 by Sheila

We (yes all five of us) spent 8 hours working on the garden redo on Saturday. I am so excited to see all the changes finally coming together and starting to look like a neat and organized attempt.

First we started by putting down landscape fabric to help eliminate some weeds.

We added 3 new beds, 2 are 12 feet long and 2 foot wide while that third is 8 foot long and 2 foot wide.

Finally on Sunday, I started some green peppers, rainbow peppers and cucumbers inside by the back door.

I am so excited to get this started!

5 Things Friday

Posted on March 19, 2021 by Sheila

I have been out of work for 2 days this week because of a stye that became infected and decided to spread to my entire face.
We have decided and completed a refinance of our mortgage. We dropped the interest rate by over 1 %. We are going to pay off credit card debit with what we decided to cash out. Our current goal is to pay a extra principal payment each month in order to complete pay off the house in 7 years instead of another 15. One interest fact for me is that my first mortgage was at 9.99% and our current mortgage is 2.75%.
We leave for Disney in 15 days!!!!!
Our stimulus check was used for the following- 4 new pair of glass for the kids, the cost associated with redoing our square foot garden and paying for a condo on a NC beach for a week in July.
Today, I have placed two orders one for lumber $602. and a second for dirt $550. Our trip to Lowes was an additional $135. All expenses for the garden! I have increased the budget to $1500 after today.

SAVING ON SATURDAY-

Posted on March 13, 2021 by Sheila

This week we are again focusing on re-doing our square foot garden. I am so excited that we have been able to save all of the dirt that has been ordered and put in our previous beds. We also have 2 large tomato beds, a sweet potato bed and 2 strawberry beds that have cost us absolutely nothing. Our demolish phase is complete and next week we hope to build out all of our new boxes and get place and the garden part completed. This will allow us to plant the first few weeks of May!

Zach wanted his picture with all his hard work. He has even been working after school.

Saving on Saturday

Posted on March 7, 2021 by Sheila

Yesterday, I gave you the reason that I am updating and drastically changing the square foot garden. Today I am going to share a couple of pictures of our progress.

The best part of these three new beds is total cost was $0. The tin was salvaged serval years ago from a car shed that my brother was tearing down. The wood and screws were from the previous square foot garden beds which are about half way removed. I also re used pavers from the previous bed. I should be able to grow a total of 22 tomato plants and enough sweet potatoes to last us an entire year with just these three beds. This finally picture is just to show where we are at curently.

Lots more work and cost to follow but for the first 2 days of actually work we are at zero cost!

Square Foot Garden 5 Things Friday

Posted on March 5, 2021 by Sheila

This list is a little different as it is the reason that we are going to undertake the mass project of re-doing our square foot garden. My goal is to use the same concept for square foot gardening just in a different way. The biggest difference will be that the garden boxes will not be on the ground instead they will be elevated.

Prevent dogs and cats in the neighborhood from using the boxes as a rest area. Even Rugar is really sneaky in this. I am sure that is part of the reason some of the plant last summer did not survive.
Expand the number of items that I am able to grow. My plan is to reduce each box to a width of 2 feet. This will allow me to have easy access to both side and should provide an additional 50 square feet in the garden.
Place weed cloth under all the boxes and remove as much grass as possible. By raising the height of the beds this will prevent lots of grass from ended up in each garden bed. It feels like we have more weeds and grass in our current square foot beds than we do growing in the area around it. Because we are reusing most of the dirt, we also can remove lots of the weeds that are growing at grown level as well.
Allow me to spend more time and energy in the garden without bending or sitting on the ground. This should be a huge benefit in year to come as the beds will be around waist height for me.
Expand and arrange the growing season and spaces better. We hope to add a small growing tunnel in the fall. But we will be able to have several different varieties of peppers and beads without the worry of cross pollination.

Thursday Thoughts

Posted on October 29, 2020 by Sheila

Today is a remote learning day for both myself, Zach and Kendall. We are expecting serve weather from tropical storm Zeta to move through this afternoon. Zach is already enjoying watching the wind and rain bands move through. It is very different based on the fact that we are all working on school related task but at home. I will admit it takes the fun out of missing school but should make the schedule much easier to manage.
Following the storm today, it is suppose to turn much cooler. With freezing temperatures on Sunday night and Monday night. We still have not turned on heat or air so I am hopefully to make it to at least Monday or Tuesday before needing to turn the heat on. We are also going to have to harvest the remaining peppers and tomato from the garden. This is actually the longest that I can remember having items still growing.
November is a very expensive month for us. We have car insurance ($408.27), Microsoft renewal ($100), my web site renewal ($30) and the rest of Christmas presents. Thankfully I have a ton of hours in Guam this month. I am hoping to cover most of our December Disney trip. A sad realization is that I receive a paycheck this Friday but will not receive another check until after Thanksgiving.
We survived our busiest week so far this year!! I even have a list on the board of task to complete on Saturday.
Budget wise October has been a great month. We are at $250 for gas and $550 for groceries. I am planning to hit my goal of paying of one credit card by the end of December. We also should not use most of the grocery budget for November and December as our freezers are full. I am now looking a small holes such as soups for lunch and other convenient items. I have also restocked the paper supplies as well.

Teens Tots and Everything In Between

Life, Love and Coupons

Category Archives: Square Food Garden