The agenda for this weekend was going to be all about painting the risers for our stairs, all of which are just raw MDF at the moment… And then the weather turned beautiful and we got totally distracted by garden work.

After all the main construction finished, our yard was left as a pretty desolate patch of dirt which had been compacted under workers, equipment and heavy machinery for nine months. On Sunday we were able to put serious work towards getting the front yard where it needs to be. It gets full sun basically all day long and is going to be our main food production area. We set up the garden a while ago and it is just now sprouting peas, spinach, and arugula. But this weekend was all about the areas to the sides of our entry steps.

We finally removed the post for our temporary mailbox, and in its place went an artichoke (one of two). The slopes got graded with strawberries planted in parts to hold the soil in place. In addition to the artichokes, we also picked up a cardoon, and planted our fifth tree (not counting street trees), a persimmon.

We’ll probably be living with masked off steps for a few days before we get a chance to come back to painting.  There’s still lots to do including finishing up our final report for the Bureau of Environmental services to receive our ecoroof grant money, and getting paperwork and income verification in to PDC.

Gifts

I’ve mentioned this before, but we have the best neighbors. One from a block away came over and gave us an heirloom black tomato and a couple of amaranth starts! We haven’t planted them quite yet, but they’ll be going in the ground shortly.