First seeds in the ground!

Yay! There is almost no better feeling than churning up the soil in the spring, smelling the newness of it, seeing the dark, richness that reminds me of ground coffee. We anticipate all winter long for the opportunity to do this, and finally this weekend we could!

While we got plenty hot and sweaty getting the garden cleaned up, tilled and ready, sticking a thermometer in the ground said the soil was still only 49 degrees -- too cold for much to germinate yet. Even so, we put in our onion sets and planted peas -- Steven will get the lettuce planted later this week, but at least our garden season is off and running!


(not to distract any from the wonderful plants Steven has already started indoors under his grow lights -- but it isn't the same as when we break garden ground).

There was a elm tree, about 20 years old or so, that had been taking over the west edge of the garden, so Steven girdled it a couple years ago to kill it; and this weekend, we took it down, as well. We left enough of the stump to make a nice resting stool for the gardener. It was really very pretty wood, for elm.

The cut is slightly darker on the one side because I began the cut with my chain saw, but ended up finishing most of the cut through with our two-man cross cut saw, by hand, to make it smoother and more level.

(sorry these photos aren't all that great - took most of them with my phone rather than run back inside and get a camera!)