Category Archives: Gardening

Gardening in Greeley Colorado

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free-seeds
Our Seed starter setup

It is the start of the gardening season here in Colorado.  All the local stores start to stock seeds, compost, potting soil, pots, shovels, gloves and all the related items a person might need to grow some food or do some landscaping.  Cassie was lucky enough to score some free seeds at a local gardening workshop.  More seeds than we could possibly use.

We are going to plant a variety of peppers, tomatoes, melons, lettuce, strawberries and some flowers.

I got an early start last weekend but maybe I wore myself down to much.  I was sick the previous week and recently I’ve  had a fever of 102 for the last few days.    It really sucked, mainly kind of a chest cold.  It put me down for the count  and all I could do was sleep and try to keep warm.  Luckily today I am feeling better and I decided to resume light garden work and it was a beautiful day.

We’ve decided to move the chicken from the greenhouse (which was a temporary location) into a home built chicken coup that I am making so she wont eat all the seedlings.   More on the coop in coming days.

When I was expanding our vegetable garden I moved some rocks and landscaping fabric.  I found a whole lot of bindweed.  This stuff lives under any condition imaginable.  Its been under wraps for over 3 years and was just continuing to grow.   Why can’t food to grow this easily?

bindweed
Bindweed

Noodles?  No…Bindweed!

We bought some compost a week ago to amend the soil in our vegetable garden.  It was $1 a bag which I didn’t think was too bad.  But it is cow poop, so I dont think they could charge too much.  Their marketing spin on it was “Steer Manure”.   Makes it sound better.
garden-expansion
Chicken bug buffet

It is also time to cleanout the greenhouse where the chickens have been fertilizing all winter long.  We use an old cat feeder for the chicken food and Cassie’s mom Charlotte was kind enough to give us a chicken water dish.  She actually just happened upon it beside a trash can  one day while she was watching the chickens for us when we were in Puerto Rico! That is just plain lucky.
greenhouse-cleanup
Chickens old house

Due to the chicken needing to be restricted from growing plants we also have to build a section of fence.  We were finding parts today and some of them wouldn’t fit in the Honda so they went ON the Honda.

gate-on-car
Strapped to the roof

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Egg production in full effect

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The chicken knew spring was coming weeks before the time change.  All of a sudden she started popping out an egg a day again.  I think the amount of light that they get helps them start egg production.  Since the sun is up longer now, she is an egg laying machine.

Chicken eggs

Chicken eggs

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Back to the Daily Grind in Greeley

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It has been a week since we returned from Puerto Rico and we are back to the daily grind of working, running errands and doing chores. Britton had to get new brakes because they were really grinding -literally a daily grind 🙂 whenever he was driving. We went to a mechanic to get a price quote and they said $300-600! So Britton said he’d do it himself and save the difference. He just had to get some pads, a part from Honda and have the drums machined/resurfaced.  Total cost minus Britton’s time of about two hours work: about $30. It’s astounding how much they overcharge.  He also got new tires and we made the final, last, ultimate payment on the car. So now all three of our cars are fully paid for. That will make it easier for us to save money or invest in other things so we can move to PR faster.

changing-the-brakes
Britton Changing the Brakes

Dirty Hands
Only condition is you must be willing to get dirty

When we came back last weekend we had fried turkey for the first time ever! That was quite the experience. We went over to my parent’s house for the adventure. You take a big vat of boiling oil and dunk a turkey in for about 30 minutes. It was pretty good, kind of like fried chicken. It was a lot quicker to cook and enjoy, but much more dangerous.

char-cletus-and-britton
My mom Char, Cletus their Neighbor and Britton frying a turkey

We are also getting ready for spring. I think we’ll have to start the seeds for the garden this weekend or next so that they are ready to transplant in April or May. My brother Justin is trying to expand a lawn care and sprinkler business and asked us to help him set up a website. We just started it today but you can check it out at: www.lawnsbydavis.com

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Back to Colorado from Puerto Rico

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We arrived back at DIA in Denver at about 8:00pm to cold weather. We were just starting to get used to the time difference, so it felt like it was 11pm to us (Puerto Rican time) -the weather difference was easy to get used to! 🙂 The flight was uneventful, but as we went from Puerto Rico to Miami and then Miami to Denver we saw a definite shift in people, and we knew we were back in plain, sterile, straight (roads) and fairly uneventful Colorado.

We were trying to describe the difference of Puerto Rico and Colorado to people. It’s kind of like being in a dream world and then waking up in boring reality (or Greality -Greeley- in our case). Another way to describe it is going to Toon Town (PR) in Roger Rabbit and back to the regular world, or going back to the black and white part in the Wizard of Oz  after seeing the Emerald City (Colorado is very drab right now with virtually no color and Puerto Rico is just covered in color and life). It is an awesome difference where there is something new and unknown around every corner, but I suppose it is also nice to have a boring routine to go back to as well- like warm water in the sinks and showers, and where time actually means something concrete and not vague.

Bird of Paradise and spider

Our last few days in Puerto Rico we met up with Nick and Miri again after trying to see another movie that the theatre accidentally forgot to start (again time is something very vague there). We also met with Dios Dado and he took us to Lago Dos Bocas near Utuado and we took the free boat ride across the lake.

orocovis Puerto Rico town plaza
Orocovis town center plaza

He then drove us to Orocovis where we had Longostino (sp?) for lunch. It was real criollo Puerto Rican food, and very good. Orocovis is the dead center of the island.

Now that we are back, it is bittersweet. We were just starting to get the swing of that lifestyle and now we have to readjust. We still have a lot of pictures and stories that we’ll post in the coming days though. We left on pretty good terms with Awilda, all things considered, and we still may buy it. In Puerto Rico, you never know anything for certain.

Cassie and Britton on the beach
At the beach in Puerto Rico

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