Grown from seed: Tomatoes

Sometime in February we started vegetable seeds. We picked-up a seed sowing schedule from our local garden store, City Floral, and for the most part we've followed the recommendations. Matthew strung a grow light above a table in our basement and I sowed seeds in our starter trays. 

We're trying new veggies and testing some new growing methods this year, and honestly, here at This Old Alley House our gardening has reached a new level of obsession. I think it will be fun to highlight, describe and analyze our efforts to share with our faithful 1.35 readers as well as document for the future. 

First up- tomatoes. For Matthew's birthday Emma and I gave him water walls. This allowed us to plant our tomatoes in April. A month and a half earlier than we've ever put a tomato in the garden. And this has yielded "mondo" tomato plant pictured below. It's huge, grown from seed without any fertilizer and it already has a tomato. Unfortunately I don't have a picture of the puny little tomato plant we put in the garden - TRUST M - if you could see it you'd be as shocked as we are with the current size of our plant this early in the season. We got a few light skiffs of snow after we put our tomatoes out, but we closed up the top of our water walls and everything did just fine. Initially I was a bit skeptical because it didn't seem like our tomatoes were getting any bigger. However, sometime in late April/early May things really started heating up and our little plants took off growing. We left the water walls on until earlier this month after the leaves from our plants started to peek out the top. 

See our water walls with my little helper in the pic above.

Mondo tomato

The first fruit on Mondo tomato

Walking in a spider web

The school where our community garden is located has a great playground. After watering yesterday, Emma played around on this awesome web-like structure. I sent a picture to Matthew of Emma in the web - he said it makes her look old. I kind of agree.

More peas, please

Last summer I planted a few pea shoots in a flower garden. I offered the pods to Emma and it quickly became the place she'd check first in our backyard. Standing at the edge of the flower bed she would point with her chubby one year old hand and say, "ma, ma" (more, more). I'd check for new pods, sometimes showing her the peas inside, sometimes letting her gnaw on the whole pod.

This past fall we had raised garden beds built on the south side of our yard and we are in full garden mode this spring. I started peas very early and the pods are just starting to appear. Emma stands below the trellis of peas and asks us to pick her a pod. Today, Matthew propped her up on the ledge of the garden bed and it took all the self-control a two year old might possibly possess to keep her from picking the smallest pea pods.

Emma adopts a lizard

While waiting to have the oil changed in our car last week Emma checked out the waiting room toys. I convinced her to leave her babies at home; frequently she has one tucked snugly under her arm.

She checked out some Legos and then found a lizard. She was like a dog adopting a kitten that lost its mother. She picked up the lizard and tucked it under her arm, she gave it kisses, fed it the remainder of her applesauce and lucky me - lizard joined us in the bathroom.

Emma helps in the garden

Dirt on the nose...

Emma spends most of her days covered in dirt. The girl just loves to dig. 

 

Happy Valentine's Day!

I fail to document lots of things on this here blog of ours; like Emma's obsession with her bike helmet and the way she wore it everywhere for an entire weekend, and Matthew and I going all American Guns and visiting a shooting range in Vegas. We hosted the majority of Matthew's family for Thanksgiving and my brother came to visit for Christmas. Emma was so enamored with Duane she'd bypass me or Matthew and  go directly to him for pretty much everything during his visit. There are also the little day-to-day things like Emma eating dinner with her bunny and sharing her broccoli and beans and Matthew showing her how to make and wear play-dough eyeglasses and mustaches.

I've compiled a video montage (yes, my first montage!) of these and many other things for your viewing pleasure.

Untitled from Lisa Alley on Vimeo.

Weather

Last week it was sunny and warm. 

Emma found time to mow the lawn,

shovel dirt into Maya's water bowl, 

 and climb around in the herb garden box. 

Even Maya perched under our big maple tree to hunt squirrels. 

On Friday our yard turned in to this:) 

@#$!&! What's Emma looking at?

You mean the green scaly thing behind the glass? Oh, that. It's an Anaconda!!!

Shit, Brad is old!

I apologize for the expletive in the headline. Just thinking about the look on by brother in-law's face when he reads it makes it all worthwhile.

My brother in-law Brad turned forty last week. His lovely wife Kendra planned a big Vegas birthday surprise to mark the occasion. Matthew, me, his parents, a couple of Brad and Kendra's friends and my brother and sister in-law Nate and Annie all flew to Vegas to celebrate.

Kendra's idea was for us all to slip in to Vegas unnoticed and surprise Brad at dinner. However, we had one tiny little hitch -  Matthew and I ended up flying from Denver on the same plane as Brad and Kendra. It was 65 degrees the day we left and Matthew and I sweated it out in our winter coats and hats to hide from Brad. We successfully snuck on to the plane, had three close encounters at the Vegas airport and our hotel without Brad ever noticing. Maybe eye exams should be mandatory at forty.

 Matthew going unnoticed at the airport. 

 Lisa incognito.

 After we successfully snuck past Brad on the plane.

 Brad in line to check-in at the hotel. This photo was taken while we hid behind a pillar in the lobby.

Matthew behind the pillar while I try to check us in to our room.

We gotcha! Brad was completely shocked. 

 Brad with his proud parents.

The band reunited for a three day tour!

Happy New Year!

Wishing you all the best for 2012!

What would you do if Santa brought you an Elmo toothbrush?

Comand your mom to immediately remove it from the package so you can brush your chompers on Christmas morning. Duh.

Pudding paint

A couple of weeks ago one of our friends invited us over for some pudding painting. Emma quickly progressed from painting on a cookie sheet to body art.

Sledding

I love playing in the snow and I am so happy Emma does too! She was such a good sport about sledding in our front yard. Down the hill she'd go and then pop-up and say "again".  As in, "I want to go again!!!" She surprised us with her repeated and eager teetering up the steps in her snow gear. Happily, she'd plop down in the sled ready to go "again"!!

Maya turns 5!

Maya turned five years old on Sunday. I know, hard to believe considering she's no better behaved than a six month old puppy.  Matthew pointed out she's getting a little gray hair below her bottom lip. I am ignoring it and prefer to think it's the mark of something she's recently eaten off the counter. 

(Emma was given a piece of chocolate immediately following the filming of this video. It was 9:30am. Unfortunately, I had not been drinking. Tone deafness is the only explanation for my rendition of "Happy Birthday".)

Potty training

A few weeks ago Emma was asking to sit on our toilet. I decided to get her a little toilet of her own. We made the purchase a family affair. Here are some photos Matthew was able to catch of Emma carrying her toilet through Target. She insisted on carrying it and even gave it a little test.

At this point Emma's toilet is more of a glorified reading chair. If she sits on her toilet, I read her books to try and keep her entertained. She has yet to actually do a number 1 or 2 in it, but I figure she's still in the getting to know you phase. As Emma's pediatrician put it, "you can try potty training at anytime, but if you force it there will only be one girl (Emma) in the room left standing."

Halloween

Matthew, Emma and I walked to Boo at the Zoo to see what it was all about. For Emma it was all about checking out the animals. It was wonderful to see how excited she was to see them and point out the ones she knew.

One of the last times I took Emma to the Zoo she spent the entire time climbing down the stairs to the bathroom. It's so great to have her actually enjoy the animals now.

Snow!

It snowed in Denver last week. I kind of consider it Emma's first snow. It was the first time she could walk around in it, feel it, lick it and really explore.