Went camping last weekend. As a kid I remember how fun camping was, running through the woods, climbing on fallen trees and searching for new and unusual bugs. We would spend the mornings canoeing through quiet waters looking for beaver damns or birds catching a snack. In the evening I loved sitting by the fire with the family, talking to each other and watching the stars. As a kid I would forget all the troubles at home and just live in the moment of those fun days and peaceful nights. Last weekend my kids experienced everything I loved about camping and it made me feel like I am doing okay by them.

After a long day of caring for the children, household chores, running errands, doing algebra homework and four and a half hours of math class, I am done. I pull up at home, on my bike, ready to spend a quality moment with Charlie.
And this is what I am greeted with-



The maturity level around here astounds me sometimes.

Garage sale score!

Well they weren't really a score but what I wanted.... I have been meaning to plant up the boulevard, but with 30 some kids on the block who seem to converge on my front lawn every night, having plants out front is flora homicide. And with these box we all win, however I am the only one who imagines them as plant boxes- So far I have seen them become ships in the high sea, surrounded with sharks. An arena for gladiators to battle till the death. A trapeze so thin and wiggly that imminent death is just a tragic slip (or push) away. A bunker to ambush the enemy with water guns. An archeological excavation to uncover a rare and extinct breed of monster trucks. And a nice place to sit and eat popsicles on a hot summer evening...

My mini rain garden

I finally got this in, only two months after the Metro Bloom rain garden class- I'm quick like that...

The plants I choose :
long headed coneflower
heuchera villosa "caramel
blackberry lily
columbine
2 avalanche feather reed grass
and good ol' karl foester

It will collect the water via gutter off the southeast corner of the house. The only problem is over a year ago we pulled off the gutters to paint the house with plans to put up new soffits and gutters, and the project is moving right along at slug like pace... We almost have the soffits up but no sign of gutters yet! Summer is so hard, you finally shake off that awful thing that is winter and you are set free! but the projects hang over your like a ton of bricks, totally dampering the whole skipping through the meadows image I have of my summer...

The moment one gives close attention to anything,
even a blade of grass, it becomes a mysterious, awesome,
indescribably magnificent world in itself.
- Henry Miller

My grass is finally here- And it is nice...

Popeye the Sailor in Gopher Spinach

I got my letter from the U, I am officially a gopher!

I promise to think of the gophers when I am a landscape architect... We must learn to work together for a more sustainable environment for all the people and rodents of the world.

The sun has finally warmed up the Midwest enough to venture outside again, and I have been taking full advantage of it and gardening like crazy.



I love mulch, especially free mulch that the city provides! I would mulch the whole yard if my tribe would let me, but they like grass for some reason- waste of good planting space and water in my opinion. But I am attempting to reseed the small patch left of my nemesis. No little fluffs of new green grass yet, but I guess it has only been 7 days. Still my patience is being tried...


I thought I had lost this Clematis to morning glories but they came back with a feisty spirit and next year should fill this trellis. The sooner the better, as copper is a hot commodity here in Minneapolis and I was terrified it would be ripped off before I got something growing on it!


Silly grass- grow already! I hate you.