Tonight we had our very first homegrown Iowa Dinner! Fresh Spinach and Romaine from the garden topped with pork tenderloin. Rich slathered the tenderloin in mustard, cumin, salt, pepper, and old bay seasoning. Then grilled it really slowly. YUM!!!

As of today here are the updates on some of the garden beds. Below is a section of spinach. These plants were sown directly to the garden on 4-15-08. They are Organic Erste Ernte Spinach. Tonight’s dinner was taken only from our “thinning profits” The flavor is amazing! Mason loves it!

Our two rows of tomatoes, on the left is an entire row of Heinz Tomatoes. There is a row of plants on either side of the fence. The row on the right has a few Heinz, a few Romas, and a few Big Beef Tomatoes. These plants were started indoors 3-26-08 and transplanted outside on 5-15-08.

The left row is the same row of various tomatoes in the picture above. The row on the right are 4 circles of Sugar Star Snap Peas and 4 circles of Oregon Sugar Pod II Snow Peas. These were direct sown on 4-15-08. Why circles you ask? I had an idea about a pea growing structure using a pvc tube with an old bike wheel on the top and bottom. String woven between the wheels would be the perfect place for them to grow.

This is a shot of our Yukon Gold and Red Potatos and Lancelot Leeks row. We’ve never grown either of these so we’ll see how it goes! They were started from sets on 4-14-08.

A view of our Organic Butterhead (right) and Organic Crisphead (left) Lettuces. What you can’t see “yet” are the Ogranic Rodelika Carrots. They are just now starting to show their ferny little heads. These were all direct sown on 4-15-08.

More Onions! These are Red Burgermaster. Direct Sown Sets 4-14-08 Not pictured are the row before that is full of onions. They are our Walla Wallas (fresh eating and cooking, and freezing). There are also lots of Copra Onions for storage. Also some Guardsman Bunching Onions are in the previous bed.

The bright green leafy stuff on the left of this picture is our Erste Ernte Organic Spinach.

This is only a portion of the gardens!! We’ll keep you updated!

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Oil Prices, isn’t that on the top of everyones list?

One part I hardly hear mentioned, but then again I don’t watch TV, is that the American economy is tanking. We knew this right, but how does it affect gas prices….Well it’s a foreign commodity. If the value of a dollar falls, which it has and continues to do, the cost of foreign goods goes up. Maybe the cost of oil isn’t changing much in the Middle East, but maybe our money isn’t worth much there anymore. I think that’s a factor to why the prices keep going up. I thought the $100/barrel concept seemed to be an outrage as we hovered close to it. No one wanted to see it. Now that we passed it, record prices come day after day. No one tries to stop it.
Then again, we need to suck it up and get used to it. I’ve talked to my worldwide business partners, and 1-2 years ago, we compared fuel prices. Fuel here is cheap, the government subsidies it. Why do you think Europe has public transportation and fuel efficient small cars? High fuel costs forced them to think about it, and do something.

We were pampered with cheap fuel, and huge SUV’s. I’m tired of hearing people complain of the cost of a fill-up when they commute 40-60+ miles a day in a Yukon, Cherokee, or large truck. Maybe we need the expensive fuel so that this country is forced to act. Bush wants to up the fuel economy in 10 years to match what Europe is running now? What kind of progress is that?! Detroit continues to complain about Honda Hybrids outselling thier large gas-guzzlers?

Driving is a privilege, not a right. Complaining gets you no where. Time to bike, walk, carpool, take public transportation, etc. Wait, what’s that? Oh yeah. We hardly have any. Trade down to smaller cars, go hybrid, go electric or burn veggie. Something drastic will have to take place to change the amount YOU spend at the pump. No more being pampered.

Oh, and all you people who complain about China suppling all our goods, stop shopping at Wal-mart!! Didn’t you realize that 70% of their stock comes directly from China?. I thought 20 years ago, when I first saw a Wal-mart, they had ‘Made in the USA’ stickers everywhere. Where did those go? Now, everything comes from the lowest bidder, China. Progress in the form of shareholder dollars.

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Where have we been? Wow, springtime is busy around here. Besides work, play, Cub Scouts, RAGBRAI, there is farm work to be done as well. Actually, the farm work started a month ago here in the basement. Reagan started seeds for tomatoes, peppers, onions, herbs, flowers, and a few other things. Once the ground was thawed, we also seeded our lettuce, spinach, peas, onions sets, black eyed peas, beans, squashes, and a couple of hop vines.

Instead of a large garden, we are going with the stripe method. I planned it to alternate a width of the tiller, a width of the mower, etc.. We thought this would be a good system to easy access everything, and not have to worry about mulching the walking paths. After all, we have plenty of room.

The gardens are started on the SE corner of the property, surrounded by a 25 foot buffer strip of lawn. BTW, see the car on one side of the corn crib, and the tractor on the other. That’s right, this is farm country. It’s only parked on the property line. It appears they had worked the surrounding fields today.
It took me a few days to ‘rip up’ some grass to make a patch for corn and sunflowers. This patch is out in front of the barn. I can’t wait until I can take a picture of the barn, with a row of sunflowers sitting in front of it.

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