The garden is growing! The garden is growing! And so are the weeds…

I have been weeding almost every night and have decided that I need to go back to my original plan of weed blocking material and straw/hay to control the weeds. I didn’t really want to, but the weeds are growing as fast as the vegetables. With weeding all the time, I am not getting much else done like canning strawberry jam!

Typical gardener issues, I know.

We have strawberries! A lot more than last year! However, I am thinking about planting more strawberries. I think we will need more plants for them to provide for our needs and still have some to snack on. I have a space open next to them that I will add more plants too.

I was able to take advantage of a sale on strawberries from the local grocery store. Four pounds of strawberries for $4.88. By far the best deal I have seen this year. I got 3 – 4 pound boxes to can jam and dehydrate the strawberries. Hopefully, this is the last year I will have to buy extra.

The chickens are growing like crazy! I can’t believe how much they change from week to week. I need to get back to work on their indoor area as well as get new bedding down. They need roosts and I need to get busy building nesting boxes. I started feeding them some of the plants I thinned out of the garden as well as kitchen scraps. They love them! I love it because the feed stretches further. We are considering free ranging them for a little bit everyday soon.

Rob and I went to Tomah last weekend to the tractor pulls for three days. It was great to get away with him for three days! I was happy to go and happy to come home. There is very little money saving going on there, but we bought in our own water and some snacks to keep the costs down.

I froze the last of the rhubarb I had picked and put in to the fridge until I could deal with it.

I was able to earn some extra money by taking cans/bottles back to the redemption center and getting paid mileage from work for picking up a computer part.

I was also able to pick up some really good quality cat food for $2.00 for a three pound bag. I got the last five bags. Normally, this would cost $10.00 per bag for this particular variety.

I put together a Spaghetti Herb mix with items on hand to add to tomatoes for spaghetti sauce. I would like to able to just can tomatoes from the garden, add seasoning, and have spaghetti sauce. No more buying spaghetti sauce!

Not a lot done this last week, but progress was made! Hopefully this week will be more fruitful.

Thanks for reading!
Erica

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