Go to the roots!

The middle of January we started some new plants for the greenhouse and early garden. We started them under lights in the house and took them outside during the day to the greenhouse but this past week has been so nice and mild that they are now living in the greenhouse.

We've had such success growing lettuce in the house that I have started carrots and beets in containers to grow inside under lights as an experiment. I plan to start some more for the greenhouse and then outside in a bed to see how they grow best this time of year.

Last fall when we started our little plants in the tubes, we had the fertilizer mix wrong and the plants had their roots burned. We bought some new type of fertilizer the first part of December and thought we'd keep the damaged plants going to see if we could tell a difference and experiment with them.

All I can say is wow! The plants grew and are deep green and we are actually getting a little bit of broccoli. I pulled these lettuce roots up out of the tube and was shocked at how many roots there were.

Healthy roots make healthy plants. I am transplanting some of the smaller broccoli plants into pots to make room for our new seedlings to go into the tubes. Here is another picture of the roots on the plants.

My babies are 35 years old today!

I can hardly believe it but my baby boys are 35 years old today!

Can you tell which is which?

(Eric is on the left and Ryan is on the right)We didn't know until five days before they were born that we were having twins. Ryan laid sideways below my diaphragm and they didn't ever hear his heartbeat. They also came three weeks early with a lot of medical problems but we are blessed and they are healthy today!

Happy Birthday!

Lettuce and Tomato harvest!

We have had a learning experience over the winter with our greenhouse. We started out with the wrong fertilizer mixture and hurt the roots of the plants in our tubes. However, we got some different water soluble fertilizer and mixed it up to see what it would do for the plants.

Many roots came back and for the past six weeks they have taken off despite the shorter days. These plants were only about 3" high a month ago.

This head of lettuce is now ready to be cut. In fact, I cut it right after the picture was taken. It should keep growing. I'm excited on what we have learned. We are starting some new plants and hopefully will have another batch of plants to try.

Our downstairs lettuce has also grown. I took some pictures and blogged about it two weeks ago but now they also are ready for their first cutting.

I plan on trying carrots and beets indoors as well! I think we can do that. We have watered them about two times a week and they have organic soil to get their nutrients.

We are still getting some tomatoes each week from our tomato plants in the greenhouse. The plants look terrible but they were planted last July! I have some new ones started to replace them in another month or so!

Is it Turkey time?

Today I was on my way into Duncan, just around the corner from where we live near the bridge and looked out into the field to see this:

We seem to have a herd of about 50 wild turkeys living nearby.

I guess they live in the woods nearby but were out foraging for food. I've seen them twice now and they seem to be at home! I hope they don't find the garden in the summer like the beavers did!

Ice on trees

We ventured out this afternoon for a short time and I noticed that the snow is coming off the tops of the trees. However, it's still cold enough that as the snow melts it refreezes into ice.

The trees were beautiful as they shimmered in the sunshine.

Schools are closed for a fourth day! Michael had to go to class this afternoon as they opened at noon. Once he got to the freeway the roads are fine but secondary roads still have a lot of bad spots.

Winter indoor garden

We have snow outside but we are growing crops inside! We had heard you can start lettuce and grow it under incandescent lights so we decided to do an experiment. We got a plastic container and filled it with our growing soil that we make. We put in some lettuce and . . .

The lettuce is growing. We keep the lights on longer than the sunshine would be. This is just in our basement and it's growing slow because it's not heated, but also it's not freezing and probably around 60. I am hopeful that when it's too hot in the summer that we can grow lettuce indoors.

Believe it or not, now is the time to start seeds for many things that will be able to be placed outdoors in the garden in about 8 weeks. We bought some grow lights and made a seedling box to start about 100 plants of broccoli, lettuce, cauliflower, collards, cabbage, Brussels sprouts and some tomato plants for the greenhouse and the others to put both in the greenhouse and in a protected bed.

We have plastic over the top until the seeds sprout (7-10 days) to keep a moist, humid environment. We have a heat pad underneath to help keep them warmer. I have put these in a south facing window for sunny days! We made our own pots out of newspaper rolling them with a prescription bottle. The newspaper pots and our soil work the best of anything we have tried. You can just put the newspaper straight into your pots or garden to you don't disrupt the new roots. You don't want to use shiny paper but the regular newspaper print ink is made from soy so it's biodegradable.

2011 JANUARY SNOW!

Here are pictures from our house on the heaviest snow in years!

It was a good day to stay home and stay dry.

I had to work since I work from home but still life has slowed down!

I made chili for dinner and it hit the spot.

It's only about 27 but we are starting to get some freezing rain on top of all of this snow that could lead to black ice on the roads!

They made it!

Mom and dad had many heirlooms from families and I am blessed to have several of them. I was to get the 175 year old cake plates and fruit plate (top shelf). These belonged to my great grandmother who married in 1872 and probably got them as wedding gifts.

Whenever I'd visit dad and see them, I wondered how I would ever get them across the country intact without driving to Oregon and back. This Christmas was the time of decision. Flying them home worried me so I took them to the UPS store and explained what we had. They said they could package them to get them here and so I put my trust in UPS. Well, the boxes came today and wow, they were double packed in two boxes, peanuts in both and foam all around them. They made it beautifully and were put on the shelves I had in mind for them when Michael first built the fireplace insert.

It's funny but things my mom loved or made are the things I wanted. The shelf with various bird figurines all belonged to my mother. She just loved to spend time to watch pelicans when she visited Florida. The next shelf has two saad irons (very heavy but if "it fits it ships") that also belonged to my great grandmother and the old brass bell belonged to my great grandfather. Mom loved the music figurines and they were hers. The plates on the bottom were also my mother's favorites, a pelican and a mill. I'm happy and feel so blessed to have these and other wonderful heirlooms to pass on. I hope my sons and their families will treasure these and other items when I die!

Dad's funeral

Dad's funeral was beautiful. All of us kids and spouses participated. We had a viewing beforehand and made up a table of his life interests and pictures and then had a slideshow of pictures of his life.

LaDonna gave the eulogy, Renetta gave a talk what is a dad, Rich talked about dad's example in life, Michael sung while I played. Brad Richardson, the Stake President and lifelong friend was the final speaker. Dad served as the ward clerk for Brad when he was Bishop (Dad was 85-90 at the time). Brad surprised us with a recording of his father singing mom and dad's favorite song The Holy City. His father was was wonderful tenor voice and listening to that brought back a lot of emotion.

Bishop Hitchcock was wonderful working with the family.

I loved the top of the vault for dad's coffin. It had the angel Moronion it. Their headstone has the Salt Lake Temple on it and they are buried in an LDS section of the cemetery with a beautiful mural of the temple.


Grandson's or granddaughter spouses and one great grandson were the pall bearers.

Mom and Dad have a beautiful spot under a tree. It's on a hill and you can see all over the Willamette Valley.

Here is a picture of the grandchildren and spouses who attended the funeral.

Then we added in great grandchildren. They called dad "Grandpa Great."

Finally, here is a family picture at the cemetery.

I took a pine cone from the tree to place with the pine cone I took when we visited mom's grave several year's ago. Rest in peace Mom and Dad until the resurrection!

Funerals and family

One positive thing about funerals is that they bring families together. Not all of the grandchildren were able to come, but many did that I had not seen in years.

It's always a chaotic time and a time for lots of pictures.

JC, Wendy, Steve, Jill, Amy, Adrienne and Annalina take some time together during the viewing.

Renetta got a huge Christmas present from dad. All of the kids were able to come for the funeral so she had them all home during Christmas. They now live all over the country. Here's baby Sean, Sarah, and Jeff from Texas, JC from New Jersey, Erica from California and Nicole from BYU-Idaho on Renetta's side and next to Richard are Wendy from Utah, Jill from California and Steve from Texas.

Of course, I was with my siblings, Mick, me, LaDonna and Richard.

Here is the family that were able to go to the private family viewing of dad/grandpa.