Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary...

I finally was able to take some pictures!

 Tomatoes and broccoli, homemade tomato cages...

 The sparser side! Carrots and garlic you can see; the other side had carrots too but the dog got in and destroyed them. Grrr. So I replanted more carrots, and finally bought some onion seeds too, which you can barely see starting to sprout. I also planted peppers but they have not come up yet.

 My rock markers!

My Veggie Garden

I finally finished planting the garden. I transplanted all the seedlings and they are growing really well! I planted garlic too and they sprouted within a week, it was very exciting! I have to throw in a few pictures of my flowers, too. It is one of the highlights of my day to see a new flower or a new bud!

 

 Yellow Moss Rose

 

 I love these pink-orange roses!

  

So here it is! All fenced off and everything! I have a row of tomatoes, broccolo, more tomatoes, and an empty row for peppers, then garlic, and carrots (half rows).

  

Here's the garlic!

 

 I can really tell how the broccoli has grown, but because of the heat here it probably won't produce a good crop. I planted it anyway. The tomatoes have adjusted now (some leaves were yellow) and they are growing strong too!

 

Purple Moss Rose

 Marcos bought this flower for me when I came home from the US in 2010. It didn't spread like the other vinca, and it's my favorite! The 2 litters of puppies nearly destroyed it, so I took a chance and planted some cuttings. Lucky for me, the cuttings rooted, seeded, and now I have several new potted flowers, while the original is completely gone thanks to the dogs!

 

Orange Moss Rose

You Can Never Have Enough Flowers!!

I was so excited this past week because all my roses had buds on them! They bloomed this week and now I know what colors they are! I knew which one was red, and now I know which one is pink! I'm waiting for one more that still hasn't bloomed - it's either pink or white. The hibiscus bloomed too (pink) and we have a banana tree that is finally going to have bananas!!

 

We were so excited - it is the first one to bear fruit. I also was curious because I have only seen bananas on a tree once they are already big - I had never seen how they actually grew from the beginning.

I went to Tegus the other day and on the way back we stopped at the Mennonites and I went to their nursery. They had so many beautiful flowers and some that I have never seen in Catacamas; when I go back I am going to buy some more. This time I was in a rush and just bought more Colchon de Nino which I figured out finally is called Moss Rose!! One is white and one is purplish/pink. They are bigger blooms than the others I have. Now I have orange, yellow, pink, white, and purple! I can't wait until they spread all over the flowerbed!

January News

Well, January has flown by!

This is my third week on the new job. We had our first visiting group this weekend and it went very well. I am *starting* to get into the swing of things! Although my eyes hurt from staring at a computer all day, I wouldn't go back to teaching!

I wouldn't say I'm "addicted" to Pinterest now, but I would say that I use it a lot and have found lots of helpful things on it. It's a great place for ideas. This month I have used it for 5 recipes already, and several sewing/crochet projects. I'll post my favorite recipes in another post...

Leyla is growing up SO much! She is really becoming quite the singer. I have a video on that for a later post. She sings whenever I'm singing, whenever there's a music video or a movie on or if her toy is making music, or even outside just running around - she's always singing! I love it. I can't wait to see how she develops her singing voice as she grows!

I took these pictures of her one day when I did her hair in pigtails. She was waving to the camera and unfortunately in some of them her hand is in front of her face!

 

 

 

This month we've also been working on planting a garden. It's been a slow process, and we're still not finished. We didn't calculate the dirt right so we still can't plant. Marcos has brought dirt from the mountains every time he goes but the raised bed is still not full! My tomatoes and broccoli are still alive but they're definitely ready to be in the ground. I have carrots, spinach, peppers, and onions in a bed too but they haven't sprouted yet. We also need to buy fencing materials.

 Leyla was a big help :) She wanted to help do everything! We dug up a bunch of worms too and it was so much fun to watch her with the worms, getting excited, but scared to touch them, and then wanting to play with them!

Love my little girl!

Garden Project(s)

I finally took the seed packets I bought 2 years ago out of the fridge with the REAL intention this time of actually planting them. I did germination tests on all of them and was amazed to find that 100% of the broccoli seeds are viable, and maybe 50-75% of the tomato, pepper, carrots, and spinach viable. The carrots, onions, and spinach are still in the baggies - I went ahead and planted the broccoli, pepper, and tomato seeds to get them started.

Broccoli

So, here's what I did. We brought some old wood back from the mountains and recycled it into a raised garden bed! Marcos went back to the mountains on Thursday, so I did it ALL BY MYSELF. I'm proud :). First I had to cut the grass (with a machete) and without a pick-aze or a hoe, I turned up the dirt. I used a shovel to basically dig holes everywhere, then smoothed it again with a rake. Then I built the frame for the bed. One of the pieces of recycled wood turned out to be shorter than the other 3, plus all of the boards had at least one end that was rotted....but I got it built and I think for a garden bed it will be fine!

That was Thursday. Yesterday, cleaned the pila with Leyla, and planted a small red hibiscus in the front wall garden. Today, I planted a rose in the side wall garden. I was so pleased that it bloomed - it's one of the ones I rooted! It is a pinkish-orange rose, really pretty! When I went to plant it I found an ant nest :( ugh. I had to spray before I could dig, and the dirt was so rocky, I had to dig an extra big hole and bring dirt from the back to fill in around it.

Hibiscus

Rose

Rose, impatiens, dahlia, hibiscus, and more impatiens.

After Leyla fell asleep for her nap, I started work on the other beds. The dogs have made a MESS of them, so I got to work cleaning up around the edges, clipping them a bit shorter, and cutting out the dead branches. I tried my best to put stakes in the spots where they have decided to make their beds, so hopefully they won't lay there anymore! I picked up ALL the trash around the yard and burned it. Then I weeded all the beds - which is tough because we have this thorny weed that is AWFUL and I can't pull it up to save my life! I had to just cut them right at their base so they don't just take over. I guess I'll have to keep doing that unless I can find a way to dig them up - or buy some strong rubber gloves so I can pull them!

Now, when Marcos gets back, he'll be surprised to see all the work I've done! Next thing is to bring rich, fertilized soil from the mountains to fill up the raised veggie garden. I also want to build some window boxes to liven up the windows. Or hang some pots. I love hanging flowers so I'm excited to plan something!

How does your garden grow...

I am so impatient for my flowers to be big, lovely bushes with blooms all over! My rose has 5-6 buds on it right now that look like they will bloom all at the same time, so that will be really pretty soon. My Dahlia had its first 2 flowers and they were very nice and big - my first real success at growing a flower from a cutting!

 I am also really excited for my "Colchon de Nino." I can never remember what it's called in English...but it's so pretty! A friend gave them to me from her yard; I have two varieties, this orange one, and a purple one. These are the most flowers they've ever had at once! It took them awhile to really take root and get "comfy" but I can tell that now they are going to grow really fast. I really want them to grow and cover the ground underneath the roses and hibiscus I have planted in the same area. It will be so pretty!

 

Lazy Sunday

The power was out all day today, from about 8:00 this morning until around 5:00 tonight. No fun....

Marcos had the bulls brought in today so tomorrow we will find out how much they weigh and what they're worth! Exciting day! We have 12 total, hopefully they will all get top price (which means they will weigh about 900 lbs).

Since I had nothing else to do today and 4 men from the mountains were at my house, I decided to plant a couple more flowers and weed. We extended the fence on the neighbor's side of the yard and planted the Dahlia there - it has grown so well and has a bud at the tip so I decided it was ready to plant. In the other fenced area we planted a red hibiscus plant, one that grows tall and bushy with small red flowers (not the large hibiscus type). Three of my potted roses have rooted for sure, and I have three more that are green but still not showing signs of life (no leaf buds). I have an orange hibiscus and a pink hibiscus, plus 4 more of the same red hibiscus! We only have 2 more spots in the two gardens, for the roses. We'll have to buy more screen/wire/posts to make another small one, and then figure out where to plant the bazillion hibiscus plants, ha :) Haven't taken pictures yet, but I will in the morning to post! Also, we still have 4 puppies left - once they are gone I will feel more comfortable planting without fences. Bull and Lizzy don't bother the flowers too much anymore.

In other news, we BOUGHT a puppy. Yes, that's right - we have 4 puppies we're trying to sell, and we bought one. Crazy. She is a German Shepherd, two months old. Marcos had 3 German Shepherd's growing up and always wanted one, but they are very expensive. His friend had bought this little puppy and Marcos made a deal with him to take her! She seems to be adjusting well to life here with the 6 other dogs....HA. She is very sweet and playful though. So, now we will have 3 dogs - the plan is, when she gets old enough to cross, we will have to give Bull back so that he doesn't impregnate her....and eventually we'll cross her with another German Shepherd. Then we'll end up with just her and Lizzy. I like that much better :) No puppy problems unless we WANT them!

Here are a couple of pictures of Leyla and her new toy. It is a stroller Bartola bought her for her birthday! She loves it and plays with it all morning long, pushing it back and forth in the yard. She calls it her "toy."

 I love her oversized PJs shirt!

Before Garden Pictures

I took a few pictures of the garden so I'll have some "before" pictures to compare in a few weeks. Hopefully everything will grow!

Okay. Here is the right side of the front yard. We have the huge vinca flower bed that has a mind of its own, in pink, purple, and white. The pink napoleon is in the corner, then by the front gate (the left of the picture) is a small jasmine. By the neighbor's fence I planted the white/yellow hibiscus and a little magnolia.

 Here's an upclose shot of the newest fenced garden.

 This is the magnolia that Ruthie, Maria's friend, gave me. She called it a magnolia, but I have yet to find out if magnolia in Honduras means the same as magnolia in America! I'm kind of worried it will turn into a tree....but we'll see!

The left side of the front yard with the fenced in section. Once again we have a huge vinca bed with an impatiens variety in the middle. In the fenced section, starting from the left, is the pink rose, white/yellow hibiscus, and Francelia, and another jasmine all the way to the right.

Here is my rose! It has had 3 blooms since I planted it. Now it is starting to grow from the bottom, and has a new little bud at the top! I am very proud of it - it always has a rose and continues to grow without problems.

 The other white/yellow hibiscus we planted got a break in it :( We don't know exactly what happened, but, it wasn't completely severed so we wrapped it tightly with plastic wrap and tied it to a supporting stick. I was so excited to see all the tiny new green leaves above and below the break! It looks like it has healed completely!

Here is my teeny, tiny Colchon de Nino I was given. It adjusted super quickly and already has a flower! 

 This is my potted rose garden at the pila, ha. Unfortunately not all of them have rooted, but several are showing good signs. I have a pink hibiscus, a purple dahlia, a red rose, a pink rose, a white rose, and a pink/yellow rose.

 I'm not sure which color rose this one is but look closely at the bottom and it has a new leaf!!!!! That means it rooted!!! Soooooo excited! :)

More Flowers!

My flowers are doing good so far. My rose has now bloomed 3 times since I planted it, the hibiscus is budding new leaves everywhere, all over it's stems, and the 5 or 6 smaller, red hibiscus variety have rooted. The other roses and dahlias I think are rooting but are taking a little longer.

I am excited now because a friend gave me some "Colchon de Nino." They are really pretty purple, pink, red, orange, and white little flowers that grow in FULL sun - perfect for our house! They spread everywhere, like ground cover, so I planted them under the rose and hibiscus bushes, to spread underneath, and also because that area is enclosed and protected from the dogs.

When I told my sister, she actually knew what they were and had planted some herself in the early summer. Here is a picture of hers! They spread a lot and have so many flowers! so pretty!

Lazy 3-day Weekend

I am having a great weekend so far. Saturday, the school took all the teachers out for lunch for Teacher's Day. We went to Juticalpa, and, surprise! they took us to La Colonia (big superstore) to buy groceries as well. They gave each of us 500-600 lps to spend (about $30). I bought things we can't get in Catacamas, like turkey, provolone cheese, baguette bread, barbecue sauce...yummmm. Then they took us out to lunch at a place called Gypsy's where we had Cordon Bleu! Interesting Honduran-spin on it, but I actually liked it better than the Cordon Bleu I have had in the US.

So, all weekend I have eaten turkey bacon sandwiches with provolone cheese on toasted baguette bread :)

I also took several rose cuttings and we worked in the yard. Marcos brought big sticks from the mountains that we cut for posts, so all we need to do now is buy barbed wire or something to wrap around them. So we have the flowerbed all ready for the roses when they root! We also cleaned up, weeded, pruned, and fixed the rock borders around the beds. My mother-in-law also happened to have some root hormone, so I put that on the new rose cuttings to improve their chances. I now have 9 roses, 3 dahlias, and 1 hibiscus rooting. Can't wait to see if they grow!!!

Then, we brought Marcos's old bed from when he was a child from his house and put it in Leyla's room for her when she moves out of the crib. It is really nice, mahogany (I think) and handmade. It also has drawers underneath. All it needs is a little clean-up, a few replacement pieces of wood, a railing, and a nice new mattress! Her room looks nice and cozy now! I think for now we will just let her take naps in it (like she did today) and get used to it being there, then move her into it once we get a railing put on it. It will definitely be easier on me now at night when she wakes up, to be able to lie down with her in her own bed instead of taking her into ours. Here are a few pictures!