I woke up today feeling very optimistic about the mulching project I had planned.  My goal this summer is to put mulch down on all of my boulevards, so I don’t have to mow anymore.  This is a huge job because I live on a corner lot, but I’m up for the challenge.  So I spent 6 hours putting down 400 gallons of mulch, which is 2 cubic yards.  I put down 5 to 6 layers of newspaper and quickly run to get the hose to spray it down so the wind doesn’t take it away (no easy feat with today’s weather).  Then I put mulch on it and lay some more newspapers.  The thing I love about this project is that I automatically practice mindfulness and forget about all my worries.  Thoughts on food, money, business, relationships… it all just goes away and it’s me and my hands working to make the world a more beautiful place.

I did end up running out of mulch when I was 3/4 of the way done, so I decided to get another load from the compost site.  Before leaving, I dug out my hacksaw and cut a 20 foot branch that had fallen in Thursday’s storm into 2 pieces so I could fit it in my little Civic.  Then I pruned my apple tree – I know this isn’t the right season for pruning, but the branches are so close to the ground it’s very difficult to mow the backyard.  I shoved all those branches into my car and went to get another load of mulch.  While I was there, I was commending myself for lifting the 18 gallon buckets of mulch like an old pro.  I’ve gotten really strong doing these projects and I’m really proud of myself, since I wasn’t sure I had the endurance when I first started.  Now I can lift the heavy buckets with little effort.

After finishing the mulching, I swept my driveway and sidewalk to make it more friendly for my neighbors to walk by with their dogs.  Then I decided to move a few of the tulips that are done blooming.  I have two bunches of tulips on the north side of my garden, but they don’t get quite enough light there, so I wanted to give them the treat of a new location.  As I was digging them up, I realized I was excitedly exclaiming every time I found a clump of new bulbs.  There were something like 20 or 30 of them and it was like digging for gold.  So I gently pulled them up and then planted them in their new locations around my garden.  I’m really looking forward to spring next year because I have 50 tulips planted all around the perimeters of my gardens.  It’s going to be so fun to see them bloom!

After all this, I was ridiculously dirty and thirsty, so I took a shower and had lunch.  Then I found myself walking to see all my neighbors’ gardens.  My next plan is to get some red-orange bee balm and yellow primrose to add to my garden, because I fell in love with them today.  I also fell in love with the beautiful flowers on my carrots that are blooming.  I have a special fondness for these carrots because I planted them last fall and they came up this spring.  I haven’t eaten them yet, but they sure are pretty.

 

Oh, and I just remembered that the first sugar snap peas are out on in my vegetable garden, so I need to go pick those and give them a taste.  I’m getting excited for the produce I’m growing, but I haven’t quite figured out how to keep the birds from eating my strawberries.  I already made strawberry-rhubarb preserves that I canned last week using rhubarb that was a gift from my patient, but I had to buy organic strawberries because mine are struggling from all the bird scavenging.  So I’m still researching natural remedies to discourage the birds.  So if you know anything that works, let me know!

Vegetable Garden

Recycling and reusing is very important to me, so I try to live by the advice of my favorite tee-shirts:

• Hug a tree
• A little change can make a difference
• Recycle

I have a friend who was thinning her flowers this week, so I went to her house to reuse the extra plants by planting them in my garden.  My mother always tells me that “They just want to live!”, so I took home a carload full of day lilies, irises, bleeding hearts, lily-of-the-valley, ferns, and hostas.  I spent most of yesterday planting, but I didn’t finish it all, so I wished for a light rain today to keep me cool while I finished putting all my beautiful plants in the ground.  As soon as I walked outside this morning, it started sprinkling a refreshing mist that continued throughout my planting.  I finished in 2 hours, then drove a bunch of weeds to the compost site and picked up more mulch while I was there.  As I was driving home, it started raining heavily which I totally appreciated because it will help my new plants be comfortable in their new homes.

I can’t stop smiling at the good luck of it all.  Actually, I think it’s more than luck; I manifested what I needed for today and it became a reality.  Within the first 10 minutes of planting, I realized I had a huge smile on my face and I stopped for a moment to acknowledge that I’m really happy.  It’s not just that I’m in a good mood, but am happy all the way into the deepest core of my being.  My life as an acupuncturist on my little piece of land in St. Paul, surrounded by organic vegetables and flowers is exactly what I wanted and needed.  Life is so beautiful here that I hope there are people everywhere who find the kind of joy in their life that I have created.

I just got in from planting the wildflowers that my Uncle Dicky brought me from Oulu, Wisconsin today.  Yes, I know it’s 10 pm and yes, I know I’m covered in dirt and mosquito bites.  That goes with the territory when you’re planting in the dark.  The story goes like this…

I went to bed last night at 11 feeling quite exhausted from a joyful memorial day weekend and a lot of mulch hauling and didn’t wake up until noon.  Around 4 pm, I went to Somerset to meet Uncle Dicky and pick up the wild lupines and sedum he brought me.  The wildflowers needed to be put in the ground today since they traveled quite a journey in the trunk of his car, but after getting the flowers I didn’t have to come home before going to Brasa to celebrate mother’s day and my mom’s birthday with my family.  So when I got home from dinner at 8:30 pm, I started planting and was really enjoying the quiet summer night while practicing mindfulness.  Until the mosquitos came out a little after 9.  Then I was just digging up the rock hard ground as fast as I could in between swatting at my arms and legs with mud-covered hands.  So this is how I came to be covered in mud and dirt, yet smiling the hugest smile of summer so far.  I believe life is made for the great stories and usually those come from a little bit of joy mixed with a little bit of suffering.  May your summer be filled with as many great stories as mine will be.

I’ve spent a few days hauling 500 gallons (2.5 cubic yards) of free mulch from the compost site.  My goal is to get rid of all the grass in my front yard because it is so full of dandelions that I have to use a gas mower.  My backyard has beautiful grass that I can mow with my push mower that relies on my own qi to operate, so I don’t mind it.  Along with being eco-friendly, the push mower is great because it is quiet and I can practice mindfulness while methodically pushing it around the yard.

I’ve been putting down newspaper in the front yard and then covering it with mulch.  I designate the walkways using stones, but someday I hope to put down pavers.  I’m still gathering flowers for the new flower beds, and actually I’m getting some lupines from wisconsin today, which my uncle Dicky is bringing for me in a cooler.  I can’t wait!

The next time you come to the clinic, take a moment to appreciate the beauty of the wildflowers in the front yard and know that all the work done here was done with my own power and love.

I woke up this morning to a very steamy room and before I opened my eyes I felt like I was in Nepal, my favorite place in the world besides my little piece of land here in St. Paul.  So I kept my eyes closed and just enjoyed those moments when I could imagine I was there.  I felt kind of lazy, so I did my morning yoga and qigong and then went downstairs to sit outside on the deck around 10 am.  I was going to spend the day doing nothing, so I thought I would get my gardens watered so I wouldn’t have to do anything else all day.  Since I mowed and weed-whipped the yard yesterday, I figured I would just enjoy my day outside on the deck.

As I finished watering the vegetables, I was contemplating where to move the 3 extra tomato plants because all my gardens are pretty crowded.  I found a spot in my perennial bed and moved them over.  I also took part of my green onions out of the ground and planted them in a big pot.  I tried this last year, but they didn’t live through the move into the house in the winter, so I’m going to try again this year.  I left the pot next to the other green onions, so they can have their green onion friends nearby as they adjust to living in a pot.

As I walked around the back to sit on the deck, I saw that my ferns are planted too close together.  I have them growing under the edge of the deck, but I crowded them because I didn’t think they would all survive the transplant.  Since they all made it, I wanted to take half of them and move them to the other area under the deck where there are no plants.  I got my shovel and moved them, feeling quite satisfied with getting a few little things done.  Now I was really ready to relax.  But first, I wanted to look at the front flower gardens and think about how I’m going to change them this year.  My goal is to have all flowers in my front yard by the end of the summer, so I won’t have to mow grass there anymore.  I hope to do landscaping block on the edges next year, since I will still have to mow the edges of the hill.  I’m sure my neighbors and patients think I’m a little crazy because I have beautiful flowers, but my grass is always too long and overgrown with dandelions.  I don’t want to use chemicals because I have organic vegetables growing nearby, but I just don’t have time to mow the lawn as often as I should.  So I hope everyone will bear with me until my landscaping transition from grass to all flowers is complete.

After spending some time looking at my pretty flowers, I decided to just move a few of the wild daisies.  Since wild daisies are my favorite flower, they have their own special spot in the front.  I am adding a walkway (it will be pavers someday) between my house and the neighbor’s house since the mail carrier uses that route as a shortcut, and I will connect it to the walkway I’m creating from the vegetable gardens to the front of the house.  With this new plan, I need to move some of the wild daisies, so I decided to just do a few.  I’m trying to do things in moderation, since I’m always telling my patients to take time for themselves and not overdo it.  So I dug up only about 15 shovels worth of grass to move a handful of the daisies and moved the rocks to the edge of the expanded bed.  By then it was 1 pm and I’d been gardening for 3 hours in the blazing sun.  In the spirit of moderation, I decided to call it a day and cleaned up all my tools and went to eat my vegetable pasta salad on the deck while enjoying the birds.

As I finished eating, my neighbor Sally (she has the most beautiful gardens ever) came over to give me one of her purple bachelor’s buttons.  She has some other babies of those to give me, but I’ve never known where I wanted to put them until today.  I told her I would love to come over and get some more, so while she went to visit another neighbor, I decided to move some more of the rocks in my front yard until she got back.  I moved a bunch of very heavy big rocks and transplanted my purple crocus bulbs to their new location.  Sally came back with some canna lilies for me and I put those in the ground too.  Then we went to her place and got some more bachelor’s buttons, shasta daisies, and snow in the mountains for me to bring to my place.  Of course, I had to get them in the ground right away, so I planted them.  By then, I was really sunburned and tired, but I figured I would just move my early-blooming tulips since they are resting and I’m going to forget which ones are which kind.  So I moved 7 red and yellow tulips and was going to stop when I realized that my purple hyacinths are covered up by other plants and getting very hard to find.  They also needed to be moved now that the rocks are in their proper location.  So I moved them into their new home along with the grape hyacinths (muscari) that go next to them.  I was going to stop, but then I thought I should just move my bright long-stemmed tulips while I can remember which ones they were, so I got them interspersed with the red and yellow tulips.  Finally, I was so hot and thirsty I had to quit.  I had been drinking water all day, but I still felt dehydrated from the hot sun.  So I cleaned up my tools again and went inside.  I couldn’t believe it was 4 pm already.

I was extremely hot and dirty, so I took a nice cool shower.  It felt so good to have the cool water on my hot skin that I almost wept.  I took a few extra minutes to enjoy the cold water in the spirit of taking some time for myself.  Then I meditated under the ceiling fan so I could enjoy a few moments of relaxation.  Now I’m off to put some homegrown aloe on my sunburn and eat some dinner while enjoying the yard.  I might not be great at moderation, but I really did try.  And I actually ate lunch, which I usually forget to do while gardening, so I am making steps towards finding balance.  At least I had a fantastically fun day gardening!

The process of building my new raised gardens turned out to be quite straightforward. It took me about two weeks and added 450 square feet.

Annual Flowers: violas, marigolds, alyssum

Annual Herbs: basil, cilantro, rosemary, dill, sage

Annual Fruits: watermelon

Annual Vegetables: kale, cucumbers, sugar snap peas, broccoli, green beans, tomatoes, jalapenos, orange bell peppers, purple bell peppers, chocolate bell peppers, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, baby bok choy, lettuce, potatoes, beets, parsnips, turnips, rutabaga, kohlrabi, carrots, onions, garlic

Perennial Herbs: mint, tarragon

Perennial Fruits: apples, strawberries, blueberries, rhubarb, grapes (soon!)

Perennial Vegetables: green onions, chives, asparagus

I’m so excited to make herbal salves and do a bunch of canning this season. It’s going to be a great year!

Raised Gardens for Vegetables & Medicinal Herbs

Raised Garden for Herbs & Root Vegetables

My aunt got me 40 new canning jars that she found when helping a lady clean out her basement. So I excitedly picked them up today and drove by the garden center on the way home. Uh-oh, I thought, stick to your list. I dragged my rain-weary body inside to the warmth of the greenhouse and wandered all the aisles while dreaming of my gardens.  I was able to stick to my list and only bought organic herbs and some annuals to brighten my front walkway. I chose multi-colored violas for the front walk since they dry really well and then my mom can make bookmarks and cards with them. I also got bright orange marigolds for the window boxes on my front porch because they remind me of my ama in Nepal – she loves “saipatri”. Somehow along the way, I forgot about the rain and the sun came out, if only for me.

I finally planted some of my cool weather seeds, since my perennials and fall plantings are up already.  I’ve been eating chives and green onions since sometime in March or April and my mint, carrots, garlic, sugar snap peas, strawberries, and blueberries are up and going strong. I did plant asparagus about a month ago, but it will take many years before I actually get to eat it. I love having raised garden beds, because it really extends the growing season. So yesterday I planted green beans, kale, baby bok choy, and lettuce. I’m hoping to plant roots soon, including carrots, parsnips, turnips, rutabaga, radishes, beets, and potatoes.  I’ll probably wait until May 15th to get the watermelon, cucumbers, tomatoes, broccoli, jalapenos, green and purple bell peppers, basil, cilantro, sage, rosemary, dill, and grapes planted. I’m so excited to finally get things growing again! I’ve still got a lot of work to do, but we’re getting there!