So... this is the final farewell post from this blog. I have now moved to Blogger, a free blog site, where I will be sharing photos and updates of my garden, a garden diary, of sorts. I love to be able to go back and say.... 'oh yeah, that was the year that we did not get summer weather until mid-July' or 'oh yeah, that was the year that my onions were maggoty, my tomatoes were late, nut I had the most amazing peppers and cucumbers...

Hi there. If you have been with me for this wonderful ride these past years, I want to thank you so much. I so appreciate you and have loved having you by my side. This will be the last blog post for me. I've been at it for a very long time. Not many bloggers can say that they have been doing it for over 16 years, but it is time for me to hang up my blogging hat.

This will be my last garden blog post so I thought I would share an update about how things are growing, plus tips for the July garden.

Happy first day of summer, eh? Also, happy Father's Day to all the dads. Today is a rain day here on the prairies. Cold, breezy, and rainy...but! There is sunshine in the forecast for all of next week. Here we are, the longest day of the year. I was heading for bed at 10pm the other day, thinking wow, it is so light outside still!

Happy first day of summer and happy Father's Day, too. I hope the weather is better where you are. We are sitting at 9°C (48°F) ... brr! So, while we will be barbequing (it's tradition!), we will definitely be eating indoors. There is never any water left in the birdbath as Berkie drinks it all. You'll be happy to know that our caterpillar issue is nearly gone.

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This month is fairly flying by and the list of things to do in the garden is ever so long. We have had a dreadful spring but this weekend is lovely, so we will do what we can while the sun shines, eh? Tent caterpillars on a brand new apricot tree. The caterpillars are still a thing! Oh. Em. Gee. I am not worried about the ones on the tall, mature aspens, or the ones crawling all over the house and deck and pathways...

Well, hi there. How is your weekend going? We have the Daines Rodeo going on here this weekend so the town is bustling. Love seeing the town full of folks having fun. Luckily, the weather has turned to sunshine.. at least for a few days. We enjoyed the parade yesterday morning. The local art club had my favourite float with the members posing in (cardboard box) frames of famous artists.

Well, we had about two weeks of absolutely stunning weather, broke records all over the place... and then Junuary happened. It has been so cold for the past week. We have struggled to hit the high teens during the day and nighttime temps remain low. So low that I had to put the heater back in the greenhouse. I was able to get just about everything planted last week, now I am wishing I had waited a few days.

Well, hi there. Happy Sunday! How are you all doing? Do you ever get grumpy for no particular reason that you can figure out? I had a day like that yesterday. Everything was annoying me to no end, even the radio stations. It was too loud, too much singing, too much talking, lol... there was nothing that was good, I was just out of sorts.

You all, our weather is beyond wild. We have gone from heat warmings down to single digits! The other day, my weather station told me it was 35°C (95°F) on the back deck and 33° in the greenhouse. Today is only 5 (41°F) degrees on the deck and 6 in the greenhouse. Oh. Em. Gee. This is the most bizarre thing ever.

Well, hi there! Happy Sunday! Are you all busy bees? Planting your veggies, sowing your seeds, and getting your patios summer ready? Now that it is the actual May 2-4 weekend, we are all good to go! I have a huge list of things to do. It is going to take me the week to get it all done! We had two pallets of mulch delivered to the house, I have weeding to do now that things are starting to grow again, plus doing up all my pots and garden beds.

It's the May 24 weekend. No, not the long weekend, that one was early this year, but the actual 24th of May... a great time for planting your tender plants in most all parts of Canada. Yay! I got all my seeds in before the cold snap but this weekend has been a busy planting time for me. Making up my planters, planting up my (bazillion) flower pots, planting tomatoes, direct sowing squash and cucumbers.

This is a bit tongue in cheek... of course, you can grow anything you like. These are ideas for what to grow/plant at this time of year, if you missed out on the cool spring temps. Curly kale in the bottom right corner, dinosaur kale in the center. Surrounded by calendula and garlic chives. Kale not Spinach If you missed the March/April planting window, it is too late to grow spinach now.

You guys.. I have had a week! The entire week was chaotic and wild but to top it off, we had a dead skunk to deal with, too. This is where he was hidden.. and died. As the weather last week was in the mid 20's (Celsius), nice and warm and sunny... the inside of the house was starting to get smellier and smellier.

Happy Mother's Day! Hope you all have a wonderful day... and enjoy this inspiration ramblings post ; )

We have had gorgeous double digit weather all week (finally) so getting the yard and gardens prepped has been the number one goal. Beds are weeded, edges have been tidied up (I use deep trenches to keep the grass out of my garden beds, no plastic needed), have been planting and cleaning and tidying. This weekend, plant out your... peas…

This is it. Finally planting and yardwork time here on the prairies. Time to get stuff done! I have started removing the leaves from my garlic bed. We still have a few ladybugs hunkering down in the leaves, so I just gently moved them to another bed so the ladybugs can hide out as long as they want (the leaves were kind of matted up so easy to move over in large swaths).

Happy Sunday! Tanja

Looking for a small evergreen for your city yard? I got you!

Getting excited about spring!

Well, hi there. Happy Sunday, eh? We finally, finally, finally have nice weather here on the prairies, so it is going to be a busy week ahead.... and hey, what is it with windows? They get sooo dirty and seem to need a good wash every month! Therefore, washing windows is on my today agenda as our temps are going to be in the high teens.

Well, by golly. It sure has been difficult to get excited about gardening lately, as the weather has been all over the place here on the prairies. From cold and snowy to double digit highs. I like those sunny, plus degree days just fine ; ) I did not post last weekend, on the Easter long weekend, as there really has been little that we can do in the garden.

So many tips for you this week. No greenhouse? Check out the easy cold frame diys (possibly more helpful than a greenhouse is!) Shade gardens, asparagus, roses, robins...

Happy Easter, friends. I hope you are having a lovely weekend.