Brother Brigham would be proud

You might have noticed an absence in our blog updates and maybe you've even wondered why I haven't posted pictures in, like, a year. The answer to your curiosity is in this post. We have been busy bees.

In the past month, Cortney and I have been planning and cultivating our yard for one moment, which took place last night- to plant our garden. It has taken us a long time to do this because 1) we have never grown anything before (yes, I am from Orange County) 2) our only time to do this is in the evening because trying to do yard work with Will is futile and 3) my physical limitations really make it so we only have 1.5 adults to do the manual labor.

I have spent a lot of time reading about gardening and asking questions to other more experienced gardeners and we even went to a gardening class (but this doesn't quite count as very much effort because it was a Sunday School class). We tilled our soil. We added more soil. We tilled the two soils together. We raked it smooth. We built a planter box. We bought our plants. And last night we upped our "suburban Mormon" credentials with adding "backyard vegetable garden" to the list of: drive a Camry, live within walking distance of the temple, fly a BYU flag on game days (we fly a Buckeye flag as well. We give separate, but equal representation) and (the obvious) we live in the suburbs.

The process started almost a month ago when I started transplanting plants from our backyard to some bare spots in the front by the porch, to make room for the vegetables in the back. I have become really endeared to my Dad during this gardening process because each day that I spend in the yard, I can barely walk at night, and when I do, I walk with a limp. My Dad has walked with a limp his whole life since he had a serious spinal cord injury as a teen. But the good thing is Dad doesn't have the pain that I do with my limp:) And the other good news is hopefully my pain will go away in about 4 weeks.

I am becoming an amateur landscape designer and I've commented more than a few times to Cortney that if we had unlimited funds, I think I could get really in to landscaping. I really love it! In addition to adding our plants to the front, we have also planted rose bushes on the side yard, as well as 2 evergreens in the front of our garage, with more plans for the other side yard. I was talking to my friend about gardening the other day and we were commenting on how calming and therapeutic gardening is and the conversation entailed why it had this effect on people. We have come up with the answer: plants are way easier to take care of than kids. And this says nothing negative about our kids. Plants just simply don't need as much attention. And the nice thing about gardening is that when you do something, you usually don't have to do it again for a week (like pull weeds), unlike housework which seems to be re-done every hour. And since I know my entire house will never totally be clean all at once, I love driving up to my house and looking at the beautiful flowers and grass and thinking that it looks like such a great little house, even if the inside is in disarray.

In addition to "working the land", Cortney and I have also taken quite a bit of time lately dry canning. I bought flour, sugar, rice, and oats in bulk a while ago and have been waiting to find time to check out the dry canner, and finally decided it just needed to be done. For a few nights in a row after Will went to bed, we would head out to the garage and start canning. I'm positive as our neighbors drove by they were thinking, "what are those crazy Mormons doing now?!" I'm sure the multiple 25 lb bags of flour and a large canning contraption made for some considerable eyebrow raises. Cortney has commented a few times in this month of industry, "If only Sandra Fagergren could see me now!!" which only a few of our readers will understand, but I can only say that Sandra would be very proud of Cortney. He has learned to can and garden.

And so without further delay, I give you McAllister Garden and Landscaping LLC. Just imagine it. I'll post pictures later.

If all goes as planned we will have a bounty of: cherry tomatoes, Roma tomatoes, yellow bell peppers, green bell peppers, jalapeno peppers, strawberries, cucumbers, yellow squash, zucchini, basil, rosemary, parsley and cilantro. Our goal is to can homemade salsa at the end of the summer.