What's this? A fence??

A fence, a fence it's now up!!  We don't have a gate, sorry kids!!  However as the fence was going up, the little feet found out how they can get in.  Do you see the stairs on the play set?  They work there way up them and over.  They know better, so it is done rarely!  And Jacob can't figure out how to get over.  Yea!!

Our pretty flowers will will now flourish, because little feet will not trample!

Our pea's will get plump, little fingers will not take and eat before ready.

We will get green beans, this will be fun!!

The pretty flowers will stay on the tomato plant so we can taste the goodness of a tomato.

The chickens will stay away from the strawberries.

It amazes me how a plant can grab on to wire.  Isn't it beautiful.  These are our new pea plants.

Our lettuce is overgrown because it is bitter.  We really need to figure out why it gets this way.

Oh no what is this?  Mushrooms.  eeeeew.

Sorry not the best picture of the mushrooms.  They are in the middle at the top of the picture.  

-Ma

Little feet, little feet, get out of my garden!!

What a beautiful flower garden you have...

And oh those peas, they look so strong and healthy,

And those strawberry plants, they are coming back well considering the chickens ate them to practically nothing.  (Two new plants were planted with the 4 old ones.)

And your corn rows, they are so beautifully done!! 

Oh, little feet, little feet, please oh please get out of my garden!!!

What?  It's not just little feet?  Bikes too?  PLEASE GET OUT OF MY GARDEN!!

I Love Spring Time!!

I love it when spring time comes.  I just feel so happy and the beautiful things come out in the world.

The apple tree is blossoming.

This is very exciting!!  We will get Apples this year!

And here are some lemon blossoms.

Grape vines always seems to look dead, but I hope they survived the cold.

There are little white buds on them...

I think that's promising.

Last year I had a hard time not looking at the beauty of the green leaves.  They are beautiful!

I love our banana trees, after the leaves turned brown when they got too cold, I cut them off.

It seems that the one closer is bouncing back quite well.

But the bigger one, there is no sign of growth.  But there still is good color.

I am thinking that I need to chop off part of the top.

And it looks like we will get oranges this year too!!

New little animals are so fun!

And the big ones are just gorgeous!

Yep, that is a compost pile in the background.  -Ma

What to do with Sour Oranges

When we first moved into our house 4 years ago we were excited to have a citrus tree, however we couldn't figure out what it was.  They have the color of an orange yet they are kind of shaped like a lemon.  Then one day a friend came over and he grew up here in Mesa and he told us that this mystery tree of ours is a sour orange tree.  What?  He said, "ya you can make marmalade, or tang.  You can even graft in other fruit trees and make like a fruit salad tree.  I guess these trees are very strong, they can endure a lot.

So today we went out and picked some of those sour oranges so we could make some marmalade.

Then we brought them inside to wash.

And we made marmalade.  Although I don't think I did it right.  Is it supposed to be runny??

Anyways it looks neat.  -Ma