1 post tagged “compost”

Since May is just about here, I thought I'd send one out in April.  Here things are going fairly well.  No news on any library jobs.  Homeschooling continues to progress.  We're up to Pocahontas and Jamestown and I learned for the first time that Mary Queen of Scots and Bloody Mary are two completely different people, though related.  Bloody Mary was Elizabeth I's older half-sister.  Mary Queen of Scots was a cousin, the daughter of the King of Scotland whom Elizabeth I had killed when there was possible evidence she was after England's throne.  MQOS was the mother of James I, who succeed Elizabeth to the throne.

The weather up here made history last week  --   we got the latest snow in recorded history in the Seattle area at SEATAC on April 18th and 19th.  The benefits are that it extended the tulip season, we got to play in the snow and my procrastination in setting out our veggie garden this year was rewarded.   I planted it this weekend instead and now have to find a way to battle the slugs and save the strawberries and lettuce.  There was a cool blog that mentioned that slugs get a shock when they touch copper, so rings of pennies around plants will keep them at bay.  We certainly have enough old pennies to do the job.  If the rain holds off, I'll have the kids do it this afternoon.

One more garden-y type of thing.  Ever since I watched an ER episode about 14 years ago where Carol Hathaway helps a lady save her worms from freezing I have been really interested in worm composting.  We haven't really had a good set-up for it and I honestly haven't gotten around to it.  It has a bit of the feeling of having a pet and being responsible for another living creature, so while I thought it would be cool and loved the idea of turning waste into good soil quickly, I hadn't done it.  Fast forward to this house, where there really isn't a garbage disposal  - there is one, but its location doesn't work out, and there is a big yard with a little "compost bin."   I've been taking our food scraps and peelings and having the kids dump them in there.  Imagine my delight when I turned the pile today and found my own private colony of happy little worms, composting away!  They are doing a fabulous job, and I don't have to do a thing but keep adding food scraps.  The bin has open sides, so the finished compost spills out the bottom.  I did have to remove an opportunistic raspberry bush or two that had decided the compost pile was their home, but otherwise things are going well.