I Couldn't Help Myself!

I really could not help myself!!! haha

After writing up that last blog I simply HAD to sneak out back to see if there was anymore progress in the garden today. 

THERE IS!!!

This is my little cucumber plant, which was essentially three leaves flat in the dirt when we first planted it. You can see that it has gotten taller, and has added more leaves!

Grow cukes, grow!!! :) 

This is our pea plant. You can see that it has doubled the amount of leaves it has each day the last two days. :) It is even putting out more tendrils looking for something to hold onto. 

I guess this guy really IS a keeper!
Grow baby, grow!!!

My pumpkin plant still looks a little droopy, but there are clearly many more leaves than there had been.
I was also asked what we are going to do when the plant gets big and bushy and all pumpkin-y. I have some research and thinking to do! lol

My cherry tomato now has ten beautiful little cherries adorning the top branches! They are growing well, and are so fun to watch! 

I hope this is the start of more cherry tomatoes than we can handle later on in the year. 

Seriously, my kids can eat three pounds of these little guys all on their own without my help. 

Grow babies, grow!!!

 BAM!!!

Look at the growth of this beefsteak tomato plant!!!!

That is what I call REAL growth!! It has been just six days since we laid this baby in there, short and thin. Now look at it!! 

GROW BEEFY, GROW!!!

:)   :)   :)   :)   :)  :)   :)  :)   :)  :)

My broccoli plants are not exactly that impressive... We'll see what happens with these little guys. ;)

The celery is still doing well. The stalks are starting to look a little thicker to me. 

What do you think?

The two tomato plants (heirlooms) that Giraffe helped plant look like they are on their way out. :( :( 

Poor Giraffe! Still, it was a valuable learning experience. If these don't make it we'll probably move the pea plant over here so the space isn't wasted. 

Their counterparts (also heirloom) in the same bale look okay but not great. I am really hoping that these guys start to take off here soon.

Grow guys, please grow!!

Straw Bale Garden: and We're Off!

After thirteen days of conditioning our straw bales, our little plant starts were starting to wilt and just had to go in. Hubs worked late, and I didn't want to leave him out of this fun and family-friendly project so I waited for him to get home from work. 

He very kindly stopped by a garden center and checked to see if they had a few other plants that I wanted, and they did! Yay! By the time he got back with the plants, potting and garden soil, it was getting dark outside. Still, it was much cooler than earlier in the day. That was a nice perk! :)

We began by making holes into the straw bale itself. This actually gave us a really good idea of the readiness of each bale, as some spots were easy to dig out, and other spots were hard. Hubs used the spade/planter and I used a weeder, having found it fairly easy to stab down through the composting straw. 

The first plant we put in was my cherry tomato, which had begun suffering, as you can see here. We placed it carefully into the hole along with some good quality potting soil. We also put the tomato cage around it before we added more soil to it. This is because winds can really gust in our back yard and I hope to have it pushed in deeply enough that it won't move. 

While I was working on the cherry tomato, hubs began digging out a spot for the beefsteak heirloom tomato he'd just brought home. 

In the past we have grown cherry tomatoes and hybrid tomatoes in a planter on our balcony. (We didn't have a yard at the time.) I've always hoped for larger tomatoes, and am really, really hoping this is that year!

After planting them with good potting soil and mounding the dirt tightly around them, we added regular garden soil on top. It was nice and warm, and I couldn't help but feel we were putting our babies cozy to bed for the night. lol I would have gone with all potting soil, but I ran out. 

You can see here that there is a color difference, and that the plants really did look pretty droopy. 

The next morning I was eager to take a picture. This is what the bale garden looks like right now. Next year we will get more complicated and use rebar steaked into the ground and wires across the whole, but for this year we used tomato cages. I am going to have to use extra wire on them as the plants that vine grow out more. 

My brother-in-law gave us some tomato plants right around the time we began to condition the bales, so they had spent about 12 days out in their individual potting pods. Thankfully they were still green, so we placed them in by two's. You can see that I hadn't yet picked up the last of the tomato cages. We have since. :)

Here again are my beefsteak (left) and cherry (right) tomato plants. I cannot tell you how I am babying these two! I have such high hopes! 


I will be honest though, on this first morning after planting I was worried sick about my little garden and hoping fervently that we see progress and growth instead of slow death. 

Here we have cucumbers (left) and pumpkin (right). The cucumber is in a tomato cage that I will be adding/using additional wire where I need to as it grows to help it vine out. 

I am still a bit unsure of the pumpkin, but I am eager to learn what I can do to help this little guy out as well. :)

A week before planting I had picked up a little celery start. I was SO excited to have my own celery plant!

After reading about them online and what all it takes to grow them well, I became discouraged. There are a million things that can go wrong. Still, I had paid for the little fellow, so we dug a quick hole by the house and planted him anyway. 



The idea is to let nature take it's course. Still, I did want to give him his best shot. I knew that celery likes shade and water, so we put him up close to the house where the only shade in the yard can be found. We also put a lot of pellet fertilizer at the bottom of the hole, and gave him plenty of potting soil around the roots and base before covering over with the original yard dirt. 

This isn't a great picture, but you can see the little celery stalks already looking so cute!

You can also tell that my yard needs mowed and trimmed.... but that is another story. Ugh. lol One little stalk is dying because Giraffe forgot that the celery is there and smashed it with the hose the very next day. 

Fast forward just four days, and we are seeing which plants will make it and which may not.

Admittedly I should have watered the plants before taking their pictures, but here they are anyway. (This was two days ago already. Time has gotten away from me!)

My droopy little cherry tomato is getting thicker and fuller! Best of all, there are eight little tomatoes showing up at the top of the plant!

Hubs, Giraffe, and myself are beyond excited! Yesterday while we were outside we snapped off the dead branch (why keep it around?), and continued with our watering and fertilizing rituals.

Even Koala baby is excited! She keeps toddling up to the bales (which come about to her armpits) and pointing at them with many exclamations of "Oooooh!" and "Fow-er!" (flower)

The beefsteak tomato has made the most progress, as you can see here. It has bushed out to around twice it's width overall, and has even gained some height. Seriously, I couldn't be happier!!

Keep your fingers crossed, people! We may just end up with some big tomatoes yet! :)

This pumpkin plant is one reason I said that I should have watered the plants before taking the pictures. They are much more perky after a good watering. ;) 


Still, I think you can tell that we are already seeing growth here, as well! 
Yeah!!

This cucumber could also probably go either way, but the fact is that the little guy is growing! Slow growth, maybe, but it is definitely there!


I hope to get some liquid fish-based fertilizer to put on these sometime over the weekend. I hear it really helps!

These are our broccoli plants. Two of them are presently thriving, and two of them were so brown (the right two) that we just plucked them out yesterday. 

I honestly think that this is probably one of the spots in the straw that didn't "feel" ready for planting. We'll keep feeding/fertilizing, and then I hope to put in a watermelon plant. 

I have to mention a couple more things before I sign off for today. When we took the dirt off of the bales to condition them, I had already seeded in the beefsteak. They hadn't sprouted though, so I just threw the dirt in (and on top of) the existing strawberry plants in the planter. 

Big surprise, we came home Monday night to these babies! lol I wanted beefsteak tomatoes, and now I have too many starts to use!  

Another cast-off plant from the first misguided attempt at bale gardening was a pea plant; four, actually.

This little guy survived so we set the tray aside and continued to use plant food. What do you know, the dying original vine sprouted a new one! That new one is growing!!! It was even taller yesterday. We're going to have to figure out what to do for this little guy. lol 


So, there you have it. Our straw bale gardening adventure is not just started, we are officially off the ground! Things are planted and growing, with just a few casualties so far. :) Every day we water the plants, and at least every other day we try to soak them with plant food or add fertilizer. Today is the 'every other' day, so they'll be getting another feeding. If everything goes right we will have strawberries, watermelon (yet to be planted), pumpkin, broccoli, cucumbers, sugar snap peas, and a wealth of tomatoes this summer! :) Should that really happen, next year the bale garden will be larger and more goodies will be planted. Let's hear it for urban gardening! haha

Meet Our New Hermies! :)

Our family is growing! :) Three more little hermit crabs have come home to live in our tank. :) 

Since we were at the farmers market this morning, we put a bit of fresh celery, spinach, and yellow cherry tomato in with them on the ride home. It didn't take long for them to find and start sniffing around the food. :)

The thought was to go pick up one more crab. It turns out that we are not that great at getting just one. We liked the natural shell, but felt like it was important to get these other two out of those awful toxic painted shells - especially the poor little guy whose shell they artificially added to, to make it look like a baseball cap. 

Joe

I was of a mind to keep this little crab, and name him myself. Children come first, though, and from her first look at him Little Koala made it clear that he was hers. 

She pointed with her little baby fingers and cried out "JOE!!! JOE!!!"

That quickly, the baby had her first crab pet, and had given him a name. :) 

It turns out Joe truly was sick of his toxic little shell. (Who wouldn't be?) He got into the tank, and immediately began walking around looking at other shells. It wasn't too long (about ten minutes or so) before he found one he liked - a turbo shell - and flipped out of that horrid little baseball cap and into it! :) 

Since that first shell change, he has flipped again into a brown shark eye shell. The first flip gave us a good look at him, so now he is a confirmed male. It looks as though our tank is full of those!

You can see in this picture that he is still interested in the many shells around him. I don't anticipate knowing exactly which shell he is comfy in for a while. :) It makes me SO happy to see our crabs settling immediately in when they get home. :)

Violae Valuable

Giraffe chose this crab to be hers, and gave it the name Violae (vie-oh-lay). She later added the middle name Valuable. :) I have to admit, this is one of the prettiest shells we've come across in a store tank.

Violae was equally happy to get into a nice tank environment. :) We don't know if she is a male or female, but for now (and for the sake of Giraffe) she is a girl. ;) I'm also not sure if she will change shells, but I suspect so, given that she is in a pretty small one for her body size. 

Bootstrap

Last is Bootstrap. :) This is Hubby's crab. :) He is a bashful little guy, but has a lovely blend of coloring.

It was very hard for me NOT to take home all thirteen little crabs that were in the store today! 

The sad fact is that our purchases are a win and a loss. If we don't purchase these poor crabs, they may never again get a normal shell to live in. If we keep buying them, we are part of the demand that keeps people painting shells. :/

Like poor Joe, Bootstrap hated being in a toxic shell. He seems to be a bit more shy, and hid away until we quit gawking at him before slipping discreetly into the turbo shell that Joe had just abandoned. (At last count, Joe has now been in THREE shells in the four hours he has been home!)

I have a video of Joe flipping from the baseball cap into the dark turbo, but I do not have a good picture. I hope to figure out how to embed a video in the blog soon, but do not yet have that knowledge. In this picture, you can see Bootstrap now in the same turbo shell Joe tried on earlier! 

Well, I suppose it is high time I wrap this up. :) We have a love affair going with our pets, but I have heard that they can creep people out. lol I suppose I can understand that. Lobsters give me the heebie jeebies and hermies don't, even though they do share similarities. lol

I will end by showing you what our little lovelies are having for dinner tonight. 

I chopped them up a lovely dish of fresh organic bananas, blueberries, spinach, oranges, and cherry tomato. 

I'll admit it. I love spoiling these little guys! They can eat such a variety of things! 

I don't know if you noticed it in the picture above, but I also put a tantalizing little drip of locally made organic honey right on the rim. This is their treat for the night. They can have it, but only occasionally and in small amounts. Eat up, guys! 

Say, do you think this is enough food for eleven crabs?  ;) 

A Morning At The Farmers Market

We have lived in town now for about four years, but only just today made it out to the local farmers market. I am delighted!! It has been a beautiful day, though it started out quite crisp. :) 

We loaded up Koala in her stroller, dressed warmly in clothing and coat, and covered over with a blanket. She was quiet the entire time, squinting against the sunshine and the overall morning-ness of it. (She's my little moon child, late to bed and late to rise.) Even when we bought her a handmade plush pillow, her face didn't betray any signs of interest. lol Silly child. <3 

Giraffe on the other hand is my sun child, and was not only awake, but chipper and chatty as ever. :) She was talking a mile-a-minute by the time we pulled into the parking lot, and once we walked over to the first stand began a constant stream of "Oh Mom, LOOK! They have..." lol 

The first "Oh LOOK!" was honey. Rich, sweet, raw, locally harvested honey. :) We bought four taster sticks, which sold the product. We ended up buying their largest container, a hefty two pounds. Needless to say, we'll be just fine on this gooey sweet liquid for a while! 

Next came tomatoes, both cherry and heirloom, and a bag of fresh spinach. Following that was a soft pillow and a little coat for our dog. There were plants, too, which we hope will thrive in our straw bale garden. My intention was to purchase whatever came closest to our preferences, so now we have tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, broccoli, and best yet - celery! I was delighted to see the celery starts for sale. I'm going to be praying these babies to fruition, let me tell you!

While Hubs lugged my various plants back to the car Giraffe, Koala, and I moseyed along browsing. Giraffe was a constant stream of chatter and, while I was eyeing up some locally made barbecue sauce, drifted to the next booth (only a few feet in front of the stroller and in plain sight with no strangers eyeballing her) and discovered 'brownies'. "Oh Mom! They have brownies! Look, Mom, did you see the brownies? Mom, would you like some brownies?" Laughing merrily in my spirit, I handed her a five and let her buy them. It turns out they were not brownies, but cake. hehe I just love my girl! :) 

Daddy returned and sampled then purchased some barbecue sauce. I was pleased about that, because (though I am not a fan of bbq) he really does like the stuff, and I wanted something to come home with us that was just for him. 

We got back to Matt (our vehicle - Giraffe named him) and loaded up. I couldn't hold everything, but I did take a picture of some of our haul on the ride home. :) Doesn't it just look delicious?!

That was only the start of the day - the morning. :) To be perfectly honest, we ate up all of the yellow cherry tomatoes and went back to buy more (the red ones pictured) that return trip is also where we picked up the cherry tomato plant. You can see by the little box from the pet store that there is more of our day to be told. ;)

Mommy Everywhere

I am a mommy in the kitchen, 'tis true;

A mommy in the living room, but you already knew. 

I'm a wife in the bedroom, but only at night.

I'm a mommy there too, giving laundry a fight.

I am a mommy in the backyard when they go play,

Mommy and teacher in our home classroom through the day.

I'm mommy in their bedroom, for cleaning or kiss goodnight,

And mommy when joyful play turns to tears and fight.

I am mommy oft through the day with toddler at breast.
When lights dim and eyelids droop I'm mommy on guard, not at rest.
I am mommy through potty training, tantrums, and "NO!"
I'm mommy at home or wherever we go.

I am mommy on the telephone; who cares if I'm on a call?
They need me to look, see, help, or for no reason at all.
I'm mommy for birthdays and holidays and every occasion.
Wish lists are built and fulfilled - every persuasion.

"Go to Mommy! Ask Mommy!" I so often hear them call.
Complaints and questions by the dozen - I answer them all.
"Mommy where is it? Mommy how do I?"
Mommy is aware of the hours and years flying by.

I'm mommy with no 'me' time, and that is alright.
When one fusses, whimpers, or falls I am mommy in flight.
To the rescue! Babies are stuck, hurting, or tired!
In mommy stuff up to my eyeballs I'm mired. 

I'm mommy at church seeing them off to their classes.

How I love and adore these two little lasses!

I'm mommy at the store. Don't ask for everything in sight!
I'm mommy at the park, and at the drive-in some nights. 

I am mommy when visiting family, or on vacation;
Mommy who needs sleep, caffeine, and probably medication!
I am mommy at Chuck E Cheese watching my child win prizes.
I'm mommy who is too soft, but to the occasion arises. 

I am mommy everywhere, from head to sole of shoe...

Alas I am also mommy on the toilet, too!

Why, just this day I was hugged and chatted up on the can.

"Making" and teaching mathematics was NOT in my plan!

At the end of the day I'm the tired mommy of a zoo.

I'm weary, and dirty, and sometimes smelly too. 

But I wouldn't change it, not even the messiest mess,

Because as a mommy I am most greatly blesed.    

;)  ;)  ;)

Glamour Shots!

Okay, juuuust kidding on the title, there! We are a little bit obsessed with our hermit crabs, though. I could not help myself, when they were out for tank renovation, I just HAD to get pictures of them! Didn't I? hehe 

Tank

This is Tank. He was our first living crab, and the largest for a long while. He is bashful, but will emerge if you stay still long enough. He loves shell shopping, and flipped shells nearly fourteen times that we saw in three days. Tank is confirmed male. He is the most purple of the crabs, though you can see some lovely red highlights in his legs. He has two distinguishing features. First, the eye on our right (his left) is a little slimmer than his other eye.



Tank's second distinguishing feature is that he has a chipped leg. You can see it  does not come to a point and has no nail. I have been fascinated to discover that the three crabs with leg damage haven't followed the same process during molting. The two crabs with a leg chipped off at the tip did not shed those legs during molt to grow new ones. Only the crab with an entire leg missing bothered to regenerate a new limb. 



I find this fascinating because Tink - who had a slightly broken claw (the very tip of the pincer that you might call his 'thumb') - shed the entire thing in order to grow a completely restored claw. 

Tink

Like Tank, you have met Tink before, although his large claw is new since you last saw him. He molted the quickest, and lived a lonely life while everyone else was down below. Tink is what we lovingly refer to as a weenie & will literally go running if you happen to come too close. lol He is one of only two guys in the tank that have never flipped into a new shell, though he has tried incorrectly several times, and failed. He is a confirmed male.

Squeak

Squeak came to us next after Tink. We have not taken a decent photo of him before now. He is the first crab we rescued from a painted shell. There was a time when he seemed very small to us, but he has grown into the top three or four crabs size-wise overall, and is living in one of the five largest shells. We're learning that crabs can be greedy when it comes to finding a roomy home! Before his molt, he looked like a little bit of nothing tucked way back in this shell. Now you can see that, while he is still pretty small, he does alright. :) We do not know yet if Squeak is a male or female. Squeak has shown himself to be mildly aggressive, and seems to greatly dislike our poor little weenie, Tink. We have no idea why.

Button

After Squeak came three little crabs all at once. We named the largest of these little crabs Button. He is still diminutive compared to our first crabs, but he seems to have a good personality. You can see that he is farther through his molt process than most of the others. His nails are sharp and have grown back in, and his exoskeleton is hardening nicely, showing off his beautiful coloring. 

While we were out purchasing Button and his friends, Squeak flipped out of his ugly orange shell and buried himself. Button flipped into the orange shell so quickly we couldn't stop it. (We were still purchasing a variety of sizes from Ebay, so unfortunately it was the only shell his size.) When he came back up almost two months later, he saw the other shells and dropped right out of the orange one - which we promptly removed. His sex is unconfirmed.

M&M

Along with Button came two small crabs we called M&M's because have shiny, brightly colored little claws. They were impossible to tell apart. One of them flipped out of his turbo into Button's old shell right away. 

We allowed the M&M who flipped to keep his name. This is his first photo. We do not know yet if he is a male or a female. His nails have not grown back in yet, but they will. 

M&M

This is what M&M looks like when he is out of his shell. You can see how pale they become during the molting process, although the colors are still deeper on the very tip of his claw and legs. 

Dead Guy

The day we changed out the tank we discovered that one of our littlest guys was still deep in molt. He is deathly still, very weak and vulnerable, and should not be moved at all. We feel SO guilty! Once he was out, there was nothing to do but hurry. We have affectionately renamed him Dead Guy. :) Don't worry! We gave him the whiff test. He is NOT dead, even after having been moved. ;) His sex is unknown. 

Emsi

Next came Emsi (pronounced em'zee), a gift from my sister and her family. He is a little bit pale because he's been in molt, and he has even grown a bit. You can see that he has some really good color on his legs. Once he is through the entire process and his new exoskeleton is hardened, you will see his colors more vividly. We do not know yet if Emsi is male or female. 

Emsi is a wonder of biology. He was missing a leg, but as you can see clearly in this picture, it regenerated while he was molting! Emsi is in the top four as far as size goes. You can see he inhabits one of the larger turbos in the tank. 

Sweet Pea

I am going to pause here to pay respect to Sweet Pea. She was the second crab gifted to us by my sister and her family, and she was so tiny!

Poor little dear, Sweet Pea did not seem to know how to tunnel down into the substrate. She went straight into molt on the surface of the tank. Tink, usually a scaredy-crab, became aggressor. He did not break or try to eat her, but climbed on top of her, rolling her over repeatedly, smelling her frantically with his feelers. We isolated her, but were not in time. She passed away and is buried in our backyard. She was a confirmed female. 

Brick

Brick

Now we have arrived at our last and largest crab, Brick. You may remember him from this post, where he is showing off his size and beauty. ;) Brick is most easily distinguished by his size, and his very unusual left (our right) eye. I have not been able to determine if that eye is injured, or just an abnormality. He is a deep burgundy in color, and dwarfs the smaller crabs in the tank. 

He is also the hardest to keep still. lol Throwing caution to the wind, Mr. Brick muscled his way directly toward the camera, and tried to charge off of the pillow I was taking his photo on. lol Brick is a confirmed male crab, having no gonopores or pleopods visible when he flipped shells. I'm sure by now you are wondering what in the world I'm talking about. If so, click here.

Brick climbing the reptile wood decoration

So, anyway. That was my long, long post about our crustacean babies. :) They do enjoy the new digs, and several have been happily coming out at night to eat and play. We can hear them clinking around in there from somewhere around ten or eleven all the way up through eight in the morning on most nights. :) 

They can be seen climbing on the various types of wood and cactus in the tank...

Seven of the Eight crabs are in this picture :)

...crawling into the food dish to scavenge whatever fresh food has been left for them...

...scaling the coconut coir climbing background (and often two or three of them are halfway up the tank behind it)....

...or hiding in any one of the many nooks and crannies provided for them. :)

Happy crabs. Happy me. 

The end. :)